Ground staff and fans had spent the day clearing snow off the pitch in a bid to ensure the game went ahead as planned, sadly it wasn't to be, thanks to referee Keith Hill reversing a decision he had made only six hours earlier.
Scunthorpe travelled down to Southend yesterday and were set to play the Shrimpers until the match was postponed by Mr. Hill just 20 minutes before kick-off.
Fans had not been given access to Roots Hall and management and players from both clubs inspected the pitch with the referee before the cancellation was announced.
No new date has been set for the match.
Blues skipper Adam Barrett has blasted the bizarre late decision and cannot understand why the decision could not have been made earlier.
Speaking to the Southend Evening Echo Captain Adam said: "I just find it all very odd and it baffles me why the game just couldn't have been called off earlier. The pitch must have been in a similar state at around 4 o'clock or even earlier so why not postpone it then. It just seems crazy to me and I don't understand why it was left so late. At that time of the day it's only going to get worse because there's no sunlight and it isn't fair on the fans, especially those who have come all the way down from Scunthorpe on a Tuesday night to see the game."
Scunthorpe boss Nigel Adkins did agree with the decision, late or not: "If you had to do a slide tackle on that pitch you would break your leg. Credit to Southend because they did everything they possibly could to get that game on. Everyone's disappointed that the game was called off — no more so than us because it was the worst case scenario having travelled down and prepared for the game. No doubt we won't be in as good shape when we go down to Southend next time because I'm sure there will be injuries and suspensions along the way. And it's a shame because we all wanted to play a game of football."
Personally, not in the best of health and conditions in London still not perfect I made the journey down after work as you do when you support a football club, and after wasting time, money on fares, food and drink, you could say I'm not in the best of moods.
This all pales in comparison to the four Scunthorpe fans on Prittlewell station waiting for the 20.08 back to Liverpool Street, and then God knows what after that, to what they must have been feeling.
Two posts made MONDAY on our sister Iron-Bru.net site;
Surely the sensible option is to call the game off for spectator safety, like Arsenal did, if the conditions are as bad as the news reports say.
I agree.
I work in London and I certainly don't fancy the trip let alone you guys!
The capital is officially closed and with Southend being only an hour away 'overnight rain' might clear the pitch but I can't see it being any safer for fans, let alone the players.
(Reports of supporters slipping on ice in the Roots Hall car park around 19.00 have been confirmed)
Will we get an apology?
I could whinge on, and I hope Suffolk Shrimper accepts my apology, but I am copying his post in a Shrimperzone thread on the whole farce, a link below if you wish to join in, as it sums up very well points I would make if I wasn't so pissed off.
(From Suffolk Shrimper)
No moans about a pointless trip - I have made many of them before, Stockport away being a recent fine example.
No moans about organising my whole day around the game, I do that all season long, I love the Club and always will despite what it throws at us, I know that the people in it are transient, I like countless others of you are permanent.
No moans about the 100 mile round trip, nice warm car, clear roads, took it nice n easy (cause I heard it was icy apparently).
But, having waded through all of the arguments on this thread to date I must say that I feel that the Club have been completely incompetent. A few points:
- outside the ground was lethal with no care for the spectators. That just shows that Ron et al couldn't give a stuff about us, and as True Blue says, for a few bob's worth of grit they could have easily sorted it. Blimey, there were enough gormless stewards standing around doing naff all, give them a spade and a ton or two of grit and let them keep warm doing something useful for their minimum wage. Now, if some old banger slid on the ice into Ron's nicely polished set of wheels that would have only been sweet justice.
- the Club made sterling efforts to get the game on, but sadly lacked anyone with a handful of brain cells to realise where the dodgy areas on the pitch were and sort them. No doubt there were folk at the Club staring at the pitch all day rubbing their chins as others toiled shovelling the snow, but seemingly no one had the foresight to sort out first the areas most prone to ice. Unbelievable it sadly is not because the Club have displayed incompetence before, but disgraceful it certainly is. We are not asking for rocket science foresight here, just common sense.
- throughout the day the ref, who is to blame too but he was I am sure guided by the Club, saw what was happening, and he must have in 'ref school' been taught about pitch conditions, thought for spectators etc. But he and the Club failed to realise that in February after 2.00 pm it ain't gonna get any more tropical. The conditions thereafter were only going to get worse from then on in, all knew what was being done to clear everywhere, yet no one could see what would be the position six hours later. The weather forecast did not suddenly change. All very brainless in the extreme.
So, where do the Club go from here? Well, they can't of course undo the mess, but they can stop the rot and, if they really have any sense of care, they should:
1. Issue an unreserved apology to all, and steer clear of hiding behind the ref in doing so.
2. Offer compensation. It will cost, but not more than the bad PR and the putting off of future customers if they fail to act. It could be done many ways, but simple is best, and as a broad brush relatively straightforward compensation act they should perhaps give all STH's and those who bought a ticket a tenner off at the Club Shop. Separate compensation should be sent to the Scunthorpe travelling fans, though maybe if we have any 'SUFC' merchandise that would do.
3. Give whoever at the Club who had anything to do with the issue an Intendo DS with a brain training game and insist that after training/work each day for a month they stay behind for an hour to practice on it.
Right, I feel better now.
Looking forward to the rearranged fixture.
SS
(If you wish to join in the debate, and there's over 250 posts now, go here: www.shrimperzone.com/vb/showthread.php?t=48770)