ADVENTURE Island may be home to Southend’s main roller-coasters.

But even the popular theme park fails to come anywhere near matching the ups and downs suffered by any fans following Southend United.

Amid ongoing concerns for the future of the football club, the past few days alone have seen deadlines partially met, a bombshell from the National League, a change of approach from the consortium and part of a winding up petition settled all before another appearance in the High Court tomorrow morning.

The level of drama puts most soap operas to shame and comes during a time of year where most football clubs will be resting and recharging.

Sadly, the Shrimpers have not been able to do that for several seasons and instead crawl from one chaotic crisis amid an all-conquering fear for the future.

At several points over the past few weeks, months and years I saw no way out for Blues.

But when the going gets tough the tough get going and none more so than the consortium where that is concerned.

Little more than a year ago, Justin Rees probably was not even that aware of Roots Hall and Southend United.

But, after forming a group of like-minded businessmen, he is now right at the heart of keeping the club alive.

And the group have already gone above and beyond in their ongoing battle to prevent the Shrimpers heading into oblivion.

The consortium, who stress at every possible opportunity that is is very much a team effort, have shown remarkable perseverance into trying to complete a complex deal.

Many would have walked away in their shoes and, in all honesty, who could have blamed them.

But the consortium have stuck together and done everything in their power to keep the club alive.

They have now pumped close to £4million into a business they do not own and were not put off by a bombshell being issued by the National League at the start of the week.

The league have told Blues they must post a bond of £1million to prove they can fulfil their fixtures next season unless the consortium take control.

But even that situation did not stop the consortium continuing their pursuit of the club.

Instead they quickly came up with an alternative way of structuring the deal and are now working hard to make it happen.

Put simply, the consortium have now detached the Fossetts Farm part of the deal from the football club.

And they now want to take control of the Shrimpers without waiting for the council to agree heads of terms with Citizen Housing for the property project.

The Fossetts Farm deal had previously been instrumental in making the consortium’s plans viable as it would also see £20million coming their way to develop Roots Hall.

But the League’s ultimatum has made the situation more serious than ever before and means the consortium are now prepared to do whatever they sensibly can to save the club.

The new deal is certainly not without risk on their behalf and it is very much their last throw of the dice.

All eyes will now be back on Ron Martin and only he can now decide what way this long-drawn drama finally ends.