One Game at a Time: You’re Only Here for the Pasties
Skythampton (A) December 29th
With the Birmingham game marking the Bon Jovi mark in the football calendar (Woah-oh! We’re halfway there…) and the continued gladiatorial mayhem at Home Park making Russell Crowe an ever more likely investment candidate (if he were not a declared Leeds United fan), we mark the playing of our final opponents of the division with for us, the relatively short hop to the banks of the Taff and a twelfth attempt to secure that elusive away victory. But are we not entertained!
With the managerial vacancy stlll very much in the Keyser Sose stage, and the list of Usual Suspects (and others) growing longer rather than shorter, Nance and Neil continue, and once again significant rotation of the squad, reflecting ongoing injuries as well as a need to play four times in ten days, with the now almost traditional six changes.
Still very much present was one of two ex-Swans playing as Argyle played the first day of Christmas game on the front foot. After eighteen minutes Morgan Whittaker tapped home the perfect corridor of uncertainty cross from the lively Ben Waine. Cheers in Green and White, plus even more pantomime villain boos from the Bluebirds faithful.
A superb long ball from the recalled Gillesphey, looking assured in the centre of a back three allowed KKH to lob City custodian Alnwick, but the ball fell just wide of extending the lead.
All fine and dandy, but this is the season of gifts, and if you can rely on this Argyle side to do one thing, it is to find new and imaginative ways to shoot themselves in their collective defensive feet.
A hopeful punt down the Argyle right was collected by Butcher, who elected to play the obvious and safe ball back to his keeper. Or at least to where his keeper (clad like any good Hazard marker in bright Orange) had been the last time he looked.
Hazard, closing the gap found himself completely wrong footed and the ball possessed just enough kinetic energy to roll agonisingly ahead of his forlorn attempt to recover. Honours even at half time, in both scoreline, and, probably, in the blame stakes.
The start of the second half was equally familiar, as Argyle once again contrived to be mentally still in the tunnel as City worked a short corner, and the criminally unmarked Grant blasted a great shot from the edge of the area to give them the lead.
Argyle rang the changes just after the hour, and then immediately returned to parity. Whittaker did his familiar cut in and shoot routine. Alnwick split the ball and it was Whittaker again who followed up his own attempt to crash the ball home. A goal and an assist in the same move? That’s one for the statisticians, but his twelfth goal of a brilliant half season puts him just behind Szmodics in the scoring charts.
At this stage there was only one winner, but with Bali managing to hit the bar with a simpler chance than the one he scored against Argyle for Ipswich, Argyle registered their third draw in four unbeaten games and climbed to a heady sixteenth place as the three teams at the bottom all contrived to lose.
Just beyond the halfway mark of the season, Argyle will be content with on field progress, being the fifth highest scorers in the division, although no-one will need reminding that they concede too frequently for the health of their fans. Poised an equidistant eight points behind the play-off places as well as the same number above the relegation places, they head into the final of the four away games against the breakaway top four sides, and their season can still go either way.
A trip along the South Coast to their Northern rivals Southampton, currently on a fifteen-game unbeaten run and with their last three games returning ten goals for to none conceded, it is perhaps a surprise to many that, in effect, this is a match between two of the current form sides. Argyle themselves are in a pack of three clubs behind Leicester in the unbeaten run stakes, and whilst Southampton have rattled in nine goals in their last two home games, they have only recently overtaken Argyle in the goals scored stat.
Argyle can also take heart from their recent (well, as recent as is possible given the relative disparity of playing level) good form at St Marys in particular, and at Southampton in general. This will be Argyle's sixth visit to the “new” home of the Saints, and if Southampton score it will be only their second goal at home in all those games.
The last time the sides played at St Mary’s was a level lower than their current one, and was Peter Reid’s first game in change as manager. Like today, also a Sky match, the game ended an unexpected one nil away win as Luke Summerfield scored in the post half time stupor that this time had engulfed the home side for a change.
Prior to that a couple of goalless games and a narrow one nil defeat accompanied a two-nil win with goals by Halmosi and the only goal of Jim “stepover” Paterson’s Argyle career. Paterson’s time at Argyle was injury blighted, to the extent that in four seasons he only managed to stepover the white line and play 68 times, and after leaving the club he had a solitary season at Bristol Rovers before being released as they fell into the Conference, before returning to Scotland where he became a personal trainer and fitness coach to Stenhousemuir.
So the ground holds no great fear for Argyle, and despite the relative disparity of the two clubs over time which has resulted in the gulf between the two side financially being massive, the home game earlier this season showed that Argyle can compete with the fallen behemoth, with the only real difference between the sides being a disputed penalty call as after Bazumu rashly challenged Hardie, the width of a post as Whittaker struck and Hazards reflex save falling to the unmarked Adams to score from a couple of feet in the final attack of the game to win the match.
As both clubs hail from the Southern Coast, and both lay claim to the Pilgrim Fathers, I thought it would be interesting to make some comparisons to the cities in the vain hope that it might stir up some form of rivalry for the clubs as the Sky commentators cast around for a suitable motif to label the match.
In financial terms there is simply no comparison. Even after the denuding of their relegated Premier League side, an estimate of the current value of the squad Southampton can choose from is north of two hundred million, whereas Argyle’s would be about a tenth of that, and even Whittakers form and Coopers potential account for eighty percent of that.
In accordance with the Spike Milligan maxim of big fleas having little fleas upon their back to bite’em (previously referenced on OGAAT past) Southampton in the past have both ravaged smaller clubs (notably the Argyle academy in the financially stricken days when they plundered Jack Stephens and Sam Gallagher) but also been similarly looted by the likes of Liverpool (Mane, Lallana & Van Dijk).
One telling difference at present for the similarly sized nautical cities is that they have a manager, whereas we need one. The appointment of Russell Martin, the vegan Buddhist, in the summer, after his falling out with the Swansea board over plans and budgets, the most notable example of which from an Argyle perspective was the withdrawal of our then loan player Whittaker, against the wishes of the player, and it seems the manager who neglected to give him any significant playing minutes, has meant that Martin-ball ( see also dull-ball, yawn-ball) is now firmly established on the South Coast.
This possession and patience-based approach has gradually started to bear fruit, despite an horrendous September which involved heavy defeats at Sunderland and at home to Leicester, as well as a fortuitous 4-4 draw with Norwich. Injuries and illness have disrupted the squad through the season, then most notable of which was the arrival of Ross Stewart from Sunderland, injured, and who on his first start for the Saints at Huddersfield, damaged himself so badly that he will be out for the rest of the season. Ings of West Ham is the rumoured loan target for the club to improve their options up front.
As two nautical cities I feel it is worth comparing naval heroes. Argyle, naturally have Sir Francis Drake, naval hero of the defeat of the Armada, the man who singed the King of Spain’s beard, a privateer, and some claim piratical figure who looms large in British naval history. Southampton have Clarence Birdseye, inventor of the fish finger. Only one winner in that head-to-head.
Higher up, Plymouth was a casualty of the Luftwaffe during the darker days of WW2 and the Battle of Britain. Southampton was the source of, and indeed the place where, the Supermarine Spitfire first flew. You would think that would make this a slam dunk for Southampton but let us not forget that Plymouth was the birthplace of Ron Goodwin, who gave us musical scores for 633 Squadron, The Battle of Britain, Where Eagles Dare, Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines, and the theme music for the Argyle Managerial Hunts first review of the candidate list, “One of our Dinosaurs is Missing”. I am scoring this one level.
In terms of green credentials, it is hard to argue against Argyles fanatical obsession with green and its various hues and shades. To be fair to Southampton recent statistics showed they have the lowest CO2 emissions as a city in the UK, but I will simply point out that those statistics pre-dated the Russell Martin era, and anyone who has witnessed his interminable jargon filled pressers and post Sky interviews will know that those levels are rising match by match. A clear green win for the Greens.
In literary terms there is only one winner. Yes, we have Theresa Driscoll, the ex-TV newsreader whose psychological thrillers regularly top the charts worldwide. And yes, I must disqualify NJ Crisp, creator of the Brothers TV series, multiple episodes of Dixon of Dock Green and even Dr Findlays Casebook, for his suspect episode of R3 entitled “The Fratton Experiment”, as a potential Pompey infiltrator. But Jane Austen, who in the opening chapter of Northanger Abbey, her gothic masterpiece, described her heroine aged only fifteen as having a “longing for balls” is clearly a football fanatic. One to the Saints.
And thus this spurious contest of cities all hinges on the Pilgrim Fathers.
We concede the Mayflower and the Speedwell set off from Southampton. The Speedwell however was to say the least, a bit leaky (and we know a bit about being leaky), and so the ships had to put into Dartmouth for repairs. Twice actually, once after getting past Lands End. Whilst Southampton has a claim to being the departure point for the Pilgrims, the failure of the Speedwell to be seaworthy meant the Pilgrims combined on one ship, the Mayflower, and did so in Plymouth. Let us not also forget that the only other really famous ship to depart Southampton was the Titanic, so their track record of sailing to the USA is not that great, even if they have six towns named after them in the USA.
In effect the Pilgrims time in Southampton was limited to shopping for the voyage, notably in the area next to the God’s House Tower, where they landed from Holland. Here Southampton have their memorial to the Pilgrims, unveiled in 1913 by the US Ambassador. And even the place where they bought their preserved meats and ox tongues for the voyage has a uniquely current Argyle flavour. When they landed in Massachusetts, what did the Pilgrims name their settlement? New Plymouth.
So clearly, the Pilgrim Fathers are a slam dunk Plymouth win. The only thing going against us is something we are all too familiar with from the last game. The name of place where the Pilgrims bought their provisions in Southampton.
Butchers Shambles. One is enough of those for the season I hope.
COYG!!!!!!!
Skythampton (A) December 29th
With the Birmingham game marking the Bon Jovi mark in the football calendar (Woah-oh! We’re halfway there…) and the continued gladiatorial mayhem at Home Park making Russell Crowe an ever more likely investment candidate (if he were not a declared Leeds United fan), we mark the playing of our final opponents of the division with for us, the relatively short hop to the banks of the Taff and a twelfth attempt to secure that elusive away victory. But are we not entertained!
With the managerial vacancy stlll very much in the Keyser Sose stage, and the list of Usual Suspects (and others) growing longer rather than shorter, Nance and Neil continue, and once again significant rotation of the squad, reflecting ongoing injuries as well as a need to play four times in ten days, with the now almost traditional six changes.
Still very much present was one of two ex-Swans playing as Argyle played the first day of Christmas game on the front foot. After eighteen minutes Morgan Whittaker tapped home the perfect corridor of uncertainty cross from the lively Ben Waine. Cheers in Green and White, plus even more pantomime villain boos from the Bluebirds faithful.
A superb long ball from the recalled Gillesphey, looking assured in the centre of a back three allowed KKH to lob City custodian Alnwick, but the ball fell just wide of extending the lead.
All fine and dandy, but this is the season of gifts, and if you can rely on this Argyle side to do one thing, it is to find new and imaginative ways to shoot themselves in their collective defensive feet.
A hopeful punt down the Argyle right was collected by Butcher, who elected to play the obvious and safe ball back to his keeper. Or at least to where his keeper (clad like any good Hazard marker in bright Orange) had been the last time he looked.
Hazard, closing the gap found himself completely wrong footed and the ball possessed just enough kinetic energy to roll agonisingly ahead of his forlorn attempt to recover. Honours even at half time, in both scoreline, and, probably, in the blame stakes.
The start of the second half was equally familiar, as Argyle once again contrived to be mentally still in the tunnel as City worked a short corner, and the criminally unmarked Grant blasted a great shot from the edge of the area to give them the lead.
Argyle rang the changes just after the hour, and then immediately returned to parity. Whittaker did his familiar cut in and shoot routine. Alnwick split the ball and it was Whittaker again who followed up his own attempt to crash the ball home. A goal and an assist in the same move? That’s one for the statisticians, but his twelfth goal of a brilliant half season puts him just behind Szmodics in the scoring charts.
At this stage there was only one winner, but with Bali managing to hit the bar with a simpler chance than the one he scored against Argyle for Ipswich, Argyle registered their third draw in four unbeaten games and climbed to a heady sixteenth place as the three teams at the bottom all contrived to lose.
Just beyond the halfway mark of the season, Argyle will be content with on field progress, being the fifth highest scorers in the division, although no-one will need reminding that they concede too frequently for the health of their fans. Poised an equidistant eight points behind the play-off places as well as the same number above the relegation places, they head into the final of the four away games against the breakaway top four sides, and their season can still go either way.
A trip along the South Coast to their Northern rivals Southampton, currently on a fifteen-game unbeaten run and with their last three games returning ten goals for to none conceded, it is perhaps a surprise to many that, in effect, this is a match between two of the current form sides. Argyle themselves are in a pack of three clubs behind Leicester in the unbeaten run stakes, and whilst Southampton have rattled in nine goals in their last two home games, they have only recently overtaken Argyle in the goals scored stat.
Argyle can also take heart from their recent (well, as recent as is possible given the relative disparity of playing level) good form at St Marys in particular, and at Southampton in general. This will be Argyle's sixth visit to the “new” home of the Saints, and if Southampton score it will be only their second goal at home in all those games.
The last time the sides played at St Mary’s was a level lower than their current one, and was Peter Reid’s first game in change as manager. Like today, also a Sky match, the game ended an unexpected one nil away win as Luke Summerfield scored in the post half time stupor that this time had engulfed the home side for a change.
Prior to that a couple of goalless games and a narrow one nil defeat accompanied a two-nil win with goals by Halmosi and the only goal of Jim “stepover” Paterson’s Argyle career. Paterson’s time at Argyle was injury blighted, to the extent that in four seasons he only managed to stepover the white line and play 68 times, and after leaving the club he had a solitary season at Bristol Rovers before being released as they fell into the Conference, before returning to Scotland where he became a personal trainer and fitness coach to Stenhousemuir.
So the ground holds no great fear for Argyle, and despite the relative disparity of the two clubs over time which has resulted in the gulf between the two side financially being massive, the home game earlier this season showed that Argyle can compete with the fallen behemoth, with the only real difference between the sides being a disputed penalty call as after Bazumu rashly challenged Hardie, the width of a post as Whittaker struck and Hazards reflex save falling to the unmarked Adams to score from a couple of feet in the final attack of the game to win the match.
As both clubs hail from the Southern Coast, and both lay claim to the Pilgrim Fathers, I thought it would be interesting to make some comparisons to the cities in the vain hope that it might stir up some form of rivalry for the clubs as the Sky commentators cast around for a suitable motif to label the match.
In financial terms there is simply no comparison. Even after the denuding of their relegated Premier League side, an estimate of the current value of the squad Southampton can choose from is north of two hundred million, whereas Argyle’s would be about a tenth of that, and even Whittakers form and Coopers potential account for eighty percent of that.
In accordance with the Spike Milligan maxim of big fleas having little fleas upon their back to bite’em (previously referenced on OGAAT past) Southampton in the past have both ravaged smaller clubs (notably the Argyle academy in the financially stricken days when they plundered Jack Stephens and Sam Gallagher) but also been similarly looted by the likes of Liverpool (Mane, Lallana & Van Dijk).
One telling difference at present for the similarly sized nautical cities is that they have a manager, whereas we need one. The appointment of Russell Martin, the vegan Buddhist, in the summer, after his falling out with the Swansea board over plans and budgets, the most notable example of which from an Argyle perspective was the withdrawal of our then loan player Whittaker, against the wishes of the player, and it seems the manager who neglected to give him any significant playing minutes, has meant that Martin-ball ( see also dull-ball, yawn-ball) is now firmly established on the South Coast.
This possession and patience-based approach has gradually started to bear fruit, despite an horrendous September which involved heavy defeats at Sunderland and at home to Leicester, as well as a fortuitous 4-4 draw with Norwich. Injuries and illness have disrupted the squad through the season, then most notable of which was the arrival of Ross Stewart from Sunderland, injured, and who on his first start for the Saints at Huddersfield, damaged himself so badly that he will be out for the rest of the season. Ings of West Ham is the rumoured loan target for the club to improve their options up front.
As two nautical cities I feel it is worth comparing naval heroes. Argyle, naturally have Sir Francis Drake, naval hero of the defeat of the Armada, the man who singed the King of Spain’s beard, a privateer, and some claim piratical figure who looms large in British naval history. Southampton have Clarence Birdseye, inventor of the fish finger. Only one winner in that head-to-head.
Higher up, Plymouth was a casualty of the Luftwaffe during the darker days of WW2 and the Battle of Britain. Southampton was the source of, and indeed the place where, the Supermarine Spitfire first flew. You would think that would make this a slam dunk for Southampton but let us not forget that Plymouth was the birthplace of Ron Goodwin, who gave us musical scores for 633 Squadron, The Battle of Britain, Where Eagles Dare, Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines, and the theme music for the Argyle Managerial Hunts first review of the candidate list, “One of our Dinosaurs is Missing”. I am scoring this one level.
In terms of green credentials, it is hard to argue against Argyles fanatical obsession with green and its various hues and shades. To be fair to Southampton recent statistics showed they have the lowest CO2 emissions as a city in the UK, but I will simply point out that those statistics pre-dated the Russell Martin era, and anyone who has witnessed his interminable jargon filled pressers and post Sky interviews will know that those levels are rising match by match. A clear green win for the Greens.
In literary terms there is only one winner. Yes, we have Theresa Driscoll, the ex-TV newsreader whose psychological thrillers regularly top the charts worldwide. And yes, I must disqualify NJ Crisp, creator of the Brothers TV series, multiple episodes of Dixon of Dock Green and even Dr Findlays Casebook, for his suspect episode of R3 entitled “The Fratton Experiment”, as a potential Pompey infiltrator. But Jane Austen, who in the opening chapter of Northanger Abbey, her gothic masterpiece, described her heroine aged only fifteen as having a “longing for balls” is clearly a football fanatic. One to the Saints.
And thus this spurious contest of cities all hinges on the Pilgrim Fathers.
We concede the Mayflower and the Speedwell set off from Southampton. The Speedwell however was to say the least, a bit leaky (and we know a bit about being leaky), and so the ships had to put into Dartmouth for repairs. Twice actually, once after getting past Lands End. Whilst Southampton has a claim to being the departure point for the Pilgrims, the failure of the Speedwell to be seaworthy meant the Pilgrims combined on one ship, the Mayflower, and did so in Plymouth. Let us not also forget that the only other really famous ship to depart Southampton was the Titanic, so their track record of sailing to the USA is not that great, even if they have six towns named after them in the USA.
In effect the Pilgrims time in Southampton was limited to shopping for the voyage, notably in the area next to the God’s House Tower, where they landed from Holland. Here Southampton have their memorial to the Pilgrims, unveiled in 1913 by the US Ambassador. And even the place where they bought their preserved meats and ox tongues for the voyage has a uniquely current Argyle flavour. When they landed in Massachusetts, what did the Pilgrims name their settlement? New Plymouth.
So clearly, the Pilgrim Fathers are a slam dunk Plymouth win. The only thing going against us is something we are all too familiar with from the last game. The name of place where the Pilgrims bought their provisions in Southampton.
Butchers Shambles. One is enough of those for the season I hope.
COYG!!!!!!!
