I’M pleased with how things are coming together at the moment.

We’ve won five of the last six matches which is pleasing but I’m slightly annoyed it wasn’t six out of six if I’m honest because we should never have lost at Burton.

A number of factors have been behind the improved results but the most important of all is that I can now see the players have the belief that they can play in League One.

I think that’s taken a little bit of time to get that but it’s incredibly important.

I read in the week that back in 2008 Belgium were ranked 65th in the world but now they’re about to be crowned number one.

Obviously the players are a massive part of that success but you have to be able to back it up.

You need to have the infrastructure in place and the right kind of support network.

We’ve worked hard to put that into place at Southend and I would like to think it’s going to result in long term success for the football club.

TRIO CONTINUE COMEBACKS

IT was great that Stephen McLaughlin, Kevan Hurst and Adam Thompson were all able to get 90 minutes playing in the under 21s at AFC Wimbledon in the week.

That made it another good week for us and so did the fact Ted Smith was again in action for England’s under 20s.

It was good for him to get another 90 minutes under his belt and also for Glen Rea to do the same for Republic of Ireland’s under 21s in Italy.

It’s certainly a real feather in our cap to be able to welcome back two international players into the squad for Saturday’s game.

It’s going to make selecting the match-day 18 even more difficult but we are going to be forced into making one change as Gary Deegan serves a one match ban after being shown five yellow cards.

Gary is an aggressive player who plays on the edge when it comes to red cards and referees.

I don’t think we can argue about any of the bookings he’s received and he’s going to have to take his medicine now.

It presents somebody else with an opportunity and if we get a good result against Barnsley then it will give me yet another selection headache.

HAPPY TO SEE KEVIN MAHER BACK

I’M absolutely delighted that we’ve been able to sort out Kevin Maher coming back to the club to coach in the youth set up.

He’s a legend at the football club and it’s important to have people like that in and around the development teams to help them work their way up into the first team squad.

NO CONTRACT FOR ANTHONY GERRARD

WE’VE said our goodbyes to Anthony Gerrard and will not be offering him a contract here.

We had Anthony on trial and he certainly has the qualities to play at a higher level than League One.

Unfortunately, he hadn’t done a pre-season anywhere and it is amazing how quickly you can lose your fitness.

I think it would have taken Anthony a month to six weeks to get his fitness levels back and unfortunately we couldn’t afford him that amount of time.

But I’m sure he will find himself a club and we wish him all the very best.

TWO MORE WEEKS OUT FOR ADAM BARRETT

ADAM Barrett is still sidelined with the hamstring injury he suffered against Millwall and he has been unable to return to training yet.

I think we’re still around two weeks away from that happening and he will definitely need a game or two in the under 21s as well before he’s really ready to try and push for a recall to the first team.

EXCITING TEAMS FOR ENGLAND

AWAY from Southend United, it’s been fantastic to see England finish their qualifying campaign for the European Championships with 10 wins out of 10.

I think it’s an exciting time for the national team and the squad has real strength in depth again.

I’m certainly considering taking my summer holidays in France next year now.