by JOHN CHUBB

Southend United manager Phil Brown is clearly looking forward to facing Blackpool in Saturday’s EFL League 1 encounter at Roots Hall, having begun his career in coaching and management at the Lancashire club back in 1994 as Sam Allardyce’s assistant.

“It’ll be a tough game, there’s no doubt” was Brown’s prediction. “But we’ve got that winning mentality, that’s slowly but surely been coming, and all of a sudden in the last 2 games we’ve got that back”, he said, referring to Saturday’s 4-2 victory at Fleetwood Town and the 1-0 home win over AFC Wimbledon on Tuesday night.

Asked for reasons why the results have begun to turn for his side, Brown said “The
treatment room emptying is one of them, there’s 1 or 2 of the bigger players coming back….to actually have John White on the bench is a blessing in disguise to a certain extent”. The Blues manager also had good words to say about young defender Harry Kyprianou, currently enjoying his most extensive run of first team football to date.

“Playing alongside Anton Ferdinand, you’re going to get the experience, the know how and the talking from Anton…..and he’s blossoming because of it”, said Brown.

Southend goalkeeper Mark Oxley, also clearly anticipating the weekend encounter seemed buoyed by the turnaround in the Shrimpers’ fortunes.

“It’s been a frustrating start to the season, both for me and for the team”, said the former Hull City and Hibernian shot stopper. “But we knew it was only a matter of time….maybe we just needed to tighten up at the back….maybe it’s time to kick on now that we’ve had 2 good results, and we need to follow that up on Saturday”.

“I think you make your own luck….we’ve been playing well in games where we’ve been drawing, and it’s been a matter of us either not finishing chances or conceding sloppy goals. But….the boys who have come in have done well, the boys who have come back from injury have done well….it’s up to us to follow it up on Saturday with another 3 points”, continued Oxley.

Comparing the sluggish start Southend made to last season to the early part of the current campaign, he said, “We’re just going to take each game as it comes….we have been playing well, it’s not like we’ve been turned over by any team….on our day we’re more than a match for anybody, but we can’t rest on the past 2 results now, we’ve got to train right and make sure we’re ready for Saturday.”