SOUTHEND United manager Phil Brown is gunning for revenge against Rochdale at Roots Hall tomorrow.

Blues’ 3-0 defeat at Spotland in October left the Shrimpers chief suffering his darkest day in charge of the club.

And Brown, whose side have been beaten just once in 14 league games since that setback, is now keen to get his own back.

“Sheffield United used their 3-0 defeat against us as motivation last weekend and that’s what we need to do with Rochdale now,” said the 57-year-old.

“When we went there we kept with a formation that was working for us but within 30 minutes I’m substituting a striker and pushing Anton Ferdinand in midfield.

“It was a dark day, maybe the darkest I’ve ever had at Southend and it was a bad changing room after the game.

“We were so poor that day it was frightening and it was definitely one of the worst performances I’ve had here.

“We don’t want to go back to experiencing anything quite like that again and we need to go and show how much we have improved since that day now.”

Blues have risen from 22nd in the standings up to seventh since that defeat but remain two places below Rochdale who have won their last six games.

And Brown is expecting another tough test against Keith Hill’s in-form team.

“Keith is a very calm and casual manager but his side play very good football,” said the Shrimpers chief.

“They can also be direct if they need to be and have a back four who have kept three clean sheets in their last four games.

“They’ve got a successful combination going at the moment and we will need to be bang at it to beat them but there’s certainly no fear where we’re concerned.”

However, Brown feels Blues will need to improve on the performance they produced against Sheffield United if they are to make an immediate return to winning ways.

“We just didn’t seem to be at it against Sheffield United,” said Brown.

“That can’t happen again because we’re facing another top team.”