Southend sack long-serving groundsman after Bolton postponement

Hare, who is still listed on the club's website as head groundsman, has been at Roots Hall for 27 years, with the last postponement coming four years ago.

The much-anticipated fixture between two promotion-chasing clubs was one of four English Football League games, all in south-east England, called off that day because of the cold weather. Games at Dagenham and Woking were also postponed in the National League and nine of 11 fixtures in the National League South were cancelled.

After four nights of temperatures between four and five degrees below freezing, Hare used covers and heaters to thaw the penalty area in front of the South Stand, which gets no sunlight in the morning, but referee Charles Breakspear decided the surface was unsafe when he inspected it four hours before kick-off.

In a statement issued on the club website, Southend said: "People generally lose their position as a result of not doing their job. The necessary decision surrounding Mr Hare was a disappointment and of course not taken lightly.

"Very FEW people have been dismissed at this football club over the past 20 years and that even extends to managers."

The word "few" was capitalised because local newspaper the Southend Echo had earlier run a version of the statement without the word. The paper's long-standing club reporter Chris Phillips has since posted two messages on Twitter to say the first version of the statement did not contain "few" and he still has it on his phone.

When asked by Press Association Sport to clarify why Hare had been sacked, a club spokesperson refused to add anything to the statement on the website.

With a big attendance expected for the visit of the former Premier League club, Southend chairman Ron Martin is understood to have taken the postponement particularly badly. Martin has been more hands-on at the club since chief executive Steve Kavanagh left to join Millwall in October.

While the late postponement was bad news for Hare, and frustrating to fans of both Bolton and Southend, it did help swell the gate at nearby Canvey Island. The Ryman Premier League club tweeted that the League One clubs were "both well represented" in a crowd of 407. Canvey lost 5-0 to Bognor Regis Town.

No date has been set for the rearranged fixture at Roots Hall but tickets will be refunded for those who cannot make it.