Firing blanks: Plymouth Argyle vs the Mighty

Too pissed off to think of a witty caption

It's a thin line between sanity and otherwise and it's not a good sign that my mind has been preoccupied by the idea of a shop called 'Kenny's Jackets' since hearing the Pompey manager mentioned on a preview show the other day. I can't decide whether it's a baked potato stall or the kind of 'leather shop' you don't see very much anymore. The sort with lurid fluorescent highlighter coloured price cards in a star shape and the smell of animal hide mixed with tobacco that, if bottled, would make you cry with nostalgia for a past you didn't realise you'd forgotten. A sort of sense memory, that like the clink of milk bottles in the faint light of dawn, can put you in touch with thoughts and images buried deep down and presumed lost. 

I should be regaling you with analysis and predictions but instead I'm trying to think of other football managers whose name lends themselves to the kind of thing. My brain isn't working very well, so all I've come up with is 'Steve's Gritt' (which, in case you haven't quite got how this works, is former Charlton joint boss Steve Gritt, but running a business, supplying grit) and 'Shaun's Dykes' (an agricultural digging service as opposed to anything else you might have imagined) 

I don't think that intro is going to put me in prime position for any of the recently vacated Soccer Saturday slots, but just in case Sky are reading and want to put some filthy lucre my way, then my prediction for the game is thus 'Could go either way this one Jeff, looks like the Mighty have picked an attacking line up which is what you'd expect from a Neil Critchley side' - what I'd like to say is 'fuck knows Jeff, can we all just stop trying to predict everything' because I've got prediction fatigue in the last few days and I'm wondering if it's a sign of the way that betting has become so ingrained in the fabric of football and the way it's discussed in the media. 

I'm pleased to see Mitchell in the line up but at the same time disappointed not to see Shaw at least on the bench. I'm convinced Shaw has a bright future if we can give him a chance, his passing and delivery is outstanding. The squad makes sense though and I'm happy there's no signs of 'pragmatism' for an away game. If we can pin Liverpool, Everton and Stoke back in their half for long periods, then logically we should be able to do the same to Plymouth. 

Whatever the outcome, there's a hollowness beneath a genuine sense of anticipation. I almost certainly wouldn't have gone to Plymouth, whilst I might write reams, others are more dedicated to long distance away trips, but the absence of a drum or a chant, the missing ebb and flow of noise can't but undermine any sense of 'being there'

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Our pre season hero is the first villain of the league season as Hamilton dallies making a clearance in the corner and gifts Argyle a cross. Jephcott stoops in front of Ekpiteta and glance the ball home. It's a hollow start after so much belief in the build up. 

Pool try and establish themselves but nothing quite comes off. Yates is making himself available and his presence felt. Kaikai tries both a run and a flicked ball round the corner but neither comes off. 

Plymouth nearly get through on goal as a ball over the top sees Nottingham (looking uncomfortable on the left side of the central two) completely misjudge it and forced to use his pace to prevent Jephcott having a second clear chance. He does quite well, but is fortunate the Pilgrim's forward has a poor touch. 

Notts is in the book minutes later when the same forward gets inside him and the Sherrif has to use his hand to hold up play. Oddly then he jogs to get treatment so absents himself from the resulting free kick which bounces threateningly in front of Maxwell but fortunately does no harm. 

Plymouth spread the play well, they look a side who really know each other. We've heard much about unity and systems but this is such a new side, whereas Plymouth are much further down the road of familiarity and it shows early on. From the left a deep cross is headed down with power and Maxwell makes a stunning stop. The rebound is tucked away but happily, the offside flag saves the day. 

Pool are struggling to put the triangles together, nothing is clicking but a neat right hand side move see Turton overlapping Hamilton and the first dangerous ball of the day, a pull back that evades Kaikai. The same man is soon on the end of knock back from Yates but his low placed drive is off target and we're at least in the game now. 

Pool put together 15+ passes in a lovely move that is snuffed out in the end by a heavy Jerry Yates touch as we start to look a bit more the side we hope we are. 

A loose Plymouth ball and Hamilton is running and running and the defence just backing away, he's going through them with the ease of ripping tissue paper. They stand aside, letting him fire hard at the keeper, who is rushed into an uncontrolled block that bounces wide where it could easily have bounced into the path of a forward or even back into the goal. 

Pool are taking control now and linking well. That man CJ plays a ball to die for from just outside the right hand corner of the box and Yates leap, sets himself and flicks the header just wide.  

Kaikai tests the keeper from a free kick, dead centre, maybe 28 yards out, doing well to make him work. 

Pool are clearly playing higher up the pitch now and the next chance comes as good deep work from Kaikai lets Anderson run from deep before handing off inside the area for Hamilton who is denied by the keeper throwing himself at his feet. From the corner Nottingham rises and glances just wide. It's been total tangerine domination but it hasn't gone in. 

As the half winds down, Hamilton goes to the by line, the ball kissing the chalk before being whipped back, low and fast but Yates can only spin in the box without getting a shot off. We've done everything, but we haven't scored. 

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What we've seen is exactly what every Pool fan fears about this side, a dominant performance in which we've been by far the better team, utterly dominant from about 15 minutes but been undone by a simple goal and an inability to finish the chances we've created. It's great football to watch, but Plymouth are in front. 

During the half, updates from Accrington remind me of their boss who could, of course be John the Coal Man. I need to get out more. I imagine him and Jimmy Bell, dirty hands and faces, heading to the pub together after doing their round, dropping off bags of anthracite across East Lancashire. Mind you, would Jimmy Bell be better suited to running an alarm company? 

I need more sleep. 

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Pool start in the same manner they played much of the first half in as former Pool man Will Aimson (one of those boycott era players who is little more than a name to me) stabs a Hamilton cross out of play. From the corner, Pool have at least three efforts on goal but no one can evade the Plymouth bodies and the effect is like the most frustrating pinball machine in the world. 

Danny Meyer has an insane run where he seems to evade half the Blackpool side before Chris Maxwell has had enough and takes it off him, like a parent taking a noisy, annoying toy from a child. He releases quite brilliantly and Hamilton is flying, then crossing, Kaikai meets it at the near post with a Plymouth man and from the 50/50 the ball breaks to Yates who lays it off when it feels like he might take it on the turn and the move again breaks down as the players arriving can't quite make the most of the moment. 

A ball across the box (again CJ) evades everyone, curving along the six yard line inviting a finish but no one responding. 

The game is more even with Plymouth getting joy on the right of Pools defence, Meyer nearly breaking through several times and drawing fouls in dangerous areas. 

We're an hour in and it feels like Pool need a change. Plymouth have altered their set up and are on the front foot. 

As I think that, Pool get a grip, three neat moves and two corners, uncountable passes, a vague shout for a penalty but never quite fashioning a clear cut opening. It's frustrating. We work the ball from one side to the other, we seem to be able to do everything other than the clinical stuff. 

Kaikai has a similar free kick as he had in the first half and whistles it not far over the top. 

We get the Pool sub and it's Jordan Williams for Mitchell and I have to be honest, it wasn't the one I'd have made but Critch is a coach who has not only a certificate from night school to prove it, but also a gilet* with his initials on it and I'm just some fella so what do I know. I don't own any clothes with my initials on. Let alone get them for free. In NC we trust. 

*or 'body warmer' as everyone and their dog called them before there was some kind of memo from the 'armless clothing marketing board' in the mid 2000s about a 'rebrand designed to pivot from targeting farmers union countryside alliance types to unlocking a more aspirational middle class urban/suburban kind who would identify with a European name as suggesting a certain cultural/fashionable quality  

It's the lad whose just come on with a probing ball starting move that again goes through several players  and ends with the ball touched back to the edge of the box where Anderson produces a curling strike that has to be well saved. Truth be told, we've not made the Plymouth keeper work much in the second half.

Shortly afterwards, Maxwell is alert to beat away a cross and Robson does well with rebound under pressure and us going forward is leaving gaps at the back.  

Another sub and this is the one I'd probably have made, with Dan Kemp coming on for Kaikai, the West Ham man having shown both skill and industry in his showings to date. Hamilton switches to the left and Kemp takes the right hand side. 

Yet another chance as Hamilton (now in the left) gets away again, beautiful footwork, stuttering then sprinting but Grant Ward can only lift the ball wide from the knock down. 

Robson and Hamilton carve further crossing opportunity but despite stretching and and lots of shepherding the ball across the edge of the area, Plymouth hold firm. The keeper is untested. 

I'm getting a word. 

'Madine' 

But the goal machine's backside remains resolutely on his seat despite my sense that it would be better off in the six yard box where he could help out a tiring Yates or the ball might just bounces off it and go in. We've been pretty, we've dominated possession and the wide play especially has been dangerous but we've just not got enough presence in the box... An ugly goal is the only way I can see us scoring but I'm not sure Critch thinks like that.  

Again, it's Hamilton onto a simply gorgeous ball from Robson, great cross but no one can get on it. Yates at the far post but no one at the near. 

The sub is Lubala, (for Anderson) and I'm thinking, exciting as Bez is, it's a bit like we've taken Kaikai off to bring him back on. 'For fucks sake Neil, stop being a purist and get the big lump on up front to finish a cross' is probably the sort of sentiment I'd be muttering were I at the game. 

5 minutes of injury time goes by with Yates looking knackered and Pool looking frustrated and conceding corners and the game ends with Pool doing what they've done a lot off, running at Plymouth, laying it off, going back and coming again but not making the breakthrough. 

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It's a crap outcome and I feel like kicking the back of the chair in front of me, but there isn't a chair in front of me because I'm not at the ground. At least for a moment I forgot I was on the couch. Hamilton was superb today, but it was never the less his mistake that led to the goal. That doesn't bother me though, mistakes happen. What concerns me far more is not scoring.

Again.  

It's getting boring writing 'Robson used the ball well, Yates linked up well but didn't look clinical, Kaikai has his moments and Keshi works hard' but that's the essence of it. We know the script and we can see that parts of the system work really well. At times it looked like it was only a matter of time before we at very least equalised and possibly went on to overwhelm them but what also concerned me alongside the lack of lethality (a word I've just made up), was a lack of an obvious plan B when the energy of the plan A ran out a bit. 

Hamilton is accused of 'lacking end product' but I thought he put the balls in and we didn't finish them. Our set pieces weren't bad either, and several times we won knockdowns only to do tippy-tappy work, trying to fashion the angle or the opening but no one seemed to quite want to put their foot through it or their head on it when the chance was there. 

Ward did ok today, he looked athletic and comfortable with the ball but I can't help feeling he's one 'footballer' too many and that had he been fully fit (which I assume he wasn't,) Virtue's willingness to a) put his foot in b) his decent shot and c) his late runs into the box might have made a difference. Maybe Sarkic is the missing link in this plan.

I dunno. 

I'm in too much of a strop to finish with another witticism about managers whose names sound like crap companies in the Yellow Pages. Anyway, I can only think of Mel's Machines, where ex Barnsley and Man City boss Mel Machin rents diggers, cement mixers and such items, striding round a filthy yard wearing a fleece jacket, holding a clipboard whilst pointing and shouting over the noise of engines and the barking of a couple of big dogs on chains with a greasy roll up on the go. 

Fucking football.

It's a load of shite. 

Once we get going, we'll be reet.

utmp

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