To all who were following City’s fourth away game of the season at the home of Southend, it was looking like another three points were in the bag as the game entered its final phase.

That was until an ex City player Barry Corr, and Freddy Eastwood were brought on by Southend’s manager Paul Sturrock.

For most City fans, Corr will be remembered for his sending off against Leeds United on his Grecian debut and his eventual release at the end of that season.

With City leading 1-0, Sturrock rang the changes with just 20 minutes remaining. The rest is history but for the record, Corr who had not played for 17 months headed in the equaliser in the 78th minute, and 10 minutes later Freddy Eastwood sealed the win for the home side with another header from a left wing cross.

City’s goal after an uneventful first half came five minutes after the break, when Matt Oakley’s right wing cross was back healed at the near post by Pat Baldwin, enabling Scot Bennett to sweep the ball home with a low, right footed finish from six yards.

Paul Tisdale was quick to praise his team’s spirit despite losing an encouraging unbeaten run. The good news is Exeter remain in the third place in the table.

Commenting after the match Tisdale said: “We’re very irritated that we’ve lost late. It’s frustrating as we’ve played so well today and we were every bit as good as we have been on the road in the previous three games. We were very controlled, very organised, very sensible and defended really well. We controlled the game and at 70 minutes I thought we had just as much chance, if not more, of scoring a second as they had of scoring an equaliser. I’m not going to beat the players with it, they need to beat themselves about what they could have done at the end, that’s their responsibility. Southend are a very good side, and should be challenging for promotion come April.”

Other news around the club was confirmation that compensation for the loss of Troy Archibald Henville to Swindon and James Dunn to Stevenage was agreed by the Professional Football Compensation Committee.

For Troy it was decided that Swindon Town should pay Exeter City an initial compensation fee of �200,000 with add-ons, and for James Dunn Stevenage should pay Exeter City an initial compensation fee of �75,000 again with various add-ons.

Julian Tagg commented: “We have already used a significant amount of the money, in the sense that at the beginning of the season the board had to make a judgement call on what was likely to happen.”

This Saturday it’s a home derby with Bristol Rovers who with just four points to their name have lost three games and drawn four of their the seven games they have played.

As we learnt from last week’s game we can take nothing for granted and I am sure the players and manager will want to bounce back with a good result so where else would you want to be this weekend? Come on you reds!

We are always very keen to hear from those interested in learning more about us, and hopefully joining the East Devon Grecians.

Check out our website http://www.eastdevongrecians.com/ or phone 01395 515552.