Plymouth Argyle v Morecambe Matchday Thread

Two great goals just shown on sky

sufferedsince 68 wrote:

Greenskin wrote:

Yep, another good win today.6 wins and a couple of draws from the remaining games should see Argyle comfortably safe.

Good stuff from DA and the boys.

Only 7500 at the game which is supprising, perhaps the wider public are not convinced by the Bucket Rattling culture surrounding the club, even though we have a good manager and a decent league two side! also if yoom not a proper fan living near a siren and so on the twenty two quid to watch will put the casuals off going.

i'll be kind and say the World cup final and trick or treating was a far bigger draw than morecambe.

Well done Derek & the Bheys.

If we want bigger attendances then a reassuring word or two from Jimmy wouldn't go amiss. Until then January remains a huge month for the 'wait n see it fall apart' brigade.

Another regulation win it seems. Hoping to make the york game.

I hear Argyle played ok and deserved the win.

5 pts clear of second place, not bad at all if I say.

Not attended a match since the Bristol Rovers home draw, but it seems Argyle are going swimmingly well. It takes some getting used to, seeing Argyle at the 'top' of League Two, but it is a very pleasing site after previous yearly showings.

Once again the attendence was atrocious for a side at the top of L2.

Angry wrote:

sufferedsince 68 wrote:

Greenskin wrote:

Yep, another good win today.6 wins and a couple of draws from the remaining games should see Argyle comfortably safe.

Good stuff from DA and the boys.

Only 7500 at the game which is supprising, perhaps the wider public are not convinced by the Bucket Rattling culture surrounding the club, even though we have a good manager and a decent league two side! also if yoom not a proper fan living near a siren and so on the twenty two quid to watch will put the casuals off going.

i'll be kind and say the World cup final and trick or treating was a far bigger draw than morecambe.

I have just spoken to a mate of mine and he said he thought the crowd looked much bigger than the 'official' figure given.

VillageGreen wrote:

Not attended a match since the Bristol Rovers home draw

Once again the attendence was atrocious for a side at the top of L2.

Is that an attack on the people of Plymouth, an attack on the (still) poor running of our club or the words of an hypocrite?

As Tring rightly says so often, until we one day get to the top level, cement a fanbase, and change the mentality of football followers in this region, then it is no real surprise to anyone with half a brain that we can't equal the attendances of that other team further along the coast that starts with 'P'. What do Portsmouth charge to get in? Is that an over-riding factor on their attendance figure? No. Of course it isn't.

There's no massive difference whether in League 2 or League 1 really as far as Argyle is concerned. It's pretty samey. Crowds will increase towards the end of the season if we are still at the business end, same as they always have.

Rugby World Cup final won't have helped, mind.

Everything else aside, it's a great time to be watching Argyle. For a change.

VillageGreen wrote:

Angry wrote:

sufferedsince 68 wrote:

Greenskin wrote:

Yep, another good win today.6 wins and a couple of draws from the remaining games should see Argyle comfortably safe.

Good stuff from DA and the boys.

Only 7500 at the game which is supprising, perhaps the wider public are not convinced by the Bucket Rattling culture surrounding the club, even though we have a good manager and a decent league two side! also if yoom not a proper fan living near a siren and so on the twenty two quid to watch will put the casuals off going.

i'll be kind and say the World cup final and trick or treating was a far bigger draw than morecambe.

I have just spoken to a mate of mine and he said he thought the crowd looked much bigger than the 'official' figure given.

i often think the same to be honest

Agree with all that Czarcs.  A lot of people out for Halloween tonight as well, rightly or wrongly.  Quite a few equally if not more interesting home fixtures coming up.  Millwall should see around 8k, Exeter, possibly Orient if they're still seen as the team to beat.  Add Christmas approaching then I'd say today's attendance was decent and far from atrocious.

"Limited" ticket announcements wouldn't have helped either.

Coxside_Green wrote:

VillageGreen wrote:

Not attended a match since the Bristol Rovers home draw

Once again the attendence was atrocious for a side at the top of L2.

Is that an attack on the people of Plymouth, an attack on the (still) poor running of our club or the words of an hypocrite?

It is not an attack on the people of Plymouth, far from it, I would say more like an attack on club itself.

The ticket prices are high and that is a put off for many people I believe, including myself.

The club is being run in a way that is not of the liking, couple that with the above, then there are two reasons right there. I believe this to be true and trying to convince other people is a challenge and a half. A few will agree, a majority will not agree.

The attendence was smaller than what was probably anticipated by the club. I pointed that out, so I am a hypocrite for saying that. Perhaps atrocious was a bit strong, maybe I should have said a disappointing crowd.

Would I have gone today if I could have afforded the admission price, I do not know, a part of me wishes to go to the matches and cheer on the side, while another part of me does not want to go, the latter is usually victorious. The two reasons already given play a huge part in that decision.

VillageGreen wrote:

Coxside_Green wrote:

VillageGreen wrote:

Not attended a match since the Bristol Rovers home draw

Once again the attendence was atrocious for a side at the top of L2.

Is that an attack on the people of Plymouth, an attack on the (still) poor running of our club or the words of an hypocrite?

It is not an attack on the people of Plymouth, far from it, I would say more like an attack on club itself.

The ticket prices are high and that is a put off for many people I believe, including myself.

The club is being run in a way that is not of the liking, couple that with the above, then there are two reasons right there. I believe this to be true and trying to convince other people is a challenge and a half. A few will agree, a majority will not agree.

The attendence was smaller than what was probably anticipated by the club. I pointed that out, so I am a hypocrite for saying that.  Perhaps atrocious was a bit strong, maybe I should have said a disappointing crowd.

Would I have gone today if I could have afforded the admission price, I do not know, a part of me wishes to go to the matches and cheer on the side, while another part of me does not want to go, the latter is usually victorious. The two reasons already given play a huge part in that decision.

Fair play pal.

Today's attendance wasn't too unpredictable to those who know and understand.  If Jimmy expects 10k plus at this stage of the season v Morecambe then he's either misinformed or plain clueless.  That said I still wouldn't say 7.5k was atrocious.

Keeping it in perspective, highest attendance in L2 and only 3 teams in L1 with higher attendance, so not a bad attendance at all, would like it to be higher but there are a lot of distractions around

Morecambe at home league 2 or bury at home in league 1 would see similar gates whether top or bottom

Football league sky goal of the day result.


Sky Sports News HQ ‏@SkySportsNewsHQ 17 minutes ago

POLL RESULT:

Butterfield 8%
McCormack 1%
Grant 1%
Armstrong 9%
Soares 5%
Carey 64%
Roofe 12%

Congrats to Graham Carey & thanks for voting

The gates will crescendo after Christmas should Argyle maintain their current form, as has been the case in previous promotion seasons- and not just Argyle promotion seasons. The gate today was probably about 1000 up on what could have been expected for a similar type of fixture last year and it really is absurd to suddenly expect regular gates of 10000 or whatever. Maybe the "but Pompey get 15000 every week" factor is influencing some people's thinking but the comparison is not a valid one. Pompey, whatever may be thought of the way that they did it, built their following by winning the cup and playing Inter Milan in Europe etc, achievements which Argyle have never come close to matching. There was a time when the two clubs were in the old third/fourth division and their gates were virtually no different to ours, so it does seem rather stretching things to say that Pompey folk are genetically more loyal to their club than Janners. Anyway, even if the same gate level were to be maintained throughout the season, it would probably still rank in at least the top 3 of the division, which is an ample base from which to compete-just hope that the "blame the fans" mentality won't be used to explain away any failures which should be attributed to other factors.

The Ministand/retail park fiasco damaged Brents credability along with the Begging culture and the rip off prices, Argyle are still suffering with the Tinpot image and general lack of belief in those who run the club thats why the crowds are low in my opinion.

Greenskin wrote:

The gates will crescendo after Christmas should Argyle maintain their current form, as has been the case in previous promotion seasons- and not just Argyle promotion seasons. The gate today was probably about 1000 up on what could have been expected for a similar type of fixture last year and it really is absurd to suddenly expect regular gates of 10000 or whatever. Maybe the "but Pompey get 15000 every week" factor is influencing some people's thinking but the comparison is not a valid one. Pompey, whatever may be thought of the way that they did it, built their following by winning the cup and playing Inter Milan in Europe etc, achievements which Argyle have never come close to matching. There was a time when the two clubs were in the old third/fourth division and their gates were virtually no different to ours, so it does seem rather stretching things to say that Pompey folk are genetically more loyal to their club than Janners. Anyway, even if the same gate level were to be maintained throughout the season, it would probably still rank in at least the top 3 of the division, which is an ample base from which to compete-just hope that the "blame the fans" mentality won't be used to explain away any failures which should be attributed to other factors.

That's how I see things at the moment, GS. Nice post.

Looking through the clubs in Div 4 there's probably 5 that don't belong.  Pompey being the obvious ones for their recent history and us, Oxford (questionable), Bristol Rovers and Luton.  The one thing we've all shared is shite owners.  We are the least successful alongside perhaps Bristol Rovers, through no fault of the fans.  Historical support should prove this.

Best start since 1958.

Played some lovely football today, after going 2 up we were a bit toothless in front of goal but some of our build-up play and ball retention was excellent, no hoof ball on show and a fully deserved 3 points against a disappointing Morecambe team. 5 points clear ffs!

Les Miserable wrote:

Played some lovely football today, after going 2 up we were a bit toothless in front of goal but some of our build-up play and ball retention was excellent, no hoof ball on show and a fully deserved 3 points against a disappointing Morecambe team. 5 points clear ffs!

Eye

Tremendous stuff......was having wifi issues where I am and relying on "Line" and "Messenger" for Updates service kicked back in and bang 1-0 2-0 came through together from my two lads.
As it was at Luton punched the air in delight.....
Disappointed with attendance but we are what we are. God help the Reluctant one in January if he doesn't retain and reinforce

Due to a multitude of reasons, I haven't been posting my long match report synopsis so much lately. A mixture of being busier with work and other writing, tiredness and not being able to get them out within a short distance of the game finishing led me to knock them on the head for a bit. However, I've got a bit more free time now and as well as that, the standard of football is so mind bogglingly superb that I simply can't fail to want to gush about it. So, if my long and rambly reviews are your thing, read on. If they aren't, feel free to turn your head here.

To put it simply, we're really bloody good. Properly fantastically good. I never really brought into the argument that Argyle were receiving large dollops of luck earlier in the season. Whilst luck is obviously a thing that does exist, it's far outweighed by game management and knowhow. It's an awful cliche but you do make your own luck to a reasonable extent in football. In such 'lucky' games as Accrington and Notts County, the sceptics failed to notice that when we actually WERE pegged back like against Crawley and Wycombe (and later Luton) we would go on to score a winner. That's the sign of a winning mentality. It's the sign of a side who are mentally strong enough to always score when they need to, even if they play averagely when leading. It's the sign of a side who may not always defend leads comfortably but they usually see out the win without trouble. And, on the occasions where they don't, they have their mental wherewithal rise to the occasion and go into 'we need to score' mode. In short, they (we) demonstrated our excellent psychological and technical superiority in all of these games.

However, where the sceptics may have had a valid point, is that we hadn't really taken FULL control of many games (perhaps bar Northampton away and Exeter home) until recently. We hadn't really very comfortably seen teams off. This has changed in the last two games. Luton took a last minute winner to get the win but what a fantastic moment it was and it would also have been an absolute tragedy on the balance of play if we had drawn the game. We were simply by far the better side over the 90. This continued today.

Let's get one thing straight. 2-0 flattered Morecambe a lot. It did not nearly reflect the extent of our dominance throughout the game. After we dashed into a 2-0 lead early on, we had chance after chance to kill the game and my only grumble is that we didn't quite do so. The performance was complete dominance though. You could tell Argyle had seriously done their homework on Morecambe and knew exactly how to counter a good attacking side like them. We didn't allow them a second on the ball with our high pressing game and we moved the ball at pace whenever we had it: it was very rare for a player to take more than two touches and I believe this was intentional. Adams knew how Morecambe like to play and didn't want to play in on their terms. We contained them to the extent where it became a pure contest of our attackers against their defenders and there was only ever going to be one winner there. The visitors had one very good chance which was blazed just over in the second half but aside from that it was one way traffic from start to finish. The defending was very good in that we contained Morecambe entirely and did so in all areas of the pitch. The attacking was also superb in the sense that we played at a high-octane, exciting tempo and created enough chances to have really won by more if not for a few dodgy finishes and some fantastic goalkeeping by Roche. We also saw the game out with the bare minimum of late trauma. This is also an improvement from earlier in the season where we've had a fair few hair-raising finishes when defending leads. To put it simply, we were very very good. We're now getting even better.

This may be a little pre-emptive but I really think that Adams has it in him to be the best manager in Argyle's history. And I'm including Sturrock in that. To think I was daft enough to be taken in by the media scare stories about his time at Ross County when he was first appointed. How wrong I was.

In terms of individual players, today was an embarrassment of riches. McCormick had a perfectly solid game and was one of our weaker players purely by virtue of almost everyone else being fantastic. He did however command his area very well whenever he needed to and only a couple of iffy kicks let him down. The real revelation for me today however was Kelvin Mellor. His start to the season was inconsistent which was a bonus on the second half of last season where he was consistently poor. What he's brought in now though is something looking very much like consistency across 90 minutes. He barely put a step wrong defensively and showed real composure when marking his man. He was also fantastic going forward, not just causing Morecambe problems with his ability but also demonstrating some very smart decision making. Nelson and Hartley were excellent as ever. They both had a slightly below par start to the season as they were adapting to the 4-2-3-1 system as opposed to three at the back. They've both been magnificent of late though. Both were a key part of our high pressing and high defensive line that saw off Morecambe so comfortably today. Nelson too carried the ball forward out of defence very well and Hartley was particularly imperious on a left side that seemed to receive more traffic than the right. Hartley seemed to move a little more gingerly after his injury knock- but he was still far from poor and kept his composure throughout. Another revelation, arguably more of one than Mellor, was Sawyer. Whilst Sawyer has always been something of a steady eddie, the last two games he has been far more than that. He's cut a few of the defensive errors where he was done for trickery out of his game. He's also learned to get forward a LOT more than he previously did without compromising his position at the back. Just shows- nobody is too old to learn under Derek Adams.

McHugh was, as ever, absolutely fantastic in midfield. He's playing far better in there than O'Connor ever did. Although that said, I'd love to see what O'Connor could have done in an Adams team which is clearly far better than the set-up he was playing in last season. But McHugh did very well indeed- another instrumental part of the high pressing game which I keep raving about with some crunching tackles in the mix for good measure. He even showed some moments of pure unadulterated class in the second half where he turned, span and passed the ball more like Andrea Pirlo than the no nonsense centre-half we saw last season. Incidentally, whilst McHugh adopted Pirlo's style, Lee Molyneux (remember him) seemed to be impersonating him with the new hair and beard. Took me a second to realise that it was actually him. Boateng too had a very good game. Perhaps not as instrumental as McHugh but very good when he got near the ball nonetheless. A shame to see him go off injured.

Whilst Mellor and Sawyer were arguably the biggest revelations of the past week or so, the biggest revelation of the past month is the player who I gave the man of the match award too both at Luton and against Morecambe: Craig Tanner. When he first came to the club, he was a pretty one-dimensional player albeit one with potential. He only really had one thing that he'd do with the ball which was cut inside and get dispossessed the majority of the time. He has probably proved the quickest learner that we've ever had, given what a different player he is now. He can pull off a pass, a cross, a dribble past a player and when he does cut inside, his one vs one decision making is infinitely better now than it was then. He had their defence absolutely on toast today. His forward runs off the ball and his defensive work have also vastly improved. Graham Carey was equally sublime. I say this many times but it is a complete and utter madness that this guy is playing in League Two. We should cherish him whilst we can because he is so utterly ludicrously good for this league, it's a joke. He performed his usual ballet-like movement, weaving in and out of defenders to pull them out of space and demonstrating the smoothest passing seen at Home Park since the days when Hungarians roamed the pitch. There is absolutely nothing he isn't good at. Even his off the ball pressing is exceptional for someone of his size and frame. With the ball though, he can caress it and do stuff with it that nobody else in this league (as far as all I've seen indicates) is even close to being capable of. It goes without saying that both players topped off their performances with magnificently taken goals.

Jake Jervis was back in the side after a dodgy run of form saw him dropped for Luton. For my reckoning, he's actually better out on the left side. It stops him from ever drifting out of the game and he can be seriously good cutting inside. He was a little wasteful on the ball, perhaps due to adapting to his new position, but off it he was good even by the standards of this side. He kept shape very well and linked well with both Boateng and Sawyer. Brunt was technically mediocre and missed a chance in the second half that he really should have been putting away. It was nowhere near his level at Luton last week where he was truly amazing but he still put himself about well and occupied the attention of the Morecambe centre-backs.

Of the subs, Simpson was on for longest and was very impressive indeed. Someone who can recycle possession as quickly and efficiently as him should never be underestimated in this league or indeed in any league. He doesn't have the dynamism or the crunch in the tackle of McHugh or Boateng but he has a lot of stuff in his locker that no other CM at Argyle does. The subtlety of movement, making himself very difficult to dispossess. Also, his passing ability under high pressure is superb. McHugh and Boateng both have good long passes in them but the ability to make short and medium range passes QUICKLY AND ACCURATELY when under a lot of pressure and the game is moving quickly is underrated. People decry players like Xavi and to a lesser extent Joe Allen by saying that they only pass short distances. In a situation where the game is moving very quickly around them, you will find those most players when they get the ball in such situations need to take a touch or go back to the player behind them, With midfield metronome types like Simpson and indeed Allen for Liverpool, it's not the distance of his passing that makes it impressive. It's the fact he can take the ball, turn and find someone in a better position in difficult situations. Where most players panic, lose the ball or surrender territory, possession players like Simpson will ensure we get it in a better position than we had it in the first place. He's a very underrated player for us. He can also do a good long pass when he needs to and is far from slow.

Threlkeld had a bit of a headless chicken vibe about him when he came on but also won the ball fantastically well a few times. I'm getting Mellor/Kellett/Alessandra vibes from him, in all honesty. That being a player excellent on his day but whose day does not come often enough. Maybe Adams can rectify that if he ever gets a run in the side. Purrington was decent, one dodgy defensive moment was counterbalanced by one excellent pass. The rest was all neutral. Was on for too little time to judge.

On the whole, absolutely cracking performance. Two concerns have been well and truly answered. Firstly, that we can't control or dominate games. Secondly, that the 4-2-3-1 doesn't work at home.

Please please if you're uncertain still and reading this post, get yourselves down to Argyle. Something incredibly special is happening this season. And I'm still not even sure if this side has reached its peak yet. What a scarily wonderful thought that is.



McCormick-7

Mellor-9
Nelson-8
Hartley-8
Sawyer-9

McHugh-9
Boateng-8

Tanner-9 MOTM.
Carey-9
Jervis-7

Brunt-6

Simpson-8
Threlkeld-7
Purrington-6

Nice report Buddy.......Hoping that Reubs will be fit for the next match but clearly we are just as good without him currently