Rethink needed - the Mighty vs Plymouth Argyle

I don't want to write this. Maybe I've done too many of these. Perhaps having to have 'a take' for every game is wearing thin. Maybe I should just go to the game, see what happens, enjoy it (or not) and then do something else afterwards. 

Maybe it's just us being shite that makes this tedious. When you consider that the boycott robbed us of one promotion and Covid 19 robbed us of the vast, vast majority of another, then it's really 2012-13 and the first few games of the season after since we've actually seen us be any good for any sustained length of time and that's 14 years ago. Yes, we had the Championship season and that was good craic and we did very but we finished 16th. 

What never ending joy will today bring?

--- 

Today brings a lopsided 'Pool team who, to put it bluntly, look nowhere near matching the level that would fulfil the early season optimism. I can't be bothered with a blow by blow account. It's too depressing. The short version is: We started well enough, create some chances, miss a few chances, score a goal, concede a piss weak goal (again) don't look very good after that and basically get eased out of the way by Plymouth side who just do better than us at winning the ball.

My mother in law (a small lady) has a story about being picked up and moved aside in a scrum at a shop counter by a much bigger person who then took the bargain on sale and walked away with their prize. That's basically us today. 

We looked like we looked for a lot of last year. Like we're simply not as good as other teams at tackling, winning headers and on the occasions we do have it, passing it between us. We looked ragged at the back - in fact, ragged is kind. The left side of defence was a mixture of sluggish and panicked, the midfield ran around not being in the right place and our only consistent mode of attack was to try and work the ball out to Bowler, something that quickly became predictable and, as in previous games, allows the opposition to shut us down when actually, it should simply open another angle of attack. 

Defensively, I can barely type out the shambles of some of our play. Their second goal saw (quite literally) our defence air kicking, then lying down and waving their arms around at the injustice of life like toddlers in a supermarket before sheepishly getting up and running backwards in a blind panic. It was a fucking joke, a cavalcade of amateurish shite. The first, they just waltzed through us without us even seeming to make contact, they didn't even need to brush off challenges because none appeared to come, the fourth saw Williams shrugged off by their big lad like someone pushing a cat off their knee and I can't remember the third because I'm pissed off. I think it was quite a good goal but we probably did something stupid along the way. 

What's wrong with us? Why has the promise of the opening few games evaporated?

I think it's relatively simple. We do the same thing every fucking week. We line up with 3 at the back, three in midfield 2 wing backs and two forwards. Come what may, regardless of who is fit and who we are playing. We've been here before. It's the fucking steering wheel and all of that. We've swapped the nerdish stubborness and polo shirt for a masculine vanity and quarter zip knitwear instead. We've also got a million injured players, because we always have a million injured players but the way we play demands high intensity, it's a style that requires a deep squad and rotation - but there's no depth to the squad because they're all broken again. Well done everyone. Isn't it marvellous being a Blackpool fan?  

Our chief weapon is 'the press' - which translates into 'working harder than the opposition to shut down their play, block their passing opportunities and stealing the ball from them as high up the pitch as we can' - which is great if you are a set of hyper-fit players but if you've nailed your colours to that particular flag, then you've got to actually execute it - and playing that way demands a hell of a lot of your player in terms of their collective discipline, awareness and athletic ability. 

We're set up to do this, to press high on the pitch, to push up and overwhelm the opposition - but we've got the slowest defender in the world alongside two other lads who can't really be described as 'remarkably quick' - there's no Marvin Bryan (or for that matter, Marvin Ekpiteta) in our backline, so, if and when we fail to win the ball higher up and we get turned round, we're basically fucked. The midfield is all 'average' in terms of pace too, so where is the cover? 

I think the central players are set up wrong - Brown in the deeper 'hole' is a waste of time as he's not going to spread play but he's not really a dominant shield either. Morgan pushing up into a left sided support role for the forwards feels wrong. The best we've played this year saw Albie in the deeper slot (where Clarkson could also play) but instead we've got a player in that place who doesn't offer the imagination it demands. The theoretical benefit of our formation when we're building up is that we stretch the pitch and therefore gain an attacking advantage, create space going forward - but for that to actually be the case, someone has to distribute the ball effectively across that space.

After we conceded, I never felt like we'd score. When we did, it was a surprise, it was a fabulous finish from Jerry, turning, lashing the ball home, a cannon shot, a glorious reminder of his prowess, but in general, after the first 25 minutes, our attacking play was tepid, it lacked any real, discernible ideas. As we chased the game, we launched long ball after long ball towards players who are fundamentally unsuited to playing that kind of game. Jerry isn't a big lad, Bloxham has improved a lot (and was by some distance our best player today) but he's not 'a target man' - watching us boom long passes towards Bowler just felt hopeless. Throwing Dion on seemed to make us even imbalanced, loads of players up front, but no build up play. 

Plymouth possess the fantastically physical and gloriously named Bim Pepple. What he does is run around up front and have an ongoing fight with defenders. Cos he's big and reasonably good at football, that's an effective thing. We don't have that player. We haven't had that player for ages. Why don't we have that player? This is League 1. We're going to have to go long sometimes. We do go long sometimes. We go long quite a lot. Even Neil 'tactics' Critchley recognised that having a physical option was important. I do not understand why, when we've got a keeper who can clip it to the edge of the opposition box (and quite often does) without looking like he's even trying, we don't have someone who can disrupt the opposition defence and win the ball, hold it up, flick it on, nod it down, shield it, lay it off. If we're going to twat it long, FOR FUCKS SAKE HAVE A PLAYER WHO CAN FUCKING WIN IT AT THE END BECAUSE IT'S SO FUCKING PAINFULLY OBVIOUS THAT IT MAKES ME MISS JAKE FUCKING BEESLEY FOR FUCKS SAKE AND STOP PRETENDING THAT WE'RE JUST ON THE CUSP OF MASTERING TOTAL FOOTBALL BECAUSE WE'RE REALLY OBVIOUSLY NOT. 

Not being able to hold the ball puts pressure on a midfield who are already overworked galloping up and down and chasing all over. They look fucked already. Karoy started the season looking like the best midfielder in this division. Now he looks leggy and a bit headless. We're too slow at the back to burst forward, not strong enough up front to win the ball and hold it and therefore, there's a hell of a lot of pressure on that midfield to control the game, something which, lets be honest, we haven't looked close to doing since the opening 20 minutes of the Barnsley game.

It's tempting to just blame the midfield, but I think it's essentially structural. We seem to have an underlying idea that we're going to swarm the opposition and be a fluid force, up and down. I don't hate that idea but if you're going to do it, then you have to do it properly. 

If you're going to play a game where you try to tempt the opposition on then break through them, then you have to have defenders who trust themselves in relation to their ability to out-skill or outrun the opposition forwards. Earl, whilst yes, a unit, is inferior to James Husband in terms of his comfort on the ball and ability to drive forward (remember how Husband used to make those late runs from LCB, overlapping and putting in what was quite often a handy clipped ball? We miss those) Ashworth, as a wing back, looked like a man who'd fallen asleep at the wheel of his car and woken up in the split seconds before it hit a wall. Who the fuck knew that Zac Ashworth (a solid enough player on his day in a different role, but not exactly a whippet or sexy footballer) wouldn't be flying down the flanks shrugging off tackles and whipping balls across the face of goal? It's like playing Callum Connolly there. 

When we try to play the short goal kick, we don't get anywhere. That means the midfield are always deep and receiving the ball facing their own goal - the key is to have someone who pushes us on in the back line, who gets us higher before releasing the ball to an attacking player, but that's not happening - you need either a centre back to have the ability to drive and lay it off or a wing back who will tear up a flank and in CJ-less team (yes, I said it) we simply don't have that. Weirdly, we have the most productive wing back in League 1 last season sat on the bench doing nothing again. He's either not actually fit or we've signed a player the manager doesn't want. 

What was especially worrying yesterday was the signs of frustration in the team. I watched Jerry give a bollocking to Ashworth who got involved in the last few minutes with a stupid, petulant altercation. Jerry walked back to his position shaking his head. I watched Bloxham yelling at those behind him to follow him in when he's pressing, rightly aware that if he gallops towards the man with the ball on his own, then it's pretty much a complete waste of time and energy. I watched arms being thrown up in the air as passes weren't read or seen. There was that sense that sometimes, we didn't really know what we were doing in relation to each other. When we had the ball, there was a distinct lack of pace to our play, of ability to pass and move and unsettle the opposition, of the pairings, the relationships and the collective awareness that attacking football is based upon. 

I thought Plymouth looked a good side - but not one that left me in awe of anything they did or one that you just have to say 'well, they're just too good' (like I felt about Birmingham a couple of years ago). It just felt like they trusted themselves, they knew what their game was, they basically won more battles than they lost, had some attacking patterns and were thus able to move the ball back to front without making a melodrama of it. They looked fit, physical and whilst no one blew me away with blinding individual quality, as a unit the sum of their parts was effective. We looked like 11 players who, unless Bowler beat 3 people (he didn't) or Bloxham made a run (he did) we didn't have any real plan to get the ball down the pitch but nor did we look very comfortable retaining the ball and waiting for a chance. 

I wrote in an earlier piece that we'd get twatted at times playing like we did in the first few games and we shouldn't shit the bed when it happens. I am clearly not heeding my own advice - but since the Peterborough game, we've managed a couple of 20 minute spells of not being shite and the intensity has otherwise gone. We have got twatted but we also haven't played like we did in those first few games. There's absolutely nothing wrong with not being able to play like Klopp's Liverpool on amphetamines for 90 minutes of every game - in fact, you really can't play like that for 90 minutes of every game and if you aren't 100% on that and do it in a disjointed, fatigued or half arsed way, it's a very dangerous way to play. All reward requires risk - but what is lacking is the counterpoint to the in-yer-face pressing, the ability to fall back to something else, to do the simple things, whether it be defensive structure (the team falling back into an effective shape) or attacking patterns (hitting channels for quick players to chase or playing it into the feet or head of players strong enough to retain the ball.) 

Thank fuck for pointless international breaks because this needs a rethink. We need to work out what the fuck we're doing when things aren't going our way and get some variation into our plans because this isn't going to get us anywhere near where we want to be. 

For fucks sake Pool. 

Onward


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Writing about football is possibly a bit pointless in an era when there's the telly and youtube and videos all over the shop. It's not my living this and it's just something I do because I do so there's no problem with reading it and then getting on with your life - but if you do want to chuck some money at the cause of some random fella writing shit no one ever asked him too, then Patreon. is a thing.

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Teams like... - the Mighty vs Bromley

Today we're playing Bromley. I can't really accept that we're playing Bromley.

It feels like I must have fallen asleep for a decade or so and we have have been relegated several times and reallocated to the Beazer Homes South East Division. James Alexander Gordon never said "Bromley", in a upward, downward or neutral inflection (depending on the result) after he precisely intoned "Football League, Division 3"

Bromley. We might as well be playing Sidcup, or Yarm or Erith and Belvedere. This is not the name of a football league team. Surely?

Yet it is and here they are in a kit the colour of some expensive silky pyjamas. The type that Daily Telegraph readers might wear. I'm going to call it 'jade' or 'teal' - I don't know what colour it is. Whatever it is, it is not a football colour.

Don't be fooled though. They are no set of hillbillies from some sleepy little backwater. I pass by a little gaggle of their supporters. I'm guilty of thinking 'oh, how nice it must be for them to be here' whilst I muse upon which of our players will score his hattrick first. Once I'm inside though, the effect of their sheer physical mass as team puts aside any thoughts that we might be playing a ramshackle bunch of lovable no hopers. They're fucking huge. I've fallen into the exact same trap that so many must have fallen into whilst they've climbed to where they now are. I've patronised the fuck out of them and assumed that, because we won the cup in 1953, we will obviously roll them over 10-0.

Football, sadly, doesn't work like that. You'd think I'd have learned by now. I haven't. 

This is a challenge. This is the challenge of this season defined. It's all very well playing football on the break and having dynamic tactical flexibility and all of that modern jazz, but how do we fare against the teams in this division who pare things down to the absolute essentials and don't give a fuck about half spaces and the like. 

It's tempting to write about their shithousing, their time wasting, their reliance on set plays and shirt pulling and a referee who seemed to have had a bang on the head before the game that caused him to see left as right and up as down. I'm not going to fall into that familiar territory because I'm bored of it.

It's what I've written oh so many times before when we play a 'teams like' team and don't do very well. Instead, I'm going to say this - I admired Bromley. I admired how they've maximised their resources. I admired how they didn't crumble when we scored and instead launched a genuinely impressive bombardment of our goal, all the big lads thundering forward, the weight of their boots on the turf producing a low rumble, like the guns of the Somme. I admired how their manager looked like a bloke from the pub and seemed to be revelling in every little bit of skullduggery and wind up merchant behaviour, whilst our urbane, tactics talking, slacks and tailored fit jumper wearing manager seemed more and more frustrated as the game went on.

Football goes in cycles. For every heralded innovator, for every heralded guardian of the sacred spirit of the beautiful game (a Cruyff, a Pep, the holy Liverpool way etc) there is the counterpoint, the positional of maximum opportunity, the sum of the parts becoming greater than the whole, disruptive, simplifiers. One is never better than the other.

The beauty of the game is, yes, in the Dutch teams of the 1970s, in that Barcelona side who no one could lay a finger upon, in Stanley Matthews timeless ability - but it's also in Wimbledon winning the FA Cup, it's in Arsene Wenger's frustration at how his team's fluid football foundered every time on the jagged Big Sam shaped rocks at Bolton, it's maybe even in how, after so many failings time after time in a league hyped as the next level of football, a game so evolved it had become entirely abstracted from what went before, Arsenal set pieced their way to a title, with scrambled fist fights in the penalty area like it was 1976 all over again.

We go in cycles too, Big Mick with his back to basics ways, Critch with the ipad and steering wheel, the gang of Steves, Evo and the all-timer tangerine crew. We seem to flip flop between ideas, forever building towards something, but never getting to the end point. This season has, thus far (Reading aside) provided some hope that we might actually be moving towards realising an idea.

It doesn't seem to matter what our guiding ethos is though - we hate playing 'teams like' teams. It's your Crawley Towns, your Stevenage's and that type of thing that strike terror into the heart. Surely, surely, surely, we should be able to out football them? Surely we should be able to dance, move, pass, dribble, better than them? Surely we can't fall into the trap, yet again?

---

You know the score. It's us. We don't start hugely well, but we score first. Albie smacks a free kick right down the middle. He's leathered it, but the keeper definitely should do better. Hurrah, well done chaps, we'll cruise this 4-0 now... We don't. For a ten minute spell, there's just tangerine bodies bouncing off jade shirted monsters.

It's like a bunch of soldiers from a Soviet war memorial have come to life, huge figures, all angles and granite muscles and a terrifying sense of purpose and in middle of them Brown's bald patch and Albie's little frame run around ineffectually like a dad and his lad dropped into the middle of a Premier League game. Even Karoy looks diminished in this company.

They score. Inevitably it's the goal we concede all the time. A cross, not dealt with, blah, blah, blah. A 'teams like' team scoring that goal. Our players looking like confused skittles at a bowling alley. The ball in the net. Skittles turning into sad teapots. The tinny roar of a tiny away following. Again. FFS Pool.

I'm not sure on the order of things if I'm honest but Bromley put a lot of pressure on us for a while. There's an absolutely absurd scramble which looks for all the world as if it's gone in. We can't seem to get the ball down and play. When we do, it looks as if we're a division better, but when we don't the effect is reversed. It's actually quite interesting as a clash of styles - but it's very frustrating.

Tom Bloxham has emerged as my unlikely key player for this team. I was never convinced by him as a striker last year - but this season, he's emerged as the player we can't do without. Every time he leaves the pitch we seem diminished. He's a point of difference and there's a hitherto unseen intelligence about his forward play, drifting to the wing, dropping off, sitting on the defenders shoulder. He's got the pace, the power and the touch to do all of those things. Suddenly it seems like Bloxham plus one of the others when perhaps it felt like he might be the one pushed out.

The second goal when it comes seems perfectly timed. We've established a bit of pressure, we've spurned a few chances (Karoy most notably, missing what felt like a sitter and a beautiful through ball from Bowler setting Bloxham for a decent effort, well saved.) Monroe does well to keep a misplaced Morgan shot alive, pull it across the box and Bloxham gets a reward for for his efforts this season, a simple tap in, the ball basically colliding with him, impossible not to end in the back of the net. The relief is palpable. The order of things are restored.

---

Half time. I'm not sure what we should do. Dion has basically not been playing today, even though his name is on the team sheet, so it might be an idea to give Jerry a go - but beyond that, I'm not really sure what we could add from the bench to assert more control. Perhaps we just need to let time take it's course. Maybe another 45 minutes and this lot will fall over. 

--- 

That doesn't happen. The second half feels a bit like sitting through a company briefing in a boring job. It's all just routine stuff. Bromley maximise the disruption, the referee marches around pointlessly intervening in things and ignoring stuff that he might actually deal with. It's fair enough. If the ref lets you do it, do it.

We look any good when we just move the ball about. It's that simple. If we pass it, relatively quickly, side to side or sharply switch it to the wings, we get in. You can see what Bromley want to do, every time they have a goal kick. They crowd all the play into as small a section of the pitch as possible. They don't want us to be expansive, they want the game compressed because if you do that, then the physical advantage comes into play. 

There are chances. Bowler waltzes through and then hits the corner of the stand, rather than the top corner. Jerry slides in on one laid through, but either his run is slightly off the pace or the ball is slightly too heavy. Bloxham gets wrestled to the ground in the box, from an entire pitch away, I can see that the defender has his shirt in his fists and is pulling him, but the ref isn't interested in such things, he's more keen on marching players back, using his shaving foam with an authoritative flourish. I bet he gets home and cuts the match video up to the points where he's on screen whistling and pointing and drawing foamy lines and saves them in a big file to watch back himself. Clarkson misses from our bast move, a bending shot, that doesn't bend enough. Sometimes it feels like our technical abilities might get ahead of doing the simple things in front of goal. Yes, you *can* bend it in the top corner, but perhaps just smash it on target instead sometimes. 

They have chances too. BPF produces a fantastic fingertip save to tip one over. They hit the side netting (and think they've scored) - they're not all massive brutes, they've got a sprinkling of nippy little lads with good feet and our defenders aren't the quickest, so it's always a risk when we commit forward and so many times we seem to give the ball away in attack at the point where we've thrown everyone as high as we can. 

The equaliser itself is comical. I'm sure you've had the kind of morning where your alarm doesn't go off, you jump out of bed, stub your toe, hop downstairs and then open the cupboard only for the cerial to fallout and go all over the floor. The world seems weighed against you, the gods are frowning upon you, laughing at your misfortune. Jordan Brown has the football equivalent. We have one of the frequent fairly promising bits of build up, but when Brown tries to chop onto a different foot to take a shot, they nip the ball off him, leaving him wondering where it's gone as they burst up the field. Brown recovers, turns and launches into a lung busting run to try and get back, he makes it, he slides in, right on the edge of the box. The referee blows. From my angle it looked like a good challenge, but this ref and this moment of luck isn't smiling on the monk-like one. A free kick then, a carbon copy of the moment Morgan put us ahead. It's blasted, it's ok, it seems for a split second, it's off target but then, suddenly, as I track the ball, Jordan Brown is in the frame, seemingly unaware and the ball is hitting him, changing direction and giving BPF no chance. A goal, created and scored by Jordan Brown - just for the wrong team. 

Their goal is where the game seems to end. What I've written above happens both before and after it - but beyond it, everything seemed inevitable. I watched the game after their equaliser in a kind of silent reverie. Why can we not deal with this kind of football? Only one moment briefly inspires me. Bowler, who second half is wasteful and more uncertain in his play than he's been all season, has that moment, twisting, turning, wriggling and getting a shot away. It could be that this most glorious of footballers has risen above the level, has turned the inevitable on its head.

A low save, the follow up isn't there. Another 'teams like' team will go to their fans and soak up the acclaim. We will slink off and wonder what might have been. 

--- 

If we go up at any point in the next century, we'll be that 'teams like' team. We've been the 'teams like' team plenty of times in recent memory. Again, I'm not going to whine at Bromley. Fair play to them. It's remarkable how far you can get with keeping the game relatively simple, some joined up thinking and a lot of effort. That's not snobbery, it's admiration. We've tried teams full of big lads but not had the intelligence to find someone to take a decent corner or long throw. We've been shit every time we've tried that kind of football since Fat Sam's reign so to look down on it seems misguided. Bromley weren't shit at what they did and they deserved a point. 

I'm not going to complain that lads like Clarkson and Morgan couldn't out battle them either. It's like expecting a ford Fiesta to crush a monster truck. What I will complain about is the lack of dynamic movement and the lopsided nature of our play. Whether it's because Earle has the acceleration of one of those trucks that takes a NASA rocket to the launchpad and therefore he didn't want to leave vast spaces behind him, or because he's just callow, Monroe wasn't really effective as an outlet. Bowler did some lovely things and some rubbish things. Bloxham was very handy - but beyond that, we didn't grab the game, we didn't make them dizzy, we didn't stretch the pitch as we could - and it became very obvious, very quickly that we wanted to get the ball wide right as often as possible. 

It seems simplistic, but it felt as if had we been more unpredictable as we attacked and had we done what we did faster, we'd have asked a lot more questions. We've played some very fast football this year - but it feels like it takes an opposition who play the same sort of thing to remind us that we're capable of it - and that's going to define our chances. If we want top 6, we can't let 'teams like' teams dictate what the game is going to be like, we can't slow to a crawl against them, unless we're going to combine that with bursts of invention and incision and have the confidence and the right shape/balance, to really go at them, force them back and neuter their own desire to break on us. 

The last three games have been a reality check. Autumn is coming and the sun soaked optimism of a few weeks back seems giddy and foolish. It's always a battle though and how we come into January, whether we're in a place for it to be worth complimenting what we have and, up to that point we learn to reliably maximise the abilities of the players we already possess will define us. 

Onward!


You can follow MCLF on facebook, Twitter, Bluesky, Threads and Instagram or use Follow.it to get posts sent to your email If you appreciate the blog and judge it worth 1p or more, then a donation to one of the causes below which help kids and families in Blackpool would be grand.

Home-Start Blackpool Food Bank

Writing about football is possibly a bit pointless in an era when there's the telly and youtube and videos all over the shop. It's not my living this and it's just something I do because I do so there's no problem with reading it and then getting on with your life - but if you do want to chuck some money at the cause of some random fella writing shit no one ever asked him too, then Patreon. is a thing.

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Where we going? - the Mighty vs Peterborough Utd

Football can weigh on your shoulders. It can drag you down. It can be dismal, miserable and boring. It can leave you wondering why you bother, what the point of it all is, leaving you sinking into a pit of collective misery. unable to save yourself or the doomed souls around you from the slough of despond that you've stumbled into. In short, unlike many alternative 'leisure pursuits' you could undertake in your weekends and evenings, football is pretty unique - in that it will regularly make you feel worse than you did before the game and what sort of a thing is that to spend your money on if you stop and think about it? 

The thing is, if it wasn't like that, then you'd never have the opposite. If football was whatever else people do with their lives (if every other cake at the cafe at Dunhelm Mill was shite, would it be as inexplicably packed as it always is, whenever you have the misfortune to need to go to your local branch because everywhere else that sells a packet of screws has closed down? (RIP Wilko btw. A nation mourns you and your no frills practicality.))

Would we want football to be predictable and reassuringly reliable? Would we want it to be a simple transaction? You hand over your money, you get exactly what you paid for? Would we fuck. That would be boring. That would be wandering about the aisles of a retail barn, muttering inanely about the shite on the shelves and just basically waiting to die whilst nothing actually happens. A life without ups and downs and only in-betweens. Who wants that? We should, in fact, raise a glass to the piss poor defeats, the passionless capitulations and the mind numbing, soul deadening games that make you wonder what it is that the players do all week, because it doesn't seem to be practice playing football. 

There are plenty of those days but then, there's always, always, next week. Next week becomes this week and usually we're thinking about next week again pretty quickly but once in a blue (tangerine) moon, to make it all worthwhile, there is this. The day when everything goes to plan, when everything you want to see plays out, right there, right now, in front of you. These days don't happen very often - but when they do, it is exactly the reason you suffer what you suffer. There's always next week and next week might be today and today was silken magic, spun by celestial powers. Today was the reason we all are who we are and do what we do and today was tangerine. 

--- 

The ball in  gets a touch then an almighty scramble. I'm too far away to see anything but a whip sharp finish from within a crowd, a pistol shot that leaves the net taut and the players running away. I think it's him. It must be him. That's what he does. He's a sniper, he's a killer, he's all sinew and twitch fibres and movement and kill shots from angles and that was a point blank headshot of a goal, an opportunist pounce. It takes a split-second to take a life. Bang... 

No one around me is quite sure. We *think* it's Jerry. Even the Kop doesn't seem as certain as you'd think it might, the goal being right in front of them.

"Blackpool's fourth goal, coming after 72 minutes, the scorer..." 

Tony Parr milks the moment - a pause, dramatic, pregnant with anticipation... 

"Blackpool's number 12..... Jerry.... Yates!!!!" 

Nothing else in the world matters. He is back. He is home. He has scored. I am lost in the noise of all of us. No one could ask for more than that. There is nothing more to want. Life is complete. If you could synthesise this total and utter contentment in the form of a powder or pill, then you'd be on the verge of solving world conflict. 

Where we going? 

It didn't start quite as easily as it ended. Jerry is on the bench and despite some good, intense early pressing from the Pool, Posh are well in the game and cutting through us very easily. The first warning is all too simple to create for them, a ball in finds space behind our defence that probably shouldn't be there, a cross, an effort that looks like it's for certain going to ruin the buoyant mood, but then Bailey Peacock Farrell seems to appear out of nowhere, flinging himself and stopping the effort from a starting point that gave us no hope or expectation of him getting there. I've had my doubts about him, but he's in fine, fine form right now and the stop is as important as any of the attacking play yet to come. 

It feels initially like two good teams and if we're honest, like Posh might be the better one. They're moving it well. Similar to the Stockport game, Pool are a threat on the break though, a laser guided ball from deep, (again great stuff from BPF) finds Dion and we push towards goal but are just unable to make it count. Posh have more control, quick passing, plenty of movement and incisive play. They get up the pitch again after Bowler dallies and is robbed after a short free kick. They're in again, there's a massive overload and we're running back in blind panic, no shape, just desperation. Somehow, they don't score, both BPF and the offside flag rob them - it's a moment where, if I were a Posh fan, I'd be bemused and furious at how we'd let the opportunity slip. 

Then the game turns. Another freekick - this time, we don't play it short - Albie instead floats it up to the back of the box, Earle, who is imperious today, leaps, he gets a flick on that scuffs off his head, Casey, with the clumsy gait of a centre back doing attacking things, lifts it over his own head to help it on. It doesn't seem too threatening, but Williams nips in, like an opportunist thief who has spotted an unlocked car with the keys in the ignition and before the keeper can claim it, is there to flick it into the roof of the net. If we're absolutely frank, it's a really poor goal. I mean, it's a brilliant goal, I love the goal - but it feels exactly like a goal we'd concede. Posh must feel exactly like we seem to do have done far too often in recent years.  

So often in the last however long it is, I've written 'and then the other team 'just score and it's far too simple' - well, here we are, leaping around after just scoring a simple goal, an opposition who did a load of good things but then just let our defenders run wild in their box and do what they wanted at a corner. It feels lovely. Up the fucking Pool! 

It gets better though. It starts, as so much of what is good about us in recent matches does, with a crunching challenge from Karoy. We work it wide, Bloxham, Bowler, work it between them, we lose the ball, it comes back, we try again, finally Bowler can have a dart, a shot, a save - but there, as the ball pops lose, again, right in front of the keeper, is Dion Charles and again, the ball is in the net and again I can't help feeling that Peterborough really should have dealt with the threat two or three times before Dion popped up and that were the boot on the other foot I'd be raging about 'just letting them fucking dance around in our box and when they fuck up, basically picking it up and putting it on a tee for them to have another shot, then standing around like fucking teapots afterwards shaking our heads' - but I'm not, because I'm jumping about for the second time in a few minutes celebrating and not giving a fuck about what the possession stats say or whether football is 'fair' - because I've been on the other side of these two goals more times than I can count and to be the one looking across at the crestfallen opposition this week is what we all hope for. 

From here, the Pool dominate. Posh's early promise evaporates. It's clearly a team with some skill and a team being coached to play - but the pressure to make something happen seems to destroy the early composure. They knock it about nicely enough within the initial build up, but they're ragged and forced as they move towards our goal. Our defenders cope nicely. Casey is immense today, so many well timed interceptions, blocks and headers. Earle is quality, like James Husband on great form, but made of concrete and rebar and 5 inches taller. Williamson continues to just look really good at football, CJ deserves so much credit for the last 6 months, where he's become actually good at defending, his pace filling in where Earle has none, his slight gait compensated for by Earle's bulk. Even Josh 'wing back' Bowler deserves mentioning in dispatches - he doesn't have his best attacking game ever, mixing some loose stuff with the usual stuff - but he's up and down the flanks, he's coming inside, he's *checks notes* tackling people and looking like he means it and *checks notes again* he heads one away, actually jumping into a duel with another player, something that I've literally never seen him do before ever. 

Going forward, we're increasingly delightful. We press superbly, hunting in packs, penning Peterborough in. Charles is just gloriously horrible, always making contact with his man, unsettling, annoying, moving. Honeyman is a terrier. I've not really enjoyed him as often as hoped I might since he signed, but today he makes sense, stepping up, making the attacking two into a three and cutting off the pass, straight into the face of their defence and moving constantly. I've already run out of words for Karoy. He's just Karoy. Every week. Behind them, Morgan prompts and spreads and outside of them the wing backs gallop adventurously. 

Bloxham though is simply magic. He doesn't score but he does everything else I could want from him. He's frustrated me in the past - a big lad who has seemed uncertain about how to use his heft to his advantage. He's had all the attributes but seemingly little grasp of how to assemble the pieces into the player I could see in my mind, a player all set up to be a terrific centre forward but spending his time hankering for fiddling around on the wing instead. It feels this year as if the penny might have dropped, as if things might be clicking into place. He's backing in, he's wrestling, he's rolling his man and racing away. He's got the touch, the skill, the pace and now, he's got the attitude. He's disruptive, he's movement, he's a joy to watch today and if he keeps playing like this, he's going to be a huge part of who we are and make it very hard for the rest of the strikers, none of whom have the physique and presence he has, to get a shirt off him. 

There's a lull after we score the second, it's quite nice to enjoy it, and then we kick back in to it. We have a lovely, comfortable spell of possession, moving it calmly but quickly, back to front, around and back again, side to side and finally into space where a Bowler snapshot is saved. Dion, harrying as ever, nicks a loose ball, there's a shot, another shot, again from Bowler and another stop. Albie Morgan, possibly the greatest midfielder in all of football, slides in, takes it cleanly, the ball comes loose for Honeyman who charges in, slightly miss-hits his shot but forces another save.

This is fun. I like us being good. 

---

I don't think a whole lot at half time. I just want the game to start again. It makes a change to not be diagnosing what is wrong, but instead reflecting on what is right. 11 players who appear to understand their jobs, trust in each other and back each other up. What else is there to say? This is Blackpool FC though. It could all yet fall apart into a big heap on the ground and leave us bereft. It's the hope that kills you and so far, the game has generated a worrying amount of optimism within me. 

---

Bloxham is right back on it. He's hustling, fighting, bursting out of a tustle with a centre back, bearing down on goal and smacking it hard, low but just dragging it wide. He's like an old fashioned forward today, that would have been like a black and white goal, the kind you can see in your mind, with some big, raw boned bloke from the 1940s bludgeoning defenders and then smacking the heavy brown leather ball, strings and all, past a keeper in a woollen cap (that falls off as he hits the ground), to prompt frantic rattle swinging and much tossing of hats in the air within the crowd. 

He's at it again, this time haring down the wing, him and Dion, like a tag team of fighters, exchanging passes, the return into the box just not quite right, but the intent and the attitude absolutely brilliant to see. 

There's maybe a tiny spell in the second half where I worry for a moment that we might be running slightly out of steam. Posh don't entirely wilt and they come into it a little bit. We generally time our tackles and if we don't, Posh's composure in front of goal is entirely lacking, crosses loop out of play, cross field passes go astray and most enjoyably, one of their forwards manages to tackle himself when he seems more likely to score. 

Even more enjoyably, right about the time I'm wondering if we might not regret making a bit more of our chances, we put our boot on their neck and press hard. Bowler darts infield. CJ loops a cross. Honeyman tidies up and has another go, it's an inviting ball and Karoy, running from deeper, springing, dreadlocks swinging like a graceful counterweight, twists his head and glances the ball down and away from the keeper, into the corner of the goal and we're done. That's it. We've won this game and no one deserves their moment of adulation for their effort thus far than Karoy Anderson. The simple precision and timing of it all was glorious. 

This game just keeps on giving. Where another game might feel like a pleasant stroll to the line, there's the matter of the fella on the bench who has just stood up, stripped off his training top to reveal a familiar physique, both muscular and skinny all in one and now, is putting a tangerine shirt over his head for the first time in a long time. No one since the boycott ended and probably no one since the heady days of Holloway has been as universally adored, as totemic, as generally loved by all as Jerry Yates. He's a lad, he's ours, he's everyone's favourite because you can't not like him. It's just not an option.

This could be a fairy tale in a world that seems to serve up far more depression than joy. Dion is wandering off, Jerry is bouncing, he's swinging his arms and now, he crosses the white line, he sprints, his step all springy and full of acceleration, skittish and unpredictable but explosive, arrowing this way and that, like a deer in the woods, spooked by something only it can hear. Jerry is on another wavelength sometimes. It's like a strange dream that he's back. It's not a dream though. It's real. 

A header is won. He's tracking, dropping, pulling away. He's rekindling a link with Bowler, the trust instantly there as a sharp pass to Josh shows. He's inviting others to give him the ball. I don't know if we ever really thought of him as 'a leader' - but here, in the flesh, you remember how at every kick off he bounced, he clapped, he talked non stop, to himself probably as much as anyone else. The main thing that comes flooding back is the energy he brings, the elastic, angular, darting movement, the restlessness - it makes you think about how so many others up front since have seemed so flat, predictable and how much Jerry was the player he was for us because of how much he gave to every second. He squats on his haunches for a moment. I am concerned, then I remember that he does that. He's never stationary. He can't be still. Up and down, like he's trying to shake out every last drop of something that's built up inside himself for the moment of matchday.

I've missed him. 

Then, that moment. A corner from Clarkson, Earle leaps, his downwards header is powerful and the keeper falls and saves, it's quite brilliant, but there, a yard from goal, is a figure, tiny at a pitch lengths distance, but massive in mind and memory of every Pool fan. The ball is in the roof of the net. The finish is emphatic, the celebrations are almost muted at first, as if disbelieving. This day was already great, but what everyone wanted seems to have happened. Is it Jerry? It is isn't it? Is there a flag? What about a whistle? It all seems alright. Can this have happened? 

Tony Parr's amplified voice spells it out: This is a fairy tale in real life. We're at heavens gates. 

--- 

What more can be said? We've looked good this year so far. Each game a little better, a little more assured, a little more fluent. We're capable of some serious football. We ended the match playing glorious triangles to the sound of 'ole!' We also have a new found nastiness and physical threat. It's not just brawn and height, it's the way we do things in unison, we back each other up. Yes, we lose the ball, but that's ok because sometimes we lose it trying to do something good and we go and win it back. That lets Josh or Albie try things and trying things makes chances and chances make goals. It's that which is the fine margin between side to side mind numbing football and galloping adventure and chances. 

 All of this is underpinned by fitness. We're not fading at the end of games, we're not simply a quick burst of energy and then flatness. We look the equals of others and perhaps fitter than some. 

It's only a few games. The sample size is small. It's so easy to get carried away and for next week it all come crashing down - but if we don't let ourselves dream, if we don't enjoy days like this, then why do we sit through the many weeks of tedious shite? The remarkable thing is, as fluent as we were at times, I don't think this group is yet fully gelled. We see moments of remarkable football - but they've not been together long enough to totally have each other's wavelength yet. There's numerous players, some of whom would really put pressure on those in the starting line up, still not fit. To think, we could add 3,4,5 players to the squad yet who improve this, even if we didn't sign anyone else (which we should, we need an additional midfield body for the perfect depth) is reason for optimism. This result should give us confidence, but confidence can be dangerous - squad depth is a vital thing for protecting against complacency. 

I don't think this is going to be plain sailing. We actually play quite dangerous football. In the first 20 minutes, we committed a lot forward and left ourselves quite open. I love that, lets keep doing it, but it will backfire on us at some point - for me, the key will be to keep our nerve and to keep doing it. Losing when you've risked winning is fine. Losing when you haven't is unforgivable. The quality we have will mean it will bear ripe fruit more often than rotten. 

Top of the league means nothing after so few matches. Actually, fuck that. fuck that right off right now. This isn't some shitty ex pro guest spot on Sky Sports where we're talking in dull rent-a-quote boring, phoned in cliches. This is fanaticism, this is blind love, hopeless and doomed, but never wavering, this is hope, faith and escape into the tangerine dream land, the lush green grass, vivid against the greyness of the week. I'm not fucking minimising this, I'm drinking it in, every last drop of it and I don't care. I'm on the piss, drunk on joy. 

We're top of the league, we won 4-0, Preston, Bolton and Burnley all lost and Jerry fucking Yates came home and scored a goal. 

After Jerry scored and after I'd screamed out the immediate moment, for a moment, I watched and I listened. The noise echoed round from the Kop and picked up in power as it went, coming back and then being amplified again. I realised I was smiling. I realised I was grinning like an idiot. Childlike happiness. It's such a rare, fleeting thing.

I watched Jerry at the end, taking deep breaths, looking around him, soaking it up. A playground footballer on his home turf. 

It can't get any better than this, can it Mick? 

What a day. 

.
You can follow MCLF on facebook, Twitter, Bluesky, Threads and Instagram or use Follow.it to get posts sent to your email If you appreciate the blog and judge it worth 1p or more, then a donation to one of the causes below which help kids and families in Blackpool would be grand.

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Foundations laid? - The Mighty vs Wycombe Wanderers

Here we go again.

Once more into the breach.

After the light aperitif of a tasty cup game in glamorous Grimsby, it's time for the stodgy main course - the slog, the route march, the steady and relentless uphill trek that is league football.

If Mick from Barnsley hadn't inadvertently spawned multiple million gifs to the contrary, I'd confidently state that "It (the start of the season), can't get any worse (than last year)" but we all know what Mick from Barnsley said about being positive.  

I AM cautiously optimistic though. I don't think we'll smash the league playing non stop champagne football but I just don't think we'll be adrift at the bottom playing football that tastes like a pint of drip tray slop with a few old fag butts floating round in it.

I just want to feel like we've gone forward in comparison to the backsliding of the past 4 years. I think there's some reasons for this optimism. We've signed more thoughtfully, we've certainly trained more professionally and preseason has shown glimpses of a potentially fitter, engaged Josh Bowler.

There are plenty of questions as always:

Is Dale Taylor just something you see out of the corner of your eye every now and again but can't be certain that he's real? 

Has Evo accidentally written a 352 formation on the whiteboard in the dressing room in permanent marker pen and doesn't want to have to own up to it if he picks a back 4?

Have we got a plan for when some League 1 teams scandalously and selfishly *don't* play like Barcelona?

Nothing will be decided today, but perhaps a tone will be set. Songs often starts with a solo melody or tempo. Last season was a dirge from the first note, each note that joined more out of key, further out of time, as the sound multiplied, I just hope this year we can start in tune with each other on and off the pitch - because if we do, it could grow into something special.

---

Then the team sheet is out. Up front we have a lad who hasn't played a league for us in more than 2 years and another lad who is more likely to play full back than centre forward. I don't really know what to do with this frankly comical information other than have an extra pint and grit my teeth in anticipation.

We play 'ok' in the first half - things I like include: Karoy Anderson's existence on earth, us getting Bowler into the game, Williams looking like he knows what he's doing, us passing it like we've actually practised passing and receiving and moving about a bit. I particularly liked the move at the end of the first half that ended with a rasping effort from Ashworth and the snapshot from Bowler that forced a sharp stop somewhere in the middle. Going forward we're a little bit laboured at times but generally, our use of the ball is a lot better and the players seem to understand how each of them relates to the next. I know that's the basics and Evatt has been here for a while now - but such things weren't a given last year and our season was basically ruined before autumn was over because we didn't do those basics. 

Things I don't like in the first half - George Honeyman runs about gamely but his touch in tight spaces isn't great, the Sunday league haveagohero frontline does indeed have a go, but it's not really very dangerous. CJ has some nice runs but the problem comes when he has do something at the end of it, Kylian mixes the odd silky touch on or pass with some decisions which aren't very good. I also obviously don't like the couple of half decent stops from the Wycombe keeper that deny Bowler and the ball in the face (I think that's what it was) that sees Jordan Brown go down and then totter unsteadily round until firmly pointed down the tunnel by Evo (it turns out Brown was ill and in retrospect he very much looked it.) I don't like that referee turns down a penalty appeal as Bowler surges into the box (I've no idea, it was miles away - but the ref was a bit of a random decision generator all game, so there's every chance it was)

Things I really don't like - The flimsy, piss weak goal we concede after dominating the opening however long it was. They get a corner and just score a goal like it's no effort at all. It's *that fucking goal we keep conceding yet again* - nor do I like the time, after we've just had a good 5 minute spell of dominating possession but not really doing anything with it, Wycombe get up the pitch and force a save with 2 or 3 passes.

---

If you won games on some kind of style sheet with a Strictly Come Tikitaka judging panel we'd be 3-1 up. That's not football though. We've held the ball and moved it about nicely but on chances it's probably even enough even though Wycombe have done very little and of course, by the actual scoreline, we're losing the game.

---

I'm slightly surprised we don't make further changes at half time. To use an analogy, if we were a missile, then it looks like we've done an ok job putting the rocket together but we've got no explosive in the nose cone. We do have two actual strikers on the bench but we carry on with what finished the first have for a good 15 minutes.

That said, we play well - we seem to be pressing higher and what we did well in the first half we do well this, but a little bit quicker. Our football is good, but chances aren't coming. For the first time in what seems like forever, we have control of a game - but I can hear the ghost of Neil Critchley in my ear saying 'quality in both boxes' and give a shudder. Control is fine and we're definitely nullifying Wycombe effectively and probing - but there's limited sense that we're actually going to *score a goal*

Eventually we get Bloxham and soon after that, Dion. The game definitely opens up at this point. Charles impresses me with the aggression of his running, he's always looking to unsettle, running hard into channels, disrupting the defenders rhythm by seeking contact as he drags them about but then also dropping off into space and tempting defenders to go with him creating the chance for others to run beyond.

Bloxham also impresses. His ability has never been in doubt, but there's been a share of games where his mindset or stamina have - today he looks really lively and hungry. He's also seeking to put himself about (and if he ever learns to really, properly do that with consistency, we've got a proper player) and pulling out to the right and again, creating space.

We're really aggressively pressing now which feels like it might bring rewards - but of course, it also creates greater risk - the higher up you commit to confronting the opposition, the worse it looks if they beat you - Once or twice in the initial period after the subs Wycombe do just that. I'm glad to see it though, because it is a willingness to make a game a bit more chaotic that will break down stubborn opponents and Wycombe are just about the epitome of a 'well organised' league 1 side - if you don't take risks, you'll never beat such teams. 

It goes back and forth for while but again, we gain control. Albie is on fine form, conducting from deep, spinning it this way and that, revelling in having adventurous wing backs, turning, checking, going back the other way, spreading it left, laying it right, driving up the middle, head up and scanning for space. It took him a little while to get to the speed of the game, but once he does, we look a much more serious proposition and I'm reminded how much a fit Morgan could bring to the season.

There's a chance from the right for Bloxham which is screwed across goal. There's a frankly gorgeous ball from CJ (now at wing back) which Charles puts wide. We look much more incisive, we're actually putting a period of pressure together. There's some belief in the way we're playing and that's transmitted to the stands. We take off Coulson and bring on Munroe. We withdraw Honeyman and put on Clarkson - We've committed everyone we can to going forward and that's what we do.

Karoy scoops it down the line. There's a bizarre moment where everyone stops and acts as if it's going to roll out of play but then Bloxham realises quickest that it isn't and races after it, he gets there, he's tight to the goal line, he thinks about driving into the box but then pushes it firmly across goal, Dion meets it and I've barely got time to bemoan the resulting block before I realise that Finlay Munroe is charging in and the loose ball is there to be hit and hit he does, he fairly takes the leather of the thing and it rockets, unstoppable, into the roof of the net...

It's a deserved goal and there's real joy in the moment. The question is, can we go and win this?

At moments, the answer seems to be yes - I'm ready to celebrate a goal for the ages as we explode from back to front and Clarkson finds Bowler who ghosts past the last defender like he's made of liquid flowing round a rock, and then crashes it towards the top corner. It flies just over and Josh lies prone on the turf on his back. It was beautiful even if it didn't go in, a teaser for what may yet be to come.

Another moment of lovely football sees Bloxham again pulled right out to the right and skillfully getting the ball across, Charles takes it first time, it's a difficult chance but I'm glad we're thinking like this. Teams that have success get the best out of each other and there's more ambitious attacking link play in this last 30 minutes than we saw over several games put together last season.

We run out of time in the end. The game ends with Williams crashing a shot well wide when, if he'd just taken a look, there was a simple ball to lay Bowler through with a direct run in on goal. He's a right back though and he's had a good game so lets not be too harsh on the lad.

---

Was a tone set? I'd say, yeah, up to a point - there was plenty of effort, there was a sense that we collectively knew what we were doing. In the latter part of the game there was some real attacking intent and some actual quality at times.

There's no question that starting your 5th and 6th choice strikers blunted us but once we introduced a cutting edge then we made quite a lot of sense. 

A draw at home to Wycombe certainly isn't something to be overjoyed with. There are better teams and there are teams that aren't better than them, but will bring a more extreme version of the pragmatic approach they brought. There was a reasonable amount to like though in the general approach and the formation wasn't the millstone I feared it could have been. 

On balance, though it's irritating to concede another shit goal, I did like that all of the new players have fitted in well, I like that we've found a way to get Bowler properly involved and that he looks fitter than he has done for a long time, including that rubbish loan spell when we got relegated. I like that he's tracking back (to the best of his ability) and that he's demanding the ball and linking play, not just standing there waiting to have a run. I like that each sub improved us and all of them looked sharp because that gives optimism that a) we might start something stronger next time and b) if we ever have something approaching a full compliment of players, we might be able to generate the relentless intensity you only get when you've got 18 or 19 players straining for a shirt.

We need a little bit more in.

I like both Ashworth and Casey - I thought Ashworth had a really good game today, being willing to get forward and gamble (which I want from my centre backs because this sort of football only really works if you will commit everyone forward when you need to) but the combination of them worries me against the most physical sides and there's no real back up. Today, we more or less moved to a back four as the game went on and Bowler got higher (in fact, as Munroe also went higher, we became an actual back 3) and it concerns me that Andy Lyons is all that is left should someone go down.

We're clearly at least one striker short for a while. CJ isn't a striker, Kylian is a plan B option for the last 15 minutes if we need to punt it forward (for the lack of anyone better) - that's not a forward line we can seriously imagine relying on until Taylor and Ennis return. We need to be able to rotate our forward options to maintain the kind of explosive movement and pressing intensity we managed in the latter part of the game and few players could play like that for 90 minutes twice a week so options are needed. If only we knew where there was an out of favour striker who has a reputation for running himself into the ground for the cause...

I think we *could* also upgrade a little on particular positions - but I think other business is probably predicated on someone going out to get someone in. There's a lot of ifs (when is there not?) but IF Morgan can get a proper run, we look a lot more composed and creative. IF Bowler can keep playing as he has for the first two games, we've got the most talented player in the division who should be approaching his prime years and absolutely motivated to prove he's not a one season flash in the pan. IF we can add at the front and the back then we get both more ability to take a risk and more rewards when we do.

All in all, I was more encouraged than discouraged. It wasn't a vintage performance, we need to get better, and we need players back/players in - but there was a team who played football, looked unified, (the players that weren't injured) appeared fit and as Evatt rightly pointed out, didn't crumble at going behind, but got back into the game and finished it very much on top. We all want to immediately jump to the top of the division and stay there and keep winning till the world is just tangerine - but ultimately, against how we've started the last two seasons (the aimless shambles of Steveball part 2 and the toothless and flimsy rigidity of Critch's final few games) then a broadly encouraging draw was progress - and that's what's written on our badge.

Onward!

You can follow MCLF on facebook, Twitter, Bluesky, Threads and Instagram or use Follow.it to get posts sent to your email If you appreciate the blog and judge it worth 1p or more, then a donation to one of the causes below which help kids and families in Blackpool would be grand.

Home-Start Blackpool Food Bank

Writing about football is possibly a bit pointless in an era when there's the telly and youtube and videos all over the shop. It's not my living this and it's just something I do because I do so there's no problem with reading it and then getting on with your life - but if you do want to chuck some money at the cause of some random fella writing shit no one ever asked him too, then Patreon. is a thing.

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