PICTURE the scene in the Lord's pavilion ... Mike Watkinson checks the football scores as he pops another champagne cork: "Southend five ... I don't believe it!"

Down the river and out along the coast at Roots Hall, Essex man wouldn't have believed it either, if he hadn't seen it with his own eyes.

A goal feast against the league leaders was as unlikely a prospect as a 57-run batting collapse in a NatWest Trophy Final.

Believe it or not but, happily for Lancashire and sadly for Wanderers, that was the reality on Saturday.

Top dogs at the start of the day, the Burnden boys were barking mad with themselves as they came home with their tails between their legs.

They now know for sure that this 'bouncing back' business is going to be no easy ride.

Quality and class alone will not be enough to see them through. Like 'Winker' Watkinson's Lanky lads, there will be times they'll have to dig in, forget the fancy stuff, and adapt to the conditions of the day.

Colin Todd advocates positive, enterprising football but he's enough of a realist to know that there's a time and a place for everything.

At QPR, where they were allowed to strut their stuff, it paid off. They had strength at the back, control in midfield and finishing power to match. But the manager warned his players they'd be in trouble if they didn't match Southend's 'muck or nettles' approach.

His worst fears were realised when he saw his previously unbeaten team get drawn into a slugging match which left them floored by not one but three second half sucker punches.

Todd saw his strikers missfire, his defence wilt and, horror of horrors, his midfield struggle to impose themselves. So it was with justification that he concedes: "I felt we were second best in a lot of areas.

"This side is capable of a lot better than we showed at Southend - as we've proved in the previous games. We've shown a lot of quality, a lot of resolve and we've been disciplined and organised but this time we just didn't perform as a team."

Nathan Blake and John McGinlay got the goals but they also missed the chances that would have given Wanderers their fourth straight win and put them out in front as clear leaders of Division One.

Blake missed a first minute sitter when he headed David Lee's cross wide of an open goal yet that paled into insignificance compared to the one he put over the bar on the hour.

The Welshman couldn't have asked for an easier chance to confirm Wanderers' superiority as McGinlay's cross dropped invitingly at the back post. At that moment only one team was going to win 5-2 and it wasn't Southend. But Blake was left berating himself for missing the target, just as McGinlay had done five minutes earlier, when he shot wide after Per Frandsen and Michael Johansen had paved the way.

"Nathan missed a golden opportunity," Todd acknowledged. "He should have made it 3-2 and he's held his hands up and said he should have scored.

"But we should still have been good enough and, even if the worst had come to the worst, we should have been able to keep it at 2-2."

After twice coming from behind in a whirlwind first half, Wanderers settled into something approaching their elegant stride and had the game in the palm of their hands 15 minutes into the second. Southend, with only one point and two goals to their credit in their previous four games, looked set for a collapse as dramatic as the Essex innings which was being announced, wicket by wicket, to the disbelieving crowd.

Frandsen, for one, is convinced there was only one winner at that stage. "If Nathan had scored we would have gone on to win, for sure," was the Dane's unequivocal view.

"We were playing well until they got their third goal, which was a little bit lucky, and their fourth was bizarre."

Those two goals in four minutes left Wanderers wondering what had happened to their previously well-organised defence.

Steve McAnespie came to the rescue with two vital goal-line clearances in the space of a minute. But that was just a stay of execution.

Jeroen Boere, whose fifth minute acrobatics had started the goal rush, somehow managed to create a chance out of nothing, bludgeoning his way past Jimmy Phillips and Gerry Taggart before smashing an angled shot past the suddenly exposed Keith Branagan.

Then all eyes were on Boere again, this time watching him run back from a clear offside position while Paul Williams passed him going the other way to latch onto Keith Dublin's pass and finish in style. There was a time when the flag would have gone up but, accepting the recent rule change, there were few complaints from Wanderers.

There were certainly no grumbles when Andy Todd tripped John Nielsen to give Mike Marsh the chance to cap an impressive midfield performance with No 5 from the penalty spot.

A high-scoring game was on the cards from the frantic start when both defences looked vulnerable, although it was surprising to see Wanderers, previously well-drilled, in such disarray.

Boere did well to hook a shot over his shoulder for the opening goal but Dublin's free header from Julian Hails' corner suggested all wasn't well at the back.

Blake atoned for his first minute miss when he pounced for the equaliser after Alan Thompson miscued a cross-shot. Southend were back in front within two minutes when Nielsen - a free transfer from Isaact - lashed in a sensational left foot volley. Danish dynamite Frandsen could only watch and admire.

It was all square again when McAnespie cleverly put McGinlay in for a deft finish that tantalisingly beat Mark McNally's desperate bid to clear. You sensed Southend had shot their bolt.

McGinlay shot narrowly wide and Sansome saved well from Blake as Wanderers appeared to be well on their way.

Shrimpers' boss Ronnie Whelan admitted the scoreline was "a bit flattering" while Todd weighed up the chances and reckoned: "It could have been 5-5 if we'd taken ours.

"When we had to get back to 2-2 that should have told the players they needed to dig in. But we wilted too easily at times.

"We've played well in patches but the players know they haven't played well enough and they've let themselves down. Now they have to pick themselves up.

"It hurts to lose but it's too early in the season to start being too critical. I wasn't getting carried away when we were top and I'm not going overboard because we've lost a game."

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