Plymouth Argyle v Ipswich Town

Ipswich Town will be looking to make it five successive wins in the Championship when they travel to face Plymouth Argyle on Saturday afternoon.

At a time when the visitors sit level on points with second-placed Leeds United, Plymouth are 15th in the table, albeit just five points above the bottom three.

As recently as a few weeks ago, Kieran McKenna would have accepted that Ipswich may have to settle for a playoff spot at the end of the season, despite spending so long in the top two.

There could be no complaints after winning just once over a nine-game period, yet Ipswich are now back in contention to either finish as runners-up, or even as champions.

A four-match winning streak, scoring 13 goals in the process, has been put together at the same time that leaders Leicester City and fellow contenders Southampton have lost their way.

Leeds United look unwavering right now and are justified promotion favourites over the Tractor Boys, yet Ipswich are back to having their destiny in their own hands once again.

The East Anglian outfit have also lost just once in 11 second-tier fixtures, something that has gone unnoticed, and they possess the second-best away record in the division with 32 points from 17 matches.

From the perspective of Plymouth, they have already recently faced four promotion candidates in succession, collecting just one point from a possible 12.

However, they were able to bounce back in style last weekend, running out 2-0 victors at Middlesbrough to put some breathing space between themselves and the bottom three.

Perhaps most importantly in the long run, Plymouth were able to record just their second away success of the campaign, both of which have come this month since Ian Foster's arrival at the turn of the year.

With relegation rivals to play in the next two matches, there are more important battles to come, yet this represents an opportunity to raise their level from earlier in the season and make it nine wins at Home Park in 18 attempts.

Plymouth Argyle Championship form:
WLDLLW

Ipswich Town Championship form:
LDWWWW

Although using Darko Gyabi in a more advanced role worked against Boro, the Leeds United loanee may return to a deeper role for this contest.

That said, Gyabi may also miss out altogether, with Alfie Devine likely to return in the final third for Plymouth and Adam Randell and Jordan Houghton having formed an effectively partnership at the Riverside Stadium.

Adam Phillips is expected to remain among the replacements, while Adam Forshaw is regarded as an injury doubt.

Manager Kieran McKenna has confirmed Wes Burns and Nathan Broadhead will both miss this weekend’s visit to Plymouth.

The Welsh duo came off early in the victory over Birmingham City last weekend and will be assessed following the visit to Devon before returning to action.

Harry Clarke could also take the spot of Axel Tuanzebe at right-back after being rested for the game against Birmingham City.


Plymouth Argyle possible starting lineup:
Hazard; Pleguezuelo, Gibson, Galloway; Sorinola, Randell, Houghton, Miller; Whittaker, Hardie, Devine

Ipswich Town possible starting lineup:
Hladky; Clarke, Woolfenden, Burgess, Davis; Morsy, Luongo; Hutchinson, Chaplin, Broadhead; Moore

On the back of returning to winning ways last time out, the pressure has eased somewhat on Plymouth. Nevertheless, with Ipswich back to showing their ruthless touch from earlier in the season, the visitors should do enough to earn another win here.

Referee

The man in the middle, Josh Smith

He has issued 106 yellow cards and six reds in 27 games.

He will be assisted by Matt Jones and Sam Lewis

The fourth official is Keith Stroud


Taken from around the web

Home banker.

2-2

Miller,Mumba

Another total mismatch like WBA. Just better hope QPR, Stoke & Sheff Wed also all lose (but Sheff Wed have Rotherham)

Argo 1-3 Ipswich

There bang on form Ipswich absolutely flying at the moment !
nothing would give more pleasure to turn Ipswich over today
But I think they will just have a little to much for us today even with a full home park and our good home form it might just be a little to much for us today …there a good side & have invested well and gone for it (maybe a lesson our board could learn from)
Anyway I really hope iam wrong I’d bite your hand off for 3points but be happy with a point from this one

Going for a streaky win

Inevitable. Now 2 points off the relegation places. QPR, Stoke and Sheff Wed all winning.

Another piss poor home performance under foster but as I've been saying all season it's our away form that'll keep us up

We're down

Looks that way freathy, everyone around us is in form and we've gone to dogshit, attacking football my arse

Foster needs to go. Now.

this stinks of the del bhey era for me. When we play well in the first half go in for halftime and come out a completely different team and have no idea how to change our fortunes if plan a isnt working or we go behind.

I saw online the sun are reporting that Pulis is being lined up to replace snake at stoke (maybe that's put on ice for another week seeing they won today) i rather the board talked to him about coming back here till the end of the season and keep us up instead then we can take the application process more seriously when we hire a new MANAGER with experience and knowledge not a HEAD COACH as foster is completely out of his depth as one with a championship side with very little support around him to better that scenario.
I don't want to hear any talk about him and nance being fine with the coaching duties and not rushing to bring in people to fill the vacant roles. The team is not fine we are going backwards and he needs the assistant, the additional coach and definitely the fitness guru in NOW to save his job as the fans are turning more and more against foster even this early into his reign and that's not a good sign at all for him. As i said last week when we beat Middlesborough while quoting tring's old saying one swallow doesnt make a pornstar and that was proven today.
The club have this philosophy of wanting us to play attacking, winning and attractive football all on the cheap and we aren't doing any of that atm. How long till the dreaded vote of confidence is issued.

as for the game i thought gyabi played very well as did sorinola, Miller had a good game when he wasnt slidding all over the place. Hardie looked very off too me is he injured? forgot whittaker was on the pitch today he was kept very quiet. It was a shame for Galloway for their first goal it was unfortunate i did laugh when the guy who strike it and it deflected of him into the goal celebrated like he meant that he didnt at all it was going no where near hazard's goal. 2nd goal was inviteable as we didnt offer anything to try and snatch and equalizer.

overall if we took a point here it would have been a good result we didn't play well enough to even warrant that being possible. With teams below us winning today the gap is 2 points now things need to change now or we will be going down.

Even if by some miracle we avoid the drop I do NOT want Foster here next season. Hallett must acknowledge he's made a major misjudgement appointing Foster and must get rid in the summer and bring in actual manager for next season. Foster has got to go.

Freathy wrote:

Even if by some miracle we avoid the drop I do NOT want Foster here next season.  Hallett must acknowledge he's made a major misjudgement appointing Foster and must get rid in the summer and bring in actual manager for next season.  Foster has got to go.

whoever advocated for a head coach over a manager as a way to save money in wages and transfer budgets making it a vacancy attractive to only youth coaches looking to breaking into first team football which lead to foster being appointed needs to be fired imo as that philosophy was a serious misjudged decision that's taking the club backwards.

First half was ok but not really that threatening against an Ipswich team who were more direct than in previous guises and who were very professional at practicing the dark arts when needed. Second half was a shit show, not quite WBA but not far from it. Ipswich took the initiative from the start, for sure is was a very unlucky deflection for the opener but there was plenty of time left to get back into the game but Argyle never looked likely to. I thought about 10 minutes before they scored that substitutions were needed and some fresh legs required in midfield but none came and it just seemed inevitable what was going to happen. Argyle's performances at home have taken a distinct turn for the worse notwithstanding the opposition and loss of Azaz-two scorers in the top 6 of the championship and they aren't getting anything to bite on-Hardie one shot, Whittaker a couple of great crosses were about the sum total today and that is very disturbing especially compared to away performances at WBA and Ipswich earlier in the season. If Argyle don't get some points from these next two relegation battles then Foster is going to come under very serious pressure-hope Mr Hallett is keeping a very close eye on matters.

Greenskin wrote:

First half was ok but not really that threatening against an Ipswich team who were more direct than in previous guises and who were very professional at practicing the dark arts when needed. Second half was a shit show, not quite WBA but not far from it. Ipswich took the initiative from the start, for sure is was a very unlucky deflection for the opener but there was plenty of time left to get back into the game but Argyle never looked likely to. I thought about 10 minutes before they scored that substitutions were needed and some fresh legs required in midfield but none came and it just seemed inevitable what was going to happen. Argyle's performances at home have taken a distinct turn for the worse notwithstanding the opposition and loss of Azaz-two scorers in the top 6 of the championship and they aren't getting anything to bite on-Hardie one shot, Whittaker a couple of great crosses were about the sum total today and that is very disturbing especially compared to away performances at WBA and Ipswich earlier in the season. If Argyle don't get some points from these next two relegation battles then Foster is going to come under very serious pressure-hope Mr Hallett is keeping a very close eye on matters.

if he is i hope he acts quicker than he did (well the reluctant one mainly to be fair) with del bhey and not wait till its too late.

Hallett has to sack Foster today. Not next week after we've lost to Sheff Wed and Blackburn which we will do as that will be too late. I'd rather go the rest of the season with Nance as caretaker than lumber on with clueless foster.

Freathy wrote:

Hallett has to sack Foster today. Not next week after we've lost to Sheff Wed and Blackburn which we will do as that will be too late. I'd rather go the rest of the season with Nance as caretaker than lumber on with clueless foster.

if we dont beat two teams below us then there is no way foster can be kept hold off as that will put us into the relegation places if other results go against us too. Dewsnip's yes man has to step up now or they can both go.