So that was 2023. How was it for you?
Having started the year with a redemptive three one home win over the previous seasons party poopers MK Dons, and what at the time appeared to be Morgan Whittakers final goal in green, we end on a frustrating defeat at St Marys, in a game that showed how far we have come as a club, and yet how far we still have to travel.
It started with the belief that we had found a coach who was destined to eventually move on to greater things. It ended by the cold hard realisation that money talks and what a fan thinks is greater is not always the same as what a manager thinks when the sound of rotor blades pierces the silence. Still at the original football home of Alan Shearer of SAS fame, we found a new meaning for the acronym. Still Above Stoke.
We end it with a stronger squad, but uncertainty over who will lead it. Playing to full houses at home and scoring ( and conceding) for fun. We also understand the definition of pilgrimage as a journey of faith as we await an away win and yet still have three thousand hopeful and lustily voiced supporters for an awkward Friday evening early Sky kick off at St Marys.
I have used the lies, damned lies and statistics quote before. That Southampton, as a strategy, dominate possession is a known fact of the division. It is the essence of their manager and his desire to use possession as a weapon to destroy shape. It was therefore hardly a surprise when, by setting up to conceded possession to deny space for scoring opportunities, that the stats were heavily in the favour of the hosts.
Even so, we reached the interval all square and with, despite a large number of attempts, a relatively unthreatened goal. One good save, one hit the post (statistically a miss) and one audacious Armstrong lob from close to halfway which would have been a brilliant goal. But it missed too. Never in doubt Conor.
If the plan was to frustrate and break, then it was only the break that was missing, although cynical defending fouls were a part of that too. We had been here before, on Sky also, when Luke Summerfield's second half goal led to a one nil win. And for ten glorious seconds we were on that path again. A Whittaker break, a perfect cross to the far post, headed in by Mumba, redeeming his Cardiff folly, all in front of the joyous travelling Southerners.
But no. For what seems like the umpteenth time this season, the officials collective brain fart denied the moment, and, after some quick thinking from Bazuma, the ball was swiftly moved upfield and Alacaraz netted a thing of beauty. From one up to one down in under a minute. Credit Southampton for not being phased by their good fortune and maximising their advantage.
It is frustrating, although in the cold light of day there was no guarantee that we could have held the lead we should have been allowed to take. But just once it would be nice to be allowed to try. A further goal following great movement and strength by Adams, but possibly helped by Hazards glue footedness which left him in no mans land as the ball was nicked past him, put the game seemingly out of reach. Bazumas own brain fart which allowed the closing down of Hardie to deflect a late consolation gave respectability, and a whole series of what ifs to a second 2-1 at the hands of the Saints.
I am not by nature a conspiricist, and so the list of costly errors this season for me are simply that. Errors. I am sure if you visited every fan site in the country you would find a similar number of game changing mistakes against each home club, analysed in detail and the impact on their season equally calamitous. I honestly doubt we are being persecuted deliberately, or even accidentally. In truth it isn't even the worst we have experienced.
Take Brentford at home in 1972. Notable for two things. The final game of my mothers favourite player, Ronnie Brown, and perhaps more curiously ( although not much more) the bizarre goal that never was. Tom Reynolds, the Welsh International referee despite being born in Battersea, London, was the only person who thought the shot by Murray went into the goal, including Murray. The clue was the ball being behind the goal on the running track after being deflected up and rolling down the netting on the outside. But no, Reynolds was convinced the ball had somehow pierced the netting and gave a goal. The winner as it transpired. Some two hundred fans were so incensed they staged a protest at the end of the game until they were cleared away by the police after a visit from then director Stafford Williams. There was no hole in the net, but the referee was not to be swayed.
And that isn't even the worst impact we have experienced from a referee costing us a match. Four years previously, on our first ever visit to Holker Street we got to play a team unbeaten in seventeen games at home in Barrow. Argyle defended manfully, and there was, it seemed little danger when, after a corner George Maclean swung a hopeful boot and launched a shot heading well wide of Pat Dunne's goal. Enter Ivan Robinson, the referee whose attempt to get out of the way, merely sent the ball in the opposite direction, leaving Dunne flat footed, and Robinson the embarrassed owner of the best referee goalscoring record in British football. At least he didn't Mike Dean it back to the centre circle.
So we move on, to what may well be the final match of the Neil and Nance managerial partnership, and a home game against Watford at the end of a hectic four match period which we are sorely in need of a win to cement the relatively decent league position. It will also give the respite that an FA Cup third round tie might afford a hopefully new incumbent in the managers office to get his feet on the Harpers Park grass and start the new era for whoever is lucky enough to be given the honour.
Watford themselves will travel denuded of their main striker, Bayo , sent of against Stoke in a petulant moment of indiscipline, leaving, for Watford, long serving manager Valerian Ishmael shuffling his depleted pack for the trip West. It does mean that we will likely see the deployment of a Danish Montenegran striker in Milita Rajovic, who has had bestowed upon him one of the most colourful and unlikely nicknames in the EFL.
During the summer transfer window ( and of course we have the opening of the January Window to entertain us for the next 31 days as well), like all clubs, Watford fans followed the rumours of who may or may not arrive, and the whispers of a Scandinavian based striker soon took over the bulletin board traffic. When Rajovic, for it was he, emerged blinking into the light, one comment on a website for his club alluded to the fact that the sale seemed suspicious given they had no need of the cash and he was their main source of goals. The phrase used in Swedish "Ana ugglor I mosses" loosely translates as to find owls in the marsh, and the meaning is that should you find owls in the marsh, then you might anticipate problems or danger. To say the phrase has lost something in translation as applied to Rajovic is an understatement as the Watford fans have christened him "the Bog Owl".
It is likely we will see him today, as with Bayo suspended and a number of other injuries Ishmael has limited choice. Let us hope his wings are clipped.
Watford is of course forever linked with Elton John, their most famous resident and supporter, and in the season of good will you can only applaud his inclusion of his Watford season ticket in the video for "Step into Christmas" although as Argyle fans we all prefer "Tiny Dan Scarr" ( I know I used that gag on another thread but I like it a lot). Other than that, the area is known for Ovaltine, the Grand Union Canal, and the fact that the main reason for going to Watford is to be on the way to somewhere else. Be that as a highwayman on the Bushey Road, one of the 30,000 evacuees that transited through Watford as part of Operation Pied Piper in the Second World War, or as a member of the Carter family on the way to Walford from Watford in Eastenders, Watford is not a desiination of choice. Ask Super Hans of Peep Show.
Whilst Sir Elton is its most famous resident, Watford was also the birthplace of Nicholas Breakspear, or as most of you will know him Pope Adrian IV, the only ever English pope. It is an area with some religious fervour, with the 1974 Odeon showing of the Exorcist picketed to protect the "children of Watford from the influence of demonic power." That fervour seemed to diminish when the town was used for filming "the Demon Headmaster" and even less so with the economic benefit of Leavesdon Studios, home of the Harry Potter movies.
It was also the home of the asylum which housed Aaron Kosminsky, one of the alleged potential identities of Jack the Ripper according to one of the many books on the subject which claims to have identified his DNA. On a more savoury, if filmic note , the area provided the foster home for Charles Fraser-Smith, the second world war gadget inventor, thought to have been the inspiration behind the Q figure in the Bond novels of Ian Fleming. He might have made a better fist of VAR for one thing.
So as well as giving us the store that became John Lewis (Trewin Brothers), and, via the Moor Park country house kitchens, the hybrid strawberry that has become the familiar commercial fruit we consume in huge numbers today, Watford have also provided the greatest obstacle to Argyles FA Cup adventures, having twice eliminated the club when it has progressed to the quarter or semi finals.
In 1984, it was the only goal of George Reilly, later shamefully attacked and his ear badly damaged by an assault by a claimed Argyle fan when, post retirement from the game, he was working on a building site. In 2006, a single Hamer Bouazza strike was enough to seal the picnic botherers win, although that was primarily as a result of a superb man of the match display by the Watford Keeper Ben Foster, who single handledly it seemed kept them in the game.
With 19 managers in 11 years, one fears for Ishmael and the curse of "the likes of Plymouth" if we manage to continue or home successes of the very recent past. With forwards coming back into fitness, and hopefully form, and another sell out crowd (and no need for a booster seat for visiting Prime Ministers like last Friday) we can only hope that a new green and golden era will begin 2024.
Same old Argyle, even if the banner will shortly read "Under New Management".
So a warm and prosperous Happy New Year for 2024 from OGAAT to all Greens (and even our opponents without whom these little confections would not be possible, although clearly not starting today!).
COYG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Having started the year with a redemptive three one home win over the previous seasons party poopers MK Dons, and what at the time appeared to be Morgan Whittakers final goal in green, we end on a frustrating defeat at St Marys, in a game that showed how far we have come as a club, and yet how far we still have to travel.
It started with the belief that we had found a coach who was destined to eventually move on to greater things. It ended by the cold hard realisation that money talks and what a fan thinks is greater is not always the same as what a manager thinks when the sound of rotor blades pierces the silence. Still at the original football home of Alan Shearer of SAS fame, we found a new meaning for the acronym. Still Above Stoke.
We end it with a stronger squad, but uncertainty over who will lead it. Playing to full houses at home and scoring ( and conceding) for fun. We also understand the definition of pilgrimage as a journey of faith as we await an away win and yet still have three thousand hopeful and lustily voiced supporters for an awkward Friday evening early Sky kick off at St Marys.
I have used the lies, damned lies and statistics quote before. That Southampton, as a strategy, dominate possession is a known fact of the division. It is the essence of their manager and his desire to use possession as a weapon to destroy shape. It was therefore hardly a surprise when, by setting up to conceded possession to deny space for scoring opportunities, that the stats were heavily in the favour of the hosts.
Even so, we reached the interval all square and with, despite a large number of attempts, a relatively unthreatened goal. One good save, one hit the post (statistically a miss) and one audacious Armstrong lob from close to halfway which would have been a brilliant goal. But it missed too. Never in doubt Conor.
If the plan was to frustrate and break, then it was only the break that was missing, although cynical defending fouls were a part of that too. We had been here before, on Sky also, when Luke Summerfield's second half goal led to a one nil win. And for ten glorious seconds we were on that path again. A Whittaker break, a perfect cross to the far post, headed in by Mumba, redeeming his Cardiff folly, all in front of the joyous travelling Southerners.
But no. For what seems like the umpteenth time this season, the officials collective brain fart denied the moment, and, after some quick thinking from Bazuma, the ball was swiftly moved upfield and Alacaraz netted a thing of beauty. From one up to one down in under a minute. Credit Southampton for not being phased by their good fortune and maximising their advantage.
It is frustrating, although in the cold light of day there was no guarantee that we could have held the lead we should have been allowed to take. But just once it would be nice to be allowed to try. A further goal following great movement and strength by Adams, but possibly helped by Hazards glue footedness which left him in no mans land as the ball was nicked past him, put the game seemingly out of reach. Bazumas own brain fart which allowed the closing down of Hardie to deflect a late consolation gave respectability, and a whole series of what ifs to a second 2-1 at the hands of the Saints.
I am not by nature a conspiricist, and so the list of costly errors this season for me are simply that. Errors. I am sure if you visited every fan site in the country you would find a similar number of game changing mistakes against each home club, analysed in detail and the impact on their season equally calamitous. I honestly doubt we are being persecuted deliberately, or even accidentally. In truth it isn't even the worst we have experienced.
Take Brentford at home in 1972. Notable for two things. The final game of my mothers favourite player, Ronnie Brown, and perhaps more curiously ( although not much more) the bizarre goal that never was. Tom Reynolds, the Welsh International referee despite being born in Battersea, London, was the only person who thought the shot by Murray went into the goal, including Murray. The clue was the ball being behind the goal on the running track after being deflected up and rolling down the netting on the outside. But no, Reynolds was convinced the ball had somehow pierced the netting and gave a goal. The winner as it transpired. Some two hundred fans were so incensed they staged a protest at the end of the game until they were cleared away by the police after a visit from then director Stafford Williams. There was no hole in the net, but the referee was not to be swayed.
And that isn't even the worst impact we have experienced from a referee costing us a match. Four years previously, on our first ever visit to Holker Street we got to play a team unbeaten in seventeen games at home in Barrow. Argyle defended manfully, and there was, it seemed little danger when, after a corner George Maclean swung a hopeful boot and launched a shot heading well wide of Pat Dunne's goal. Enter Ivan Robinson, the referee whose attempt to get out of the way, merely sent the ball in the opposite direction, leaving Dunne flat footed, and Robinson the embarrassed owner of the best referee goalscoring record in British football. At least he didn't Mike Dean it back to the centre circle.
So we move on, to what may well be the final match of the Neil and Nance managerial partnership, and a home game against Watford at the end of a hectic four match period which we are sorely in need of a win to cement the relatively decent league position. It will also give the respite that an FA Cup third round tie might afford a hopefully new incumbent in the managers office to get his feet on the Harpers Park grass and start the new era for whoever is lucky enough to be given the honour.
Watford themselves will travel denuded of their main striker, Bayo , sent of against Stoke in a petulant moment of indiscipline, leaving, for Watford, long serving manager Valerian Ishmael shuffling his depleted pack for the trip West. It does mean that we will likely see the deployment of a Danish Montenegran striker in Milita Rajovic, who has had bestowed upon him one of the most colourful and unlikely nicknames in the EFL.
During the summer transfer window ( and of course we have the opening of the January Window to entertain us for the next 31 days as well), like all clubs, Watford fans followed the rumours of who may or may not arrive, and the whispers of a Scandinavian based striker soon took over the bulletin board traffic. When Rajovic, for it was he, emerged blinking into the light, one comment on a website for his club alluded to the fact that the sale seemed suspicious given they had no need of the cash and he was their main source of goals. The phrase used in Swedish "Ana ugglor I mosses" loosely translates as to find owls in the marsh, and the meaning is that should you find owls in the marsh, then you might anticipate problems or danger. To say the phrase has lost something in translation as applied to Rajovic is an understatement as the Watford fans have christened him "the Bog Owl".
It is likely we will see him today, as with Bayo suspended and a number of other injuries Ishmael has limited choice. Let us hope his wings are clipped.
Watford is of course forever linked with Elton John, their most famous resident and supporter, and in the season of good will you can only applaud his inclusion of his Watford season ticket in the video for "Step into Christmas" although as Argyle fans we all prefer "Tiny Dan Scarr" ( I know I used that gag on another thread but I like it a lot). Other than that, the area is known for Ovaltine, the Grand Union Canal, and the fact that the main reason for going to Watford is to be on the way to somewhere else. Be that as a highwayman on the Bushey Road, one of the 30,000 evacuees that transited through Watford as part of Operation Pied Piper in the Second World War, or as a member of the Carter family on the way to Walford from Watford in Eastenders, Watford is not a desiination of choice. Ask Super Hans of Peep Show.
Whilst Sir Elton is its most famous resident, Watford was also the birthplace of Nicholas Breakspear, or as most of you will know him Pope Adrian IV, the only ever English pope. It is an area with some religious fervour, with the 1974 Odeon showing of the Exorcist picketed to protect the "children of Watford from the influence of demonic power." That fervour seemed to diminish when the town was used for filming "the Demon Headmaster" and even less so with the economic benefit of Leavesdon Studios, home of the Harry Potter movies.
It was also the home of the asylum which housed Aaron Kosminsky, one of the alleged potential identities of Jack the Ripper according to one of the many books on the subject which claims to have identified his DNA. On a more savoury, if filmic note , the area provided the foster home for Charles Fraser-Smith, the second world war gadget inventor, thought to have been the inspiration behind the Q figure in the Bond novels of Ian Fleming. He might have made a better fist of VAR for one thing.
So as well as giving us the store that became John Lewis (Trewin Brothers), and, via the Moor Park country house kitchens, the hybrid strawberry that has become the familiar commercial fruit we consume in huge numbers today, Watford have also provided the greatest obstacle to Argyles FA Cup adventures, having twice eliminated the club when it has progressed to the quarter or semi finals.
In 1984, it was the only goal of George Reilly, later shamefully attacked and his ear badly damaged by an assault by a claimed Argyle fan when, post retirement from the game, he was working on a building site. In 2006, a single Hamer Bouazza strike was enough to seal the picnic botherers win, although that was primarily as a result of a superb man of the match display by the Watford Keeper Ben Foster, who single handledly it seemed kept them in the game.
With 19 managers in 11 years, one fears for Ishmael and the curse of "the likes of Plymouth" if we manage to continue or home successes of the very recent past. With forwards coming back into fitness, and hopefully form, and another sell out crowd (and no need for a booster seat for visiting Prime Ministers like last Friday) we can only hope that a new green and golden era will begin 2024.
Same old Argyle, even if the banner will shortly read "Under New Management".
So a warm and prosperous Happy New Year for 2024 from OGAAT to all Greens (and even our opponents without whom these little confections would not be possible, although clearly not starting today!).
COYG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
