Steve Tilson was again left feeling for his players, after admitting losing at the death to Charlton Athletic was another "bitter blow".

The Blues was left disappointed by the antics of Nicky Bailey that led to Jean-Francois Christophe being sent off, although ultimately not surprised, but despite suffering a 2-1 loss, he could find no fault with the player's performance tonight.

"To concede again in the last minute is a bitter blow," Steve told southendunited.co.uk.

"When you are down to 10 men for such a long time, Charlton are always going to get chances.

"The lads have given me everything tonight and I can't fault them.

"We had a couple of good chances ourselves at the end; Francis Laurent should score and Jean should hit the target from a corner.

"That is the way it is going for us at the moment, I'm afraid.

"With the sending off, we know what Nicky Bailey is about; he's diving and rolling around on the pitch and that says it all.

"It's not the first time he has done it and it's a pretty regular thing with Nicky.

"With 10 men we kept two up top though and it worked, but we got done by a ball down the side at the end and it has cost us tonight.

"It was a big effort by the players on Tuesday night at Norwich and it wasn't quite to be tonight."