THE STORY SO FAR...

Ipswich Town 2:2 Morecambe League One Saturday 7th August 2021.

Well – what a difference between today and the last time Morecambe played a competitive match. That was at Wembley in May. Derek Adams was in charge and his masterstroke was to send on John O’Sullivan as an Extra Time substitute. Sully was fouled for the decisive penalty and the Shrimps  Wunderkind of last season – Carlos Mendes-Gomes – scored from the spot. They thus picked up the League Two Play-Off Trophy and with it promotion to League One for the first time in the club’s history. At the end of the game, Yann Songo’o also deservedly picked up the Player of the Match award.

Today, though – barely two months later – all the people mentioned above have gone. Derek took a step backwards to pick up the reins at Bradford City – and took Yann with him. Sully left for former club Accrington Stanley. Carlos is hopefully on his way to fame and fortune at Luton Town of all places.  So today’s line-up against Ipswich featured six newcomers.  Of the men who won the Play-Off Final against Newport County earlier in the summer, the most surprising omission was club Captain Sam Lavelle, about whom there have been persistent rumours that he is about to depart for Pastures New. Sam was warming the bench initially today. In front of him, this was the first competitive test of Ulsterman and previous Motherwell Manager Stephen Robinson as the new boss of the club from Lancashire. He said about his first selection of a team to take place in a competitive match:

“There can’t be guarantees in football; who plays well in the staff’s opinion will play today. There are no favourites; there’s none of that. Contrary to what some people think sometimes, I pick a team to win football matches and we’ll do that. There’s a real competition, there’s a really good spirit in the camp. Everybody knows they’re fighting for a place. People will be disappointed not to start but it’s a long, long season.”

However, the fact that the team Robbo selected and the opposition – who had once been managed by Bobby Robson as one of the best sides to ever compete in the highest echelons of English football – met as equals today speaks volumes about the two separate journeys the Tractor Boys and the Shrimps have been on in recent times.

They last played each other in the FA Cup in 2003 and 2001. The latter game was at the old Christie Park and Ipswich – managed by former star fullback George Burley – were third in the Premiership at the time. They won 0-3 but suffered several scares during the first half when the non-league team played the better, more dominant football. Last time out – with Morecambe club Captain Jim Bentley sent off right at the start of the game – it was easier for the men in the blue shirts and they comfortably came out winners by four goals to nil.

But who would have thought – way back in 2003 – that these two clubs would be competing in the same EFL division on a level playing field only eighteen years later? We all know about the steady progress of Morecambe through the non-league world to the Conference and then the EFL. For Ipswich, though, the Twenty-First Century has been a disappointing era. It started off well, with the Tractor Boys beating Barnsley in the 1999-2000 Play-Off to start the new century back in the Premiership. They did well at first but were relegated in their second season back in the Big Time. George Burley left and replacement Joe Royle took the club to the semi-finals of the Play-Offs in 2004, where they beat West Ham in the first leg 1-0 but – crucially – lost the away fixture 2-0. West Ham beat them again in the Play-Off finals the following season as well and by 2005, Royle had gone and the club was to be stuck in the wilderness for the next ten years as a succession of managers including Roy Keane and Paul Jewell came and went. Mick McCarthy took the Tractor Boys back to the fringes of the Big Time in 2015 but the defeat in the Play-Off semi-finals by local rivals Norwich City left a bitter taste in the mouths of many at Portman Road. More Managers came and went but were unable to stop the slide towards further relegation, let alone steer the club back in the direction of the Premiership and at the end of the 2019 season, down they went again. Even more Managers then came and went but no improvement in the club’s fortunes arrived with any of them. At the end of last season, Ipswich ended up ninth in the table, five points adrift of the Play-Offs. Today, former Wigan Manager Paul Cook was at the helm and the team he picked featured former Morecambe favourite Joe Piggot leading the line plus a Holy Goalie as one of the substitutes.

So – as we have seen – the fortunes of the two clubs have been diametrically opposed this century: Ipswich’s a tale of gradual decline as opposed to Morecambe’s steady rise up through the ranks. But who would the fickle finger of fate favour today?

It had been wet in Suffolk earlier and rain intermittently swept across the ground until about ten minutes before the game started. Before the match kicked off, there was a minute’s applause to remember Paul Mariner, Town’s brilliant ex-England star striker. I once personally witnessed Paul laying out supposed Liverpool Hardman Tommy Smith at Anfield when Tommy tried a `loosener’ on him off the ball early doors. For a man with a Jeff Beck barnet, he was a hell of a lot tougher than he looked and Smith never went near him after that…

Any thoughts of a blue tide sweeping the men in the all-red strip aside were quickly dispelled as the teams seemed pretty well matched early on. Cole Stockton caught the eye with a clever back heel to Wes McDonald after two minutes and this was a combination – Cole looking to hold-up the ball and then feed it to Wes on the wing – which seemed to be a deliberate ploy for the visitors. McDonald had a couple of efforts blocked by the Town defence early on. For the hosts, Skipper – the ex-Wigan Welsh international Lee Evans – impressed with some clever play and a free-kick he took after eight minutes went fairly close to the Shrimps’ goal – but not close enough. Ex-Salford City goalkeeper Vaclav Hladky did well to act as a sweeper and belt the ball away from danger as Stockton bore down on him after ten minutes. The Morecambe centre forward then played the ball out to McDonald twice in the next few minutes but Wes forgot to take it with him on the second occasion. With almost twenty minutes played, an unmarked Joe Piggot headed narrowly wide from a free-kick which came in from the Ipswich right. But history was made a minute later. Cole received the ball about 35 yards from goal and started to weave his way through a Town defence that backed off – and backed off. He kept going and – having wriggled his way into the home penalty area –finally brilliantly squeezed the ball past the home custodian from an acute angle on the Morecambe right to score the Shrimp’s first-ever goal in League One. It was a sublime effort and a just reward for Stephen Robinson’s positive approach so far.

The home side responded with a shot from Scott Fraser which hit the side netting. Then a corner hit to the far stick was headed wide by Toto Nsiala after 29 minutes. Not long afterwards, the same player was led off in tears after suffering what looked like it could be a very serious injury. Let’s hope it isn’t. As the sun came out with just over half an hour on the clock, Alfie McCalmont played Cole in again but this time, the home goalkeeper was able to push a shot swerving towards his top corner away for a corner kick. Thirty-three minutes had been played when Ryan Delaney was hurt in a collision and had to retire to be replaced by Sam Lavelle, who took the Captain’s armband. Matt Penney burst into the box on the Shrimps’ right after 38 minutes but smashed his resulting shot into the side-netting instead of hitting the target. Arthur Gnahoua then missed the target as well at the other end when well-placed shortly afterwards. Following that, there were few other scoring opportunities for either side and the fact of the matter is that the visiting goalkeeper didn’t have a single effort from Paul Cook’s men to save by the end of the half.

The Tractor Boys’ Manager must have roused his troops at halftime because the onslaught we might have expected at the start of the match certainly happened in the opening stages of the second period. Letheren made an excellent save from Piggot just a few minutes in at the cost of a corner. Then, as rain threatened to fall, he punched an Evans free-kick away from danger shortly afterwards. But at the other end, McDonald swept down the flank following a pass from Shane McLoughlin after 57 minutes and slipped over a low cross which Stockton was only just unable to connect with. Ryan Cooney and his goalkeeper then combined well to clear Penny’s cross away for a corner just a minute later. The home team’s increasing pressure paid off after 61 minutes when Scott Fraser equalised when a neat one-two with Conor Chaplin led to a curling shot to Letheren’s left. Robbo immediately took McDonald off and replaced him with Jonah Ayunga, who impressed with his strength, skill and speed from the moment he entered the fray.

Morecambe were beginning to weather the Ipswich storm by this point and – as the home crowd became noticeably quieter – started to push forward themselves again. Toumani Diagouraga almost played Jonah in after about seventy minutes but Hladky was able to get to the ball first. His defenders got in a tangle almost immediately afterwards though. This allowed Cole to pounce again, take the ball forward, round the goalkeeper as if he wasn’t there and pass the ball into the net to put the debutants in League One back into the lead. As all the noise started to come from Morecambe’s travelling support, it looked like the favourites for relegation were about to pull off a tremendous victory against the favourites to return to the Championship next season.

Sadly, it wasn’t to be. In injury time, a lapse of concentration at the back by the Shrimps allowed substitutes James Norwood and Macauley Bonne to combine well for the latter to slip the ball low under Letheren to make the final score 2-2.

There were a lot of positives for Morecambe at Portman Road today – despite the disappointment of being pegged-back right at the death. They played positively throughout and at no time looked overwhelmed by a supposedly far superior side. All things considered, they were very good value for a point and Stephen Robinson must be really pleased with his team’s overall display. In the nascent League One Table, Ipswich are in ninth position in front of Morecambe only on alphabetical order tonight.

Ipswich Town: 31 Vaclav Hladky; 24 Kane Vincent-Young; 22 Toto Nsiala (44 Janoi Donacien 36’); 6 Luke Wolfenden; 3 Matt Penney (Y); 4 Rekeem Harper; 8 Lee Evans (C) (Y); 7 Wes Burns; 21 Conor Chaplin (18 Macauley Bonne 77’); 11 Scott Fraser; 9 Joe Pigott (10 James Norwood (Y) 78’).

Subs Not Used: 1 Tomáŝ Holy; 12 Louie Barry; 14 Armando Dobra; 16 Idris El Mizouni.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C until 33’) (Y); 7 Wes McDonald (17 Jonah Ayunga 62’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 15 Ryan Delaney (5 Sam Lavelle (C) 33’); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Liam Gibson (Y); 24 Arthur Gnahoua (3 Greg Leigh 76’); 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Subs Not Used: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 18 Adam Phillips; 2 Kelvin Mellor; 6 Callum Jones.

Ref: Craig Hicks.

Attendance: 21309 (356 from Morecambe.)

Report by Roger Fitton.

Blackburn beaten by Burnley Loanee – Ouch!!!!

Before we go any further, let’s make a bit of a departure from the norm this season and have a quick look back at last Saturday’s game in Sussex first. After the Shrimps’ first-ever match in League One, Ipswich Manager Paul Cook said the following:

“Take your hat off to Morecambe. They were absolutely magnificent from the first minute to the last minute – they couldn’t have left another breath on the pitch. I must pay Morecambe a massive compliment: they come here today and they gave an amazing account of themselves and it’s a great sign for them in the division in the future.”

Amen to that. For those of us who haven’t already seen it, I am also indebted to Ben Kennedy for posting the following photograph on Facebook of `a very classy Suffolk Lass’, to quote Shrimpsvoices Maestro and namesake Keith Fitton’s description of her as she celebrated the Shrimps’ first ever goal in League One:

I wonder what was going through Alfie McCalmont’s head as he looked back at her. (He might have been counting how many fingers she has on each hand and concluded – as someone else suggested somewhat unkindly – that she wasn’t really from Ipswich at all as she only has five digits on both…)

Touché Madam. Finally, here’s a little stat to make everyone realise one of the many realities of the transition from League Two to League One. Saturday’s gate – 21,309, including 356 from Morecambe – was the largest crowd (bar Wembley Finals) that the Shrimps have ever played in front of. Wow...

But that was then. How about tonight?

Morecambe travelled to Ewood Park this evening to face Championship Blackburn Rovers in the League Cup First Round. They arrived on the back of their tremendous display against much-fancied Ipswich Town at Portman Road last Saturday. The Shrimps’ first ever League One match ended in a very creditable 2-2 draw. Meanwhile, Tony Mowbray’s Rovers were beating Swansea City 2-1 here to start their own league campaign on a very positive note. Tonight marked the first occasion on which two Lancashire clubs which are less than 40 miles apart geographically have ever faced each other in a major competition.

There have been developments at the Mazuma stadium since Saturday, mostly concerning Morecambe’s central defenders. Ryan Delaney was hurt during the game against Ipswich and had to leave the field to be replaced by Club Captain Sam Lavelle. Since then, Manager Stephen Robinson has announced both that Ryan’s injury is a long-term one and that he needs to get a left-sided central defender in to cover as a matter of urgency. Enter Scott Wootton, who was signed on a one-year deal today. Recent rumours also suggested that the game at Portman Road would be Skipper Lavelle’s last for the club: he was almost certainly going to be a Wycombe Wanderers player later in the week, if he wasn’t one already.

So much for the Rumour Mill: Sam led the team out at Ewood Park tonight with the Captain’s armband on as usual.

Concerning the prospect facing his players this evening, the Morecambe Manager said:

“Another hard, hard game for us, our start was always going to be difficult but an exciting one again. It’s not too far up the road so we can go and enjoy ourselves, we’re under no pressure, I think we proved on Saturday we can certainly compete but we’re going to have to produce another performance like that. Blackburn are a good side, I watched them against Leeds and Tony Mowbray is a very good manager so we’re going to have to be at the top of our game to try and get a result. They had a very good result [on Saturday], we’ve seen the game and as I said, I’ve seen them live against Leeds and they’re a good side, they’ve got very good young players, some exciting players so we’re under no illusions it’s a tough game for us, but we’ve got absolutely nothing to lose. First and foremost, we just have to be competitive against Blackburn and make sure we try and take the game to them, possibly a little bit more than we did against Ipswich, take all the good points from that game and learn from the things we can do better from.”

Opposite Number Tony Mowbray said prior to the match:

“We won’t be making wholesale changes because Morecambe are a team of strong, professional athletes. They are coached very well (so) we’ll put out a strong team to try and get through to the next round of the competition. For us, we will be trying to beat Morecambe, will make appropriate changes and look to try and continue the momentum from the weekend to move forward. Morecambe are a team with momentum, with promotion on their CV and with a team that went to Ipswich Town, in front of over 20,000 supporters, and earned a 2-2 draw. They’ll come to Ewood in a confident mood. We have no real injuries from the weekend. Joe Rankin-Costello and Bradley Johnson are closest, but they are both not quite ready yet.”

It was a beautiful, bright summer evening in East Lancashire as the game kicked off. The majority of the bumper crowd of away fans chose to stand for the entire 90 minutes among the seats in the Darwen Road Stand. You wondered how many of the home crowd realise that the Ronnie Clayton Stand which faces it has as much significance to the visitors as it has for themselves. Ronnie was not only Rovers’ and England’s long-term Captain back in the 1960s; he was also Morecambe’s Player-Manager once his league career came to an end. He still made playing the game look easy. Sadly, his managerial skills were not in the same league…

All the players Took The Knee before kick-off and any jeering was drowned out by loud applause from all sides of Ewood Park. Rovers immediately went onto the front foot and they should have taken the lead after just four minutes when – with the Morecambe defence at sixes and sevens – Ben Brereton Díaz contrived to put the ball over the bar when he was unmarked in the centre and only a few yards from goal. Not long afterwards – with the visitors looking as if they were in danger of being overrun – he was denied again by a tremendous save from Jökull Andrésson low to his left.

Morecambe looked off the pace, disorganised and weak, particularly on their left flank. Nearly all the game was played in their half for at least the first half an hour and it was no surprise when Rovers took the lead after twenty minutes. After good approach play, Harry Pickering slung an inviting cross into the danger area and Tyrhys Dolan emphatically headed it home. Thirty-three minutes had been played when Brereton Díaz weaved his way through the Morecambe defence and passed the ball to John Buckley, whose shot was only just wide of the target. As the match continued to be dominated by the home team, Andrésson was called into action again after 36 minutes to brilliantly keep out another header from a Pickering cross, this time by Ryan Nyambe. There were other chances for the home team as well whilst Morecambe offered little going forward apart from a truly sublime effort by Adam Phillips which we will return to later. Having said that, there were a few positive signs for the visitors on occasions. Cole Stockton kept the home defence fully occupied throughout. Greg Leigh put in a sterling performance at left-back. In flashes, Shane McLoughlin looked like he can play a bit.  It has to be said, too, that – even as their team looked disjointed and then fell behind – the fans from North Lancashire’s loud vocal support of the men in the red strip never relented for even a single second.

Robbo responded to what had been a one-sided contest so far by changing his line-up and the formation at the start of the second half. He complained after the Ipswich draw that his team should have actually gone for it when ahead instead of playing within themselves and trying to hang on to what they already had. Tonight, they were losing. But the Manager clearly reminded his troops that they had nothing to lose.” Win or bust” seems to be his mantra. Let’s hope so…

Whatever, the shaky-looking Kelvin Mellor and the ineffectual Wes McDonald were replaced by Liam Gibson and Toumani Diagouraga and the 4-4-3 they had started with was changed to three across the back with two wing-backs pushed slightly further forward.

It turned out to be a masterstroke. Right from the off, the visitors dominated the play. For the first time, they started to consistently press further up the field. The Shrimps played at a much faster tempo than they had done in the first period and Blackburn never seemed to me to adapt to either the increased pace of the game or the fact that they were being put under pressure every time they got the ball. Was this complacency on their behalf? Did they underestimate Morecambe and consider the match already won? Or was it the simple fact that they were being outplayed by a totally rejuvenated team?

Nippy and skilful Left Back Leigh – who had defended so stoutly throughout the first half – was given the license to pull the Rovers’ defence this way and that as he continually marauded up the Blackburn right.  Jonah Ayunga – who had made a lot of the poor service he had received during the first half – increasingly troubled the hosts as he ran with the ball; held it up; swapped positions and shifted the play into areas where the men in blue and white really didn’t want him to go. As the so far undemonstrative home crowd fell even quieter, there was a feeling of inevitability about the equaliser. Morecambe had already caused a few missed heartbeats in the Rovers’ defence before Ayunga burst into the home penalty area at speed on the Morecambe left, looked up and played a cross to strike partner Stockton to score with an emphatic finish. Wow – two games played; three goals scored by Cole. Thank goodness he didn’t allow Derek Adams to persuade him to follow the best Manager Morecambe have had so far to Bradford…

At this stage – the fifty-second minute – there was only one team going to win. Tony Mowbray tried to freshen things up with a double substitution after an hour or so. Last Saturday’s match-winner Sam Gallagher was one of the men thrown into the fray. But the change made absolutely no difference. The game was decided in the eighty-fifth minute when quicksilver Leigh was caught by a clumsy and panic-stricken challenge by Dolan in the Rovers’ penalty area. Phillips almost burst the net from the spot. And that was it –1-2 to Morecambe at the end.

For me, the absolutely outstanding moment of the game arrived in the first half when – with his team losing – Adam Phillips made a phenomenal tackle in the centre circle, pushed the ball forward and – spotting goalkeeper Thomas Kaminski way off his line – belted the ball half of the length of the pitch. It looped way over the goalkeeper and missed the top left corner of the Blackburn goal by only a few inches with the man in the fluorescent yellow strip a mere spectator as he tried to recover his ground. Given the tribal hatred between Blackburn and Adam’s parent club Burnley, this would have been a special moment indeed for the player. If it had gone in – as it so nearly did – it surely must have been a contender for goal of the season so far. (And Burnley FC were not slow to celebrate their player’s achievement tonight on Twitter to rub it in either…)

It’s all too tempting to suggest that a Referee called Steve Martin must be a bit of a joke. But his performance tonight was worse than a joke – he was absolutely dreadful. He made loads of basic mistakes. As Blackburn’s frustrations grew towards the end of the game, there were handbags exchanged between the two sides. The players must take ultimate responsibility for this bit of stupidity but the man in the middle is also culpable for making a string of poor decisions and failing to punish adequately a few really bad tackles which were made during the course of the game: a better official would never have let things deteriorate to that point.

But let’s end on a far more positive note. Morecambe’s win tonight on a Championship ground against a strong team is probably the upset of the season so far.

There was nothing of a fluke about it. Nobody watching this game tonight would have thought that the team in the red strip are favourites for relegation. It was an outstanding and very well deserved victory which had only a little bit of the gloss taken off it by a clearly serious injury to Liam Gibson towards the end of the game. Just two matches played and already two men are out of the frame to add to Jonathan Obika, who was crocked before the campaign even started. Let’s hope the bad luck stops here: at this rate of attrition, Morecambe will have no players left by October…

Blackburn Rovers. 1 Thomas Kaminski; 36 Tyler Magloire (6 Jacob Davenport (Y) 64’); 26 Darragh Lenihan; 24 Hayden Carter; 2 Ryan Nyambe; 27 Lewis Travis; 21 John Buckley (Y) (14 Dan Butterworth 45’); 8 Joe Rothwell (9 Sam Gallagher 65’); 3 Harry Pickering; 22 Ben Brereton Díaz; 10 Tyrhys Dolan.

Subs Not Used: 35 Jake Garrett; 45 Jordan Eastham; 34 Dan Pike; 33 Lenni Rea Cirino.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 2 Kelvin Mellor (8 Toumani Diagouraga 45’); 4 Anthony O’Connor (Y); 5 Sam Lavelle (C); 3 Greg Leigh; 18 Adam Phillips (Y); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 6 Callum Jones; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 9 Cole Stockton; 7 Wes McDonald (22 Liam Gibson 45’; 16 Jacob Mensah 78’).

Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 11 Josh McPake; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Ref: Steve Martin. 

Att: 5,283 (908 from Morecambe.)

Today, Shrewsbury Town were the first visitors to the Mazuma Stadium this season. Before we go any further, I would like to take my hat off to their Manager Steve Cotterill, who has described his personal battle against Covid-19 and the complications of it which almost killed him earlier this year here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rg5IOl7suCk&ab_channel=ShrewsburyTownhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rg5IOl7suCk&ab_channel=ShrewsburyTown

I have to say that his lack of any obvious self-pity and his appreciation of the way other people – particularly the NHS – fought to save him puts things like mere football matches into their true perspective. I wish this man all the luck in the world – except today on the football field.

So let’s continue the thread in my latest posting of looking back at Morecambe’s last game.

Blackburn Rovers Manager Tony Mowbray is a man for whom – for what it’s worth – I also have tremendous respect given the way he has coped with tragedy in his personal life that would have probably floored most of the rest of us. But Tony did his best `Ashen-faced Ron Knee, 59′ impression this week. He said – after his Championship side had been well and truly beaten by Morecambe Manager Stephen Robinson’s change of personnel and tactics in the second half at Ewood Park last Tuesday:

“They matched us up in the end and the substitutions were to revert to a 4-3-3 and play in the spaces between them. I’m not sure it made them the better side but it allowed them to stop us playing and disrupt our fluency. We always deal with the result, I wouldn’t say they were the better side but they got the result so full credit to them. 

I actually WOULD say that Morecambe were the better side by a country mile in the second half – but my job doesn’t depend on it. 

So let’s get back to matters concerning today’s match…

The Shrews arrived by the sea in North Lancashire today in one of League One’s relegation positions:  23^rd in the nascent table. This was after they lost their opening league fixture at home to Burton last Saturday by the only goal of the game. In mid-week, however, they came from 0-2 down against Lincoln City to draw and then win their League Cup tie on penalties.

The two clubs have met before on fourteen occasions in various competitions. Shrewsbury have won seven of these to Morecambe’s four. This has been a sort-of win/lose sandwich: the Shrimps contrived to lose all of their first five meetings and also the last two.

They went into today’s game, though, in a very positive frame of mind. With a little more ambition – according to Manager Steven Robinson – and certainly better concentration at the end, the Shrimps could (and probably should) have won their opening fixture at highly-fancied Ipswich last Saturday. Instead, they drew 2-2. Against Blackburn last Tuesday, they rode their luck in the first half at Ewood Park only to put on a truly masterful display in the second period to come from behind to deservedly dump their lofty Championship opponents out of the League Cup to set up a home tie against Preston North End in the next round. Before today’s game, Robbo said:

“Our home games are massive, we have to make it a hard place to come to, and we also have to play with a little bit of style and enjoy our football, that’s what the fans want, to be entertained, so hopefully we can do that. A point at Ipswich was brilliant, it should’ve been three. We have to follow that up with a performance and the result usually follows the performance and if we can get anywhere near the second half at Blackburn, then we’ll do okay on Saturday. You see the buzz around the town, we took 1,000 fans to Blackburn and 700 to Ipswich so the momentum is growing in the town, there’s a real feel-good factor about the place and we have to continue that.”

For the Shrews, Assistant Manager Aaron Wilbraham said this:

“Morecambe have already started off with a couple of decent results but this will be their first home game. They will be up for it, the crowd will be up for it so we need to go there and start on the front foot. We need to be ready because they will come at us. Preparing for them is a slight unknown seeing as they’ve just come into the league so we have to be on our guard against them. We need to focus on ourselves more than anything else. They’ve had some positive results in the first couple of games so we know it will be tough.”

It has been sunny in North Lancashire for the last couple of days. But as morning gave way to the afternoon today, the sky started to cloud over and a few spits of rain were beginning to fall by three o’clock. The game kicked-off in front of a bumper crowd, all eager to watch the Shrimps’ first ever home game in League One.

And they were not disappointed. The men in the red strip played confidently and assertively right from the start, moving the ball quickly on the deck and always trying to probe their way forward rather than hoof it up the field and pile after it. Arthur Gnahoua set-up Ryan Cooney for a shot which missed after a couple of minutes and the home side were probably marginally on top in the opening stages.  Having said that though, Salop weren’t here just to make up the numbers. Seven minutes had been played when Josh Vela tried his luck with a poor shot which went high and wide of the goal. Then, after almost quarter of an hour, Aaron Pierre headed wide from a corner kick when he might have at least hit the target.  Shortly after this – in the eighteenth minute – Greg Leigh also tried a hopeful shot from some way out for the home team. He too also missed by quite a margin.

But the first blow which counted was struck when the imperious Toumani Diagouraga  played the ball out to Adam Phillips on the Morecambe right with just over half an hour on the clock. I thought the chance had gone begging  when Nathaneal Ogbeta had a rush of blood to the head and clearly brought the Burnley loanee down with a really crude challenge in the penalty area. Adam picked himself up, dusted himself down and coolly slipped the ball past Marko Marosi in the away goal to put Morecambe one goal to the good. Well done that man to score a second very assured penalty in just a few days. But Hats Off to Toums as well; I thought that – with the occasional clever feint and constantly excellent use of the ball – he was absolutely outstanding again today. I also thought that the Shrimps continued to shade it until half time. Gnahoua drew a routine save from Marosi after almost forty minutes but the game seemed to be heading towards a narrow deficit for the visitors until just before the break. Then, the Shrews conceded a corner; Phillips took it and Cole Stockton was in the right place at the right time to force the ball over the line. That’s four goal in three games for the much-improved centre forward in eight days. His latest one made it two goals to the good half way through the match – and I thought Morecambe were good value for the lead.

Steve Cotterill tried to shake things up for Town in the second half by introducing huge centre forward Sam  Cosgrove – signed this week on-loan from Birmingham City – from the off. His sole contribution to the game was to square-up to his much smaller Opposite Number Cole Stockton literally right at the end of the game. He’s certainly big enough to be a Rugby player – but he doesn’t have to behave like one. Youngster Tom Bloxham – who scored the winning penalty against the Imps last Tuesday – was also sent on for the last few minutes. He, too failed to have any impact. The second half was quite intriguing to watch although there were few chances for either side and the play was sometimes disrupted by a very erratic performance by Referee Declan Bourne, who got a lot of things wrong today. The Shrews had periods of possession but did little with the ball and looked both short of ideas and – worryingly for them – any real threat. At the end of the game, Jökull Andrésson in the home goal had been limited to just having crosses to deal with until he made a good stop from  a close-range header from Matthew Pennington in injury time at the end of the match. The Shrimps always looked like they could find a way through the visitors’ rearguard and Josh McPake was instrumental in a lot of this: his was also a tremendous performance today and the work rate of the young man was phenomenal. Marosi was the busier of the two goalkeepers throughout the game and he did well to keep out efforts from Cole The Goal and impressive substitute Wes McDonald during the second half. But all-in-all, this was quite a comfortable win for the Shrimps which saw them go up to fifth in the table. Winless Shrewsbury, on the other hand, returned to Shropshire rock bottom of the table and – very alarmingly from their point of view – no goals scored either..

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor; 5 Sam Lavelle (C); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 11 Josh McPake (7 Wes McDonald 76’); 18 Adam Phillips (25 Alfie McCalmont 62’); 19 Shane McLoughlin (Y) (31 Scott Wootten 90’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 21 Ryan Cooney (Y). 

Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Kelvin Mellor; 6 Callum Jones;; 27 Shayon Harrison.

Shrewsbury Town: 1 Marko Marosi; 5 Matthew Pennington; 6 Aaron Pierre (Y); 17 Elliott Bennett (C) (18 Tom Bloxham 81’); 16 David Davis (Y); 10 Josh Vela; 3 Luke Leahy; 23 George Nurse; 11 Daniel Udoh; 15 Rekeil Pyke; 14 Nathaneal Ogbeta (9 Sam Cosgrove 45’). 

Substitutes not used: 13 Harry Burgoyne; 19 Charlie Caton; 21 Gregory; 22 Joshua Daniels. 

Ref: Declan Bourne. 

Att: 3772 (471 from Shrewsbury.)

Joe Biden: “Rotter-Damned United!” (even though he didn’t mean it that way…)

With just a single game played this season, Rotherham United found themselves at the dizzying heights of the top of the League One Table. But they arrived in North Lancashire tonight having lost their last two matches. They were dumped out of the League Cup at home last week when they lost by the odd goal in three to Accrington Stanley. Then they lost again on Saturday at our other nearish-neighbours Wigan to the only goal of the game. They were thus tenth in the league standings at tea time this evening and Manager Paul Warne – the loser who took them down last season – even though I don’t mean it that way (see below) would be looking for a quick end to the losing sequence. He said prior to the match about tonight’s opponents:

“I’m surprised – and I know that sounds like a very insulting thing to say, I don’t mean it that way. They had a really hard start and have done amazingly well. They have pulled a team together and got some really good experience in there as well. Here are two players that I have been linked to sign in the past with Greg Leigh and Toumani Diagouraga. I’ve always really liked the latter as a midfielder. I think Stockton has done really well and they’re a real physical force. I think they have had the shock result of the season so far, when they were leading at Ipswich and then ended up drawing. I have watched that game and they performed really well. Then they did well at Blackburn and beat a brand new Shrewsbury side, who have invested well in the summer. I think they have been the surprise package of the league as we speak. In pre-season, everyone was talking about the Ipswichs and the Sunderlands as always and Morecambe have arguably had the best start out of all the clubs from what people expected. Fair play to them, there’s no reason why they can’t continue.”

But could they continue tonight? Morecambe boss Stephen Robinson saw no reason why not:

“It is another difficult game on Tuesday night against a team who has come down from the Championship, they are a very good side. They are big, strong, physical – I have worked with a few of their players, Freddie Ladapo up front and they have a real strong athletic side that we will have to match. We have to do that to allow us to play our football, our performance in the second-half (against) Shrewsbury shows that we take the game to people, we are a very good side but we have to start well and match their physicality. Rotherham will bring a few fans as well, the atmosphere at the Mazuma was fantastic at the weekend, the Shrimps fans really got behind the boys and it is another game to look forward to. People are starting to notice us and that is down to the work that was done by the board and the players last season. We have to be realistic but we have made a great start.”

The Millers have played Morecambe on fifteen previous occasions. The first time was at old Christie Park in an FA Cup tie way back in November 1979. Morecambe drew and what sticks in  my mind is the massed ranks of Millers’ supporters in the Umbro or South stand chanting – almost to a man:

“There’s Only One Yorkshire Ripper!”

This was at a time when the lunatic Peter Sutcliffe was still at large – and still attacking and murdering women at random in his personal reign of terror as the Boys In Blue over in Yarksheer did virtually nothing about it. The local Constabulary did something on the day though: in the light of this traditional Greeting from God’s Own Country, they brought dogs into the Stadium. Which proceeded to bite virtually anything that moved.

In the Morecambe end. Well done lads.  What happened next? The Shrimps’ team went on strike and demanded more money for contesting the replay at Millmoor. The club capitulated at an emergency meeting at the M62’s Birch Services on the way to the game. Sadly, so did the team later on when they lost two-nil.

In total, Rotherham have won six of their previous fifteen contests with the Shrimps but lost five. Tonight’s task would be made easier for them with the loss of exceptionally promising Shrimps’ talent Jonah Ayunga with a long-term injury. That means – with fewer than four games played – Morecambe have already lost four of their squad (Jonathan Obika, Liam Gibson and Ryan Delaney had already been relegated to the Treatment Table due to serious injury). So, to repeat what I wrote in my recent Blackburn report: let’s hope the bad luck stops here: at this rate of attrition, Morecambe will have no players left by October.

A quick look at the team sheet made my heart sink. No Greg Leigh. No Aaron Wildig. But when I saw that the referee for tonight’s game was David `Tangled’ Webb, it sank even further. He’s fussy; he’s officious; he’s too large for a man of his diminutive size and his little legs and generous belly make it a challenge for him to keep up with play. So he doesn’t bother even trying to. He should be charged with bringing the fine art of refereeing into disrepute. I’ve moaned about him several times before: there are lot of poor officials on the EFL list but this man must be one of the worst. And he didn’t fail to disappoint tonight: he was absolutely hopeless throughout.

It was dry but cold for the time of year and quite windy with it as the game kicked-off. The visitors must have won the toss because they immediately insisted on a change of ends. All players on the pitch Took The Knee and – just as was the case last Saturday – the home crowd enthusiastically applauded as they did so.

Right from the start, the visitors in their all-black strip made it clear they had not come here for a draw: they attacked straight from the off. Chiedozie Ogbene immediately caught the eye: this nimble, tricky winger gave the Shrimps’ defence problems all night and if his final ball was better, United would certainly score many more goals.

Morecambe had the first chance though: a short corner routine saw Shane McLoughlin set-up Josh McPake for a shot which was blocked by the United defence.

The visitors showed their appreciation of their boss’ admiration of Cole Stockton by constantly catching him in a Rotherham Sandwich as the two defenders allotted to deal with him regularly tugged his shirt; hung onto his arms; repeatedly pushed or pulled him back and basically did whatever they could to stop Cole getting the ball. This happened throughout the contest. Whilst Mr Webb looked on and did absolutely nothing to stop it.

The referee and his officials were all wearing shirts identical in colour to the one sported by home goalkeeper Jökull Andrésson. A referee worth his salt would have noticed this before the game and done something about it. But Webby’s sole alternative would probably be a black one. That would clash with Rotherham’s colours. Blimey – wot a dilemma. Probably safest to do nothing…

But why not simply ask the home goalie to change before the game?

Because that would need a modicum of thought and even foresight – and it’s simply easier to blow your whistle whenever you feel like it, repeatedly wag your chubby finger in (usually the wrong) players’ faces and spray Shaving Foam all over the place. Oh – and book the man in the Morecambe net after just twenty minutes for `time wasting’.

How does that work, exactly? Twenty minutes gone. Nil-nil. Time wasting? What? How about all the time wasted later on – when corner-takers regularly ambled from the middle of the pitch to take United’s dead ball kicks? No – seemingly that’s ok. As is constantly infringing on home free-kicks and kicking the ball away when penalised. But that’s Dave the Webb for you…

As I say, the first half was a pretty even and entertaining contest occasionally spoiled by poor decisions by the incompetent in the middle. Arthur Gnahoua was a constant threat for the hosts and McPake was a handful early on before fading towards half time. There were chances for both sides – for Gnahoua for example, when he forced Ferguson to block his goal-bound effort after 28 minutes and – for the opposition – when Ben Wiles’ shot was also blocked after 32 minutes. Then, huge, nippy and aggressive striker Michael Smith’s fierce shot was blocked by Shrimps’ Skipper Sam Lavelle later on. But – in all truth – it has to be said that Andrésson was by far the busier goalkeeper throughout the first half.

Rotherham came out in the second period and immediately went onto the front foot – and stayed there until precisely an hour had been played. Wiles missed with a wild effort shortly after the re-start. In the fiftieth minute, substitute Richard Wood’s header from a free-kick was brilliantly saved by the home goalie but it was virtually one-way traffic for the first fifteen minutes. Morecambe were just a smidgeon too slow or inaccurate with their play – and they kept giving the ball away into the bargain. They were on the attack again in the fifty-ninth minute when they lost possession once more only to see the Millers immediately counter quickly and effectively as men poured forward down the wings and through the centre. There, 40 yards out and with no apparent danger, the tall tough guy who is Michael Smith received the ball, turned with it and then unleashed an absolute peach of a shot which swept past a despairing Andrésson as he leapt high to his left and smashed into the back of the net.  It was a gem of a strike. And it won the game. After that, Rotherham shut-up shop. And that was that.

At the end of the game, Morecambe fell to eleventh in League Two. At least they tried to play positively throughout, which is more than can be said of their opposition. At the end of their exercise in negativity for the last half an hour, Rotherham found themselves sixth in the table. Their Manager Paul Warne would probably see this as success but I disagree. With more ambition, his team could and probably would have won more convincingly tonight. Throughout, they had a little more nous that their opponents in the red shirts. You could clearly see that a lot of this team have Championship experience.

So why so many Dark Arts? Why the shameless time wasting at every opportunity? Why the play-acting and diving? Shane Ferguson actually screamed like a stuck pig when he received an ankle tap from behind during the second half and then rolled about in apparent agony as he craftily pulled one boot off so as to waste even more precious seconds of a match his team were winning putting it back on again. When he saw his number come up on the Substitutes’ Board  on the touchline near to him later on, he quickly tried to cross to the other side of the pitch to drag-out the tedium even more by leaving the field at a snail’s pace.

He should change the `n’ in his first name to `m’ – this kind of thing is pathetic. His Manager obviously encourages this sort of stuff though. Shame on him too – why spend almost all of injury time trying to keep the ball in the corner of the pitch and make no attempt even to move your forwards up the field? What sort of tactics are they? I suspect the Millers were relegated last season because of this utterly negative approach to the Beautiful Game. If they had played to their obvious strengths, I bet they would have stayed up. I don’t get it personally – if your team can play – then do so, for goodness sake. Thank god he’s not our Manager…

But there’s me indulging in Sour Grapes. In truth, I thought that tonight’s game was a bit of a Reality Check for Stephen Robinson and his team. But the real reason for my moaning is that I had a dream last night in which Morecambe beat the Millers four-nil and the team from Yarksheer have now gone and ruined it. They’ve also ruined the end of this article, which I wrote yesterday after watching the World News on the telly in the expectation that Rotten Rotherham would lose this evening. So please forgive me the extremely contrived and tired `dream’ suggestion as I battle on regardless.

In my imagination, the screen of the international press hub in the corner of my living room started to flash. What did the red letters on it say? They said: CAUTION – POLITICAL SATIRE ALERT!

I wondered what that might mean… So please bear with me for a further moment or two. Please also remember that Rotherham United had just lost 4-0 in my dream. This is important.

I saw a message download from the wire onto my hub. It read:

`Associated Press can confirm that a packed international Press Briefing was held in New York this evening. The event had been hastily transferred from the White House to the site of the 9/11 attacks which prompted the US invasion of Afghanistan precisely twenty years ago. Close to the place where so many people had lost their lives, the United States’ President – ashen-faced Joe Biden, 78 – addressed the assembled members of the world’s media. This followed intense all-day sessions between the USA’s Chief Executive and America’s Best foreign policy analysts at the CIA, the State Department, the National Security Council and the Pentagon. We can report that President Biden announced:

“I would personally like to salute Saul Warner and his tremendous Rotterdam United soccer team tonight for their outstanding performance at a stadium where – from the sounds of it – far more fans than were expected actually turned-up. Yes: More Came. I can only describe the exceptional efforts of Saul and his team as almost as heroic as our own on the World Stage in Kabul during the last couple of days. Well done everybody! God Bless America! God Bless New York! And – most of all – God Bless the New York Stadium!”’

Thankyou for your indulgence.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson (Y); 2 Kelvin Mellor; 4 Anthony O’Connor; 5 Sam Lavelle (C); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 11 Josh McPake (27 Shayon Harrison 75’); 19 Shane McLaughlin (18 Adam Phillips 65’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua (7 Wes McDonald 67’); 25 Alfie McCalmont; 21 Ryan Cooney (Y). 

Subs Not Used: 6 Callum Jones; 31 Scott Wootten; 16 Jacob Mensah; 26 Connor Pye.

Rotherham United: 1 Viktor Johansson; 20 Michael Ihiekwe; 23 Rarmani Edmonds-Green (6 Richard Wood 45’); 2 Wes Harding; 18 Ollie Rathbone; 11 Chiedozie Ogbene; 16 Jamie Lindsay; 8 Ben Wiles; 24 Michael Smith (Y); 17 Shane Ferguson (3 Joe Mattock (Y) 71’); 19 Joshua Kayode (7 Kieran Sadlier 77’).

Subs not used: 30 Joshua Chapman 22 Hakeem Odoffin; 4 Dan Barlaser; 14 Mickel Miller.

Ref: David Webb.

Att: 4004 (617 from Yorkshire.)

Where’s Wally? – He’s sitting in the stands!

Oliver: “More!” Comes Back To Haunt Morecambe….

Morecambe made the long journey to the other end of England today to visit Gillingham at their Priestfield Stadium in deepest, darkest Kent. They arrived in eleventh place in the League One table, having registered their first defeat of the season when they lost at home to Rotherham United by the only goal of the game last Tuesday night. Meanwhile, the Gills were also losing – 1-0 at Plymouth. In previous meetings, the Shrimps’ record against the Kentish club is poor. They lost their first ever match close to the River Medway five-nil. Since then, they have lost another three; drawn three and only won one, ten years ago back in North Lancashire. In four previous visits to Priestfield in all, Morecambe have only taken a single point home with them again. So the omens weren’t good. However, with three league games played so far, Steve Evans’ team has yet to pick-up three points and consequently were eighteenth in the table prior to three o’clock having drawn two and lost one of their three League One games so far.

What can we say about the Gills’ Manager which hasn’t been said before? This gentleman – who could be charitably described as a Larger Than Life Glaswegian character – can probably be summed-up by the fact that he wasn’t allowed to stand on the touchline today. He was banned by the FA during the week and fined a thousand pounds for abusing a match official earlier this month. Ironically he did this during the only game his team have won this season. This was against Crawley in the League Cup, which the Gills finally won on penalties. I think the kindest thing to say about Steve Evans is: if you ever manage to discover which Charm School he graduated from, don’t go there: it’s obviously not very good. But what did he have to say about today’s opponents 24 hours before his team actually played them? Strangely, he referred back to Gillingham’s very first game of the season when doing so:

“Morecambe are meticulously organised and work so hard, and one more important factor is that they’ve got some very good footballers. It will be tough tomorrow. The first thing you have to have is respect for all opponents. Morecambe will be organised and disciplined. We had an excellent performance against Lincoln. If we win tomorrow it becomes a very good start. We need to get three points, but it will be difficult. This is a good test for us.”

Morecambe’s former player and current First Team Coach Diarmuid O’Carroll – who was not banned from the touchline today – said prior to the game:

“It’s a very, very tough game. Gillingham are proven, they know what they’re all about, they’re very, very difficult to play against. They’re a very physical side, they’re bought into their way of playing; their style of play; it’s a tough place to go. Everyone’s different in terms of their style, but you know that Steve Evans’ going to have his team organised; they’re going to be hard to beat; they’re going to fight and run for him so if we get any points down there, they’re going to be earned and we’ll deserve it coming back up the road.”

The game gave Vadaine Oliver the opportunity to show Morecambe fans what we have been missing since he left to be closer to his family a couple of years ago. With seventeen League goals and nineteen altogether last season, he was the club’s leading scorer. In my opinion, he would make the perfect foil for Cole Stockton which Morecambe Manager Steven Robinson hopes Courtney Duffus  – signed from Bromley Town this week – will prove to be. Dan Adshead had been signed on-loan from Premiership Norwich City for the Gills this week and he went straight into the starting line-up for Mr Evans’ side.

Morecambe named both newcomer Courtney Duffus and Scott Wootten on the bench today. Kyle Letheren was injured in the warm-up before the Rotherham game last Tuesday and Stephen Robinson thus named the Shrimps’ legendary stopper and current goalkeeping Coach – Barry Roche – as cover for young  Jökull Andrésson.

It was overcast but dry as the game started. Both sets of players Took the Knee and the home side went straight onto the front foot. With barely a minute played, Ryan Jackson received a lucky ricochet, took the ball past Greg Leigh and slid the ball across to Mustafa Carayol, who missed an excellent chance with a shot which went wide of the target from only six yards out. He wasn’t going to be denied for long, though. Just four minutes had been played when Vadaine Oliver drew a foul from Anthony O’Connor. Kyle Dempsey slid the ball to Carayol and he struck a thunderbolt of a strike past Jökull Andrésson from all of thirty-five yards. The visitors responded well and Cole Stockton had a shot blocked at the other end before Ryan Cooney blasted the rebound high and wide. There was a decent shout for a penalty to the Shrimps for a foul on Adam Phillips just a minute later but Referee Tom Neild wasn’t interested. Arthur Gnahoua tested Jamie Cumming in the home goal with a shot after ten minutes which went straight at him. Then Jack Tucker did well to head a dangerous ball away from the Gills’ penalty area just before Cole reached it only to see Josh McPake’s low effort comfortably saved by Cumming with fourteen minutes on the clock. The visitors continued to look lively despite a couple of attacks from the hosts but the second key moment of the game arrived after 24 Minutes. Stockton had his back to goal when he received the ball on the edge of the penalty area; spun and took on the home defence in the way he did at Ipswich two weeks ago. It ended with the same result: he scored with another outstanding goal as he wriggled his way to a point where he could squeeze the ball from the left-hand side of the penalty area from his point of view past the goalkeeper low into the far corner of the net. That was basically it until half time but Morecambe probably looked marginally the better and more convincing side.

Gillingham changed their tactics early in the second period. They initially backed-off and tried to play on the break as Morecambe were encouraged to press further up the field. Leigh galloped up the left flank early doors , received the ball from Cole and then put in a superb cross only to find no man in a red shirt in the vicinity. He got the ball over again a minute or so later to see it headed away for a corner kick. From this, Phillips slung over a cross which Skipper Sam Lavelle headed into the side netting. With the sun beginning to shine and the home team continuing to back off, substitute Wes McDonald tried his luck after 56 minutes with a wild shot which was way off target. With an hour played, Jackson made good progress for the hosts and slung over a cross which Oliver headed virtually straight at Morecambe’s goalkeeper.  Then Cole tried his luck again almost immediately afterwards at the other end but missed this time. It was around about this period that the Gills seemed to stir themselves and actually start to play on the front foot. As they did so, the noise at the Priestfield suddenly also went up a notch. Carayol tried an ambitious overhead kick which came to nothing before substitute Danny Lloyd-McGoldrick forced a decent save from the visiting keeper after 73 minutes. Then, four minutes later, Andrésson was fouled by Oliver but instead of taking his time and waiting for his team-mates to regroup, he tried to immediately play the ball out with a pass which went straight into touch. From this, the always bothersome long throw which the Gills used to their advantage throughout the game fell to Lloyd-McGoldrick – and down he went under a challenge from O’Connor which may or may not have been a foul. But Referee Tom Neild – after quite a long pause – adjudged that it was and awarded a penalty. Oliver belted this straight down the middle against his former employers – and that was that. Gillingham shut-up shop in the cynical and tedious way that all Steve Evans’ teams always do and the visitors never really looked like they had the nous to get back into the game.

So Morecambe’s very poor record against the Gills continued. This was a disappointing result today. Morecambe were a bit naïve against a team which looked pretty pedestrian and frankly nothing out of the ordinary. They need to use the ball better and not give away needless opportunities. The winning goal for the hosts came about from a poor clearance from our young goalkeeper which he didn’t need to make. He’d have probably got away with it in League Two. But not any more…

Gillingham’s first league win of the season propelled them into fifteenth place in the table, one point and a single position ahead of the Shrimps.

Gillingham: 1 Jamie Cumming; 2 Ryan Jackson; 5 Max Ehmer; 6 Jack Tucker; 14 Robbie McKenzie; 8 Kyle Dempsey; 4 Stuart O’Keefe; 11 Ben Reeves (10 Olly Lee 62’); 16 Dan Adshead (17 Danny Lloyd-McGoldrick 50’); 24 Mustafa Carayol; 19 Vadaine Oliver (Y).

Subs Not Used: 12 Aaron Chapman; 18 Rhys Bennett; 23 Harvey Lintott; 27 Bailey Akehurst.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 21 Ryan Cooney (Y); 5 Sam Lavelle (C) (Y); 4 Anthony O’Connor; 3 Greg Leigh; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 6 Callum Jones (19 Shane McLoughlin 68’); 18 Adam Phillips (28 Courtney Duffus 81’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 9 Cole Stockton; 11 Josh McPake (7 Wes McDonald 45’).

Subs Not Used:  30 Barry Roche; 15 Ryan Delaney; 25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Scott Wootten.

Ref: Tom Neild.

Att: 3,789 – about 100 of them from Morecambe. It’s a long way back and seems even longer when you’ve just lost…

Preston North End Morecambe’s Hopes…

Preston North End visited the Mazuma Stadium for the very first time tonight to see if they could achieve what their fellow-members of the Championship – Blackburn Rovers – had failed to do at Ewood Park two weeks ago: dump Morecambe out of the League Cup. The Lilywhites arrived on the back of a stuttering start to their own Championship campaign. Although they beat Peterborough United by the only goal of the game last Saturday, they had lost all three of their league matches before that. Their only victory prior to beating Posh was when they got the better of League Two Mansfield 0-3 in Nottinghamshire in the previous round of this evening’s competition.

Morecambe’s form, conversely, has been almost diametrically opposite to their visitors’ so far. They started well but their form has dropped-off with two defeats in the last two games. Manager Steven Robinson has been plagued by injuries and the need this has created to constantly shuffle his squad. Greg Leigh wasn’t risked last week against Rotherham because of twinges to an old hamstring injury. Kyle Letheren was hurt in the warm-up for that game and his absence has meant a return to the subs’ bench for club icon and current Goalkeeping Coach Barry Roche. Aaron Wildig and Jonathan Obika have been unavailable for selection all season so far due to injury; Ryan Delaney is barely recovered from being hurt in the Shrimps’ opening league match at Ipswich and Liam Gibson won’t be available for some time either after picking-up an obviously really painful injury at Blackburn. Tonight, then, Robbo had little option other than to throw new players into the fray yet again. The games are coming thick and fast and the Morecambe Manager’s greatest worry currently must be not just finding his strongest starting eleven from a squad still getting used to playing alongside each other but also to ensure they all remain fit into the bargain.

Previous clashes between the two clubs have all been in cup competitions. Morecambe won the first one of these – in the League Cup – 1-2 in the League Cup during 2007 at Deepdale but they have lost every one of their four subsequent meetings.

Stephen Robinson – who once played for North End – said before tonight’s latest contest:

“It is a nice draw and it is one that I wanted; either Preston or Stoke. A home game is what we wanted and Preston gives us a good opportunity for us to test ourselves. They struggled to get off the mark with a win but did at the weekend. They have a lot of depth in their squad. Make no mistake it is a tough game but we’re going to go out there and enjoy ourselves. The next two games are going to be a full house and it just shows the direction the club is heading in. The atmosphere in the last two home games has been excellent. It helps a lot and there is a great feeling around the football club. Win, lose or draw, we will continue to stay level-headed. We know what we set out to achieve at the start of the season and I don’t get too carried away when we win.”

Opposite number Frankie McAvoy assessed the task facing his men this evening with these words the day before the match:

“It’ll be a tough game. Stephen Robinson’s been and done really, really well. He was excellent in Scotland with Motherwell, he did extremely well up there. He’s a good experienced manager and he’s got his team very well organised, very structured, difficult to beat, and to be fair it’ll be a tough game. They knocked Blackburn out in the last round. I said when we played Mansfield Town, these games are all tough, you’ve got to earn the right to go and win and I expect nothing but a really hard game tomorrow night. I know we’ve sold all our tickets to go there which is absolutely fantastic for the Preston fans and I just hope we’re capable of delivering a positive result tomorrow night for them.”

Mr McAvoy had worries, too, about the current unavailability of some of his own key players. Former Morecambe favourite Tom Barkhuizen along with team-mates Alan Browne, Ched Evans and Liam Lindsay have all been affected by the Covid pandemic and none of them was available for selection tonight.

It had been a beautiful, warm sunny day in Morecambe today and the town was packed with visitors earlier on. The Maz was also packed as the game kicked-off on a balmy almost windless evening.

The first half was a good game to watch with both teams going for the win and very little negative play from either side. Morecambe had the first chance after six minutes when a corner was cleared only for the ball to be played in again from the left flank to the far post where Captain Sam Lavelle headed straight at Declan Rudd in the visitors’ goal when he might have done better. The ball went straight up to the other end; Preston played it into the space between the centre backs and an unmarked Sepp van den Berg swept it home beautifully past a helpless Jökull Andrésson. It was a poor goal to give away. But the second one the hosts conceded was even worse. The young goalkeeper dived along the ground in his own penalty area just as Skipper Lavelle was sliding in from the opposite direction. The goalkeeper got the ball; there was a sickening collision between the two of them and the ball slipped – or was probably jarred – out of his hands for a grateful van den Berg to double his tally for the night with a simple tap-in. In the meantime, there had been a couple of chances for North End as Brad Potts warmed the home goalie’s hands with a fairly tame shot after ten minutes and the young Icelander did well to punch away Ryan Ledson’s free kick ten minutes later. There had been a break in play after about 25 minutes when one of the EFL’s better Referees – James Oldham – was forced to retire with some sort of injury. Paul Graham took over and what appeared to be Father Xmas with a trimmed beard ran the line – well done that man because he looked absolutely ancient. Mr Graham’s inexperience in controlling things soon became obvious. When PNE were awarded a free kick by him on their left shortly after he took over, for instance, he took the Shaving Cream out of his back pocket and sprayed a line where the ball should be placed. Then he paced-out ten yards and sprayed another line on the pitch for the Morecambe defenders to stand behind. And as he was doing so, North End players moved the ball two feel nearer. Cat-calls from the home crowd drew his attention to this and the visitors relented by moving the ball back a foot. Yes – just twelve inches. And he let them do it. I suspect he was also in two minds when Preston scored their second goal. A more experienced referee would certainly have stopped the play when Lavelle and Andrésson collided – they were clearly both genuinely hurt. But he didn’t do that either.

A less determined team than the Shrimps might well have thrown the towel in after this unluckiest of ways to fall two goals behind. Instead – roared on by the home crowd – the men in the red shirts started to try to get back on terms. As half time approached it was All Hands To The Pump for Preston as they struggled to clear a corner. Minutes later – as the match entered Extra Time as the five minutes which resulted from the painful collision between two of Morecambe’s key players were added-on, the home team went one better. From a free kick which the men in the white shirts just couldn’t clear, Anthony O’Connor forced the ball over the line to reduce the arrears to a single goal.

It was a great time to score – just before half time. Whoever scored the next goal would surely go on to win…

Morecambe had the first chance. Courtney Duffus – thrown in at the deep end after playing at non-league level just two weeks ago – showed a couple of really deft touches tonight and he tested Rudd in the visitors’ goal after 49 minutes with a shot which was pushed away from the danger area. Potts immediately missed the target at the other end with a low shot. They came much closer after fifty-three minutes when Daniel Johnson forced an absolutely top drawer save at full length from Andrésson with a thunderbolt of a strike from far out on the Preston left. But the stadium – noisy at both ends throughout the game – exploded when Cole Stockton had the skill to elude the tight marking which held him in a straitjacket for most of the night and smashed home a well-deserved equaliser as he latched onto a low ball into the penalty area. Momentum was definitely on the side of the Shrimps at this point in the proceedings.

But it seemed to me that from this point on, North End simply stepped up a gear. They played at a faster pace; they pressed harder and further up the pitch – and Morecambe, in all truth – had little answer to them. Cole put the ball in the net again in injury time only to see it immediately chalked off – he was offside, I think. But by that time, the match was well and truly done and dusted. Preston retook the lead just five minutes after being pegged-back to equality with a sumptuous half–volley from Ryan Ledson right into the top corner of the net. Then Sepp van den Berg (Boo!) removed any doubt with another goal ten minutes from time. Morecambe huffed and puffed. But Preston, for me, always had the edge.

During the second half, I lost count of the number of times Ryan Cooney delayed taking throw-ins – and then immediately gifted possession of the ball to the opposition. He had a poor match by his standards this evening and two attempts he had on goal in both halves were almost remarkably woeful. This, in my opinion, was the fundamental difference between the two teams tonight: North End didn’t make basic errors such as these.

However, let’s not be all downcast and doom and gloom. Morecambe played some really good stuff at times tonight. For brief periods, they were the better team. Toumani Diagouraga was imperious yet again – probably the outstanding player on the field tonight. Cole scored once more and the goalkeeper – despite the calamitous nature of the second goal – looked to be already in a different class: at just nineteen years of age. Robbo must be encouraged by a lot of what he saw. To be beaten by a Championship team is no disgrace – and Preston will know that they were in a proper game tonight. Good luck to them in the next round.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 21 Ryan Cooney; 5 Sam Lavelle (C); 4 Anthony O’Connor; 3 Greg Leigh; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 28 Courtney Duffus (Y) (18 Adam Phillips 79’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua (7 Wes McDonald 75’); 19 Shane McLoughlin (11 Josh McPake 79’); 9 Cole Stockton; 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Subs Not Used:  30 Barry Roche; 6 Callum Jones; 16 Jacob Mensah; 31 Scott Wootten.

Preston North End: 1 Declan Rudd; 2 Sepp van den Berg (Y); 14 Jordan Storey; 16 Andrew Hughes (Y); 15 Joe Rafferty (5 Patrick Bauer 73’); 44 Brad Potts; 18 Ryan Ledson (Y); 11 Daniel Johnson (7 Tom Bayliss 82’); 3 Greg Cunningham; 31 Scott Sinclair (24 Sean Maguire 58’); 19 Emil Riis Jakobsen.

Subs Not Used: 12 Daniel Iversen; 4 Ben Whiteman; 32 Josh Earl; 17 Lewis Leigh; 40 Jamie Thomas.

Ref: James Oldham (Paul Graham from 33’).

Att: 4,334 (1,774 from Preston).

Sheffield Wednesday Score Again – and Lose…

Well – who’d have thought it? Morecambe playing Rotherham Tuesday one week; and mighty Sheffield Wednesday the next one. And in the same league division as well.

Eee – it teks me back tha’ knows.

I can’t quite stretch back to Morecambe’s first ever game (against Fleetwood who won 1-4 at the cricket ground here in the town), which was played exactly 101 years ago to the day. But I can remember matches such as when Morecambe beat Matlock Town by two goals to nil at Christie Park in the Northern Premier League, for instance. Yes – Mighty Matlock, the pride of, er, Matlock. Probably. That was almost exactly fifty-two years ago: on Saturday 23^rd August 1969 when – as a fourteen-year old – I would be standing with my mate Paul and his dad on the cinder bank which was finally known as the Car Wash terrace. I don’t think any of the three of us would expect `little old Morecambe’ to be plying its trade in the Football League at any time in the future way back then. It wasn’t possible for one thing – what is now the EFL was very definitely a Closed Shop all those years ago. But as I sat in the main stand at a (virtually) brand new ground with Paul again today at a brand new game in a brand new league, I’m sure we both had to pinch ourselves to really appreciate the fact that the club has progressed so far.

Once-mighty Wednesday arrived sitting right at the top of League One. The huge potential – and actual – fanbase of this club fallen on hard times was illustrated by the fact that their entire allocation of 1,779 tickets was sold out as long ago as Monday as soon as they went on sale. Their – in my opinion – vastly underrated Manager Darren Moore has overseen the Owls draw their first League Match at Charlton and then win all three of the subsequent ones – without conceding even a single goal so far. Perhaps most significantly, they beat Rotherham – who I thought were simply too good for the Shrimps in their previous game here just over a week ago – by two goals to nil on their own patch last Saturday. (The only match the Owls have lost so far was when they were beaten in the League Cup on penalties by neighbours Huddersfield in the First Round.)

History also favoured the visitors from Yorkshire: in the clubs’ only ever previous meeting, Dave Jones’ overly cynical and physical bunch of bruisers booted Morecambe out of the FA Cup here in front of live television cameras almost exactly ten years ago.  (Guess who the Referee was? Yes – it was that internationally renowned Man in the Middle, David `World-Wide’ Webb again…)

The raw aggression and the Dark Arts clearly worked though: Wednesday were promoted to the Championship at the end of the campaign. (But it didn’t work a division higher: Dave Jones was sacked in December 2013 with his team having won only one league match all season. Part of his legacy was a £2000 fine and an FA ban following a `fracas’ with the Coach of Brighton & Hove Albion – who Jones’ subsequently described as a `nobody’- during a game between the two clubs. Nature Note: Owls and Seagulls clearly do not get on…)

Anyway…  Darren Moore is the second away Manager to visit the Maz this season who has been stricken with Covid-19 and brought very low by the virus: he suffered pneumonia and blood-clots on the lungs last season as his team lost their struggle to remain in the Championship. Fortunately, he won his own struggle to stay with the rest of us and hopefully, he is on the way to a full recovery presently.

Before the game, Mr Moore made this assessment of today’s opposition:

“Morecambe are a team used to winning given their promotion last season and a club that’s made huge strides over the last couple of years. They are brave on the ball, they try and play the game at a good tempo which is great to see. They are not in League One to make up the numbers, they are a good, well organised team and if you’re not on your game they will cause problems for you. We have to make sure we are at our absolute best and continue to build on performances.”

Opposite Number Stephen Robinson’s team, meanwhile, were sixteenth in League One prior to the game. Robbo made no bones about the difficulty that overcoming a team unbeaten in League One posed prior to his team’s latest test. Reflecting on his men’s midweek defeat by Preston North End, the Shrimps’ boss said:

“The games are certainly not getting any easier, but that’s what we are here for – all that hard work that the players put in last season has led us until this point. These are the games the fans want to come to, there was a full house then and there will be another one Saturday, and we are really looking forward to it. It is a tough, tough challenge, they haven’t conceded a goal yet and we have to try and change that – we will be aiming to take points on Saturday and if we do that I think we will all be satisfied with how we’ve started.”

However, the real question to be answered was: would today’s clash lead to Sheffield’s fourth league win in a row – or Morecambe’s fourth loss in succession in all competitions?

The weather has been beautiful for the last few days in North Lancashire: sunny and warm with barely a hint of wind. Today was no exception. Both teams Took the Knee and then a game played in an excellent spirit and which never faltered for a moment began in front of a record crowd of almost five and a half thousand fans. Wednesday looked sharp and quick and had a good balance of brawn and brain right across the team. You could soon see why they were top of the table. But the men in the red shirts were clearly up for it too and they had the earliest good chance. After Shane McLoughlin had been fouled just outside the Sheffield penalty area to the Shrimps’ left after five minutes; League One’s top scorer Cole Stockton shot low right through the defending wall but visiting keeper Bailey Peacock-Farrell saved his effort without too much fuss. There were several other chances for both sides – Liam Palmer missed the target with a header after a quarter of an hour for the visitors; Alfie McCalmont’s shot missed at the other end with just over half an hour played and Callum Paterson also headed wide with thirty-seven minutes on the clock, for instance. The nearest either side came to scoring, however, was when a deep cross by Jack Hunt from the Wednesday right looped over stranded home goalkeeper Jökull Andrésson and bounced off his far post. In truth, Andrésson was the busier of the two goalkeepers during a first half which Wednesday probably just about shaded.

The visitors opened the proceedings in the second period playing at a faster pace and pressing far further up the field. With the massed ranks of their supporters roaring them on, they dominated the play for at least the first ten minutes. George Byers could not have come any closer when his tremendous curling strike from a long way out hit Morecambe’s Icelandic goalkeeper’s left-hand post and bounced harmlessly away after just four minutes. A minute later, the same player fed Lee Gregory – who had narrowly missed with a header right at the end of the first half. Gregory turned and shot in one brilliant movement but his attempt went just too high. With almost an hour played, diminutive Owls Skipper Barry Bannan played-in Gregory again on the left-hand side of the penalty area from his point of view but Andrésson’s brave save right at his feet kept the ball out. It had been virtually all Wednesday up until this point but Stephen Robinson responded by changing his formation by replacing a forward player – Courtney Duffus – with a defensive one in the shape of Ryan Delaney after an hour. He joined Adam Phillips, who Robbo had also sent on a few minutes earlier. In my opinion, the introduction of Phillips totally changed the game. Adam was prepared to press and harry further up the pitch. He linked-up well with Toumani Diagouraga and Cole Stockton and for virtually the first time in the match, Sheffield didn’t look quite as assured at the back. 63 minutes were on the clock when McLoughlin fed Cole the Goal – who had basically not had a kick so far faced with Man Mountain but extraordinarily effective Dominic Iorfa. Stockton did what he does best only to be denied another goal by a good save from Peacock-Farrell at the cost of a corner. Phillips took it from the Shrimps’ left; there was Panic Stations in the away defence and next thing, the ball was in the back of the net. Only afterwards was the goal accredited to Wednesday’s unfortunate Dennis Adeniran.

As the visiting supporters fell more or less silent, you wondered how Wednesday would react to the unusual position of being behind in a league game. Darren Moore sent on double substitutes almost immediately after the goal but I actually thought that the Yorkshire side played worse with them on the pitch than they had done without them. The home goalkeeper was the Man Of The Match in my opinion today. But after Morecambe went ahead, he had little to do and the game ended with the hosts looking the likeliest to add to their lead as opposed to conceding it.

So it was a record-breaking day. The biggest crowd ever at this venue. Wednesday’s first defeat. Wednesday’s first goal conceded. They can still argue that nobody from an opposing team has scored against them yet, though. They will also take positives even in defeat today. This Wednesday team – in stark contrast to Dave Jones’ Neanderthals – play the game the right way. They will perform far worse this season and still win. The defeat saw them slip to second in League One behind another club whose glory days are far in the past: Sunderland.

But for Morecambe, this continues to be as good as it has ever been. I thought they were tremendous today. Paul and I were wondering what would have happened this time last season if this fixture had occurred then. Derek Adams had only one (albeit usually very effective) way of playing – on the break. When we considered the hammerings we endured against Cambridge and particularly Newcastle here last season, we both feared that we would have lost this game today. In Robbo, however, we seem to have a Manager who is prepared to change his formation and personnel when it is not working in an all-out attempt to win. It worked at Blackburn. It worked again today. Well done that man.

Tonight – with next Saturday’s game at Crewe postponed due to international call-ups – the Shrimps have time to recover and get injured players ready for the fray once again.

Let me repeat that: “next Saturday’s game at Crewe postponed due to international call-ups”. That’s us – not them – for the first time ever. Wow…

It was good to see Liam Gibson and Ryan Delaney back in the thick of things today. Aaron Wildig is clearly also ready to return to the front line. Things are really looking up: Morecambe went up fourteenth in the League One table at the end of play as well. Judged on this performance, they will be even higher before very long.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 21 Ryan Cooney (Y); 5 Sam Lavelle (C); 4 Anthony O’Connor; 3 Greg Leigh (22 Liam Gibson 79’); 19 Shane McLoughlin (Y); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 25 Alfie McCalmont (18 Adam Phillips 56’); 28 Courtney Duffus (15 Ryan Delaney 60’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 9 Cole Stockton.

Subs Not Used:  1 Kyle Letheren; 7 Wes McDonald; 10 Aaron Wildig; 31 Scott Wootten.

Sheffield Wednesday: 1 Bailey Peacock-Farrell; 32 Jack Hunt; 6 Dominic Iorfa; 2 Liam Palmer; 18 Marvin Johnson; 14 George Byers (Y); 8 Dennis Adeniran (26 Lewis Wing 73’); 13 Callum Paterson (23 Theo Corbeanu 65’); 10 Barry Bannan (C); 3 Jaden Brown (Y) (20 Florian Kamberi 65’); 9 Lee Gregory.

Subs Not Used:  28 Joe Wildsmith; 17 Fisayo Dele-Bashiru; 34 Ciaran Brennan; 40 Sylla Sow.

Ref: Anthony Backhouse.

Att:  5,481 (a minimum of 1,779 being Owls fans.)

Robinson: “I’m delighted!”

Robinson: “I’m Gutted!”

Phoenix club AFC Wimbledon visited the Mazuma stadium today with the very enviable record of being the team which has scored more goals than any other in the entire EFL: eighteen so far in all. Having said that, they were only tenth in the League One table, having drawn three and won only one of their last five games. This was last Saturday, when they walloped much-fancied Oxford United 3-1 at Plough Lane. In past meetings with the Shrimps, the Dons had slightly the worse of things, having drawn three and lost four of ten previous League Two fixtures. Mark Robinson – Wimbledon’s Head Coach – said prior to today’s eleventh meeting:

“Morecambe are doing very well. They are really hard-working but they also do things on the ball that make them a real threat. They have got some good players with good movement, particularly when they get into the final third. We will be aware of that, but fundamentally they are really hard-working, so we know that we’ve got our work cut out, but it’s another game we are looking forward to.”

Morecambe, in contrast, were five places lower in the table and two points behind their visitors, albeit having played one game fewer. They have won two and lost two of their last five league matches. Stephen Robinson, the Morecambe Manager, expressed his view of the task facing his men today in these words: 

“I’ve watched Wimbledon numerous times now. They are a good side. They are very well coached; you can tell that. They change formations; they have some very good individuals. I think they are a similar team to ourselves but these are the games that really matter: your Sheffield Wednesdays and Ipswiches: they are bonus results; these are the results that really count in the season at the end of it.” 

The Transfer Window has closed since last time Morecambe played – and club Captain Sam Lavelle disappeared through it. He has signed for League One rivals Charlton Athletic for an undisclosed fee ten months before his contract with the Shrimps was due to expire. In an Instagram message, Skipper Sam wrote: 

“Its been an emotional day leaving a club that means so much to me and my family. Morecambe has been not only such a big part of my career but my life as well and I’ll be forever grateful for everyone at the club who’s helped me develop as a player and as a person. I’ve loved every single minute. I want to thank all you fans for the indescribable backing and support you’ve given me for the last 4 years. I hope you can understand my decision and I’ll 100% be back one day.” 

Good luck to him. He – and his dad Ben before him – have been fantastic servants to the club both on and off the field, where the Club Captain has played an active and really positive role in the community. For his sterling work, he has been awarded the Professional Footballers’ Association’s Community Champion Trophy both this year and last. Sam’s involvement in community issues in a time of a Pandemic has been picked up by a statement on Facebook by club administrator Stuart Rae: 

“It’s leadership off the field that makes him so likeable for me, and what I think we’ll miss the most. Be that the way he continues to recognise and remember former teammate Christian Mbulu, arranging payments from the squad to some club employees that faced wage cuts during COVID-19, how he discreetly and respectfully contacted friends of supporter Adam Robson following his passing to forward the squad’s sympathies, or going out of his way to sign autographs and pose for pictures with young fans…. He just went above and beyond, and things like that shouldn’t be forgotten or overlooked. “

Amen to that. Sam Lavelle is a tremendously talented prospect who has always displayed a maturity far beyond his years. His are big boots to fill and he will be very badly missed. In other transfer news, Kelvin Mellor has also left the club and is now a Carlisle United player. Good luck to him too. 

Someone who doesn’t seem to need any luck at the moment is Cole Stockton. Morecambe’s outstanding centre forward has won both the League One Player of the Month award for August as well as the award for the best goal for his tremendous first effort against Ipswich on the opening day. He was leading the line again today but there was a welcome return from long-term injury for Aaron Wildig as well.

Wimbledon entered the game on the back of a publicity launch for a group called Fair Play at Plough Lane this week.  Given their own experience of having their heart and soul devoured whole by the so-called MK Dons, Wimbledon are trying to lead the way for fans to take more control of their clubs right across Britain. Andy Burnham was involved because of his involvement as Mayor of Manchester with Bury FC – who have suffered a similar fate to the original Crazy Gang, albeit for different reasons – and further details of the group can be found here: 

https://www.fairgameuk.org/management-team

The weather had been variable in North Lancashire before the game. It was overcast most of the time but then the sun would break out briefly. As the players warmed-up, though, black clouds being blown across Morecambe Bay from Cumbria – where it was clearly raining heavily – finally arrived to soak everybody on the pitch.  Both teams Took The Knee just before kick-off and it soon became apparent why Wimbledon score so many goals. Right from the off, they were looking to play on the break, using the ball intelligently and passing their way up the pitch rather than doing any of the kick and rush stuff the old Crazy Gang was notorious for. Just five minutes were on the clock when Depo Mebude was badly fouled on the left hand edge of the home penalty area from his point of view. Two Wimbledon players shaped-up to take the free kick before Anthony Hartigan decided to have a direct shot at goal. From an acute angle, he swerved the ball straight into Jökull Andrésson’s top left corner. One-nil to the Dons and a poor goal to concede at that: the young Icelander should have saved it. The visitors continued to play some slick, quick football and seemed to be just a tad too quick for our lads, too many of whom looked slightly off the pace to me. Slightly irritating Wimbledon Captain Alex Woodyard walloped the ball over the Morecambe bar following good interplay between two of his team-mates after seven minutes. A clearly rehearsed Morecambe routine where the goalkeeper played the ball to Captain O’Connor to his right presumably for the skipper to work the ball up the field was constantly frustrated by committed Dons’ pressing but the team kept persevering with a ploy which never paid any dividends. After fourteen minutes, however, visiting goalkeeper Nik Tzanev earnt his corn with a good save from Arthur Gnahoua. The visitors had the next really good chance though: out of nothing, Henry Lawrence’s tremendous shot from distance only just missed Andrésson’s left-hand post after 36 minutes. Right at the death, Morecambe’s loanee goalkeeper redeemed himself somewhat with a double save first of all from Mebude – which he didn’t know much about – but then brilliantly on the follow-up from Ayoub Assal. The latter player was booked for diving a little while after this – and to be fair, Referee Sebastian Stockbridge (who made a lot of mistakes today) certainly got this one wrong. So half-time arrived with the visitors both on top and deservedly in the lead. Their travelling support were a credit to the club first of all for turning-up in their hundreds and also for noisily encouraging the men in the yellow strip for most of the game.

Stephen Robinson changed the shape of his team for the second half. Defender Liam Gibson was taken off and winger Wes MacDonald was sent on. And the change certainly worked. From being a goal down, the Shrimps turned the game on its head within ten minutes of the restart. The Dons looked as if they were in danger of being swept away by a red deluge as the home team repeatedly pushed them back right from the off. With Gnahoua far more assertive than he had been in the first period on the right, the visitors found themselves having to defend properly for the first time in the match. They weren’t very good at it. After just four minutes, Aaron Wildig played-in Cole Stockton for Morecambe’s goal machine to imperiously score his seventh goal of the season with a tremendous shot which beat Tzanev all ends up. As Wimbledon’s defence was still at sixes and sevens, an unmarked Shane McLoughlin scored with a tremendous diving header against his former employers from another brilliant Arthurian cross from the Shrimps’ right with fifty-four minutes on the clock.  Wimbledon rode out the storm, however. You always had the feeling that they could get themselves back into this game if only because they refused to ever play on the back foot. And so it proved. Alarm bells rang after an hour as Mebude again only just missed with a tremendous low shot from a long way out. Almost immediately, Lawrence went on a run down the Dons’ left and – as the Morecambe defence backed-off and allowed him to do it – found Etan Chislett in the middle who made no mistake with a tremendous half-volley.  

All afternoon, it was noticeable that Dons’ goalie Nik Tzanev liked to amble up the field when the ball was at the other end. Sometimes, he was almost in the centre circle and you feel that any goalkeeper who does this is asking for trouble. So when Cole the Goal got the ball just inside the opposition half after 65 minutes, turned and unleashed an immediate and brilliant lob from all of 45 yards, there was only going to be one result. It was a simply sublime strike and good enough to win any game of football at any level. But Wimbledon still wouldn’t lie down. From a free-kick on their right after 72 minutes, an unmarked Will Nightingale made it three goals in three games as well as three goals each with an assured header. Again, it was a poor goal to concede. But it got even worse in injury time. The hosts conceded another spot-kick: a corner this time; their marking was all over the place and a gleeful Assal smashed a loose ball home to send Wimbledon’s travelling support into ecstasy.

Nobody could say they didn’t deserve it. This was a tremendous game of football played in a good spirit and where both teams wanted to attack – and found defending problematic. Morecambe need to tighten-up at the back, where Sam Lavelle’s calming presence was sorely missed today. Wimbledon could defend better too – but if you continue to outscore the opposition in the way they did today, I don’t suppose it matters that much, does it? The Londoners’ win pushed them up to fourth in the League One table this evening, ahead of the hated MK Dons (Booo!!!) on goal difference. Morecambe slipped to eighteenth. But they will play worse this season – and win. 

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Liam Gibson (7 Wes McDonald 45’); 15 Ryan Delaney (Y); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 3 Greg Leigh (Y); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 10 Aaron Wildig (25 Alfie McCalmont 75’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 9 Cole Stockton.

Subs Not Used:  1 Kyle Letheren; 31 Scott Wootten; 6 Callum Jones; 11 Josh McPake; 23 Freddie Price.

AFC Wimbledon:  1 Nik Tzanev; 5 Will Nightingale; 2 Henry Lawrence (Y); 4 Alex Woodyard (C); 8 Anthony Hartigan; 10 Ayoub Assal (Y); 11 Etan Chislett (Y) (6 George Marsh  81’); 16 Dapo Mebude (Y) (18 Nesta Guinness-Walker 75’); 9 Ollie Palmer (19 Aaron Pressley 81’)

Subs Not Used:  31 Zaki Nazih Oualah; 21 Luke McCormick; 30 Paul Kalambayi; 32 Darlus Charles.

Ref: Sebastian Stockbridge. 

Att: 3713 (230 Dons’ fans.)

Papa John’s Trophy. Morecambe 0:1 Everton Under 21s. Tuesday, 14^th September 2021.

In its various guises over the years, the EFL Trophy has been a bit of a joke. Does anybody take it seriously? Well – as his team was about to meet Everton Academy at the Mazuma Stadium tonight – Morecambe boss Stephen Robinson made it clear that he does for a start:

“It’s a game we’re taking very serious. It’s a chance, I got to the Final of it as a player and it’s a great occasion, these early rounds are the ones mentally you need to be strong in and we intend to do that. I think we’ve actually watched more games with Everton than we have with any other opposition we’re playing because it’s local to us, so we’ve watched two games live, we’ve had all their U21 footage so we’re well-versed in. It’s a talented academy [Everton], when I was at Motherwell, they were an academy I always looked at because I believe that their players are taught very well. They learn real football as opposed to some of the false football we see in academies, they’ve a real strong mentality, that’s credit to the staff there including David [Unsworth] and obviously with his experience, the younger players are benefitting from that. Shrimps fans can expect a strong line-up on Tuesday night. It will be a strong team we put out and there’ll be some boys who have craved game time and maybe been very disappointed not to play, that’s their opportunity. There’s places to play for, I think I’ve got a group of 20 outfield players, and including the goalkeepers, there’s nothing between them. It’s a toss of a coin on occasions, some have good runs of games, some don’t, so they’re playing for places, this is an opportunity to go and get a place in the team for Saturday as well.”

He changed no less than nine players from Saturday’s league game against AFC Wimbledon. They contributed to a first half which ended goal-less and won’t last long in the memory. After 64 minutes, Everton substitute Sean McAllister – who had just come onto the field – scored with virtually his first touch of the ball. And that was basically that. So Morecambe’s performance in this was as dire as it traditionally has been. Some things never change. For the record, this was the Shrimps’ line-up tonight:

1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (21 Ryan Cooney (Y) 60’); 6 Callum Jones (19 Shane McLoughlin 82’); 22 Liam Gibson; 7 Wes McDonald; 10 Aaron Wildig (C); 11 Josh McPake; 16 Jacob Mensah; 23 Freddie Price (24 Arthur Gnahoua 72’); 25 Alfie McCalmont (Y); 31 Scott Wootten.

 Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor; 15 Ryan Delaney.

Ref: Andy Baines.

Att: 1004 (34 Evertonians.)

Finnie Not Funny at Doncaster

Morecambe crossed the Pennines into deepest, darkest Yarksheer today to visit the Keepmoat Stadium. Their hosts, Doncaster Rovers, have endured a really poor start to the season and had a measly single point to show for their six league games before today’s contest. This in itself makes you wonder how much they are missing the talismanic James Coppinger: a tremendous footballer who finally retired after a virtual lifetime at the club at the end of last season. However, I’m sure that anyone who saw the way current Doncaster Manager Richie Wellens encouraged his Salford players to employ every trick in the Book Of Dark Football Arts at home against Morecambe last season will see this as just deserts for his cynicism and negativity. (A thought: Is this Karma?…)

It will be no surprise to anybody that he claimed `we wuz robbed’ after Wigan came from behind to beat them 2-1 last Saturday – he claims that Athletic’s equaliser came from a free-kick which shouldn’t have been awarded. In such a way, no blame could be accrued to his own defence for failing to deal with it properly or himself – naturally – for setting them up to play in the negative, neo-brutal, time-wasting way that his teams inevitably do.

Whatever, Mr Wellens had led Donny to the bottom of League One prior to the match. He and his troops would thus be desperate for a win this afternoon. The two clubs have only met twice before. Five years ago, Rovers battered the Shrimps 1-5 at what was then the Globe Arena but then drew 1-1 with them in the reverse fixture in League Two. Comparatively, though, Morecambe have a brilliant record so far in the league: two games won and one drawn in their opening six fixtures to put them into eighteenth place in the table.

Do we care what the Doncaster Manager said before the game? Not really. For the record, though – having made even more excuses for his team’s dismal record so far such as injuries, unlucky breaks and poor refereeing decisions – he said:

“No excuses anymore. The message this week is to go for it. Be expressive, get forward, get numbers in the box. Pass forward, run forward, if you’ve got the opportunity then drive forward. Training has been really, really good. We’re going full throttle at the weekend.”

For his part, Morecambe Manager Stephen Robinson saw the task facing himself and his men in these terms prior to the match:

“I watched their game against Wigan, they were unfortunate with a goal disallowed, they played well, they’ve changed systems quite a lot. I watched their game against Portsmouth where I thought they were very good. Sometimes you don’t get things go your own way, I think maybe the league table’s not telling their true position at the moment, so we certainly won’t go and underestimate them.”

The weather had been almost tropical in south Yorkshire earlier on but as kick-off time approached, the sky started to cloud over and the temperature noticeably dropped as the match progressed only for the sun to re-emerge later in the game.

Morecambe started on the front foot and won the first corner of the game within two minutes.  The ball was headed-on towards Anthony O’Connor but the Shrimps’ Skipper couldn’t quite make contact with it. Doncaster forced the first save of the match through Kyle Knoyle after five minutes though but the resulting corner was completely wasted as it was put straight into touch. The home team probably just about edged the opening quarter of an hour or so and seemed to be concentrating their efforts mostly on the Morecambe right. Having said that, neither team were playing particularly well and Doncaster looked woefully low of confidence. Seventeen minutes had been played when Joe Dodoo’s shot had the sting taken out of it by a block and visiting goalkeeper Jökull Andrésson gathered it easily enough. With twenty-two minutes on the clock, a shot by Jordy Hiwula was deflected for another corner which was fairly easily cleared. Cole Stockton showed his undoubted class when he outsmarted the double defenders he was facing and put in a perfect cross right across the Donny area after twenty-five minutes. Sadly for the Shrimps, nobody was there to connect with it. With just over half an hour played, Morecambe missed the best chance of the contest so far. Cole the Goal was instrumental again before Wes McDonald was played-in to have a clear run on goal. For the hosts, Pontus Dahlberg pulled an excellent save out of the bag but the Wes should not have given him the chance to do so. The home goalie was called into action again after 34 minutes but managed to field a cross by Greg Leigh from the visitors’ left without too much trouble. Better approach play by Morecambe then led to another really good save by Dahlberg from Shane McLoughlin’s low goal-bound shot a few minutes later. Stockton got his head to the ball from the resultant corner but headed it over the bar.  There was a moment of real controversy after 42 minutes when Leigh was clearly fouled by the home goalkeeper as he had rounded him after a bit of a melee in the Donny penalty area and was about to score. Dahlberg clearly pulled him back with a rugby tackle and it is a mystery as to why neither Referee Will Finnie nor his assistants awarded a penalty. This was the main talking-point of the game so far. On another day, Donny would have been facing a second half potentially a goal and certainly a man down. But not today…

Rovers started the second period at a higher pace and started putting concerted pressure on their visitors for the first time in the game. As the home crowd – silent throughout the first period – finally found their voices, they forced a corner after five minutes of the restart. From this, Ro-Shaun Williams almost scored his first goal for Doncaster as his header beat Andrésson only to be cleared off the line by Ryan Cooney. Stephen Robinson sent Adam Phillips on after an hour and virtually the first contribution the Burnley loanee made was to block Cole’s fine shot after 65 minutes. Phillips was actually off-side when this happened and ruined a decent chance after the visiting centre-forward had been fed by McDonald. A minute later, the outstanding Tom Anderson managed to block another shot from Arthur Gnahoua away for another corner, which the home Skipper then duly headed away to safety. At the other end, huge Watford loanee Tiago Cukur came on for Rovers with twenty minutes left. He immediately played-in Matt Smith for a shot which went just wide.  There was really good interplay between Toumani Diagouraga, Phillips and Cole after about sixty-seven minutes but the move finally broke down without any end product.

Then it all went pear-shaped for the Shrimps. Tommy Rowe scored what was only Doncaster’s third goal of the season after eighty minutes – and once again, it came from a set-piece. Phillips needlessly gave away a corner after 81 minutes; an unmarked Rowe went up for it and the ball seemed to bounce off his shoulder and loop into the top corner of the net to give Andrésson no chance at all. One of our home-grown idiots then threw a flare onto the pitch. Why? – Why? How does that help anybody?

Shrimps’ Centre-Half Scott Wootten booted the ball over the bar in injury time and Cole Stockton forced an excellent save from the home custodian right at the death. But that was as close as the visitors came to equalising once Rovers took the lead.

Overall, this was a poor performance by the team from Lancashire. Their habit of conceding from set-pieces needs to be urgently addressed by the Manager and his coaches. Doncaster are a poor team and – despite the good luck of not having seen their goalkeeper sent-off at the end of the first half – were there for the taking. To beat leaders Sheffield Wednesday one week and then lose to bottom club Doncaster must be worrying for Stephen Robinson and his staff. Donny’s first win of the season sees them still anchored to the bottom of League One. Faltering Morecambe also stayed where they were before the game – eighteenth – but are now only  two points above the drop zone.

Doncaster Rovers: 12 Pontus Dahlberg; 2 Kyle Knoyle; 4 Tom Anderson (C); 6 Ro-Shaun Williams; 8 Ben Close; 10 Tommy Rowe; 14 Matt Smith; 17 Jordy Hiwula-Mayifuila (21 Tiago Cukur 68’); 20 Joe Dodoo; 22 Ethan Galbraith; 25 Rodrigo Vilca (19 Charlie Seaman 79’).

Subs Not Used:  1 Louis Jones; 5 Joe Olowu; 15 John Bostock; 16 Aidan Barlow; 23 Dan Gardner.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 21 Ryan Cooney; 7 Wes McDonald (11 Josh McPake 78’); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 3 Greg Leigh (22 Liam Gibson 70’); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 9 Cole Stockton; 31 Scott Wootten; 25 Alfie McCalmont (18 Adam Phillips 57’).

Subs Not Used:  1 Kyle Letheren; 15 Ryan Delaney; 10 Aaron Wildig; 6 Callum Jones.

Ref: Will Finnie.

Att: 5,651 (402 from Morecambe)

As Morecambe prepare to visit Gresty Road for the first time ever in League One, let’s go down Memory Lane now and revisit Saturday, August 4^th 2018. It was The Shrimps’ first game of the season and the opposition was Crewe Alexandra.

As they say – it’s the hope that kills you. This was Manager Jim Bentley’s first game of a new season and – with new players such as Andrew Tutte in his re-shaped side – we were all hoping for great things. Only for the dreams to turn to dust as a team not even good enough to compete in the Conference were taken to the cleaners by Dave Artell’s Crewe. The team from Lancashire lost six-nil – and it could have been more. As well as my match report, D3D4 Football published this article about my experiences in Crewe before and after the game. It caused quite a stir…

IN CREWE – WHAT DO YOU DO?

I’ve moaned before on these pages about a certain train company, whose name eludes me, in an article entitled Virgin on the Ridiculous. I think we all know that other British train companies have also lived down to the sort of gold/excreta standard offered by Virgin (you pay top dollar for a crap service) in recent months. Some of us have experienced this and we will return to said topic if Northern don’t actually come up with the goods they have promised when I intend to travel to Lincoln next December to watch the Shrimps play at Sincil Bank. 

When the EFL fixtures were first published, I knew that my Better Half would not be coming with me to Crewe: she is far too busy working at the Coniston Institute’s Vintage Shop – as ever at this time of year. So I looked for a cheap train ticket to take myself to and from Gresty Road to witness the first game of the new season. 

Getting a decent deal seems as much of a lottery as the train timetables in Britain indisputably are at this moment in time in pre-Brexit Britain. If this is a glimpse of the future, god help us all… 

National Rail Enquiries offered me a day return for just under £55 over a month ago including a discount for the Old Fogies Rail Card I own. That’s about twice as much as I would spend on diesel if I drove there and back – and diesel at the pump makes no allowances for how old you might be, we must remember. Even more confusingly, if I was to buy a return ticket on the day I wanted to travel, I could do so for £43.20 – much cheaper than if I had booked it in advance. That’s not supposed to happen, is it? 

Trainline offered me a day return for just over twenty-eight quid. In other words, half the price for exactly the same journey – more or less. 

How does this work? I just don’t get it… 

But my brain cell twitched and it occurred to me that a return fare from Lancaster – the next stop southwards down the West Coast line from where I live (just over two quid return on the local service for old farts like me) might be cheaper… 

And it was. By how much? Wait for it… 

Actually, I’m so astonished by the massive discrepancy between what I actually paid and what I could have done that I have had to keep checking my tickets ever since if only to prove to myself that I haven’t imagined this. Including booking fee, they cost me precisely seven pounds and ninety pence. 

Which would basically allow me to make the same journey seven times over for the price I was initially quoted by National Rail Iniquities – sorry – National Rail Enquiries. 

As I mentioned a moment ago: I just don’t get this. 

The point I have just made admittedly doesn’t have a lot to do with football – but it says an awful lot about how train travel in Britain has more to do with the companies tasked to provide it having their foot in our collective balls more often than not. 

But I digress. To get back to the subject, what does anyone think of when the town Crewe comes up in conversation? (If, in all honesty, it ever does.) 

They think of railways – Crewe station, with its twelve platforms, is one of the biggest railway junctions to be found anywhere in Britain.

They may also think of Rolls Royce. Traditionally, this has been the town’s second biggest employer over the years although, technically speaking, it is now the Bentley factory, named in honour of the visiting team’s manager today. It is, honestly – I’ve just read it on Twittypedia so it must be true, mustn’t it? 

There’s Mornflakes too – I’ve seen the place where these oats are processed from the train as I have flashed by on by on my way to London or back again to Lancaster in the past.

But I suspect this is the abiding memory that people who think about Crewe at all tend to share: you may pass through it but you don’t actually stop and get out. And even if you do stop and shuffle around the platforms to go somewhere else, you don’t get a flavour of the town. In fact, you can get totally misleading flavours altogether – like the pastel de nata (a Portuguese delicacy which is basically an Egg Custard on Acid) which I sampled at the station on the way to Shrewsbury last season. 

But if you do stop and get out – as I did last Saturday on my way to watch Morecambe’s first match of the season at Gresty Road – what distinct charms does Crewe offer the eager, hungry and thirsty visitor with three hours to kill before the match kicks-off? 

According to the internet, it doesn’t bode well. Apparently, if has the `worst Wetherspoons in Britain’; The Gaffers Row. 

(Thinks: did this refer to the argument about who should have intercepted Dagenham & Redbridge’s Centre Forward as he scored yet another goal against us at Christie Park not too many moons ago? Today’s Gaffers at the football game have both been Captains and team-mates as central defenders in Sammy McIlroy’s Morecambe team back in the day after all…) 

The answer is very definitely – No. 

No as in a rhyme for `Row’ rather than `Cow’ as I wrongly assumed above. The Gaffers Row was so bad, apparently, that is has been permanently shut down. 

Oh dear. So what else is there to do? Or even, not to do… 

As the Intercity trains I have travelled on in the past trundled through the junction and I clocked glimpses of Crewe through the windows, I caught sight of what people of my generation probably universally recognise as the prototype of the APT – Advanced Passenger Train. This – like the TSR2 (a front-line strike aircraft literally way ahead of its time which also came to nothing after massive private and public investment) ended–up being a very costly White Elephant. I believe the only multi-million pound TSR2 which actually flew ended-up being shot to pieces on a gunnery range somewhere in Britain. But at least the £47 million APT survived derailments, scorn and public humiliation to rest – sorry – rust in peace at the Crewe Heritage Centre. This as Pendolinos whose basic design – the ability to tilt as they go round bends – was based on it blast past its final destination as they forge their ways to Glasgow Central in the north or Euston in the south. 

Some places – and I live in one, Carnforth, a few score miles north up the main west coast line from Crewe – are not known for much apart from the railway. We can’t all be like York – another massive railway junction but with an even more massive weight of Roman and Viking history. 

But we don’t have a brewery – even a micro one – here in Carnforth. Crewe does, though. It’s the Offbeat Brewery. Well, that sounds promising and it could be well worth a visit – the beer attracts excellent reviews. It would be good to try some. But I couldn’t: the Brewery is never open on Saturdays which seems a little odd to put it mildly. Or Stoutly. Or even Bitterly, depending on what range of beers they actually brew. 

Well – how about a market, then? Places like that usually give you at least a flavour of the place you are visiting. Crewe not only has one but it is apparently quite an interesting Victorian example of the genre. Maybe I could go there and sample some of the local produce before the game. 

But guess what?…

Oh dear. The entire place was virtually empty; the stall-holders moved elsewhere as `regeneration’ takes place. 

So what does that leave? On TripAdvisor, the place I was ultimately bound for on Saturday was pretty high on the list of things to visit in Crewe. And this place is Gresty Road, immortalised by the Xmas carol “Gresty Merry Gentlemen, let nothing you dismay” (apart from probably this crummy attempt at a joke.) Yes, Gresty Road, home of Crewe Alexandra football club. 

Crewe Alexandra. Not Crewe Town; Crewe Rangers; Crewe Athletic or anything else as run of the mill as that you might note. (Crewe Lokomotiv has a certain ring to it in my humble opinion…) So why `Alexandra’? 

Seeking enlightenment, I discovered the following on a website called thebeautifulhistory: 

“Crewe Alexandra played cricket and probably rugby at the Earle Street Ground before they decided to form a football club in 1877. The origins of the name of the club are still unsubstantiated. Whether they took the name ‘Alexandra’ from a hotel, patronised by those connected with the railway works and where they held their meetings, or whether it was after Princess Alexandra of Denmark, who married Queen Victoria’s eldest son, later King Edward VII, is a matter of conjecture.

The establishment of Crewe Alexandra FC in 1877, known affectionately as ‘The Alexandrians’, coincided with the club moving to the newly built Alexandra Recreation Ground, also known as the Nantwich Road venue, encompassing a cricket field, a football pitch and a cycling track.” 

So now we know. Or not as the case might be.

Anyway, the Big Day finally dawned and I donned a Morecambe shirt, got into my van and drove the seven miles from home and parked near Lancaster station as I have done lots of times before. Then I walked the short distance from there to catch the train. I drove in the first place because the only thing reliable about trains is that they are totally UNreliable in a Britain heading for Brexit and feared not being able to get to Lancaster on time from Carnforth if I didn’t go in my van. 

To be fair, the London-bound train was only three minutes late and it didn’t stop permanently at Preston as it did last time I attempted to make this journey. It took about an hour to get to Crewe. The centre is where I wanted to go.  But it’s at least a quarter of an hour’s walk from the station. This put me in mind of the old joke about some posh gent with lots of luggage getting off at Dent Station on the Settle-Carlisle line only to discover that Dent village is actually four miles away. 

“Might it not have made more sense to build the station nearer to the village?” he said huffily to the Porter on the platform. 

“Aye, well now then – aye. But on second thoughts, we decided it might be better to build it nearer the railway line tha’ knows!” 

The centre is not exactly four miles away but it is a brisk walk which I completed – eventually. But first of all, I wanted to visit the Crewe Heritage Centre mentioned above. 

So I walked through a maze of decaying 1970s Public Housing, complete with fly tipping such as beds and mattresses to get there. Given that it’s effectively part of the station, it’s a hell of a long way to walk. 

I had already bought a ticket for the match – I was the first customer as a young lad opened-up the Gresty Road Ticket Office and sold me an Old Fogies ticket for a mere £17 (as opposed to £22) using my Driving License as proof of my date of birth. Being an Old Fogy in Crewe means being over 60 (65 at Morecambe FC) so I got a reduction at the so-called Heritage Centre as well – four instead of six quid. 

(“I don’t need to see your Driving License” said the Ticket Man there.

“Shame. I hoped you would say I look far too young to be a Senior Citizen.”

He just gave me a look.

“I’ve given up guessing how old people are. Ever since I offered a Senior Citizen ticket to a woman who turned-out to be only 45…”) 

Was Crewe Heritage Centre worth it? 

Probably. 

In comparison to long-defunct Steamtown here in Carnforth, though, it was very disappointing.  I rode on their miniature track and walked through the Advanced Passenger Train as well. Then I was addressed by a very enthusiastic gentleman  who is trying to raise money to rebuild engines 10000 and 10001; scrapped diesel locos with English Electric engines and bogies which will alone cost at least eighteen grand to buy. 

I wondered how it could be possible to resurrect a design whose prototype and second edition do not exist anymore. You fake it and twist the reality of these extinct things, apparently. Using power plants almost identical to the ones long-ago scrapped; non-authentic bodies two and a half feet too short and modern digital controls – “Nobody will see them!” 

I gave him a contribution (eventually) and wished him luck. So they only need a further £17,999 to buy the bogies now… 

The Cafe on the site provided packaged stuff like crisps and biscuits and not a lot else. The older Scottish woman in charge seemed to have a vocabulary even more limited than her stock. (“No” to the availability of chips or sarnies as she stands there and looks as bored as I had been myself a few minutes earlier.)  She probably once worked for British Rail…

So lunch was a cup of tea and a bag of very overpriced crisps. 

But – to put a positive spin on things – I did manage to lay eyes on the fine lines of Lady Diana Spencer:

and actually physically touch Robert Burns as well:

Then I carried on walking into town. The fancy, Gothic spire I spotted from afar was that of Christ Church. When I got up to it, though, the church itself turned-out to be a ruin. I wondered why: part of it looked as if it had been burnt-out.

But fire has absolutely nothing to do with its current state, apparently. The ruination is not due to something as dramatic as Luftwaffe raids – as was the case in Coventry – Moslem rejection of Christianity; civil – or even uncivil – unrest. Or anything else for that matter. 

It was Dry Rot. 

So why hasn’t it been rebuilt? Or totally demolished? 

This fact in itself probably says more about Crewe than I could ever do here. 

I walked to the Market then and saw the Lyceum Theatre which is also apparently a Crewe Icon. It was hot and I was thirsty so I visited a pub opposite the ruined church. The Hops has been a CAMRA champion in the past. I hoped they might have a local brew to sample: some of their glasses had Offbeat scribed on them after all. But there was no evidence of the beer in any of its guises. So I had a pint of IPA from a micro-brewery I’d never heard of for £3.10. 

It was frankly not very good – it tasted like home brew. 

Then it was time to walk back to the stadium. 

I bought a 500ml plastic bottle of Carlsberg for three quid at the ground in the filthy, open-air pit reserved for Away Fans where you can buy all sorts of crap food for inflated prices. 

There, I said `hello’ to fellow fans I have a nodding acquaintance with – and in we went. Like lambs to the slaughter… 

After the humiliation on the field, I walked back into town and bought a pair of reading glasses for a quid at one of the many cheap shops there: I’d left mine in my van in Lancaster and I needed them to start to write my match report. There were few people around either time I visited but I heard more foreign than English voices and there were plenty of Polish, `European’ and even Romanian shops. This is why Brexit has happened – the locals simply want them to go back to wherever they come from. 

Stoke or Nantwich perhaps…

Then I returned to the Hops, had another indifferent pint of something different to earlier and started to write-up my match report on my phone. To do this, I was using the paper I had taken with me and scribbled on throughout the match but couldn’t actually clearly read without any glasses. 

I wasn’t surprised by the result: six-nil to the Railwaymen – I’m far too long in the tooth to be so. I was just disappointed. All that excitement; all that anticipation and pop! the balloon is well and truly burst in less than two hours… But at least I didn’t pay full price for my match ticket and the visit was in itself… interesting, I suppose. If I’d paid fifty-five quid to get there and back, though, defeat would have hurt an awful lot more… 

So let’s end this article now with words which are bad enough to have actually been penned by The Old Sheep of the Lake District (change at Platform Eleven) William `Daffodils’ Worthless himself: 

When you’re in Crewe, what do you do?

Before walking round it, I hadn’t a clue

Go buy a ticket – no sign of a queue

Visit the vintage trains; none of them new

Return for the match, a shambles to view:

Shrimps’ fans at Gresty all ended-up Blue!

One response to “In Crewe…what do you do? by Roger Fitton

Cllr Brian Roberts says:

August 9, 2018 at 8:16 am

Hello Roger,
An experienced certainly needing to be missed.
Next time you decide to venture into green and pleasant Cheshire East ,but in particular it’s premier town of Crewe ,I hope you will allow me to show you some of the “ better bits” of the area.
I can’t garantee you won’t pass mountains of Flytipped mattresses growing out of the many bags of dumped rubbish as you pass through bedsits land to reach the more pleasant parts of our town.
Plans being drawn up to redevelop Christchurch as part of a link to a History Centre which is to be built on the next plot which is currently the now redundant library. Just beyond that is the Market you visited which is being vacated to allow the internal to be transformed into a new food hall and a public events venue.The Historic Market Hall itself is a magnificent structure which stated its life as a cheese market service by the then newly created railway.
Next to that is the Crewe Municiple Building . The interior is well worth a look around and albeit small compared to many others of its age is on par in grandeur.
Gaffers Row area and the boarded up shops which give the impression of a town evacuated pending the arrival of a hurricane , will shortly be demolished to makeway for a much needed £50million shopping and leisure complex plus a new bus station. Hopefully a investment in public transport will save you the walk passed the mattress land by providing a bus into our shortly to be redevloped Town Centre.
I can guarantee you a better experience next time you visit but a can’t guarentee Crewe Alex won’t kick your teams butt yet again.
Really enjoyed your article.
Best regards
Brian.
Cllr Brian Roberts
Mayor of Crewe 2018-2019

Reply

Roger Fitton says:

August 9, 2018 at 5:15 pm

Your Worship Mr Mayor,

Thanks for the comment Brian – I’m really glad you enjoyed the article and read it in the spirit in which is was meant. I’ve just been interviewed by BBC Radio Stoke about the above offering and apparently they are going to broadcast what I said on their Morning Show tomorrow – I believe you are going to be a guest on it as well. They asked me if I have any mitigating (!!) factors I would like to express and the one thing I forgot to say was that I would very happily accept your offer to show me round Crewe next time I’m in that vicinity. I will, of course, expect a bit of local colour – a chauffeur-driven Bentley called Jim to meet me at the station at the very least and a slap-up lunch – preferably NOT at Wetherspoon’s.

Only choking… Seriously though – I note you are a Labour Councillor leading a Labour council in an age of austerity. More power to your elbow getting the improvements in the town funded and carried through – it can’t be easy.

Nice to hear from you – good luck! Roger Fitton.

On Wednesday, D3D4 Football was contacted by The Town Clerk of Crewe Council asking to talk to me about my article. The Town Clerk, Steve, turns out – irony of ironies – to have actually been born In Morecambe and grew-up in Carnforth where his dad Arthur is a long-term season ticket holder at the Globe Arena. He had read my article and took it as it was meant – a light-hearted observation of Crewe made by a stranger to the place: a view, he assured me, which was shared by his fellow members of the Labour Council which runs the place.

But by Thursday, BBC Radio Stoke had also got wind of the story. A woman called Hazel from the station rang me and recorded an interview with Yours Truly later in the day. I’d made a note of things I thought I needed to say and insisted what I had written was an observation, not a downer on Crewe. I said something along the lines of “I want to make it clear that I’m not Boris Johnson.” (Boris – at that time a backbencher – was courting his monthly/weekly/daily dose of controversy by writing a column in the Torygraph which, although defending women’s rights to wear the veil (Hijab) or full covering which leaves just a slit for the eyes (the Burka), took the opportunity to gratuitously insult these people as `looking like bank robbers’ or `letterboxes’. He refused to apologise for these analogies, probably just to keep the `controversy’ going…)

“If people have taken offence about what I’ve written,” I said, “I’m sorry – it wasn’t my intention to insult anyone.” (Unsurprisingly, they didn’t play any of this – it would defuse the false controversy which weak radio shows like this feed on after all.)

When asked about my own background as a writer, I mentioned that I used to write comic scripts for Whizzer & Chips and Buster comics, including strips their listeners might be familiar with such as The Bumpkin Billionaires; Tarman of the Jungle and – the one I am particularly proud of – Watford Gapp the King of the Rap:  this one was in verse and the kids loved it.

(https://www.facebook.com/groups/680255062515411)

But they didn’t broadcast any of this, presumably because it doesn’t chime with their portrayal of Yours Truly as an ignorant oik from Morecambe with no sense of humour.

I sat through the dreary three hours of their Morning Show the following morning, understanding – as I do every time I hear the usual output of their sister station Radio Lankyshite up here – why so many Southerners think we’re all thick Oop North. As listeners to serious news programmes elsewhere might have been hearing about the situation in Afghanistan or the latest news about Brexit, the two presenters on BBC Stoke  indulged in a competition concerning which of them could yell `Woohoo’ the loudest. It was like listening to two pretty stupid kids in a playground somewhere. Then the Dizzy Blonde female presenter admitted to having reversed her car into a skip on more than one occasion – but that’s what women do, isn’t it girls? Oh – and women need a Man – like the Alpha Male co-presenter – to explain to them how to do Fantasy Football – because football isn’t for Dizzy Blondes, is it ladies? All this peppered with the false bonhomie which the BBC – in its infinite wisdom – thinks the Lower Orders like you and me want to hear first thing in the morning to brighten up our otherwise completely empty lives.

Nation Shall Speak Unto Nation? More like Nation Shall Speak Drivel Unto the Nation, I fear.

So I was already losing the will to live when they started playing music from 1971. I’m old enough to remember this year and in my memory, Jimi Hendrix; Deep Purple; The Faces; Jethro Tull; The Who and the Kinks all immediately spring to mind. But they didn’t play a single track from any of these bands – why bother when you can play “Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep” by Middle of the Road instead?

Anyway, the whole idea backfired on the production team. They weren’t flooded with outraged calls from Crewe residents defending the attack on their town by a Morecambe fan throwing his toys out of the pram and ranting about the place because the Mighty Railwaymen had just demolished his pathetic team from Lancashire. Instead, they received a stream of tweets and calls from people elsewhere in the Potteries and further afield saying far more dire things about the town than I – as an outsider – would dare to do. So they dropped the whole quietly during the second hour of the programme.

What irritated me most about all of this is that nobody at Radio Stoke had bothered to read what I had actually written. Not a single word of it. Perhaps even more damning, though –  for them to so totally misjudge the reaction to the totally contrived version of what I had actually written shows how completely out-of-touch these people are with their own target audience. So what are they there for, wasting the License Fee on lazy journalism and utter drivel at that? And as for the BBC being impartial and objective – I know this is a storm in a teacup in the greater scheme of things but really: do me a favour…

Railwaymen Derailed by Arthurian Legend in the Making.

Morecambe were on the road again this evening to complete a fixture which was postponed due to international call-ups just over a week ago for the Lancashire team. Gresty Road has not been a Happy Hunting Ground for the Shrimps in recent years. In their first game of the 2018-19 season, Jim Bentley’s side were hammered here six-nil – and it could have been more. Under Derek Adams, Morecambe Old Boy Dave Artell’s side managed five goals without reply a year later. Altogether, the Railwaymen have beaten the Shrimps eight times in fourteen previous meetings and lost only three.

But that was then and this was now. Crewe’s start to this season has been poor. With seven games played, they only had five points on the board prior to tonight’s game. Three of these were picked-up here last Saturday when Spurs loanee J’Neil Bennett scored a goal against Burton Albion and set-up another against a team which had been playing with only ten men for the last half hour or so. This was their first league victory so far and they had lost three of their previous five League One matches before that.

So tonight was probably as good a time as any for Morecambe to visit. After a really promising start to the season, Stephen Robinson’s men have struggled recently. It is no surprise that the loss of outstanding defender Sam Lavelle to Charlton Athletic (for whom the ex-Morecambe Skipper scored last Saturday) has led to poor defending by the Shrimps during their last two outings in his absence. They lost by the only goal of a dreary game at bottom club Doncaster last Saturday when they were unable to successfully defend a corner. In their previous match, they scored three excellent goals but shipped four against a tremendous Wimbledon side but again were caught wanting at set pieces; losing in injury time to another corner kick which was poorly defended. After the Doncaster defeat, Manager Stephen Robinson said:

“We have conceded from another set-play, and the reality is that if we don’t defend set pieces we will be in a relegation scrap. They’re a good football side as Crewe always are, they’re a side that knocks the ball about and they’re going to be a threat, like Doncaster.

The league table means nothing, everyone’s a threat in this league, every time somebody plays Morecambe, they feel they’ll get three points, or they should be taking points off Morecambe, we’re well aware of that. We’re going to be competitive, we have been in every single game, and this is going to be no different.”

Morecambe started the game in eighteenth position, just two points clear of the relegation places their Manager had spoken about. Robbo’s Opposite Number Dave Artell has also reflected on the loss of some of his own key players whilst the Transfer Window was open and the resultant negative effect on his team’s performance recently. He said about his team’s win last Saturday:

“There is no-one thinking we have got that first win and we have cracked it. Far from it, the players know there is a long way to go and we all have to keep working hard. It was a good win and a good performance for differing reasons. Now we have another home game against Morecambe and it gives us something to build on. If we can continue to improve then I am sure with the players we have we can create chances and score the goals we will need.”

As far as tonight’s game is concerned, he added:

“Morecambe will always hold a special place in my heart. It is a terrific club with really good people at its core. It is very similar to Crewe in that sense. It is one of the unfashionable sides and I don’t think Crewe or Morecambe are many people’s second teams if you like, but they have good people running through them and the fans are very knowledgeable and loyal. I enjoyed my time there as a player but there is no sentiment. There cannot be. I am manager of Crewe and I hope we beat them. It should be another good game and we are looking to win the game and get those back-to-back home wins if we can.”

It was dry and quite warm for the time of year with virtually no wind in Cheshire tonight as the game kicked-off. Both teams Took the Knee before the hosts literally got the ball rolling. Crewe immediately went onto the front foot and seemed to favour attacking down the flanks right from the off. Scott Kashket managed to send over two unchallenged crosses from the right within the opening minutes and with Kayne Ramsay also keen to move forward from his right-back berth, Greg Leigh looked like he was in for a busy evening. However, with just over seven minutes on the clock, it was Morecambe’s left full-back who picked up Scott Wooten’s excellent diagonal pass from the back, progressed up the Shrimps’ left and then produced a peach of a cross which Adam Phillips converted at the far post to put the visitors one goal to the good with their first decent attack of the evening. Almost immediately afterwards, Leigh then sent over another gem of a cross which Crewe goalkeeper Will Jääskeläinen spilled. Cole Stockton was quickest to react to the loose ball and was denied yet another goal this season when his effort was blocked on the goal-line by Terell Thomas. Morecambe’s goal machine then had another punt at the target after about seventeen minutes but his looping shot from the edge of the penalty area didn’t trouble the home goalie. There was applause from all sides of the ground after twenty-three minutes in tribute to Christian Mbulu; a young man sadly no longer with us who played for both clubs during his all too short career.  Crewe seemed to be getting a bit of a foothold in the game when Morecambe hit them with a sucker-punch after 28 minutes. Phillips played-in Wes McDonald on the Morecambe right; Wes sent the ball over and Arthur Gnahoua was in the right place at the right time to double the visitors’ advantage with an assured finish. Forty minutes were on the clock when the Crewe goalkeeper’s poor clearance was well controlled by Toumani Diagouraga who played the ball forwards to Shane McLoughlin, whose rising shot from a long way out clipped the top of the hosts’ crossbar on its way into touch. There was time left for the visitors to give the ball away near to the end of the half only for Kyle Letheren to save well from J’Neil Bennett at the cost of a corner. Crewe took this quickly and Morecambe’s Welsh stopper excelled himself with a tremendous save low down from a Callum Ainley shot.  As his defence seemed to be thinking about their half-time cup of tea, Letheren was forced into another outstanding save in injury time – this time from Bennett again, whose powerful shot seemed to be destined for the top corner of the goal. So Morecambe went back to the changing rooms in a comfortable position for once in recent times at Gresty Road. The only worry for Shrimps’ fans was the way they seemed to collectively stop concentrating at times in the game. On another occasion – but for the alertness of their goalkeeper – they might not have been winning quite so easily half way through the match.

Morecambe had the first chance of the second period after just a minute but Phillips’ direct shot from a free kick was nowhere near the target. Cole the Goal then put a shot over the bar only a few moments later. Crewe left back Rio Adebisi – who had endured a torrid time so far this evening – did well after four minutes of the restart to find Mikael Mandron, who belted the ball past Letheren to put Crewe firmly back into the game. As the home crowd belatedly came to life, Stephen Robinson took off Ryan Cooney – who had picked-up his traditional booking during the first half – and replaced him with Ryan McLaughlin. He also withdrew Les McDonald and attempted to shore-up the Shrimps defence by introducing Liam Gibson as well. Despite the change in formation, Crewe had the next good chance but Letheren again denied Ainley with a brilliant save at the cost of another corner with twenty-five minutes left. The home team were on top by this time and Morecambe were having trouble clearing their lines, continually hoofing the ball long only to see it immediately returned into their own half. They struck again on the break though after seventy minutes when McLoughlin’s good cross from the right was hit by Stockton to Jääskeläinen’s left but the goalkeeper saved it without much trouble.  At the other end, Letheren was forced into action again after 82 minutes, saving well from Mandron who had run on to a pass from Ramsay.  The goalkeeper played a goal-kick to Cole after 85 minutes; Morecambe’s leading scorer controlled the ball beautifully and then found Gnahoua on the right for the winger to smash home a third goal for the visitors with his less-favoured foot to surely make the game safe. There were five minutes of injury time but the home team’s heads seemed to have already dropped and they never threatened to reduce the arrears any further.

It was Squeaky Bum time for large periods of the second half for the Shrimps tonight. They weathered whatever storm the Railwaymen managed to whip-up but the Manager’s key changes of personnel and shape proved to be too good for Dave Artell’s men. Crewe looked like a poor team this evening and on this showing, Dave must be worried about their prospects during the rest of the season. Their latest defeat saw them slip to twenty-second in League One. The very welcome three points saw Stephen Robinson’s men go up the table to fifteenth position.

Crewe Alexandra:  1 Will Jääskeläinen; 2 Kayne Ramsay; 3 Rio Adebisi; 5 Terell Thomas; 11 Callum Ainley (14 Oliver Finney 84’); 12 Mikael Mandron; 20 Josh Lundstram; 21 Donervon Daniels; 35 Scott Robertson; 37 J’Neil Bennett; 36 Scott Kashket (9 Chris Porter 74’).

Subs not used: 31 Dave Richards; 6 Luke Offord; 15 Callum McFadzean; 17 Madger Gomes; 22 Billy Sass-Davies.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 7 Wes McDonald (22 Liam Gibson 57’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton (Y); 18 Adam Phillips (25 Alfie McCalmont 72’); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney (Y) (2 Ryan McLaughlin (Y) 57’); 31 Scott Wootten; 24 Arthur Gnahoua.

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 6 Callum Jones; 11 Josh McPake; 15 Ryan Delaney.

Ref:  Paul Howard.

Att: 3,542.

Morecambe “Play The Game – And Not The Occasion”.

First of all – to repeat a theme of this season’s posts, let’s start with a look back at Morecambe’s last game.

I make no apology for moaning in the past that as the football club has undoubtedly moved ever further and more excitingly into a Brave New World, the way this has been communicated to an internet/Social Media-savvy new generation has often  lagged a long way behind. So when – almost by chance – I stumbled across the following earlier this week I immediately posted a link to it online:

It got millions of hits. Well – half a million at least. Dave Salmon of Beyond Radio was very quick to ascribe the credit for the creator of this fantastic montage to his co-commentator on Shrimps’ matches – Matt Smith – as the Media Man at the club. Well done Dave – credit where credit is due and all that. I am eternally indebted to Matt himself if only because he took the photo of myself and Derek Adams when I was invited into the Inner Sanctum of the club a couple of years ago which I use on Faceflannel even now – and was really impressed by the way he went about his business generally.

So why are the club not pushing the stuff Matt produces? It surely should be featuring left, right and centre on its website every week for a start. What’s the point of having a Boy Wonder in the club’s employ if you don’t feature the work he produces? It’s gold. Gold, I tell you!

Doubt it?

Hitting the nation’s imagination with a memorable image or slogan is much older than the internet itself.

For example: Ian Rush drank milk. If he hadn’t, there was only one club he would be likely to play for. 

(If you don’t know who Ian Rush is or anything else about what I’ve just written, ask your parents – or grandparents – because, even if they have no interest in football whatsoever, they will certainly be able to explain to you what the next image means).

In such a manner, let me open this week’s match report with an age-old question:

(Thanks to Andrew Baines for the photo.)

Well – who are they indeed? Their Manager, John Coleman is still Morecambe Football Club’s leading scorer of all time. Stanley – which disappeared off the face of the Earth altogether as a Football League club during 1962 – was re-established six years later with a veritable mountain to climb. They started again at the lowest level of a football pyramid which didn’t actually exist at the time. However, as the years passed and the EFL finally stopped being a Closed Shop, John Coleman and others gradually steered the club through the Lancashire Combination; the Cheshire League; the North West Counties League; the Northern Premier League and other ones as well until they finally took their place again as a Football League Member way back in 2006. Extremely ironically, they replaced the club which had taken their place in the Football League all those years earlier in 1962: Oxford United.

Since then, they were promoted to League One during 2018 and have never looked back.  

So: 1968 to 2018: Fifty years of hurt barely describes it from Accrington fans’ point of view. I take my hat off personally to all the many people who refused to let the club die.

Despite what has happened subsequently…

So what are the parallels between the two clubs?

Some people claim that Stanley have ploughed the same furrow which Morecambe have themselves followed in due course.

Oh really?

The Accrington which went bust in 1962 were members of the Football League when it was a Closed Shop. Morecambe couldn’t have replaced them on merit – or even with wheelbarrows of cash for the `administrators’ of this creaky and extremely dodgy organisation in its little bubble in Lytham St Annes of all places for a start.

(I’m not quite sure why this makes them similar in any sense so far but let’s plough on with the analogy…)

Stanley have only been relegated once in their new incarnation.

The Shrimps have never been relegated at all.

Stanley have never lost at Wembley – because they have never got there.  

It’s true to say, though, that this also applies to Morecambe in a way: they have never lost at Wembley either.

This is because they won the FA Trophy and the two Play-Off Finals they have reached at the old and new version of the venue over the last fifty years or so.

Neither club have ever been able to call on vast financial resources and they are both two of the least well-supported teams in the entire EFL.

This, at least, is true.

So why – given that the two Lancashire clubs have at least a few things in common – is Accrington absolutely the Shrimps’ worst Bogy-Team of all time, then?

In League Two alone, the two clubs have met twenty-two times in the past. Morecambe have won just two of these games and lost a quite astonishing fourteen of them.

So – all other comparisons aside – Accrington is very much the Senior Partner as far as their club and ours are concerned.

Stanley arrived by the seaside today in eleventh position in League One. They have won just two of their last five games and lost three, including their last two, which ended with a 1-4 hammering by league leaders Wigan Athletic at home last Saturday. Their Manager had this to say prior to his visit to the Mazuma Stadium:

“I had my best playing days at Morecambe. I met some unbelievable people who are still friends today. I have got friends who are Morecambe fans, it is a special place in my heart but I didn’t play in the new stadium so that doesn’t have any memories. We have generally done well there and hopefully we can keep that up. I was commentating on both Morecambe’s Play-Off semi-finals last season. I thought they were terrific, showed a great team spirit, they played some great football and they have kept quite a few players who have earned the right to play in League One and they are doing well this year. I know Stephen (Robinson) from my coaching badge days in Ireland and he is a good manager, a good footballing person and to take over a team who had the upheaval they did after getting promoted, he has done really well. They had a good performance at Ipswich on the opening day and he has carried that on and had good results. We watched them midweek as they beat Crewe. (First Team Coach) John Doolan went to the game and he was impressed with what he saw. We know we have our work cut out but if we can get back to playing the way we can play, and we know we are capable of this, we are a match for anyone.”

As far as concerns Shrimps’ Burnley loanee Adam Phillips – who `Coley’ persuaded to jump ship from Morecambe and sit on the bench more often than not at Accrington late on last season – the Stanley boss said:

“Adam is a good footballer and I have made no secret of the fact that I did try to re-sign him but he chose to go to Morecambe and that’s his prerogative. We have to hope that he feels on Saturday he has made the wrong decision. All we can do is try and win the game the best we can and the best we know, which is hard work and trying to play good football.”

John O’Sullivan – a key player in the Shrimps’ promotion last season – was named in Stanley’s starting eleven today.  But there was still no place in the visiting squad for Northern Ireland International Dion Charles, who John Coleman has publicly criticised recently for having a bad attitude – whatever that means – as well as apparent disloyalty to the club.

For the hosts, most of the players and the Manager were facing their first-ever meeting with our local(ish) rivals. Stephen Robinson said about this:

“Derbies mean everything to the fans, the bragging rights especially. I have been involved in a fair few derbies in my time: Luton v Watford when I was playing – and then up in Scotland with Motherwell and Hamilton. For us managers, it is just three points, but it is an important three points and we will make sure that we play with the desire that if the fans had the shirt on and what it means to them, means exactly the same to us. We have made it clear to the players how big of a game this is for the fans, they are aware of it and ultimately they have to remain calm, play the game and not the occasion.”

As far as his Opposite Number and the club he manages is concerned, Robbo added:

“It is a massive credit to John, his staff and the Board. They have one of the smallest budgets in the division (and) like ourselves, they have a smaller fan base and smaller finances. They have massively overachieved, they have had to sell players and have bought in players that other clubs might not touch, and have turned them into little gems. It is a model that we look at and it is something that we can aim for. Accrington have a very similar model to how things were at Motherwell when I worked there, but you have to give everyone full credit there.” 

So would the Shrimps play the match and not the occasion? It’s been distinctly autumnal in North Lancashire this week after some lovely sunny days for the time in year in September generally. Today had been grey and gloomy by the seaside and the floodlights were needed as the match kicked-off at three o’clock. By the end of the game, though, bright sunshine was dappling the pitch and it was much lighter than it had been when it started.

Accrington – playing in a white strip today – looked as they nearly always have done: big; physical and combative. They had some huge players in their squad such as central defenders 6’4” Ross Sykes and even taller Michael Nottingham. The ball spent a lot of time in the air throughout the game but for such a big side, Stanley didn’t really ever take advantage of their height advantage in my humble opinion. Seamus Connelly and Colby Bishop were a handful up-front throughout their time on the field. But – given what was about to unfold – I never thought the visitors ever had a secure hold on the game – as it was to prove in the end.

Before we go any further, though, let’s look at the absolutely key decision of the match. After almost forty minutes, there was a coming-together between Shane McLoughlin and Stanley’s Ethan Hamilton in the middle of the pitch. From where I was sitting, it looked like a clear foul by the Accrington player and I expected Referee Marc Edwards to book him. Instead, Stanley’s big units surrounded the man in the middle and basically intimidated him. He thus issued McLoughlin with a straight red card instead. And that was the game as a contest ruined. Maybe there was more to this than caught the eye but I for one thought it was an absolutely diabolical decision. And it wasn’t the only one. Marc Edwards lost control of the game at times today in my opinion and his performance overall was absolutely appalling as he constantly allowed Accrington to get away with niggly fouls all over the pitch. He’s simply not good enough to be officiating at this level.

Morecambe had taken the lead when Goal Machine Cole Stockton ran onto a killer pass by Adam Phillips from midfield beyond the visiting defence and scored with a sumptuous shot after a quarter of an hour. Just four minutes later, though, the visitors were level. The normally rock-solid Liam Gibson was already being given a torrid time by John O’Sullivan – who the home crowd booed half-heartedly every time he got the ball – on the Accrington right flank. Sully managed to get on the wrong side of the big Ginger defender and Liam was rash enough to bring down Lewis Mansell in the penalty area as the ball was played to him . This was one of the few decisions that the Referee indisputably got right this afternoon. Bishop gave Kyle Letheren in the home goal no chance at all from the spot. The visitors then turned the game on its head just two minutes later when Matt Butcher scored from a long way out with a beautifully-judged shot. But what had been a thoroughly entertaining game was levelled up by Prodigal Son Phillips with a cheeky back-heel from a cross from Arthur Gnahoua on the Morecambe left virtually on the Stanley goal-line with twenty-seven minutes on the clock.

And then the referee ruined it all.

Stanley went ahead again during the second half when – having played a lot of the game in Shrimps’ territory for long periods, they finally made their one-man superiority count when McConville’s blocked attempt from close range bounced into Bishop’s path and he duly buried it. This was after 67 minutes. But Morecambe – to their considerable credit – did not lie down. Both sides had half-chances from then until the end of the game but Cole Stockton again showed why he is the leading scorer in the entire EFL when he latched onto a poor attempted back-pass by substitute Jack Nolan and volleyed the ball home with an unstoppable volley with just eight minutes left.

So a game ruined by a weak referee ended all-square. For Morecambe, it must have felt like a moral victory and John Coleman could be forgiven for claiming that his men had thrown away two points by failing to kill the opposition off when they had a perfect opportunity to do so. To be fair to him, though, he said that the sending-off changed the game over what looked like `an innocuous’ incident and criticised the referee for a number of other decisions he thought Mr Edwards got wrong.

For the Shrimps to play for over half a match with a man down is an achievement in any circumstances. But to fight back from a losing position in a situation such as was the case today is a tremendous tribute by any measure to the spirit and determination of the team in adversity.

The draw saw Stanley go up to seventh in League One, just outside the Play-Off places. Morecambe meanwhile dropped one position to sixteenth.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 7 Wes McDonald (25 Alfie McCalmont 39’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 18 Adam Phillips (11 Josh McPake 77’); 19 Shane McLoughlin (R); 22 Liam Gibson (Y); 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 31 Scott Wootten; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 58’).

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 6 Callum Jones; 15 Ryan Delaney; 16 Jacob Mensah; 6 Callum Jones.

Accrington Stanley: 1 James Trafford; 3 Sam Sherring; 4 Ethan Hamilton (Y) (35 Jack Nolan 62’); 5 Ross Sykes; 6 Matt Butcher; 7 John O’Sullivan; 9 Colby Bishop; 11 Sean McConville; 12 Michael Nottingham (C); 26 Lewis Mansell (8 Harry Pell 62’); 28 Seamus Conneely (18 Tommy Leigh 78’); 36 Mitch Clark; 37 David Morgan; 41 Jovan Malcolm.

Subs Not Used:   40 Toby Savin; 36 Jordan Clark; 38 Yeboah Amankwah; 41 Jovan Malcolm.

Ref:  Marc Edwards.

Att: 4,142 (573 from Accrington.)

Morecambe “Have a striker who is scoring for fun. We need to be mindful of that!”

Lincoln City visited the Mazuma Stadium this evening with virtually an identical record so far in League One to hosts Morecambe. Both clubs have played nine games and accumulated eleven points so far. They have both lost two of their last five league games; won two and drawn the other. The Shrimps were one place ahead of the Imps (sixteenth) only on goal difference. Morecambe’s record, historically, is poor against City: of fourteen previous games in all competitions, they have only won two and lost seven.

Michael Appleton led his men to The League One Play-Offs at Wembley earlier this year. The day before Morecambe beat Newport County at the same venue, City took the lead against Blackpool. And then lost. In more recent history, Mr Appleton again led his men to what turned-out to be an excellent victory at Burton last Saturday against a club previously unbeaten at home. Of tonight’s game, he said:

“Morecambe have made a great start, they have the momentum behind them. They’re well organised and have a striker who is scoring for fun. We need to be mindful of that and have the same resolute attitude like we had on Saturday.”

His opposite Number, Stephen Robinson, said:

“It is a big game for us, we are right beside each other in the table and they will be thinking the same. Lincoln are a very good side. They started slowly but have started to get a few results under their belt. Every game is a tough game in this division. It is a huge incentive to get a victory that would see us move up the table.”

As far as his own club’s progression so far this season is concerned, he added:

“This season has been a bit of a rollercoaster hasn’t it? But what desire we have! If I am a Morecambe fan and I see the desire these players play with, I’d be quietly content I think.” 

Autumn has arrived with a vengeance this week in North Lancashire and there was overnight rain and even heavy hail at times. The rain persisted during the day with some torrential downpours but the game kicked-off under heavy skies in the darkness above and stayed dry throughout. All the officials and players – with the notable exception of Imps’ Skipper Liam Bridcutt – Took the Knee before kick-off and away we went. Lincoln are a good side and they play the Beautiful Game in the right way. No play-acting; no time wasting; no nasty tackles. The game was goal-less at half time and neither goalkeeper had a save of any difficulty to make. But this was far from a bore draw. In Bridcutt, City have a Pocket Dynamo who reads the game well; marshals his team-mates effectively and uses the ball brilliantly. He was constantly prompting Lincoln to play intelligent, effective football throughout the game. But for the home team, Toumani Diagouraga was just as influential and he had another outstanding match tonight.

Liam Gibson looked initially as if he was going to be in for a torrid time again as big, quick and skilful Daniel N’Lundulu turned him inside-out on the Lincoln right and set up a chance which was blocked for a corner after just two minutes. But Liam improved as the game grew older and N’Lundulu’s chief contribution to tonight’s entertainment was when he had a clear run on the home goal in the second half only to be denied by a brilliant, brave save from Shrimps’ stopper Kyle Letheren. This was after fifty minutes when the game was still goal-less and it turned out to be a key moment in the contest. It was a miss that the visitors almost immediately came to regret as Goal Machine Cole Stockton conjured a goal from nothing, winning the ball in the middle of the pitch, making brilliant progress forwards past defenders left floundering in his wake before unleashing a tremendous strike from all of 25 yards which gave Josh Griffiths in the  visiting goal absolutely no chance at all. It was end-to-end after that for some time and you had a feeling that Lincoln were far from beaten. They had what seemed to me at least to be a good shout for a penalty turned-down by Referee Ben Toner after just two minutes of the re-start: I thought that Anthony Scully was clearly fouled in the Morecambe area. Letheren then made another really good save from a long-range shot by Lewis Fiorini after almost an hour. But Morecambe’s lead was made more secure when, following a free-kick from their left, substitute Ryan Delaney headed the ball back across the penalty area from the far side and big defender Scott Wooten buried his first strike for the club past a helpless Griffiths. This was after 79 minutes but still the visitors didn’t give up. They had a couple of shots blocked late on in the game but the hosts also had chances at the other end.

So – at the finish – it was two goals and three points to the Shrimps. I’m sure the Imps were mindful of their Manager’s warning about Cole Stockton – but with the striker in the form he is currently, dealing with him is far easier said than done. It was a really good win for Stephen Robinson’s side because Lincoln are a clearly a decent team who can play a bit. For me, the only disappointing performance for the Shrimps tonight was by Adam Phillips. He had a really poor game throughout his time on the field; constantly over-hitting the ball from a succession of set pieces and noticeably failing ever to drop back to help recover it when Morecambe lost possession. This is something he needs to work on urgently: his consistency – and perhaps his attitude generally – leaves a lot of questions unanswered in my opinion.

But, more positively, the win pushed the Shrimps up the table to eleventh place in League One tonight. City, meanwhile, slipped to seventeenth.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (Y); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 7 Wes McDonald (15 Ryan Delaney 76’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 18 Adam Phillips (6 Callum Jones 64’); 22 Liam Gibson; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 82’); 25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Scott Wootten.

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 16 Jacob Mensah; 11 Josh McPake; 21 Ryan Cooney.

Lincoln City: 1 Josh Griffiths; 2 Regan Poole; 4 Lewis Montsma; 11 Anthony Scully; 14 Hakeeb Adelukan (12 Ted Bishop 45’); 19 Lewis Fiorini; 20 Daniel N’Lundulu (17 Remy Longdon 76’); 21 Lasse Sorensen (15 Cohen Bramall 65’); 22 T J Eyoma; 23 Liam Bridcutt (C); 24 Jamie Robson.

Subs Not Used:  31 Sam Long; 5 Adam Jackson; 6 Max Sanders; 37 Oisin Gallagher.

Ref: Ben Toner.

Att: 3,466 (241 from Lincoln.)

“The Morecambe fans were superb!” So was their team: in the first half…

Morecambe made the long journey to High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire today to face another team – following their earlier clashes with Rotherham and Sheffield Wednesday – which were relegated just last season from the Championship. Before the game at Adams Park, Wycombe were sixth in League One; Morecambe eleventh. Both teams have lost two and won two of their last five league games, including midweek victories for Wanderers by the odd goal in three at Shrewsbury and a 2-0 victory over an excellent Lincoln side for the Shrimps back at home in North Lancashire. The Chairboys were three points better-off than their visitors in the League One table but – crucially – had also played a game less: just nine instead of most other clubs’ ten.

I’ve discovered a website called Destination Scanner which is absolutely scathing about High Wycombe as a place to live:

“High Wycombe’s town centre – loud, some crime, not very pretty or peaceful, densely populated & unfriendly people. Desborough Road, Hughenden Road & Eaton Avenue – high crime rates, organized crime gangs, prostitution and drugs use make these very unsafe and unhappy places to live.”

Blimey! I wonder what it says about Morecambe? (Nothing apparently…)

Anyway, Wycombe’s multi-dimensional and extremely charismatic Manager, Gareth Ainsworth, cycled from his house to Wanderers’ training ground at Marlow Road on Thursday of this week due to the fuel crisis. Nobody attacked him or tried to steal his bike – as far as I know. But seriously though – well done that man – particularly given the Blackburn lad’s own struggles with spinal injuries which left him thankfully only temporarily numb from the waist down not too many moons ago. Whilst he was at Marlow Road, Mr Ainsworth said the following about today’s game:

“Morecambe are definitely a team we’ve struggled against down the years. Every time we’ve got close to achieving something, along come Morecambe to put a spanner in the works! They’re a good team and they’ve turned some big names over already this season, so do not underestimate them. People did that to us when we reached League One, and we got some good results that people didn’t think we were capable of. I’ve asked the boys to give me maximum points if we want to achieve something this season. To beat Morecambe at home is a big ask but we’ll be working really hard to work out what we’re going to do, and what plan to put in place to deal with their strengths.”

I wouldn’t dream of arguing with Gareth personally but I think that Wycombe’s record against the Shrimps is a particularly good one. In the eighteen games in the EFL they have played over the years, Wanderers have won half of them and only lost four. I remember years ago – 1993 – when the Chairboys met Morecambe for the first time ever in an FA Trophy game which went to a replay which the Shrimps lost, Wanderers’ then Manager Martin O’Neill saying that the club from North Lancashire were by far the best team his side had played so far that season. But I also have a memory of their current Manager standing throughout one of their wins at what was then the Globe Arena with his trademark long hair disappearing into a very stylish full-length leather coat. The fact that he was actually Player-Coach at the time was betrayed only by the fact that football boots and socks poked out from under the coat in a quite incongruous sort of way…

But I digress… For his part, Opposite Number Stephen Robinson said about Wycombe prior to the match:

“They have to be credited. They’ve come down from the Championship, they’re spending a lot of money, they’ve put a very, very good squad, experienced squad together, so we’re under no illusions. They’ve got a game in hand, which could put them in the top four if they win that game, so it’s going to be a big test for us. If we show the character that we have done in the last two games, then we’ll be okay, but this is going to be one of our toughest tests so far.”

Robbo recently outlined what seems to me at least to be his pretty unique strategy as a football manager. He has divided the season’s campaign into Five Year Plans – sorry, that’s Socialism, isn’t it? – into Five Game Blocks upon which he focuses all his attention. Today’s is apparently the first of the next five blocks of games the boss had delineated using this method. As far as the last five (Won 2; Lost 2) is concerned, he explained:

“When you lost the first two, nothing changes – you still need to win two games from that block and the rest is a bonus.”

So – unless I have misunderstood him – his calculation is that to survive in League One, Morecambe need to win only two out of every five games they play with every other win or draw being a bonus. To look at it another way, it’s effectively a succession of mini-leagues within a much bigger competition. Mathematically, this makes a lot of sense. But there is a psychological reason for it as well according to Mr Robinson:

“It just keeps things level in a world where social media dictates everything, where you are (portrayed as being either) absolutely rubbish or you are brilliant.” 

Excellent point.

“We just try and keep some medium feeling where it is neither. We are a good side that are improving all the time – but we will make mistakes. It (the block of five games concept) keeps you level and I am happy to go with it.” 

So would today’s contest turn out to be a one in five plus – or a one in five minus? Who would come out on top in the battle of the Centre Forwards – would (Sam) Vokes’ Wagon keep rolling? Or would Europe’s leading scorer, Cole Stockcar – Stockton rather – cruise even further ahead in the goal-scoring stakes? (Am I supposed to say `see what I did there?’ now, Mr Editor? Pardon? Well – there’s no need to be like that…)

It was wet and quite cold as the match kicked-off at Adams Park at three o’clock after sometimes torrential rain had fallen overnight and for most of the day up to that point.  Despite the soaking it had received, the pitch was a credit to the Chairboys’ groundsmen – er, women – er, people – you know: the folks who work on it – the surface was like a billiard table when the game started.

Morecambe kicked-off and the visiting fans were drowning-out the home supporters with their loud vocal encouragement even before the team they were backing scored after just three minutes. Arthur Gnahoua was fouled and Adam Phillips took a free-kick which was headed clear. The ball found its way to Alfie McCalmont just outside the area. His seemingly mis-hit shot bobbled from his thigh past a flat-footed goalkeeper in the shape of David Stockdale across the greasy surface into the back of the net for the softest of goals for the Shrimps and Alfie’s first for the club.

A lot of recent goals for Wycombe have been scored after good work down their left flank and Joe Jacobson and Jordan Obita were soon trying to work their magic in this department again – to no effect. The Morecambe defence were clearly prepared for this and kept a tight rein on them whilst being instrumental in regularly setting-up counter attacks in which Cole the Goal constantly caused problems for the home defence. Jacobson has scored a lot of goals directly from corner kicks over the years and he forced visiting goalkeeper Kyle Letheren to confidently punch away another one swerving into his top corner after a quarter of an hour. Shortly afterwards, Stockdale played a clearance directly to Gnahoua who immediately dispatched it to an unmarked Phillips who was perfectly placed to increase Morecambe’s lead. Instead of belting it, he tried to place the ball and the home goalkeeper redeemed himself with a tremendous save to keep the lead down to a single goal. After twenty-one minutes, he hit another free-kick at goal but it was fielded by Stockdale on this occasion without too much trouble. Anthony Stewart then wasted a glorious chance to equalise for Wanderers after twenty-five minutes when he blasted a lovely ball from Jacobson which had been headed by Sam Vokes right into his path wildly over the bar. Morecambe immediately charged up the field, Gnahoua and Stockton combined well only for Cole the Goal to unselfishly set-up Phillips to atone for his earlier misses with a controlled finish past a helpless Stockdale. Cole managed to slip his marker with about half an hour on the clock and took a shot which – unusually for him in recent times – missed the target. As the rain continued to hammer down, another attempt from Stockton was blocked before he buried the ball a minute later only to be flagged off-side. At the other end, Opposite Number Vokes had a free header from a Jacobson corner but completely missed the target to the obvious and loud delight of the visiting fans. The impressive Liam Gibson then galloped down the Morecambe left almost at the end of the half and took a shot which was brilliantly saved by the home goalkeeper.

So at half time – with Morecambe adapting to the monsoon conditions far better than their hosts – the team from Lancashire went back to the dressing rooms with a deserved two-goal lead, very few scares at the back and the singing of their own supporters echoing all around Adams Park.

Whatever Gareth Ainsworth said to his men at half-time quickly had a huge effect on the game. Only five minutes had been played when Daryl Horgan was not closed-down and took a speculative shot from a long way out which just might have taken a touch off Scott Wootten before squirming agonisingly under Letheren’s body into the net. With their tails suddenly up, the Chairboys soon threatened again when Curtis Thompson hit Garath McCleary’s pass just over the target shortly afterwards. Then everything went completely pear-shaped for the visitors after 52 minutes when Vokes equalised for the home team with a determined header which Letheren was unable to keep out. The home team poured forward again and the Welshman between the away sticks pulled-off a fantastic save low to his right to stop Wycombe taking the lead with a good shot from Horgan after fifty-five minutes. Slowly, though, the shell-shocked Shrimps began to recover. McCalmont’s attempt from a corner was well blocked by the home defence after 57 minutes and just a minute later, Ryan Delaney’s header from Gibson’s cross only just missed the home goal. As the rain continued to pour down, Josh Scowen then managed to block Gnahoua’s attempt after 62 minutes before Vokes missed with a shot at the other end just two minutes later. The Wycombe danger man was becoming more and more of a headache for the Shrimps particularly from long balls over the top or direct from their goalkeeper. As the visitors’ rearguard looked increasingly disorganised, substitute  Brandon Hanlan then hit the post with a prodded effort after 72 minutes. The warning signs had been there for some time before the turn-about in fortunes was completed when Jacobson then scored direct from a corner-kick just a minute later. As if things weren’t already bad enough, Stephen Robinson was then sent-off by Referee Tom Reeves with seventy-four minutes on the clock for protesting too vigorously that he thought his goalkeeper had been fouled as the third Chairboys’ goal went in. A Ryan Tafazolli header was then blocked three minutes later before Horgan only just missed with a low shot a few moments afterwards. But a last throw of the dice for the visitors saw Jonah Ayunga replace Arthur Gnahoua with just twelve minutes left. Virtually the first thing the substitute did was put the Shrimps back onto level terms when his effort went through the legs of a defender and arrowed past a stranded Stockdale straight into the top of the Chairboys’ net after eighty minutes. As the home crowd fell silent again, Delaney’s shot was blocked by the home defence after 83 minutes before Vokes headed Jason McCarthy’s cross wide a minute later at the other end of the field. Ayunga wasted a great opportunity when his shot was saved but he might have passed to a better-placed and furious Stockton instead during injury time. Wycombe wasted no time moving the ball up the field from this wasted chance and all of Morecambe’s hard work was completely undone as Thompson fairly belted a shot past Letheren into the top corner of the net in the third minute of extra time to snatch victory for Wanderers from the very jaws of defeat.

So that was it – an ultimately crushingly disappointing loss after a tremendously disciplined performance from the Shrimps during the first half. Wycombe’s One Hundred Percent record at Adams Park this season was pulled back out of the Dustbin of History right at the end of the game. Did they deserve it? Who can say? Morecambe were undone by poor defending against Route One balls from the back far too often during the second half this afternoon.  Better discipline during this period – both on and off the field – might well have yielded at least a point against a Wanderers side with a simple Plan A: to get the ball up to Sam Vokes and leave the rest up to him. Today, it worked: eventually. And in all truth, perhaps at least a little fortuitously.

The loss pushed Morecambe into possibly appropriately unlucky thirteenth position In League One. One match down; four left to redeem Robbo’s current Block Of Five. A clearly bitterly disappointed Stephen was honest enough to admit that – having got all the basics right in the first half – his men then got them all wrong in the second. “You can’t score three goals away from home and lose the game” he said afterwards. Gareth Ainsworth must be an equally very relieved man to see his club sitting in a place barely even imaginable at half-time today: amongst the Play-Off contenders as the fifth club in the table at the end of the match. To be fair, he was very magnanimous in victory, saying after the game:

“This is the best squad I’ve ever had. Performances like that should bring the crowds back because that was entertainment until the last kick. I want to applaud the Morecambe fans because they were superb. It was a great atmosphere. What a finish.”

Wycombe Wanderers:  13 David Stockdale; 3 Joe Jacobson; 5 Anthony Stewart; 6 Ryan Tafazolli; 8 Curtis Thompson; 9 Sam Vokes; 12 Garath McCleary (7 David Wheeler 94’); 17 Daryl Horgan (19 Anis Mehmeti 88’); 23 Jordan Obita (18 Brandon Hanlan 71’); 26 Jason McCarthy; 28 Josh Scowan.

Subs Not Used:  31 Adam Przybek; 2 Jack Grimmer; 16 Sullay Kaikai; 20 Adebayo Akinfenwa.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (21 Ryan Cooney 63’); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 15 Ryan Delaney; 18 Adam Phillips (6 Callum Jones 70’); 22 Liam Gibson; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 78’); 25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Scott Wootten.

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 7 Wes McDonald; 11 Josh McPake; 16 Jacob Mensah.

Ref: Tom Reeves.

Att: 4,161 (about 200 wonderful Morecambe fans)

Hartlepool Pizza Morecambe Off.

EFL Trophy, Tuesday, 5th October 2021.

Well – it’s that time of the season again, folks. Imagine if you were able to create yet another competition to flood the coffers of the EFL with even more cash then it’s already creaming-in. What would you call it?

The Bury Memorial Shield, perhaps – in tribute to the EFL’s tremendous historical record of strict regulation of dodgy owners? It would be possible to change the name of this every year if necessary: The Boston United; Scarborough; Hereford; Macclesfield or Rushton & Diamonds Memorial Shields for instance. When you come to think of it, the list of possibilities is almost endless, isn’t it?…

Or maybe the Closed-Shop Cup instead to mark the Football League’s proud decades of opposition to allowing new blood into a moribund league where the same old crummy teams stayed in year after dreary year whilst progressive clubs like Morecambe, Altrincham; Hendon; Yeovil or whoever were deliberately kept out by them…

Better still – why not accept a van-load of cash from very generous sponsors instead – but insist it wasn’t delivered by one of those in question because it would probably break-down on the way? (Remember the LDV; Sherpa Vans or Freight Rover Trophies?)

Yes – that’s a brilliant idea! Any more where they came from? Plenty – all wrapped-up in oodles of fifty pound – or one hundred dollar notes on this occasion!

So that’s why – on Tuesday night – Morecambe travelled to the North East to face Hartlepool United in order to celebrate the long tradition of Association Football in this country by playing for a trophy dedicated to an American company indulging in US sales techniques in its attempts to infiltrate its own idea of a healthy diet onto the British public.  (By definition – this is one which turns in a very healthy profit for its owners.)

Yes – that’s another very obvious choice for an elite sportsman’s trophy, isn’t it? Which footballer do you know who doesn’t exist on an exclusive diet of fast food after all? If only sponsorship by Big Tobacco – or perhaps even the Mafia – wasn’t banned! Think of the money the EFL could make if it wasn’t!

In such a manner, the Papa John’s Trophy has morphed from the EFL Trophy in recent times via the extremely memorable Johnstone’s Paint and then the Checkatrade Trophies and something else last season which nobody had ever heard of before its latest incarnation as a tribute to Chicago, New York or whatever style of take-away pizza it is supposed to be. Let’s recall what former Morecambe Managers have said of unforgettable competitions of this sort in the past – quickly adding the proviso (as suggested by my lawyers) that they were not necessarily referring to any of the companies just referred to:

“What the ’eck is “Apple Bloom Pink” when it’s at home? Looks more like Magnolia to me! Should be called “Appalling Bloomin’ Pink” in my opinion! I painted our bedroom walls with this stuff and it took me all chuffin’ week! Four coats and it’s still streaky!”

“I would check very carefully indeed before using these fly-by-nights if I was you! The only `check’ they are interested in is the one any Tom, Dick or Cowboy writes them to appear on their totally unreliable site!”

And let’s get right up to date:

“My advice is simple. When the pizza arrives, immediately throw it into the bin, even in the unlikely chance that it’s still even vaguely warm! Then get some spicy barbeque ketchup, slop this generously all over the box it came in – and eat that instead! You’ll find it infinitely tastier as well as far more nutritious!”

The Shrimps were bottom of the mini-league which this competition represents before tonight’s game with no points on the board. At the end of it, they were still there, having drawn 2-2 after ninety minutes but then lost on penalties. They picked-up a single point despite this for reasons nobody understands and most people care about even less. Morecambe thus remain resolutely anchored to the foot of the table. So some things never change. But is anyone really bothered?

For the record, Pools went ahead in the incessant rain before first Shane McLoughlin with a well-placed lob and then Callum Jones (from the penalty spot after Jonah Ayunga had been fouled) turned the game on its head by half time. For the hosts, Matty Daly then scored his second of the night before Shrimps’ goalkeeper Jökull Andrésson brought-down Mike Fondop right at the death but Hartlepool missed the resulting spot-kick. When push came to shove at the end of the game, both McLoughlin and Arthur Gnahoua also missed from the penalty spot after Ryan Cooney had netted before them and Jones scored with the Shrimps’ final attempt. Sadly, Pools scored all four of their penalties.

This was the Morecambe line-up for Tuesday’s event, which was viewed by possibly as many people on the terraces (43 from Morecambe) as there were players on the field; management, staff and reserves on and off it as well as tonight’s officials, media representatives, stewards and – presumably – pizza-sellers:

20 Jökull Andrésson; 6 Callum Jones; 10 Aaron Wildig (C); 15 Ryan Delaney; 16 Jacob Mensah; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney; 23 Freddie Price (Y) (24 Arthur Gnahoua 72’); 26 Connor Pye (7 Wes McDonald 74’); 31 Scott Wootten.

The unused substitutes were: 1 Kyle Letheren; 4 Anthony O’Connor; 9 Cole Stockton; 18 Adam Phillips and 32 Cameron Rooney.

Hassel Bainks Another Win.

Morecambe crossed the country from west to east tonight to continue a League One campaign fractured by International Call-Ups in recent times. Burton Albion were the hosts for a match re-arranged from its original Saturday afternoon spot tomorrow for reasons which elude me. Special Xmas Shopping reductions in the Burton shops for one day only? Not wanting to miss out on the Oktoberfest which started at the National Brewing Centre in the town today? Orthodox Judaism putting its foot down and making a stand against despoilment of the Sabbath at last? Or maybe – along the same lines – an actual Black Sabbath concert? Armageddon prophecies perhaps? (Is there a lot of difference between the last two in all truth?) Burton’s own website doesn’t bother to explain any reason for the change but it very helpfully assures one and all `If you have synced your device’s calendar to our fixtures, it should update automatically soon.”

Thank goodness for that. What more does anyone need to know – particularly those who are facing a drive right back across the country in the dead of night at the end of proceedings?

Burton were tenth in the League One table but had won only one of their last five games and lost three, most recently when they went down by the odd goal in three to league Leaders Plymouth Argyle in Devon last Saturday. They were thus three positions higher than tonight’s visitors but had played a game more than the team from Lancashire. For their part, Morecambe had won two and lost two of their last five league games. Last time out – two weeks ago – they threw-away a 0-2 lead at Wycombe and shipped four goals in a second half where their defending – fragile at best since the departure of former Skipper Sam Lavelle to Charlton a few weeks ago – fell apart altogether. The number thirteen recurs as we consider the total of the previous league and single League Cup meeting between the two clubs. Albion have won seven of these; the Shrimps just four. The Brewers won all four of their first home EFL League Two matches against Morecambe; the first one of which was their inaugural match in the Football League. But – as encouragement to the visitors – they have lost both of the last couple of home ties between the two clubs at the Pirelli Stadium. Even more encouragement must come from their record against each other back to pre-EFL days. Morecambe won all five of these games home and away, scoring fourteen goals and conceding just two in the process. I never visited their former ground from these times – Eton Park. But I know Morecambe supporters who tell me that an abiding memory of it was a large sign right across the front of the Main Stand advertising “Don Amott – King of Motor Caravans”. Shrimps’ supporters apparently chanted this – make up your own tune – at the end of every victory. Bear this in mind; we are going to return to it.

Before the game, Dutch legend and Burton Manager Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink said about tonight’s opponents:

“It’s a team that stick together, a team that works hard together and they stick to their strengths. They are well organised. They have a low block and back off, which then allows them to hit sides of the break. They are in that momentum of promotion and feeling good. They are no mugs – you don’t go to Ipswich and play against Sheffield Wednesday and win if you are. They have got things in order, and we need to be at our best as they’re not going to be a simple pushover.”

His opposite number assessed the task facing his men thus prior to the game:

“Jimmy has a team which work their socks off; they are really aggressive in how they press. They’ve had a really good start to the season but they’ve had some indifferent results recently but they are a good team; they are a team that’s going to be very, very difficult to play against; a team that we can play against if we are brave on the ball again but we’re expecting a really good challenge.”

It had been sunny and dry during the day at Burton. As night crept on, though, icy tentacles started to wriggle from the darkness under a cloudless pitch-black sky to gradually colonise one’s extremities and it was approaching freezing at the end of the match.

The visitors started brightly and took the lead before the home crowd had seemingly organised themselves properly. Morecambe won a throw on their left; Alfie McCalmont mis-kicked a shot at goal and the ball broke to Liam Gibson, who scored with a tremendous strike from a long way out.

The Brewers responded, though, almost immediately. In the fifth minute, Jonny Smith played-in the nippy and elusive Harry Chapman but his shot was straight at visiting keeper Kyle Letheren, who saved easily enough. Then the Shrimps conceded a corner. Fingers and everything else crossed given the calamitous way the team has attempted to defend set pieces in recent games. Thomas O’Connor took it from the Burton right. He hit the ball hard and low spinning towards the near post which Adam Phillips was allegedly guarding for the visitors. And Phillips unaccountably decided to step out of the way. In it went to the understandable anger and bemusement of Letheren, who may have touched it but was clearly both dismayed and furious about what had happened and made his thoughts known to Morecambe’s Burnley loanee in no uncertain terms. Phillips held his hands out in denial of any fault – `Wot, me Guv? What could I do?’ Well – stand your ground for a start, Adam. It was as pathetic and bizarre a goal to concede as you could ever see; it threw away Morecambe’s momentum; it threw away their advantage and – worse still – betrayed a blasé attitude towards rank bad play by what is supposed to be one of the team’s better players. Phillips was poor tonight and was rightly taken off in the second half. Apart from forcing a sharp save from home custodian Ben Garratt after 25 minutes, he provided virtually nothing going forwards except half-decent corners. It’s a shame he started in the first place in my opinion for all the use he was – not for the first time recently either.

Anyway, having thrown their lead away, the Shrimps then proceeded to try and play on the back foot. As a consequence, Chapman was again allowed to run riot and after twelve minutes, the ball found its way to Daniel Jebbison, whose shot was just too high. Just two minutes later, the home side took the lead. With the away defence in retreat and seemingly also in complete disarray, Tom Hamer took a throw to Lucas Akins who set off on an unchallenged run down the Albion left before slinging over an inch perfect cross for Conor Shaughnessy to steer past a helpless Letheren to turn the game on its head. Twenty minutes or so were on the clock when Chapman then tried his own luck with a fine shot from a free-kick which Letheren did brilliantly to claw away for a corner. Hold your breath… Morecambe survive this one though… In fact, they had the better of the final quarter of an hour of the first half, which was played almost exclusively in the Brewers’ half. Garrett again did well to save a tremendous curling effort from McCalmont which seemed to be heading for the top corner of his net with five minutes left to play. Phillips’ corner hit the post and was cleared after that but the visitors were asking all the questions as the game reached the half way point

Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink was noticeable by his constant gesticulations and endless shouting of instructions from the sidelines throughout the first half in particular. Whatever wisdom he imparted to his troops during the half-time break soon paid dividends. Burton had the rub of the green when what looked from where I was sitting to be a certain penalty to the visitors after just two minutes of the re-start. But Referee Martin Coy gave nothing. Anywhere else on the field, he would almost certainly have blown for a foul – but not tonight. There was nothing lucky about what turned-out to be the decisive goal of the game though. With 50 minutes played, Tom O’Connor received a pass from Smith and curled a peach of a shot out of Letheren’s reach from all of 25 yards to make it 3-1 to the Brewers. They had a few more chances before the end of the match but the visiting goalkeeper didn’t have any more difficult saves to make.

Stephen Robinson shuffled his pack – sorry; according to the stadium announcer, “Morecambe Substitutions are brought to you by Doggy Day Care, Burton”- and Greg Leigh and Aaron Wildig were thrown into the fray. Neither had any impact and Wildig was anonymous for the entire time he stayed on the field. Cole the Goal managed to shake-off his multiple markers after 67 minutes, turn and unleash a shot in typical style. But for once, he missed. Right in the fourth minute of extra time – with the final play of the match – he didn’t, though. The ball came over from the Morecambe left and Cole headed it home to keep up his phenomenal scoring prowess so far this season. But it was too little, too late.

Morecambe threw this game away tonight. Too many players – Ryan Cooney and the aforementioned Phillips and Wildig among them – just didn’t turn up. Aaron has an excuse – like Jonah Ayunga, who won lots of headers after coming on at half time – he is returning from a long-term injury plus illness. But the team as a whole played poorly as a unit and their defending was shambolic a lot of the time. Burton don’t look a particularly good team to me despite taking all the points tonight. The win, however, pushed them up to seventh in League One. Morecambe remained in thirteenth position – one which will inevitably change for the worse tomorrow when the rest of the programme is played.

I’m afraid I also have bad news for Don Amott. Sadly, the King of Motor Caravans has been dethroned.  Shrimps’ fans chanted towards the end of the game “Doggy Day Care Burton – Dah, dah – dah dah dah!” and thus abandoned him. So – although the team lost tonight – altogether now:

“Doggy Day Care Burton – Dah, dah – dah dah dah!”

“Doggy Day Care Burton – Dah, dah – dah dah dah!”

Burton Albion: 24 Ben Garratt; 3 Cameron Borthwick-Jackson; 4 Deji Oshilaja (C) (Y); 10 Lucas Akins; 11 Jonny Smith; 15 Thomas O’Connor; 16 Conor Shaughnessy; 21 Daniel Jebbison (9 Kane Hemmings 69’); 37 Tom Hamer (Y); 38 Michael Mancienne (Y) (23 Terry Taylor 80’); 39 Harry Chapman (Y) (40 Charlie Lakin 69’).

Subs Not Used:  22 Ellery Balcombe; 25 Ciaran Gilligan; 26 Ryan Leak; 29 Jacob Maddox.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 7 Wes McDonald (10 Aaron Wildig 57’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 18 Adam Phillips (3 Greg Leigh 57’); 22 Liam Gibson (Y); 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 45’); 25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Scott Wootten.

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 6 Callum Jones 15 Ryan Delaney; 23 Freddie Price.

Ref: Martin Coy.

Att: 2, 477 (about 300 from Morecambe).

The Covid Pandemic has made it difficult – and often impossible – to visit other places to watch the Shrimps in recent times. So Burton was only the second away game I was able to attend so far this season. Here are my thoughts about it:

Gone For A Burton.

My partner Annie and I had a post-pandemic lockdown break together last week for the first time. We spent a couple of nights in Telford which we used as a base to visit Ironbridge, Jackfield Tile Museum and the RAF aircraft museum at Cosford before heading east via Stafford and Rugeley towards Lichfield and the National Arboretum, where we would pay our respects to the dead of recent wars.

I’m under strict instructions to keep this Blog to the subject of football and not start burbling on about other things. So, mindful of that, here’s a brief summary of what happened on the way to Burton.

The Tile Museum was shut. It shouldn’t have been – but it was, due to the illness of just one member of staff. But at Cosford, we set eyes upon this:

It’s a Handley-Page Hastings. What’s that got to do with football? you might well ask. Well, Hastings has a football club which competes in the Isthmian League and plays – very appropriately as far as this stretching of credibility is concerned – at The Pilot Stadium. Also, Jimmy Hastings was a policeman who played for Morecambe way back when in 1949-50 and had to retire early due to ill health. So there we have it.

When I was about eight, I wrote to the RAF and asked them if they had any spare aeroplanes they didn’t want any more. They sent me an exceptionally polite letter offering me either a fighter jet of a sort I can’t remember – or a Handley-Page Hastings. For two hundred quid. But I had to promise not to fly it.

In my juvenile mind, it would look perfect in the back garden of our Council House near Morecambe. And put even the poshest shed the neighbours might have lovingly constructed absolutely in the shade. (Probably literally, come to think of it.) Besides, it beat any Airfix model I might have been trying to make at that time all ends up. But – for reasons I can’t possibly imagine – my Dad wasn’t quite so keen on the idea…

Anyway, it is far easier to make a less tenuous connection between the National Memorial Arboretum and football. Here is a photograph of a sculpture which commemorates the famous Xmas Truce, where combatants from all sides took the opportunity to meet each other and even play soccer at Christmas 1914.The Top Brass soon put an end to such unpatriotic behaviour (Hooray!) and ensured the mass slaughter and widespread maiming of young men from all over Europe and elsewhere continued uninterrupted in no time at all (Hiss!):

There was also this:

This is the O’s Memorial. Leyton Orient fans – and others – have recently paid for this to commemorate members of the original club (Clapton Orient) and its contribution to the war effort. The Arboretum’s website explains this thus:

The O’s Somme Memorial commemorates and honours the service and sacrifice of the forty one players, staff and supporters of Clapton Orient Football Club who enlisted into the 17th Battalion Middlesex Regiment – ‘The Footballers’ Battalion’ in the great war. 

Clapton Orient were the first English football club to join up en masse. Three players, William Jones, George Scott and Richard McFadden were to make the ultimate sacrifice, with a further ten wounded. 

I personally think the inscription at the bottom of the memorial is particularly poignant:

`Once an O, always an O’.

So there we go; lots of stuff to look at on the way and we hadn’t even reached our final destination yet. This was north-east Staffordshire and the very heart of the UK’s Brewing Industry: Burton-upon-Trent.

So what did we know about Burton before we arrived there – apart from its famous thespian sons and daughters such as Sir Richard and Amanda?

It’s where the high street tailors those of us old enough to remember such things came from, isn’t it? And it’s also rightly famous for being Britain’s capital of biscuit-making – unless I’m mistaken. 

(The Editor – who clearly has a far lower view of the intelligence of the average reader than I do – has insisted that I am actually very much mistaken. In these False News times, she insists that I must correct these claims immediately. Burton Tailoring was based in London, having been founded in Chesterfield originally and Burton Biscuits still operate from Blackpool and other sites elsewhere in Britain. The company was founded in Staffordshire, though. Leek apparently. But in the pursuit of absolute clarity, she insists I make it plain that there are no Leeks actually in the biscuits. Except the Wagon Wheels for sale in Wales. No – that’s not true either apparently and you mustn’t go spreading it about on social media. Promise? Because if you do what she asks, my Editor has even said she will share the name of the river which Burton-upon-Trent stands on later…)

So what other clues do we have about Burton? The Trent singer once known as Terence? Close but no coconut – he came from Derby didn’t he?

I know: its football team is called `The Brewers’, isn’t it? What can we deduce from this? Any ideas? 

No – they don’t sell wallpaper and paint as a sideline. Here’s a clue:

I think I can say without fear of contraception that it must be safe to assume it is the home of the black savoury spread in the iconically-shaped jar which people apparently are either very fond of –  or detest.  Did you know that Marmit is the French word for a pot of this shape? You do now. The real jars are actually made in Germany but the spread which goes in them is still manufactured in Burton-upon-Trent even these days. This is the `Monumite’ sculpture which can now be seen in a park near to the river in Burton:

Chemist and local lad Dr Justus von Liebig (local if you happen to come from Darmstadt in Germany, that is) discovered the potential of creating a nutritious spread from the by-products of the brewing process during the late Nineteenth Century. But it took local Burtonians to actually create Marmite during 1902, using the cast-offs from Bass’ many breweries in the town. And in case you’ve been wondering – and let’s face it: who hasn’t? –  is Marmite Vegan? Yes. Unless you eat it out of the 70g jar. Why? Please contact them – not me – to find out the answer. Failing that, Forest Green Rovers (where these abominations are presumably not only banned by the only Vegan football club on the planet but probably ceremoniously Burnt At The Steak – Stake, rather – before home matches) can probably tell you…

So what else is whatever reputation Burton-upon-Trent currently enjoys based upon? 

Before we arrived there, we both realised that it is well-known (I apologise for this dreadful attempt at a pun) for water for one reason or another. That’s why it’s situated on a river – the name of which still totally eludes me, I’m afraid. But far below the surface, there are a series of naturally-formed aquifers – er, basically flooded caves – which has given the town both its raison d’être (as they say in Staffordshire) and established its international reputation for brewing.

Why is this? Burton water (not Burton Waters, which is a very posh Marina in Lincoln) is rich in the mineral gypsum. This is the key to the brewing process for which the town has been famous for centuries. The huge beer conglomerate Carlsberg now own the site where Marston’s Albion Brewery can be found. This extant Brewery still draws its water from an artesian well far beneath the buildings on the site. Brewers elsewhere in Britain are known to create their own version of `Burton Water’ by adding this rather smelly rotten-eggs sulphurous mineral to their own water supply in a process known as – wait for it – `Burtonisation’. There was once a huge Brewery in Bolton called Magee, Marshall & Co Ltd. Did they use `Boltonised’ water to brew their beers? No they jolly well didn’t. Believe it or not, they actually transported millions of gallons of the stuff across the Pennines (by horse-drawn barge via the Trent and Derby and then other canals – at least originally, I think) from John Bell’s Brewery on Lichfield Street in Burton.

When real Burton Water is used to brew real Burton beer, it produces a fairly unmistakable and not particularly pleasant odour. This is known as the `Burton Snatch’. I kid you not. According to my Bible of British Brewing, this niff once pervaded the town even more than is the case at the moment. The Brewery History Society list no fewer than forty extant and extinct breweries in Burton-upon-Trent (that’s more than some counties have had. Rutland, for instance…) As well as the two I have already mentioned, these include such massive names from the past as Allsopp; Charrington; Everards; Ind Coope and Worthington at places with quaint names such as the Anchor, Black Eagle; Blue Posts, Burton Bridge and Shobnall Breweries.

It’s a sad fact of life that First Impressions have a lasting effect on one and all of us. The last times I drove through Burton-upon-Trent, I approached the town from the direction of Ashby-de-la-Zouch on the A511. This way, you drive past leafy lanes and some very nice houses until you finally reach the river, go over a long bridge and suddenly enter the environs of what seems to be a pretty unique town with some very impressive Georgian and Victorian brick-built architecture.

This time, though, we went into the town through a wilderness of modern industrial estates and retail parks off the A38: you could have been virtually anywhere on the planet in this grim, soul-less wasteland of bumper-to-bumper vehicles, traffic lights and endless roundabouts. The A38 itself is a nightmare of heavy traffic with far too many trucks and far too little space. We counted our lucky stars to think that back at home in North Lancashire, we have the very good fortune to live next to a three-lane motorway with a hard shoulder which probably handles a smaller traffic flow most of the time.

Annie and I stayed at the southbound Travelodge and the approach to this was in itself like doing the chicken run every time we went there: no prior visual warning of the very short slip-road with the sharp left turn at the end as a fifty-ton truck travelling at 60mph right up your fundament potentially added to the general excitement. Not. The last time we had this unforgettable experience was after we had come away from the football ground following Morecambe’s pretty feeble display against the Brewers on Friday night. We passed the modern, no doubt very functional Unilever factory where Marmite is currently manufactured. You could actually taste – never mind smell – this particular culinary delicacy. Wonderful if – like me – you love the stuff. (Try it with peanut butter on toast: Yum!) But probably not so good if you don’t. 

Anyway – going back to traffic features – probably a measure of Burton itself is that one of the top five attractions of the town is apparently the Pirelli Roundabout.  This can be found near the Pirelli Stadium, a.k.a. Burton Albion’s football ground. What’s so special about this specific `tourist attraction’ in the middle of the busy road to Derby, the A5121?

It has a tree in the middle. (A Rubber Tree, hopefully, with a name like the one it possesses…)

Whatever, sitting proudly right at the top of the town’s various attractions – naturally enough – is the internationally famous National Brewing Centre. Visiting this place is not so much advisable – as obligatory.

So we went. According to all the online guides, we were about to see Shire Horses; Brewers’ Drays and Beer Machines before sampling some of the liquid wares of the old Bass Brewery. Personally, I was expecting two perfectly groomed horses with braided manes and plaited tails to be literally chomping at the bit as they waited patiently to take parents and children alike on tours of the huge Brewery yard on a Dray like this one:

I expected the various – and quite curious – vehicles they possess which a number of British brewers once used to advertise their beers to be prominently and lovingly displayed. This ancient Worthington White Shield Bottle Car, for instance:

But they weren’t: they were just stuffed into anonymous sheds which you wandered around.

Two huge, handsome beasts of Stallions were standing in straw and their own dung in the Stable Yard nearby. They were both in separate stalls which looked more like prison cells, complete with iron bars. It reminded me of Zoos I visited as a child where the `exhibits’ – note the word – were treated like display pieces, not like living, sentient creatures. To me, the horses – gentle, intelligent giants who like to work and are stimulated by visitors – seemed bored and sad. And this was an impression which I felt pervaded the whole place. The Museum was like something from the 1970s where stuff was jumbled together in a seemingly haphazard way and accompanied by fading and wordy old signs which even beer bores like me found too uninspiring and needlessly technical to actually read all the way through. What was described as `the Worthington Brewery’ building had a microbrewery within it. Annie and I thought of the Lancaster Brewery as we walked past it. There, visitors don white coats and are shown the brewing process which is explained in simple terms before being served with a brew of their choice and pre-ordered food at the end of it. For a fee. Here, there was nothing like that – just a man sluicing-out the stainless steel vessels with a hosepipe. It was another huge missed opportunity in our humble opinions.  The Worthington microbrewery could have been a fascinating and unforgettable experience – with a bit of thought and a modicum of reorganisation. Just think of the weight of history to do with Worthington alone. If its microbrewery was made the centre of the so-called Brewery Tap, it could have been absolutely magical. Imagine it – you could actually drink the latest incarnations of the literally world-famous brews they have produced in the past in a place which could be filled with reminders of that glorious history – mirrors; barrels; crates; bottles; adverts: photos of tied houses – the potential is endless…

We went to the actual Brewery Tap itself next for lunch. The staff were friendly and the food was good but the place itself again lacked any atmosphere or even any discernible sense of pride in the centuries-old tradition of brewing which is synonymous with Burton-upon-Trent. Look at this, for instance:

Here we see five planks cobbled together really badly to cover a down-spout from the roof.

For me, this was indicative of the whole place. Somewhere among the Museum’s presumably vast resources, I bet there are examples of (broken) Pins (20 litre/4.5 gallon casks). Imagine cutting these wooden mini-beer barrels in half vertically and fixing them one on top of another right up the wall to hide the down-pipe. Every one of them from a different brewer.  This is a simple idea which would be a million times more interesting and aesthetically pleasing that what you have just looked at. The boring old chairs in the Brewery Tap could all be made out of beer barrels as well – what better place to do it?

I bought a book in their shop before we left. In it were pictures – most of them postcards – of some of the many fires which have wrecked various Maltings and Breweries in the town over the years. The book explains that all Brewing Companies in Burton had their own Fire Brigades until quite recently. Again – just think: an exhibition of photos of the fires which have occurred at Bass’ Number One Malting (an absolutely enormous building) in 1905; Peach’s Malthouse (another huge place) in 1908 or the massive inferno which consumed an Ind Coope Malthouse and then quickly spread to other parts of the Brewery during the 1970s as shown here:

Malt is sugar-rich and thus particularly flammable. There have been plenty of other blazes in Brewery properties in Burton as well as the ones I have just mentioned. In 1977, for instance, another gigantic Bass Malting caught fire and defied the efforts of all the Fire Brigades of the combined Burton Breweries to extinguish it. So the Army had to attend to help deal with it using ancient Green Goddess tenders. Why? Because the Fire Service was on national strike at the time. What a story – you couldn’t make it up.

Photographs and tales like these could contribute towards a visually stunning presentation at the Museum about conflagrations in its own right. But there was not a single mention of fires in any of the places I looked. All that tipped even a slight wink at this hidden history was this display of the Bass Fire Brigade, all caked in thick dust and muck whilst looking as if it hadn’t been moved, let alone used, for years: you could grow plants on the Land Rover’s bonnet…

This is supposed to be the nation’s Brewery Museum. Two things off the top of my head which I could not see any reference to whatsoever yet have played pivotal roles in the history of British brewing are The State Management Scheme (SMS) in Carlisle and CAMRA – the Campaign for Real Ale.

Tullie House in Carlisle used to have a mock-up of a SMS bar in their museum. The Scheme was the only nationalised industry ever to have made a profit – which is why Prime Minister Ted Heath sold it off cheap to his many Tory-supporting pals in the brewing industry during 1973. Its contribution to beer making and the regulation of the industry is unparalleled in the UK: that’s where the Licensing Hours and loads of other concepts such as New Model pubs came from during and after the First World War. I’d be beating the doors down at Tullie House to get my hands on the discarded pub display if I was the Director of the Museum in Burton. By rights, it should be prominently featured there and, in doing so, make a fascinating – and thought-provoking – display about experiments in governmental social control which most people don’t know anything about.

CAMRA is possibly the most successful Pressure Group ever to have existed in the UK. Its members revolted against the virtual monopoly in the beer trade which was developing in the 1960s and 70s as `The Big Six’ British brewing conglomerates systematically bought-out and shut down hundreds of local breweries, consigning thousands of skilled brewery workers to the dole and utterly unique beer recipes to the Dustbin of History at the same time. Without CAMRA, all pub beer today would be tasteless, pasteurised, homogenous brown liquid with carbon dioxide pumped into it. There would be no Craft Beers or distinct Real Ale Breweries. Surely it’s worth at least a mention?

Inside the Museum, there was a mock-up of Burton-upon-Trent as it looked one hundred years ago. And that was basically a huge expanse of Breweries, Maltings and railway lines. Burton was as notorious at one time for its endless level crossings which serviced the private railways which once criss-crossed the town as it is nowadays for its ubiquitous roundabouts. Then, of course, most of the heavy traffic consisted of Drays and Horses – cars were virtually unheard of things.

The panorama shown in the Museum is no more. In truth, the National Brewing Centre was no more once Bass’ Brewery than the place where the Microbrewery just referred to is truly Worthington’s Brewery either. The latter was huge, ornate in places and covered a vast acreage: the very small bit of it still in use was simply a humble outbuilding back in the day. Here is a picture of the Brewery in its pomp with the vast Cooperage at the front, courtesy of the Brewery History Society:

Bass had several enormous Breweries right across Burton – and even more Maltings all over the town as well. The Museum was actually part of its Engineering Department, itself a massive concern all on its own.  Most Maltings were even bigger. To give you an idea of the size of these places, The Maltings on Wetmore Road – technically once Bass Malthouses Numbers Sixteen to Twenty – have recently been converted to provide a quite astonishing ninety flats (with either one or two bedrooms each) on the top floor of its four storeys alone. Remember – there were at least another fifteen buildings of this size which Bass alone operated in the town at one time. The Maltings – a relatively small part of which was severely damaged by a fire in August 2021 – are unusual in that they have actually survived Burton’s industrial past. Most of the rest if it hasn’t. The Brewery History Society has created a historical Walk through Burton which can be found here:

 http://Breweryhistory.com/wiki/index.php?title=Burton_on_Trent

We didn’t have time to do it. But if you did, you would basically be walking through the ghosts of Burton’s past. If you worked your way through the directions, you would find no trace of Breweries such as Truman’s; Allsopp’s; Walker’s; Eadie’s and others too numerous to mention. Same with most of the Maltings referred to: they were nearly all demolished ages ago too.

With them, I fear, has gone the beating heart of Burton-upon-Trent. You feel that the place is as soul-less as its football ground had been until the Brewers went 3-1 up against Mighty Morecambe last Friday night. There’s a palpable sense of loss of purpose; of the same sort of sadness which I felt permeated the Brewing Museum. The day we left was the second day of the Oktoberfest planned for this site. Where were the adverts? Where were the crowds? How has this celebration of beer been promoted, even locally? Nothing I saw anywhere in the town was pushing this event – not even at the football ground. Even here, not a single hoarding around the pitch or on the stands would suggest that you were in a place once internationally famous for its beer-making.

So what did we make of Burton-upon-Trent at the end of our visit? Did we love it – or – just like the Marmite it still produces – hate it? The answer is: actually neither.

I still have a nagging feeling that the town itself represents an opportunity somehow wasted; that its museum – and the place that spawned it in the first place – has lost its way somewhere along the road.  

What a shame.

Some of you may deem me guilty of exceeding my brief to `not start burbling on about other things’ with what I have just written about the National Brewery Centre. I plead Not Guilty. The link between the Museum and football is betrayed by my alternative title for this article:

“The Brewers of Burton.”

I rest my case…

Joseph: Morecambe’s Technicolour Nightmare…

Morecambe travelled to Gloucestershire tonight to face their third League One game in a row on the road. The Shrimps were sixteenth in the table when they arrived in Cheltenham, having lost two and won two of their last five League One games. Worryingly, though, they have lost both of their last fixtures. Manager Stephen Robinson has divvied the season up into five–game blocks. The defeats last Friday at Burton and Wycombe the week before that mean that they now need to win at least a couple of the next three matches in order to keep Robbo’s plan – to win at least two out of every five games – on track. Or, as he put it: 

“I talk about blocks all the time and this one hasn’t gone as well as we would have wanted so far. We needed to win two games at the start of it and we still need two games. Nothing has changed. It is up to me to find a slight tweak in what we do without coming away from what has been very good.  It may be changing the personnel slightly or maybe changing the system slightly. I won’t be coming away from my principles in how we play, pass the ball or press. (I need) to give us a bit more of a defensive nous in there. People make mistakes at this level and don’t get punished. We have made mistakes and have been punished but we don’t make excuses about it. We hold our hands up and ultimately I have to take full responsibility for it.”  

For their part, Cheltenham had lost three of their last five games and won the other two, including a victory here against Accrington Stanley by the only goal of the game last Saturday. They were two places but just a single point better off than their visitors before the game started this evening. Manager Michael Duff had this to say about the opposition his team would face tonight prior to the game: 

“Morecambe are a really good team. They surprised everyone last year but they’ve built on that. I think only Ipswich have scored more goals than them. We know we’re going to be right up against it.”

In previous clashes in all competitions, both sides had won seven of twenty-four games. Last season, though – as Cheltenham were on their way to become Champions of League Two – Morecambe won both games against them; the first one at tonight’s venue in the inaugural match of the campaign.

 Could they do so again?

Stephen Robinson rang the changes after Morecambe’s sometimes shambolic display at Burton last Friday. Jökull Andrésson started in goal and poorly-performing Ryan Cooney plus disappointing Wes McDonald were both relegated to the bench. Perhaps surprisingly, Adam Phillips started tonight. The Manager was probably hoping for a positive reaction from this man, whose performance at the Pirelli Stadium was nothing short of appalling.

The game started in pouring rain which never relented for a moment at Whaddon Road during the first half and rarely in the second. Morecambe were playing with three at the back and – unusually – two up-front, where Jonah Ayunga was tasked to take some of the pressure off goal machine Cole Stockton. Jonah, indeed, had the first chance of the game when – at full stretch – he almost got a foot to Greg Leigh’s long ball from the left which skidded rapidly across the slippery surface after just two minutes.  At the other end, Kyle Vassell latched onto a back-header on the right of the penalty area from his point of view with five minutes played. He let fly and saw the ball beat Jökull Andrésson all ends up only to hit the goalkeeper’s left-hand post and then be bundled away for a corner by the Shrimps’ defence. The hosts had the next good chance three minutes later too, when the young Icelander in the visitors’ net made a tremendous and brave save at the feet of Kyle Joseph. Worryingly, the chance had been set up by a simple pass through the middle of the opposing defence by the very impressive Dan Crowley. Ten minutes were on the clock when Cole Stockton slipped his marker and made an excellent run down the Morecambe left flank only for his progress to be stopped by sheer weight of numbers. He got away again a minute later but his attempted pass to Adam Phillips in the middle was cut-out by home defenders. Former Robins’ Captain Ben Tozer has taken the King’s Shilling and gone to free-spending Wrexham in the National League. But his spirit lives on in the aptly-named Sean Long, whose surname aptly describes his throw-ins. In the unrelenting rain, these caused problems for the visitors throughout the evening. The lively Vassell headed way wide with just over a quarter of an hour played. Then Phillips took a speculative shot from a long way out which was deflected for a corner after seventeen minutes. He took it himself – and walloped the ball right over the goal into touch on the other side. A few minutes later, Morecambe were awarded a free-kick on their left after a Robins’ player had expected the ball to go into touch and handled it before it actually did so. Phillips took it again and once more over-hit the ball straight into touch. But after twenty-five minutes, the hosts took the lead through Liam Sercombe. Long threw the ball in from the Cheltenham right; it wasn’t cleared and the Robins’ Skipper beat a helpless Andrésson with an instant and powerful volley. As the rain continued to hammer down, Long himself had a half-chance for the hosts from a corner but the ball was soon at the other end of the field. For unknown reasons, home custodian Scott Flinders chose to pick-up a ball that had been passed back to him some time earlier by one of his own players – Chris Hussey – as Cole The Goal bore down on him. Referee Ben Speedie immediately awarded an indirect free kick; Leigh rolled it to Phillips and the Burnley loanee atoned somewhat for a poor display so far with a goal which ended-up low to Flinders’ right in the corner of the net.

Stockton was then clearly held back as the ball was played in front of him after 41 minutes and as the Shrimps continued to press forward, Leigh headed a fine cross by Phillips on the Morecambe right back from the far post to smack against Flinders’ right-hand post with the keeper merely a spectator.

So Morecambe returned to the Dressing Rooms at half time in the ascendency and good value for a draw in a game which – despite the awful conditions – was always good to watch.

The Shrimps started the second half quite well too. After Vassell had headed over the bar for the hosts in the first minute, Phillips again took a shot from a long way out which was deflected for another corner. From this, Leigh and Anthony O’Connor set-up The Goal Machine to bundle the ball into the net with forty-seven minutes played. He was ruled to be off-side though so the strike didn’t count.

Vassell tried his luck again after 53 minutes – and contrived to blast the ball over the stand roof and right out of the ground. It was last seen heading rapidly towards the International Space Station. Two minutes later, Phillips showed everyone what he can do if he actually applies himself when his phenomenal pass from the Morecambe right just inside his own half was inch-perfect to Greg Leigh to the left of the home penalty area from his point of view. He played in Ayunga but Jonah was caught in two minds: his shot-come-cross to Cole was neither one thing nor the other and the chance came to nothing. As the rain fell even more heavily than ever, Vassell’s point-blank header from Crowley’s cross from the Robins’ right was brilliantly saved by the young Icelander in the Morecambe goal after 57 minutes. The home forward then squandered another chance just moments later before a well-placed Sercombe in the centre of the away penalty area forced another brilliant save from the visiting goalkeeper with an hour or so played. But with sixty-four minutes on the clock, the Morecambe dam was well and truly breached again.  Swansea City loanee Kyle Joseph responded instantly to Conor Thomas’ nice cross from the right to belt the ball past a helpless Andrésson to restore the Robins’ lead. The young Scotsman scored almost immediately again when the visitors gave him enough time and space to find a better angle on the Cheltenham right before swerving a sublime shot around Jökull and into the net via his far post.

After that, there were a few half-chances for both teams but no more goals despite the fact that Robbo shuffled his pack and actually went for it in the last twenty minutes or so.

That’s now three away games lost in a row and ten goals conceded for the Shrimps. It sounds – and is – bad. But I thought they played quite well at times tonight and certainly better than they had done last time out against Burton. No need to panic, Captain Mainwearing. Not just yet anyway. Cheltenham are a good team, as Michael Duff’s sides invariably tend to be. The win pushed them up into twelfth position in League Two. Morecambe, meanwhile, dropped to eighteenth.

Cheltenham: 20 Scott Flinders; 2 Sean Long; 3 Chris Hussey; 4 Mattie Pollock; 7 Conor Thomas; 8 Liam Sercombe (C); 9 Kyle Vassell (27 Christian Norton 82’); 11 Ellis Chapman; 17 Matty Blair; 21 Kyle Joseph (10 Alfie May79’); 28 Daniel Crowley (26 Dylan Barkers 78’).

Subs Not Used:  1 Owen Evans; 6 Lewis Freestone; 14 Andy Williams; 24 Grant Horton.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C) (Y); 8 Toumani Diagouraga (24 Arthur Gnahoua (Y) 69’); 9 Cole Stockton; 15 Ryan Delaney; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 18 Adam Phillips; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 22 Liam Gibson (21 Ryan Cooney 63’); 31 Scott Wootten (7 Wes McDonald 69’).

Subs Not Used:  1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 6 Callum Jones; 16 Jacob Mensah.

Ref: Ben Speedie. 

Divine Intervention needed? Not on today’s performance…

The leaders of League One, Plymouth Argyle, visited the Mazuma Stadium today on the back of three straight league wins and an unbeaten run of thirteen games. If we were to break this statistic into the Block of Five favoured by Morecambe Manager Stephen Robinson, we would see that their last five league matches have seen them garner eleven points from three wins and two draws: Championship form indeed. The Shrimps themselves are three matches into Robbo’s latest demarcation of Five and they have earnt precisely no points whatsoever with defensively hopeless displays at both Wycombe and Burton and an only slightly better performance last time out at Cheltenham. They still managed to ship three goals there to add to the total of ten conceded in three away matches in a row. It is ironic indeed that the loss of charismatic Captain Sam Lavelle to Charlton Athletic has seen the team’s dramatic drop in form whilst Sam has scored regularly for a club currently struggling even more than his old one are in the relegation section of League One. To keep his plans On Track, Mr Robinson needs to see his charges win their next two games. So what harder task could there be than to attempt to overcome the strongest club in the division on current form today? (For anyone who saw the highlights of their 3-0 demolition of Bolton on a heavily waterlogged pitch in Devon in mid-week, they are clearly not bad at swimming either…) The history of previous meetings between the two outfits was hardly encouraging for Shrimps fans. From thirteen clashes in the past, Morecambe have only three victories to boast about and have lost seven altogether.

There has been a lot of online criticism recently of the club’s Captain Anthony O’Connor’s leadership on the pitch and the Manager’s off it. My view, for what it’s worth, is that Stephen still clearly doesn’t know his best starting eleven. Given the amount of illness and particularly injuries his players have suffered from so far, he can hardly be blamed for this. To have one of your better players – and certainly your best and most influential defender – leave as well has obviously hardly helped him. We don’t have to look far to see that Management is as much a lottery as it is an actual skill: Derek Adams has hardly set League Two on fire since leaving for Bradford but nobody can doubt his pedigree as the boss of both of the clubs which met at the Maz today. It’s true, as well, that O’Connor does not obviously bawl out his team-mates or keep up a constant loud vocal commentary during games. Some people are just like that and it doesn’t necessarily make them poor leaders. It’s surely better to have someone like this than a loudmouth who encourages his colleagues to constantly take-up the wrong positions or do the wrong things and who intimidates, irritates or actually demoralises them by constantly haranguing everybody. Management and leadership are arts, not sciences, as a slogan in a Xmas cracker I once read so profoundly stated. For me, Credo in unum Robbo. Oh yes. This man has a proven track record and I believe that we should support him instead of sniping at him from the sidelines. Plymouth is a huge place with a massive fanbase and far more resources to call upon than we will ever have. They may be leading the pack at the moment but their own first experience of League One ended in tears – and relegation. Success in a higher echelon of football is challenging and we’ve done exceptionally well at times so far. We mustn’t forget this and we also need collectively to be patient. We’re not in the same straits as Doncaster or Charlton after all. The former is a badly-managed club which are looking at a rapid return to League Two after reaching the dizzying heights of the Championship recently. The latter is a Premier League veteran fallen on very hard times. Would you swap positions with either of them at the moment?  I wouldn’t…

Anyway, the Gaffer summed-up his team’s predicament at the moment and what he hoped would happen today in these words:

“This three-game block, I don’t think we’ve played particularly well (in it). I think we’ve been just okay, and just okay isn’t good enough at this level. We know what we need to do to change, we’re looking forward to Plymouth, I think it’s a great game to play in, top of the league, prove people wrong and show how good a team we are. Without being cavalier and leaving the pitch open, we need to go and take the game to Plymouth, we have to be brave. When we’ve done that, we took it to Ipswich, we took it to Sheffield Wednesday, we took it to Rotherham, albeit we didn’t win that game, but we have to be brave, I think we’ve got good, good footballers. We’ve had a hard period now, which we always knew would come, and we’ll come back again, I’ve no doubt. The run at home with fans getting behind us, I don’t think they realise how important that is. We’ve got a really young, influenced by social media group that read things and hear things. The more positivity there is around the place, from everybody, from the board of directors down to the management to the players, it certainly does help those younger players and they’ve a massive part to play in the next seven games.”

Opposite number Ryan Lowe said:

“We can’t get complacent; we can’t get carried away. After Tuesday night, it’s on to Morecambe. That’s always the case: onto the next one and see where it takes us. We’re looking forward obviously to playing Morecambe. They’ve had a decent enough start; they’re scoring loads of goal – they’re conceding goals as well but they’re going to be a threat in different departments and it’s one we’ve got to be ready for. The lads are in good spirits; the camp’s all good and I don’t see why it shouldn’t be really, where we are in the league and the games we are winning.”

It was grey, windy but dry in Morecambe both before and during today’s match. Both teams Took The Knee and then the Shrimps went straight onto the front foot as soon as the ball was kicked for the first time.

They made all the running straight from the off. After two minutes, Jonah Ayunga showed his intent with a cross towards Goal Stockton only for Europe’s leading scorer to be denied by a fine interception by Argyle’s Dan Scarr. Four minutes later, Arthur Gnahoua worked his way down the Morecambe left and took a shot. Visiting goalkeeper Michael Cooper managed to block it but the ball ran loose to Ayunga to produce a fine finish from an acute angle to beat him and put the hosts one-nil up in front of a huge contingent of travelling fans.

It was an excellent start as Stephen Robinson’s men took the game to their supposedly more illustrious opponents, who seemed to be struggling with both the pace of the game and the amount of pressure the men in red were applying to them. Jonah missed with another good shot after eight minutes and then the Shrimps’ very impressive Number Seventeen drew a tremendous save from the visiting goalkeeper after a free kick taken by Toumani Diagouraga with ten minutes on the clock.

The Pilgrims had offered little until this point. But with just twelve minutes played, they were level. The men in the green strips worked the ball down their left flank before Ryan Hardie took a shot which was blocked. Time seemed to stand still as the ball was seemingly stuck right in front of the goal and all Morecambe fans prayed that a red-clad leg would clear it. But Plymouth’s Danny Mayor was quickest to react and he walloped it past an already floored Jökull Andrésson to bring the league leaders back into the game. As fears that the home defence would disintegrate as it has done far too many times recently, it could soon have got even better for the visitors from Devon. Mayor got away down the Argyle left and slipped a cross to Luke Jephcott which was cleared off the line by Shrimps’ Skipper and ex-Pilgrim Anthony O’Connor – who had a really good game today. This was after fourteen minutes. Five minutes later, Scarr and Conor Grant combined well only for Jephcott to put his effort over the bar. Andrésson pulled-off an excellent save after half an hour from Mayor but Referee Marc Edwards ruled that a second attempt by Panutche Camará was off-side. This was one of few decisions the man in the middle – who controversially sent off Shane McLoughlin for the first time in his career earlier this season against Accrington Stanley for what even their Manager said was an `innocuous’ challenge – got right today. He was appalling, making mistake after mistake to the disadvantage of both sides who were playing the game in an excellent spirit. In the meantime, Ayunga had missed with a shot which went over the bar after 21 minutes and then Cole The Goal couldn’t get  Greg Leigh’s cross from the left on target with a header. Controversy then ensued when Adam Phillips was clearly pushed in the Pilgrim’s penalty area just two minutes before half time. Only the Referee could explain why this wasn’t a penalty but Mr Edwards seemed to watching a different match to the rest of us most of the time this afternoon. So the match was level at half time.

It was level at the end as well without any more scoring. Stockton and Ayunga both had half-chances for the hosts and Morecambe dominated the entire half. Having said that,  Phillips had another poor game this afternoon and yet again overhit a number of set pieces whilst offering very little in terms of tracking-back. Ryan Cooney also was caught out of position far too often for my liking. Ex-Argyle player Toums was his usual imperious self; Skipper Anthony O’Connor led by example and both Ayunga and Leigh again really impressed. Official Man of the Match Callum Jones also played well – particularly in the second half. For me, Morecambe were the better team today and with a little bit of luck – and a better referee – might have taken all three points.

At the end of the game, the Shrimps found themselves in seventeenth position in League One. Plymouth, meanwhile, remained top – just. Wycombe are level on points with them but have also played one match fewer.

I note that the club has appointed a Club Chaplain this week in the shape of Martin Bateman. I’ve already stated my particular creed – Credo in Unum Robbo – but if I start to find my faith starting to waver or – god forbid – even fail, maybe I will be having a word with him at some time in the future. Only joking – a bit of luck as opposed to Divine Intervention would be more useful to Stephen Robinson at the moment in my view. Whatever – and I say this as a card-carrying atheist – good luck Martin; I’m sure you will do a good job.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones (Y); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 15 Ryan Delaney; 17 Jonah Ayunga (7 Wes McDonald 80’); 18 Adam Phillips (23 Freddie Price 90’); 21 Ryan Cooney; 24 Arthur Gnahoua.

Subs Not Used:  1 Kyle Letheren; 12 Ryan McLaughlin; 6 Callum Jones; 16 Jacob Mensah; 22 Liam Gibson; 27 Shayon Harrison.

Plymouth Argyle: 1 Michael Cooper; 4 Jordan Houghton (Y); 5 James Wilson; 6 Dan Scarr; 8 Joe Edwards (C); 9 Ryan Hardie; 10 Danny Mayor; 15 Conor Grant; 22 Brendan Galloway (Y); 28 Panutche Pereira Camará; 31 Luke Jephcott.

Subs Not Used:  25 Callum Burton; 3 Macaulay Gillesphey; 7 Ryan Broom; 14 Jordon Garrick; 18 Kieran Agard; 20 Adam Randell; 27 Ryan James Law.

Ref: Marc Edwards.

Att: 4,272 (658 from Plymouth).

Karl Wins Latest Struggle of the Robinsons

Morecambe travelled all the way from a very wet Lancashire to Oxfordshire today to visit the Kassam Stadium for the first time in six years. But let’s start again with Manager Stephen Robinson’s thoughts after Morecambe’s home draw against League One leaders Plymouth Argyle last Saturday:

“I thought we were excellent, probably our most complete performance of the season. The way we passed the ball was back to what we do. Saturday’s result came after three straight defeats in League One and the Shrimps responded by putting in an impressive performance against the high-flyers. You’re going to lose games at this level but you have to put performances in and we haven’t done that, we haven’t been ourselves, we haven’t pressed properly, we haven’t passed the ball. I thought there were some outstanding performances. But what we did, we took the game to them, we had real belief, we pressed and we didn’t look like a side that had lost three games. (Plymouth) have done brilliant this season. They’ve got a real good shape and system behind them, they’re consistent with their selection but I think for the neutral watching that today nobody would have told you who was top of the league.”

Let’s also mention Cole Stockton’s winning of the PFA League One Supporters’ Player of the Month for September. Very well done sir – and very well deserved too. Here he is being presented with the trophy by my fellow-cardiac calamity survivor Fabrice Muamba at Lancaster University:

Going back to today, in previous meetings, the Shrimps haven’t performed particularly well against the Town Of Dreaming Spires’ EFL club. They have played thirteen games against them altogether (one in the FA Cup which United won), drawn six and lost five. Today, they started the game on the back of three defeats and just a single win in their last five League One matches. Oxford, on the other hand, have won both of their last two league fixtures and only lost one of their previous five; winning the rest as well.  This fine form had led to them being in the lowest of the Play-Off positions: sixth in the table – prior to today’s contest.  Morecambe found themselves twelve places lower. This afternoon, the Shrimps faced another opposition Manager who has been struck-down by Coronavirus in recent times. Today was the first time in three weeks and four fixtures that Karl Robinson has been well enough to take charge of his team after being taken ill with the virus. Summing-up the fact that the pandemic is still very much with us, he said last Thursday:

“I feel fine now. I was a bit tired after today’s training but that’s to be expected and I am really looking forward to the game now. I want to thank everyone on the staff and all the players because they have all been brilliant and taken on that little extra bit of responsibility while I was away, but that’s why we employ good people who want to help others. I watched the three games. The first one I was exhausted after, but that was the early days when I was struggling with the illness. On Saturday it was much better and then by Tuesday night I was just frustrated not to be there in person because I felt fine.”

As far as today’s clash in particular was concerned, he added:

“I hope a lot of fans come back to see us on Saturday because we are playing well at the moment. It’s not going to be easy, Morecambe are well managed; we did a coaching course together a while back and I’m pleased to see Stephen doing well there. Basically we have the same squad to pick from that has won the last three matches and now it is up to us to keep that going. Hopefully we can get another win and the fans go home happy with the performance and with the result.”

Namesake Stephen said of the task facing his men today:

“You can’t forget what you’re really good at, sometimes results make you forget why you were successful, relatively successful early on in the season, and I thought we got back to that on Saturday. It’s now a chance to maintain that against another very good footballing side. They’ve got some very good players, an ex-player of mine Alex Gorrin, some Northern Ireland internationals Mark Sykes and Gavin Whyte, (Matty) Taylor up front, they’ve got good players throughout the team, I could name them all. Karl has built that team over a period of time and probably what we’re trying to emulate really. We’re trying to get to that stage where we’ve got a squad as strong as him, we’ve got an identity and a style like Oxford, and it’s a good club to aim for really.”

In contrast to the weather at home, it was both sunny and dry in Oxford before and during the game.  Both teams Took The Knee in front of the odd three-sided stadium’s fans and the Yellows enjoyed the early possession. Visiting goalkeeper Jökull Andrésson spilled a cross from Nathan Holland after just two minutes only for his defence to come to the rescue and boot it clear. Jamaica international Greg Leigh made a brilliant tackle on Mark Sykes with four minutes gone only for Adam Phillips to gallop up the field and try his luck only to have his effort deflected for the first corner of the match which the same player wasted yet again by over-hitting the ball. Morecambe Captain Anthony O’Connor then made another key interception in the seventh minute to concede the U’s first corner. With the sun in their eyes, the visitors’ defence continued to be the busier of the two but Wes McDonald had a punt at goal from all of twenty-five yards after about ten minutes. To be honest, it was miles away. Ryan Cooney then headed a ball down for Jonah Ayunga who then attempted to play-in Callum Jones, who just couldn’t quite keep his effort down – the home goalkeeper collected it easily. This was after thirteen minutes. Steve Seddon then put a lovely cross into the Morecambe penalty area only for nobody to take advantage before the ball found its way back to him moments later. His effort when well placed, however, was brilliantly blocked by Ryan Delaney for another corner which came to nothing. Phillips then wasted a chance for the visitors from a free-kick by hitting his effort straight into the wall after seventeen minutes. With Ayunga showing signs that he had the beating of left-back Seddon, though, Morecambe forced another couple of set-pieces which Phillips took to no effect before twenty minutes had been played. Ryan Cooney took a wild shot at goal after 22 minutes as the Shrimps were beginning to have a greater share of the play. Cole Stockton – constantly double-marked as is the norm these days – made a delightful headed flick to Jonah shortly afterwards but the chance also came to nothing. United struggled to put meaningful attacks together until the visitors conceded a corner after 28 minutes. It was taken long; the static Morecambe defence failed to respond as Elliott Moore headed it forwards to see Matty Taylor flick it backwards over his head at the far post for the onrushing Seddon to head the ball home unchallenged from about three yards out from the near stick. It was yet another poor goal to concede to add to the litany of others the Shrimps have given away on the road in recent times. Alex Gorrin then tried his luck for the hosts after 32 minutes with a curling shot which missed the target. Then the Yellows had a half-hearted call for a penalty after 35 minutes and – as the home team’s pressure continued – Morecambe’s Icelandic International loanee goalkeeper made a good save from Holland shortly afterwards. Wes won a corner after forty minutes which Phillips took quickly to no effect yet again. With about three minutes left until half time, McDonald tested home custodian Simon Eastwood with a tremendous strike which the goalkeeper palmed away quite unconventionally. Just before the break, Cole the Goal managed to slip his marker and put in a header which Eastwood saved well. But that was as close as the visitors came during the first period. Right at the death, Oxford had the final say as Holland came close again but their opponents trailed back to the Dressing Rooms once again ruing their failure to concentrate from set-pieces.

Oxford also started the second period on the front foot. But the visitors had the first priceless chance of the half when Ryan Delaney somehow managed to fail to turn a golden opportunity served on a plate into the net from just three yards out. Greg Leigh had sent the ball over from the left after a brilliant, mazy run and the ball was turned right into his path by the home goalkeeper when Ryan was completely unmarked.  

The visitors soon took advantage of this absolute howler and a simple ball over the top saw an exposed Andrésson clearly pull Taylor back as he slipped the ball past him on the left hand side of the Shrimps’ penalty area. The experienced James Henry let the visitors off the hook, though, with a truly dreadful attempt to convert from the spot. It was hardly the best way for the Yellows’ veteran – who was playing his two hundredth game for them today – to mark the event because his shot wasn’t even close as it went into orbit way over the bar. Morecambe had the next chance then but Cole seemed to have left his shooting boots at home when he missed with a couple of half-chances. But he didn’t miss on 54 minutes, though, when he walloped a truly fantastic volley past Eastwood from twelve yards as Cooney played the ball into him from the right. This was Cole’s thirteenth goal of the campaign and it was another absolute cracker. Ayunga then danced his way through the home defence a few minutes later but his pass to Cole resulted in an easy take for the home goalkeeper after 72 minutes. The visitors were well on top at this juncture.

But Karl Robinson shuffled his pack with a couple of changes after about seventy minutes – and they soon paid-off. Another lapse in concentration by the visitors saw Taylor nod a long cross back into the path of an unmarked Sykes, who beat Andrésson to the ball to head it home and restore the U’s lead with seventy-three minutes on the clock. It was a simple goal – a long punt from the goalkeeper out to the Oxford left and an equally long punt forward to Taylor: too easy by far. The Yellows played possession football for some time after going back in front. Stephen Robinson shuffled his pack as well to try and get back into the game. But with three minutes left, Seddon found an on-side Taylor with a clever backheel in the away penalty area and Oxford’s top goal scorer of the last two seasons deftly lobbed the ball over an advancing Jökull to put the result beyond any further doubt.

Morecambe weren’t good enough today. This was their fourth away defeat in a row and they need to learn – quickly – that home form alone is unlikely to keep you in any Division in the EFL. Stephen Robinson’s latest Block of Five matches thus ended with just one point from a potential fifteen – five short of the minimum he has calculated is required to keep Morecambe in League One.

In the table that actually matters, the Shrimps ended the day in nineteenth place in League One. They are level on points with twentieth-placed Charlton – who thrashed Doncaster four-nil today – and Shrewsbury (who drew 1-1 at Lincoln) to lie in the topmost of the relegation positions in the Division. Crewe were mauled 1-4 at Gresty Road and Fleetwood drew at home. The Shrimps’ next away game at Highbury against the Cod Army thus takes on an ever-greater significance as both Lancashire clubs face a struggle to maintain their status as League One clubs.

Finally, forgive me for indulging myself but I’d like to share with you some good news which emerged from Oxford this week. THE TOM PATERSON COLLECTION is out now, published by Rebellion (OX2 0ES) – ISBN 978-1-78108-940-8. This has some of my own Watford Gapp scripts in it plus a few words from Yours Truly about what it was like to work with the world’s greatest living comic illustrator – which Tom indisputably is – from my point of view. Harmless fun for all the family. Get your copy now in time for Xmas…

Oxford United:  1 Simon Eastwood; 2 Sam Long; 4 Jordan Thorniley; 5 Elliott Moore; 6 Alejandro (Alex) Gorrin Rodriguez (18 Marcus McGuane 70’); 9 Matty Taylor (19 Daniel Agyei 90’); 10 Mark Sykes; 17 James Henry; 26 Herbie Kane; 27 Nathan Holland (21 Gavin Whyte 69’); 42 Steve Seddon.

Subs Not Used:  31 Kie Plumley; 7 Ryan Williams; 14 Anthony Forde; 23 Billy Bodin.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones (23 Freddie Price 82’); 7 Wes McDonald; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 15 Ryan Delaney; 17 Jonah Ayunga (27 Shayon Harrison 85’); 18 Adam Phillips (25 Alfie McCalmont 73’); 21 Ryan Cooney.

Subs Not Used:  1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 22 Liam Gibson; 31 Scott Wooten.

Ref: Lee Swaby.

Att: 8,766 (228 from Morecambe).

Too Easy for the U’s

Morecambe approached tonight’s game against Cambridge United at the Mazuma Stadium on the crest of a slump. Manager Stephen Robinson has broken down the season into bite-sized chunks of five games. In their last five, his team has picked up just one solitary point out of a potential fifteen. By his own reckoning, they need at least six to survive in League One. The Shrimps’ away form has been appalling ever since Skipper Sam Lavelle was sold to Charlton Athletic. Having said that, they have played intelligent, effective football at times and the form of some of Robbo’s players – most obviously Cole the Goal Stockton and the superb Jonah Ayunga and Greg Leigh – give reasons for optimism.

On the down-side, though, it’s a concern that Aaron Wildig seems to have returned to a pattern all too familiar to Shrimps’ supporters from when Jim Bentley was in charge of the club. He seemed to be perennially injured or unwell then and rarely played a full ninety minutes. Last season, though, he equally rarely missed a game and usually played the full hour and a half into the bargain. Derek Adams seemed to be able to inspire what has always been one of the club’s better talents to display that skill week-in, week-out. So what’s happened? Robbo also persists with Burnley loanee Adam Phillips, whose languid performances for far too long (not tracking-back; constantly overhitting the ball and numerous other crimes against the Beautiful Game)  have not been good enough to earn him a place in a Northern Premier League side, let alone the Premier League one managed by Sean Dyche.  I don’t personally understand why Toumani Diagouraga – who is a far more skilful player with an obviously much better attitude and whose commitment to the cause has never been in any doubt – isn’t given the dead ball duties instead. Failing that – how about anyone else? Me, for instance – or even my son’s dog? None of us could do any worse…

United travelled to North Lancashire tonight also under something of a cloud – to add to the ones which have been pouring rain down for over a week now across Morecambe Bay and its environs. Their first season in League One since promotion last term has also proved pretty problematic. There is no doubt that the loss of ex-Morecambe striker Paul Mullin to moneybags Wrexham this season has had a massive effect on their form: I suspect it is the equivalent of taking his successor Cole Stockton out of our own team. U’s win by the only goal of the game against AFC Wimbledon last Saturday was their only victory in their last eight matches. Their form in their previous five League One fixtures is three draws and one loss to add to their single victory. They were fifteenth in the table at the beginning of proceedings tonight; three places and four points better-off than their hosts. In previous meetings in all competitions, it was all-square, with six victories each and three draws. (Let’s just not mention their 7-0 demolition of Jim Bentley’s Shrimps during 2016 in what remains the club’s heaviest ever league defeat – or their 0-5 humiliation of Derek Adams’ side at this venue last season in League Two…)

Manager Mark Bonner had this to say yesterday about the opposition he would face tonight:

“They are a strong side. They came up with us, but they have had a lot of changes over the summer, a change of manager as well as lots of new players arriving, so some slightly different challenges we will have to prepare for from last season. Morecambe will be slightly disappointed with their current run of form but similarly to Doncaster and Shrewsbury, their home form is excellent, and they have picked up some brilliant results. We know how tough of a game it is going to be tomorrow and we have to give ourselves the best chance of going and getting something from the game to keep adding to the total that we are on.”

For the Shrimps, First Team Coach Diarmuid O’Carroll advanced these thoughts about League One in general and Cambridge in particular:

“They’re a good side, (Joe) Ironside gives them a good foil up the pitch, they’re nice and solid, they’re very good at set plays, very good late in the games as well. We’ve seen a lot of them recently. Harry (Taylor – the club’s `Analyst’) has watched a lot of footage, myself and the gaffer and John (McMahon – Assistant Manager) have done a lot as well, so we know what to expect. They’re beatable, it’s a strange thing, every team in this division is beatable on their day, it’s just who’s more consistent, who limits the silly errors and the silly mistakes. We know we’re going to be up and down, we know we’re going to be in games. We haven’t been blown away by anybody. We’re competitive in every game we’re in. Yeah, we could close the door at the back from time to time, but we’ve been entertaining, we’ve tried to play the right way and we’ve made an impression on every team we’ve played. It’ll be great to be back, we’ve had over 4,000 at pretty much every game, I think, so it’s good. There’s a nice buzz about the place, people are enjoying the product that we’re giving them. Yes we want to get more wins than we lose, but if we can go into Tuesday confident, which all the boys are, they’re a close-knit group.”

Czech Tomas Holy – the `holy goalie’ on-loan from Ipswich – has returned to his parent club and regular stopper Dmitar Mitov returned to the first team tonight. Is he any good? Has the injury he has just recovered from done him any lasting damage?

Who knows? He was wearing a very natty pink outfit tonight which – under the lights – looked remarkably as if it was the same colour as Morecambe’s shirts from a distance. Other than that, there is virtually nothing to say about him. He had almost nothing to do and as the game wore on, he must have been more bothered by the plummeting temperature than he was by any thoughts of conceding a goal.

The match kicked-off under clear ink-black skies and for the first twenty minutes or so, the hosts looked lively. With the exception of Wes McDonald out on the left wing – who offered nothing all the time he was on the pitch once he had forced the visiting goalkeeper into what I think was his only save of the entire game after six minutes  – they looked more than a match for the team in the yellow shirts.  But as I’ve said, Mitov was only tested once and the visiting defence didn’t look like they were about to fall apart at any moment. However, I at least thought that the Shrimps were shading things and were marginally the better team.

And then the U’s scored. This was after twenty-eight minutes and it was a fantastic strike worthy of Cole the Goal Stockton himself. Ben Worman managed to control a difficult ball played into him with his chest and in an instant, he had volleyed it past a helpless Jökull Andrésson in the home goal. Wow…

And that was basically that. Morecambe’s heads dropped; their play became bitty and un-coordinated and they basically laid down and died. The U’s were pinging the ball about confidently and effectively by the end of the first half, by which time they had taken over control of the game utterly and totally.  

The second half was – if anything – even worse from the Shrimps’ point of view. The ball was repeatedly booted long by the men in the red shirts and the other men in the yellow shirts equally repeatedly played it quickly and efficiently back again. Morecambe didn’t press; they didn’t link-up well at any point – tonight, they looked beaten from the moment the first goal went in. United could have gone further ahead after an hour when the Shrimps’ young Icelandic goalkeeper did brilliantly to push a tremendous, sharp shot from Harvey Knibbs against his right-hand post. But the inevitable second goal arrived after 72 minutes when a clear penalty was awarded after Scott Wooten brought-down Jensen Weir. Joe Ironside walloped the ball home and any doubts that the Us were not going to take all three points home to Cambridgeshire were well and truly dispelled.

Jubril Okedina embarrassed himself by rolling about as if pole-axed when caught by an innocuous challenge by Jonah Ayunga before this happened. Shame on you sir! The histrionics worked though – Jonah went in the book. Also, when they scored, three young substitutes who had been discussing their conkers collections or what their mums were likely to make them for breakfast were `warming-up’ on the touchline. They ran onto the field to join in United’s celebrations. The Referee, Robert Madley, shooed them away – eventually. But one of the Herberts – white; blonde and clearly not very bright – gave him some backchat. The referee booked him. I would have personally have given him a red card for his exceedingly disrespectful reaction to this. So we faced a potential situation where – with a man silly boy sent off – Cambridge would still have had a full complement on the pitch. Bizarre...

Other than that, there is little to say. The U’s won’t have an easier win all season and if Morecambe continue to play like they did tonight, they will be relegated.

They need to improve – and improve markedly by Saturday. If they don’t, they will certainly be embarrassed at home in the FA Cup by another team who wear a yellow strip: Newport County. The only positive thing that can be said about this utterly feeble display tonight is that the young lad Shayon Harrison looks like he can play a bit.

By the end of proceedings, Cambridge had risen to tenth place in the League One table. Morecambe had sunk to twentieth place in League One – their lowest position so far. They are out of the relegation places only on goal difference. With our fixture against Wigan Athletic postponed, the Shrimps’ next game will be away at Fleetwood almost three weeks from now. By that time, the club will almost certainly be in the Drop Zone. Even at such an early stage of the season, this is looking like a really key fixture for both clubs as they struggle to maintain their current EFL status…

Would you like to look back at more positive things so far this season? You can catch up at any time on shrimplythebestfootball.com

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones (18 Adam Phillips 60’); 7 Wes McDonald (Y) (23 Freddie Price (Y) 60’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga (27 Shayon Harrison74’); 9 Cole Stockton (Y); 17 Jonah Ayunga (Y); 25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Scott Wooten.

Subs Not Used:  1 Kyle Letheren; 15 Ryan Delaney; 22 Liam Gibson; 21 Ryan Cooney..

Cambridge United: Dmitar Mitov; 3 Jack Iredale; 4 Paul Digby (C); 7 James Brophy (10 Sam Smith (Y) 74’); 9 Joe Ironside; 11 Harrison Dunk; 15 Jubril Okedina; 16 Jensen Weir; 24 Conor Masterton; 26 Harvey Knibbs (17 Leon Tracey 68’); 27 Ben Worman.

Subs Not Used: 13 Kai McKenzie-Lyle; 18 Shilow Tracey; 22 Lewis Simper; 23 John Lankester; 28 Liam Bennett.

Ref: Robert Madley.

Att: 2414 (133 from Cambridge).

Grudge Match Ends in First Defeat for Rowberry.

No Morecambe supporter needs any introduction to today’s FA Cup First Round game between the Shrimps and Newport County.

Kevin Ellison. Play-Off Final. Derek Adams. Michael Flynn.

As we all know, Kevin Ellison was surplus to requirements once Derek Adams took proper control of Morecambe prior to the campaign last season which led to our promotion for the first time to League One. Kev didn’t cover himself with glory when scoring for the Exiles in North Lancashire against ten men on his return last year: what he did in deliberately publicly insulting his former Manager was both extremely childish and frankly pathetic – it reflects really badly on a man who has many positive elements to his personality.

Mr Adams showed his usual dignity in treating Ellison with the contempt he deserved at the time and trumped it at Wembley by acting as if he didn’t exist at full-time. Well done Derek.

And when he was then asked if he had any sympathy for defeated Opposite Number Michael Flynn after the victory in the full glare of the British media spotlight at the National Stadium, the Scotsman perhaps surprisingly replied in the negative.

Instead, he said it was just reward for Flynn’s tactics in getting Shrimps’ players sent off in both of their previous League Two matches.

Fair point.

Derek Adams, of course, has left for Pastures New. Michael Flynn has also left the South Wales club – the second defeat in Play-Off Finals within three years was the final straw for him, apparently. But today’s clash had all the ingredients for a genuine Grudge Match as Newport would certainly think collectively that they have something to prove in North Lancashire.

In League Two, ex-Cardiff City First Team Coach James Rowberry – who was clearly on probation as Mick McCarthy took the Welsh capital’s EFL team precisely nowhere – has been appointed to the permanent position as Newport’s new Manager quite recently. 

As such, he has led them to eighth position in League Two at this particular moment in time. County are unbeaten in their last five league games and last Saturday, Dom Telford scored a hat-trick at Rodney Parade as Newport demolished Stevenage by five goals to nil.

Morecambe, on the other hand, have a truly dismal recent record currently: just a single point from their last six league games. Their defence has been All At Sea since Club Captain and inspiration Sam Lavelle left for Charlton. There are passengers in the team – most obviously Wes McDonald and Adam Phillips – who don’t put in anything like a proper shift and some of those that at least try may frankly not be good enough for League One.

So today was a real banana skin for Stephen Robinson’s team to slip-up on and humiliate themselves in so doing.

Newport’s new permanent Manager said after their last victory over Stevenage that he didn’t expect

“To get eight goals in two games and one goal conceded against Bristol Rovers and Stevenage, but I’m not getting carried away. We’ve got Morecambe next week and I’m already thinking about Morecambe and I’m also thinking about what we need to do to improve to try and strive forward. We need to watch the game back and get onto Morecambe because it’s important we keep progressing. In the last three or four years, we’ve had good cup runs playing the likes of Brighton, Man City, Middlesbrough, Leicester, Tottenham. It would be amazing to get a cup run but we take each game as it comes like we would normally. I went to the Spurs game as a fan with my dad so I remember that one vividly. Being from the area, I’m aware of the strong affinity with the FA Cup. We’ve got to remember that Morecambe are a division above so we’re the underdog in this game. We give it the preparation it deserves. I love the FA Cup, I can’t wait for it. It’s my first game as a manager in the FA Cup and I can’t wait for it, it’s a great day.”

His opposite number – picking up the theme of progressing – said:

“We want to win the game. We want to progress as far as we possibly can, I know what cup runs can do for clubs. We got to two cup finals with Motherwell. It lifted the profile of the football club; it raised a lot of money that allows you to build on the success and it put players to the fore. It certainly is a shop window and puts you in the spotlight which teams like Lincoln have done before and Morecambe last year, unfortunately without any fans. The fans deserve a little run; we’ll be doing everything in our power to do that, ultimately my main aim this season is to make sure we stay in this division.”

I don’t want to split hairs – I personally totally believe in Stephen Robinson – but I don’t see how `doing everything in our power’ to progress in the FA Cup and staying in League One at the same time are necessarily totally compatible aims. (Er – unless, of course, he thinks that the team who would face Newport today is good enough to continue to plough-on against Fleetwood in League One two long weeks from now.)

Just a thought, Robbo… I must say also that I don’t agree with his assessment of the significance of today’s clash for both sets of supporters either:

“There’s been so much change, I think it will be quite irrelevant on Saturday, the Wembley game. There’s not the same personalities, not the same managers at either club. So I think it’ll be completely different.”

For what it’s worth, I did agree with him when he added:

“We’ve got a point to prove as well, we haven’t picked up good results, we didn’t play well on Tuesday night. Some of the other performances have been good without picking up results. It takes the pressure of the league off us a little bit. Hopefully we can go out and put a better performance on.”

If Morecambe put on a performance as simply inept and spineless as they did when losing to a mediocre Cambridge United side at home last Tuesday, there would only be one winner: and they’re not based in England.

On the other hand, if Robbo can get his men to play today as they have done at places like Blackburn and Ipswich or at home against Sheffield Wednesday and Plymouth, they will win – Newport are not a match for either of the aforementioned clubs.

It had been a wet, windy and cold day in North Lancashire before the game started. As the visitors linked arms together in their match strips to try and keep warm, Morecambe’s players in their training tops also respected The Last Post before the game started.

This is a particularly poignant event; there are few – if any – British families who have not been affected by the dead of two world wars and other conflicts elsewhere on the globe.

Today, the lament was – very unusually – played on a bugle by a woman.

Very well done, Madam; I salute you.

During the game which ensued, a gale-force wind and sometimes truly torrential rain didn’t do anything to add to the overall spectacle, which was largely of pretty poor quality.

Morecambe started brightly enough though. Greg Leigh tried his luck after a couple of minutes which brought a routine save from visiting goalkeeper Joe Day. Alfie McCalmont had two shots which were blocked for corners in quick succession in the fifth and sixth minutes. But the visitors had the initial real tester when Jake Cain hit a half-volley from the edge of the Morecambe penalty area to draw the first of a string of excellent saves from home custodian and official Man of the Match Jökull Andrésson. After half an hour, the young Icelander earned his corn again with another tremendous stop from Dom Telford’s curling shot which was heading for the top corner of his net. Five minutes later, the away team came close again as Finn Azaz’s daisy-cutter was deflected just wide of the target. Courtney Baker-Richardson also only just missed the target with an effort after 41 minutes and our young Icelandic International made an even better save from a County player in an off-side position before the end of the half. After starting well, the home team had offered virtually nothing going forward and their play seemed both aimless and lacking any penetration. This was another poor display – and it was often more interesting watching substitute Aaron Wildig talking with his very animated former team-mate and Manager Kevin Ellison (who received a fairly positive reception from the home fans who once adored him) on the touchline.

The weather worsened in the second half and Morecambe barely improved either. With the wind firmly behind them now, the Exiles were not afraid to try their luck with pot-shots. The first of these came from Aaron Lewis after forty-seven minutes: and missed. Then – finally – the Shrimps shook themselves and a bit of assertive forward play by Cole Stockton saw Morecambe’s  Goal Machine force the first meaningful (but pretty straightforward) save from Day a minute later.  Cain then missed for the visitors and Telford put the ball over the bar with another dipping strike after fifty minutes. Cole then tried his luck with another shot which missed after 55 minutes. Then – as the heavens well and truly opened – Alfie walloped a shot towards the visitors’ goal a minute later which flew over the bar.

Sixty-six minutes were on the clock when Newport came closest to opening the scoring so far with a shot by Oliver Cooper, which was brilliantly saved by Jökull at the cost of a corner. Robbo then made a very necessary change to things. Aaron Wildig went on; the wholly ineffectual Adam Phillips was taken off. And the first contribution Aaron made to the game was to score. There were a number of Shrimps players queuing-up at the far post as a cross came over from their right after 67 minutes. Wildig was the furthest away of all of them but the ball fell perfectly for him to wallop it home with his first touch of the game.

Baker-Richardson then almost immediately equalised with an acrobatic effort which was deflected wide after 69 minutes. Azaz then fired over from distance with seventy-six minutes played. What would have been the absolutely outstanding moment of the game arrived after 82 minutes when Wildig – having spotted Day off his line from a long way out – tried an audacious lob which only just missed the target with the away goalkeeper nowhere near saving it.  Kev was inevitably introduced near the end and actually had a couple of half-chances which came to nothing. The home goalie also pulled-off a couple more outstanding saves but a poor game overall ended with a win for the men in the red shirts.

They rode their luck today and against a better team than Newport would probably have struggled.

This was the first defeat Newport has suffered since James Rowberry took the reins at Rodney Parade. He said after the loss:

“I think we showed our quality, but goals change games. I think we had sixteen or seventeen shots to their maybe nine or ten so we’ve probably got to take our chances, then their goalkeeper makes some terrific saves. There’s a natural disappointment, but performance-wise we just didn’t score and one moment in the game where we switched off in three or four different moments when they get the goal, that’s the difference between League One and League Two possibly.”

That’s probably a pretty fair assessment of a game which will not linger long in the memory.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (21 Ryan Cooney 82’); 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones; 18 Adam Phillips (10 Aaron Wildig 66’); 9 Cole Stockton; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (8 Toumani Diagouraga 78’);25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Scott Wooten (Y).

Subs Not Used:  1 Kyle Letheren; 7 Wes McDonald; 15 Ryan Delaney; 16 Jacob Mensah; 22 Liam Gibson; 23 Freddie Price; 27 Shayon Harrison.

Newport County: 1 Joe Day; 2 Cameron Norman; 5 James Clarke; 7 Aaron Willmott; 10 Courtney Baker-Richardson; 14 Aaron Lewis (21 Lewis Collins 82’); 18 Finn Azaz; 19 Dom Telford; 24 Jake Cain (22 Kevin Ellison 76’); 28 Mickey Demetriou (C); 31 Oliver Cooper (12 Alex Fisher 90’).

Subs Not Used:  3 Ryan Haynes; 4 Ed Upson; 8 Matthew Dolan; 16 Timmy Abraham; 27 Christopher Missilou; 30 Nick Townsend.

 Ref: Tom Neild.

Att: 1,879 (167 from Newport)

Meaningless – or Pathetic?

On Tuesday, 9^th November, Morecambe played Carlisle United in the final game of this year’s EFL Trophy competition. The Shrimps have an appalling record in what many people see as a tin pot competition in the first place. `First place’ – what am I saying? Morecambe came in last place not for the first time, having lost all three games in it home and away. Does it matter?

Alarmingly, the League One team fielded a lot of players who would be expected to feature in its first-team line-up against a club struggling to stay in the EFL at the bottom of League Two. Kyle Letheren picked-up an injury in the warm-up so young André da Silva Mendes was thrown in at the deep end – and played pretty well, apparently.

Just as well… The Shrimps let in two goals during the second half and lost 0-2 as Carlisle scored in the 49^th and 55^th minutes. Their first goal was scored by substitute Jordan Gibson direct from a free kick. The second was also conceded following a set-piece: Morgan Feeney headed a corner down to Morecambe Old Boy Kelvin Mellor, who made no mistake against his recent employers. Manager Stephen Robinson described this result as “Very, very disappointing”. He added:

“We have to clear our heads, you cannot spend time feeling sorry for yourself, if you get stick about this result, we will take it and start again. It is a big run of games coming up, games that I feel that we can win – we showed on Saturday that we can defend, we can defend our box and throw our bodies on the line. It is just about getting that belief and consistency to do that, ahead of a month with some big, big games in it.” 

Further trouble may lay in store for the Shrimps as some idiot came out of the crowd after eighty minutes or so and kicked the ball away as Carlisle goalkeeper Mark Howard was about to take a goal-kick. He was quickly dragged away but his brainless behaviour may have severe repercussions for the club in the future with fines or even a possible ban which will potentially affect all of us. This moron would probably protest that he supports Morecambe. Do us all a favour, mate: take yourself and your stupidity somewhere else: the Shrimps has enough on its plate already without having to deal with this sort of idiocy.

For what it’s worth, Morecambe’s line-up tonight was:

Kyle Letheren retired hurt to be replaced by André da Silva Mendes; Anthony O’Connor (C); Callum Jones; Toumani Diagouraga (Adam Phillips 78’); Cole Stockton; Jonah Ayunga; Arthur Gnahoua  (Wes McDonald 55’); Aaron Wildig (Shayon Harrison 78’); Scott Wooten; Ryan Cooney; Liam Gibson (Y).

The unused substitutes were Barry Roche; Ryan Delaney; Jacob Mensah and Courtney Duffus.

Fleetwood: So Superman IS Real After All…

Morecambe travelled the short distance southwards to the Fylde Coast today to face an old foe with which they have a long shared history. Fount of all Knowledge Wikipedia tells us:

“According to a 2019 survey called ‘The League of Love And Hate’, Fleetwood supporters named Blackpool (83%), Morecambe (74%) and Accrington Stanley (62%) as their biggest rivals.”

The first time I personally saw Fleetwood play was at Christie Park on Tuesday 26^th August 1969, when they drew one goal each in the Northern Premier League. Six years later, the club went bust – not for the first or last time either. Long before that, though, Morecambe and Fleetwood had competed against each other in the old Lancashire Combination for decades at a time when being members of the Football League was literally an impossible dream for both clubs: the EFL was a Closed Shop. For old fogies like me, actually being in a League now whose membership was once only for an elite few still causes me to frequently pinch myself. So to constantly read griping comments on social media that the club is going backwards and the Manager should be sacked, I have just two words. No – not necessarily the ones you may be thinking of but two others: Get Real. We aren’t Little Old Morecambe anymore but we still are a small club with an even smaller fanbase.  Being in the EFL at all is a tremendous achievement for everybody concerned – to be promoted to League One is still as good as it gets – or ever has got, either. Stephen Robinson’s greatest achievement this season has been to keep the Shrimps out of the relegation positions so far. If he manages to do this until the end of the season, that is success in itself.

This afternoon, the Shrimps began the game in twentieth position in the table. Fleetwood were two places; a single point and one fewer game played behind them. So what could become an absolutely pivotal eight days began at Highbury today. If Morecambe could win and then overcome Charlton at home next Tuesday night; the prospect of their televised live game against Buxton two Saturdays from now in the FA Cup could be seen as that much more of a bonus. They could also breathe a little more easily as far as survival in League One is concerned. If they were to lose, though, the struggle they are undoubtedly embarking on will become that much harder if only for the psychological burden of occupying one of the relegation places at the bottom of the division.

Neither the Cod Army nor the Shrimps played last Saturday due to World Cup qualifying call-ups. Alfie McCalmont – on loan from Leeds United – scored a brace in Northern Ireland Under-21’s 4-0 mauling of Lithuania last Friday in Belfast. Reading loanee Jökull Andrésson was also involved in the Iceland Under 21’s. Greg Leigh played the entire second half for Jamaica against the USA. I can’t remember this kind of thing happening when the club was based at Christie Park. It is a measure of how far Morecambe have advanced in the last few years that they have international players in the team at all. So let’s stay positive – all of us.

Having said that, the Shrimps started the game with an even poorer run of recent league form than their hosts: four games lost and a single draw out of their last five starts. For Fleetwood, it was three lost; one won and obviously one drawn. However, as Morecambe were beating Newport County at the Maz two weeks ago to dump the club from South Wales out of the FA Cup, the Cod Army were losing at home to Burton Albion in the same competition. Last time out, though, Morecambe lost tamely 0-2 at home in the relatively pointless EFL Trophy to a Carlisle United side which is looking at the realistic possibility of losing its Football League status altogether this season. Town lost at home by four goals to one to Accrington Stanley in the same competition – an arguably even more feeble result. In previous Football League clashes between the Shrimps and the Cod Army, the Fylde Coast club had won two of four matches and lost one.

Simon Grayson is the Cods’ Manager who many Fleetwood fans detest for the simple reason that he was once main local rivals’ Blackpool’s gaffer. To have been so for just the one time is a hanging offence on its own in their view but Simon has sat in the Hot Seat at Bloomfield Road on no less than two occasions. This unforgivable crime against Fylde Coast tribal sensibilities means that Mr Grayson is doomed to eternal damnation without hope of either forgiveness or redemption as far as some members of the Cod Army are concerned. The one positive thing that defeat against Morecambe today could guarantee – in their eyes – is that the current boss might be sacked. This is an eventuality that many long-term supporters of the club would doubtlessly welcome.

Putting this to one side, Mr Grayson said this earlier in the week about today’s game:

“I’m confident in what I’m doing and I want the players to buy into what we need to do, so we’re all in this together. It’s not an easy run we’ve been on with the fixtures we’ve had and some of the performances have been good. We now have a good spell of time to get on the training pitch to get some tough work into the players, which we need to do ahead of this next run of games. All things come into consideration; we’ll be looking at ourselves as staff as well, at what we need to do. We haven’t got a lot of players available and we’ve got a lot of younger players, but individuals wanting to make a career in the game have to make sure they learn from experiences like the Accrington game. It became too easy for Accrington and all these things can work against individuals when it comes to selecting the team for next week. They are the ones who cross the white line, they go out with instructions for how we want to play but they have to show hunger, desire, passion and a real attitude to knuckle down when the going gets tough. You get nothing for free or easily in life. You have to work hard for good jobs and to be well paid, and after the third goal went in against Accrington, we didn’t show enough leadership quality, passion, desire or hunger.”

The personal philosophy expressed in these words poses a conundrum which the Fleetwood supremo might struggle to unravel himself. If you truly `get nothing for free or easily in life; you have to work hard for good jobs and to be well paid’ then a question needs to be answered. If this is actually true, why is he still in charge of a club which has been struggling to get out of the relegation zone – and failing – so far this season? Or is he taking the Boris Johnson defence?: I’m the boss and I take the huge pay cheque  for being so – but that doesn’t mean I’m responsible for anything, does it?…

Anyway, as far as today’s opponents in particular are concerned, Simon Grayson added:

“To get promoted proved everyone wrong and they have had some body blows. They had momentum at the start of the season and have dropped off a bit, but we cannot underestimate them as they do have some really good players.”

Meanwhile, opposite number Robbo assessed the forthcoming match in these terms:

“Fleetwood are a good side. They’ve got good players; I believe they’re in a false position in the league. I’ve watched a lot of their football and a lot of their games and they’ve got a very good manager. We know if we play how we can play, then we can be competitive with anybody. We know we want to win the game. We had a good result in the cup. We want to take that performance rather than the Papa John’s performance into Saturday. We know we’re more than capable; we’ve shown that against good sides. Everybody here has got their opportunities and chances and we’re working our very best with the players (who) are working extremely hard. They’re a really good bunch of boys, and they’re committed every day in training. They want to learn, they want to get better, so yeah, the ball is in their court so to speak. We’ve signed 17 players, we’ve put a squad together, and we know we need improvements. Whether we’re top of the league or bottom of the league, that would still be the case in January, so I don’t think there’s any extra pressure on the players that are here.”

It was grey and very windy as the match kicked-off and occasional thin rain gusted across the ground throughout the game. Morecambe – in an all black strip – looked more pumped-up for the occasion than their hosts right from the off. Fleetwood’s team looked young and inexperienced and woefully short of confidence throughout a first half which the visitors dominated. There weren’t many chances but the Shrimps’ Icelandic international goalkeeper Jökull Andrésson only had a single save to make throughout the entire 45 minutes – a good stop from Callum Morton after almost half an hour. At the other end of the field, though, it was a different story. Nine minutes were on the clock when Fleetwood conceded a free-kick just outside their own penalty area. The impressive Callum Jones stepped-up to take it – and scored with a sublime strike which beat home custodian Alex Cairns all ends up on its way into the back of his net. Goal Machine Cole Stockton was then denied by Cairns with a tremendous save which was hacked away for a corner just four minutes later. Greg Leigh than walloped a speculative effort high over the bar after about twenty minutes. Five minutes later, Arthur Gnahoua also had an effort blocked as the away team forced a number of corners which they failed to benefit from. So they returned to the Dressing Rooms half way through the game probably ruing their inability to stretch a deserved lead any further.

Town improved in the second half and Morecambe fell into the old trap of falling ever deeper into their own half as the match grew older. There weren’t many clear chances for either team but Fleetwood were on the front foot increasingly and forcing a number of corners towards the end. From one of these – with just ten minutes left to play – Morecambe conceded as Callum Johnson headed Danny Andrew’s dead ball kick home. Fleetwood had what momentum there ever really was in the game at this time and I for one feared that the Shrimps’ inability to defend either a lead or set-pieces was going to undo them yet again this season. Andrésson did really well to punch a further corner from the Town left away for another one from the right with just four minutes left to play and when Referee Darren Drysdale awarded four minutes of extra time, I for one would have settled for a point.

Oh me of little faith…

Cole the Goal was denied right at the death only by two fantastic blocks by Harrison Holgate. But today, he wasn’t going to be denied any longer. With almost the last kick of the game, he received the ball in the centre circle, spun and replicated his effort against AFC Wimbledon earlier in the season with a simply sublime lowish trajectory lob which seemed to travel in slow motion towards the Fleetwood goal, over Alex Cairns and finally into the net.

We went mad.

What a way to win the game. What a way to win any game. Superman Stockton has won Goal of the Month in League One for the last two months in a row. This strike guarantees his third win in succession – it was out of this world. The Referee handed Cole his shirt back – and booked him for taking it off in celebration in the first place in a clearly rehearsed  way which was almost comical. Being booked for getting carried away with the almost primeval emotions that football tunes into is a simply stupid rule written – as I have suggested before – by automatons at the FA or wherever who have never played soccer themselves. But Mr Drysdale was simply following the Rules Of The Game in showing Cole the Yellow Card. He did so again as he first booked and then sent-off Fleetwood substitute Anthony Pilkington for continually mouthing-off at him virtually literally before he blew the final whistle.

The celebrations went on for ages after the game had ended – and why not?

The only time I can remember a vaguely similar atmosphere to today’s was at Christie Park years ago when ten-man Morecambe came from behind to beat Crewe Alexandra with a last ditch header by Dave Artell of all people.

But the sheer force of the emotions tonight was unforgettable as players, a Manager clearly on Cloud Nine and a rightly ecstatic Captain apparently only slightly lower in the sky behind him combined with fans to celebrate together long after the contest was over.

This is something which will stay with me – for one – certainly as long as I live. What a win.

The three points saw Morecambe go above Gillingham and AFC Wimbledon into eighteenth position in the table. Fleetwood’s place in the mire was deepened by their latest defeat: they remain twenty-second but their points total also hasn’t changed, which is probably even more of a worry for them.

After the game, Fleetwood’s Manager went on record as saying “Luck isn’t going our way at the moment”.

There was nothing lucky about the Shrimps’ win today.

I personally suspect that only Lady Luck herself will see Simon Grayson still in a job this time next week though…

Fleetwood Town: 1 Alex Cairns; 3 Danny Andrew; 5 Tom Clarke (C) (27 Harrison Biggins 78’); 9 Callum Morton; 18 Harrison Holgate; 19 Gerard Garner (14 Joe Garner 67’); 22 Shayden Morris; 24 Daniel Batty; 20 Jay Matete (11 Anthony Pilkington (R) 78’); 26 Callum Johnson; 32 Paddy Lane.

Subs Not Used:  13 Billy Crellin; 17 Ryan Edmondson; 28 Max Clark; 38 Carl Johnston.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones; 9 Cole Stockton (Y); 15 Ryan Delaney; 17 Jonah Ayunga (18 Adam Phillips 78’); 19 Shane McLoughlin (Y) (8 Toumani Diagouraga 75’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Subs Not Used:  12 André da Silva Mendes; 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Liam Gibson; 28 Courtney Duffus; 31 Scott Wooten.

Ref: Darren Drysdale.

 Att: 3545 (loads from Morecambe)

Charlton held by fellow-Reds…

For Morecambe FC, the closest they had previously ever come to interacting with the football world and a Charlton was when 1966 World Cup Winner Bobby opened the long lamented North Stand at the old Christie Park. As far as the team based at The Valley in south east London and the Shrimps are concerned, two very distinct histories collided today. During the 1970s – as Morecambe struggled to stay in business in the Northern Premier League – Athletic was hosting an iconic Rock Festival with The Who headlining at their massive natural bowl of a ground. The Valley was such a huge venue at that time that it had held 75,000 people in FA Cup matches in the past.

Later, as Morecambe faced homelessness and potential extinction as dodgy people with an even dodgier agenda tried to sell Christie Park for re-development as a DIY store, their fans united to stop this happening and kept the club in business. Charlton fans took this one step further. They actually created a completely new political party during 1992 in order to challenge the local Labour council in Greenwich which was in favour of the Valley being demolished and redeveloped for housing. This was at a time when the Addicks (a Sarf London bastardisation of `Haddock’ apparently; battered versions of which were for sale at a favoured chippy near their home ground) had been playing at Crystal Palace’s  Selhurst Park for seven long years as the Valley was abandoned and actually derelict. Will Magee tells us:

“In the end, the Valley Party won 10.9% of the vote in Greenwich, which although not enough to gain them a councillor did at least serve as a resounding endorsement of their platform. They ate into the Labour vote and hampered the re-election bids of several prominent councillors, stunning their opponents in the process. One of the councillors who lost his seat was the Chair of the London Borough of Greenwich Planning Committee, the body which had rejected the redevelopment plans for The Valley, Simon Oelman. In an interview on the Charlton Life forum from 2010, he was candid about Labour’s position, saying: “It’s fair to say that we didn’t see the value of having a football club in the area.” He also admitted to underestimating the Valley Party. “It was a brilliantly run campaign and more professional than any of the established parties managed,” he said. “It was a surprise to me and all the Labour Party, and we didn’t really take it seriously at first. But when we started to knock on doors and more and more people said they were voting Valley we thought: ‘Ah, there’s something going on here’… we didn’t really know what to do and by then it was too late.””[1]

Charlton fans in the shape of the Valley Party therefore took direct action to get their club’s ground re-opened and updated. Well done to them.

In subsequent years, Addicks icon Alan Curbishley (who was commentating on the live Charlton TV feed of the game tonight) led the revitalised club to the Promised Land of the Premiership during 1998. But after he left in 2006, their fall from grace has been spectacular both on and off the field. Supporters revolted again en masse as recently as five years ago; threw things such as foam soccer balls onto the pitch in their hundreds as a means to disrupt games; boycotted other fixtures altogether and applied other measures of social protest until the ownership they were unhappy with at the time sold its control of what was then a Championship club altogether.

Their reward was relegation to League One at the end of the 2019-20 season. At the beginning of the current campaign, Nigel Adkins had replaced Birmingham-bound Lee Bowyer as Manager. He took the relegated club straight to the bottom of League One by winning only two of their opening thirteen fixtures and was sacked on 21^st October last to be replaced by currently interim Manager Johnnie Johnson. One of the few positive things the ex-Scunthorpe United physiotherapist and phenomenally successful Manager had done prior to being dismissed was to sign Morecambe’s Club Captain and inspiration Sam Lavelle. Sam has been injured since but scored two goals in nine games for them before being laid low. Since the appointment of Mr Johnson, Athletic have lost only one game. Their current League One form is four games won and none lost in their last five fixtures. They were twelfth in the League One table prior to tonight’s fixture on the back of a 2-0 win against table-topping Plymouth Argyle last Saturday in London.

Morecambe, on the other hand, have found life in League One a bit of a struggle at times this season. Their last-minute win at Fleetwood last Saturday as Cole Stockton scored another literally unforgettably brilliant goal with virtually the last kick of the game was the team’s first league win in their last five league outings – of which they had lost three. Fleetwood are a poor side though and Charlton aren’t. So tonight would provide a further test of how well recent defensive lapses particularly at set-pieces have been addressed by Stephen Robinson and his players.

First team coach Diarmuid O’Carroll assessed the job facing Morecambe this evening in these terms:

“They have a lot of quality within their squad, the money they have behind them, the size of the club and the support that they have, they are a big club. I think there was twenty-odd-thousand at their game the other day, we have gone away and watched their games, reviewed them and we know that they are a good side. You look at them and they should be in the top-half of the table, we will go out there and compete, and on our day we are a very good side as well. They have had a real bounce since the new manager took over, I don’t think he’s been given the job yet – I don’t know what they are waiting on but it will be a tough game.  Every game is tough, it is such a cliché to say every game is tough but it is, we have showed that we can cut it against some of the best teams, home and away.” 

The Charlton Manager said this before the game:

“The mood around the training ground has been really good, the lads have been in bubbly form. Obviously winning games helps – you come in on a Monday after a win on a Saturday and everyone’s got a smile on their face and a little bounce. (We are) just trying to obviously keep the mood and spirits high. But also we’ve got to be serious and we’ve got to have our clear focus on the upcoming test because we’ve got some tricky games coming up. You’ve only got to look at the top end of the pitch there in Stockton, who has scored 12 goals already and he scored from inside his own half at the weekend, so there’s obvious threats. It’s a difficult place to go. They’ll make it difficult for you. Up there on the coast it can be a little bit windy at times as well and conditions can be difficult, so we’re going to turn up with the right attitude there and they certainly aren’t going to roll over and make it easy for us.”

For the visitors, former PNE and Exeter striker Jayden Stockley was still suspended after being sent-off last week at Burton Albion. No goalkeeper was selected to sit on the bench either for whatever reason.

It had been a beautiful bright, crisp autumn day by the North Lancashire seaside prior to the game. It started under a jet black sky as an astonishingly large amount of fans from London – nearly seven hundred – noisily shouted their support from the away end. This would be a lot for a Saturday match –  but for a mid-week game, it is simply extraordinary.

The chanting and drumming had hardly died down from kick-off when the visitors took the lead. Athletic were attacking down their right, pinging the ball confidently and accurately around between their front players. Diallang Jaiyesimi caught Jökull Andrésson completely flat-footed as he took a low shot towards the near post. The young Icelander showed his inexperience yet again by being caught-out with a shot which he should have seen coming but instead could only help over the line after he had actually moved the wrong way. It was a poor start by the goalkeeper and he went on to put on a very weak performance tonight, with a succession of really poor clearances right from the start of the match until the end of it.

Charlton, though,  continued to impress with their quick, accurate passing. They are a surprisingly small side in The Land Of The Giants which is League One more often than not. But in Jaiyesimi, Conor Washington and perhaps particularly Elliot Lee, they had three forwards which would give any defence problems with their speed and skill on the ball. Morecambe offered little going forward in the opening twenty minutes or so and were constantly caught on the break as the Addicks posed problems for them every time they attacked. Andrésson redeemed himself a little with a good save from Lee as the visitors fashioned a couple more half-chances before going even further ahead after twenty-seven minutes. It was a simple goal – a long clearance by away goalkeeper Craig McGillivray and a determined effort to get to the ball first by Washington against Ryan Delaney saw him lob it over young Jökull, who was again caught in No Man’s Land.

At this point, it seemed just a matter of how many the team from South London were going to score and – to be fair – they continued to dominate possession, particularly during the second half. But Morecambe dug-in and at times played some neat, positive football of their own. They reduced the arrears after Charlton Captain Chris Gunter clearly brought-down Morecambe’s Goal Machine in the away penalty area just a minute after the visitors had gone further ahead. Was Gunter the last man? Possibly. Was it a cynical foul? Definitely. Officious and fussy Referee Andy Haines only proffered a Yellow Card though. But in the immortal words of somebody-or-other, I’ve seen them given…

Whatever, Cole Stockton picked himself up and slammed the ball home from the spot to register his lucky thirteenth goal of the season so far.

(I was personally wondering if the Referee had left his cards in the Dressing Room until this point because he let a lot of niggly and `professional’ fouls go in a first half where he booked only Gunter when he might have sent him off. Maybe there was something in his half-time tea because he issued a yellow to virtually anything that moved during the second period. Once again, this was not a performance worthy of the EFL and Mr Haines was clearly not fit enough to keep up with play a lot of the time. How does that work?)

Despite the poor officiating, this was a really good game to watch. Athletic took a deserved lead back to the Changing Rooms at half time. Throughout the second half, they continued to play positive, attacking football. There was no time-wasting; cheating or play-acting. Charlton – very commendably – were here with only one thing on their minds: to win.

But they didn’t. Morecambe rode their luck at times but equalised when Captain O’Connor headed home beautifully from a corner after 72 minutes. Callum Jones had tried to replicate his goal at Fleetwood from another free-kick a minute earlier – but missed this time. Later on, they could have won it as the ball was bundled home after an effort had hit the Charlton crossbar and looped skywards before falling back into play.

So it ended two each. The visitors were probably marginally the better of the two teams tonight, technically at least. But in terms of spirit, the Shrimps came out on top. The way they collectively hung on in there after giving away two poor goals says a lot about their determination as a unit and their loyalty to their Manager.

The single point saw both teams slide down League One this evening: the Addicks to fourteenth and Morecambe to nineteenth.

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh (Y); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones; 9 Cole Stockton; 15 Ryan Delaney; 17 Jonah Ayunga (Y); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 25 Alfie McCalmont; 28 Courtney Duffus (18 Adam Phillips 70’).

Subs Not Used:  12 André da Silva Mendes; 7 Wes McDonald; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Liam Gibson; 31 Scott Wooten.

Charlton Athletic: 1 Craig McGillivray; 2 Chris Gunter (C) (Y) (20 Charlie Kirk 77’); 3 Ben Purrington; 4 George Dobson (Y); 5 Akin Famewo; 7 Diallang Jaiyesimi (23 Corey Blackett-Taylor 73’); 11 Alex Gilbey; 14 Conor Washington; 17 Elliot Lee; 25 Josh Davison (48 Mason Burstow 85’); 28 Sean Clare.

Subs Not Used:    10 Albie Morgan; 26 Ben Watson; 31 Nathan Harness; 50 Deji Elerewe.

Ref: Andy Haines.

Att:  4,009 (690 from Charlton: The Valley Party salutes you all, Comrades! Safe journey home…)

[1] https://www.vice.com/en/article/ywzvj7/remembering-when-charlton-fans-took-on-the-labour-party-and-won

Shrimps visited by Cuckoos.

I hate MK so-called `Dons’. The fact that they are in the EFL at all is a scandal and shows in one appalling example the corruption which exists at the heart of the Beautiful Game in this country. Good luck tackling that, Tracey Crouch. (Thinks: maybe she should start by taking some notes about Standing Up To Sleaze from her fellow Tory MP, Owen Paterson…)

In case you aren’t familiar with the way the team from Milton Keynes inveigled its way into the Football League, I make no apology for repeating what I wrote about them several years ago:

What is there to say about the Milton Keynes so-called `Dons’?

Quite a lot in all truth. This is the team which proved that a football club is a franchise, not a stand-alone unique institution. Every other team I know of in the EFL and further afield has its own distinct history and progression to or from the Big Time. Morecambe, for instance, have progressed from the Lancashire Combination to the Northern Premier League to the Football Conference to League Two. It has been a long and sometimes difficult process. Our neighbours Accrington Stanley went bust and were thrown out of the old Football League in the early 1960s. They reformed and started the long, hard slog to get back to where they started off right at the bottom of the Football Pyramid in England. Newport County also went bust and fell out of the League during 1989. Their re-birth was severely complicated by the Welsh FA’s (illegal) diktat that all non-league Welsh clubs must resign from whatever competition they were playing in and join the new Welsh League – or else. Or else not play in the Principality at all. So County (as part of the `Irate Eight’ clubs – including Morecambe’s former Northern Premier League fellow members Bangor City – who all opposed the edict from the Welsh FA) had to start all over again not just away from Newport but actually in a different country – hence the `Exiles’ tag. They did this because they realised that membership of the Welsh League would mean an end to any further progression: and they also wanted to get back to where they once were: the Football League. But despite enormous difficulties, they have also achieved this aim. Hats off to them.

So how come MK Dons have never had to do any of this?

How come indeed. Crystal Palace are the Eagles; Norwich City the Canaries; Brighton & Hove Albion the Seagulls. Milton Keynes should be known as the Cuckoos.  They are the team who – to their eternal shame – the football authorities in Britain allowed to initially masquerade as another club altogether and physically move seventy miles up the M1 from where that former club – Wimbledon – could once be found. In doing so, they by-passed the normal gruelling ordeal of winning successive promotions through the lower leagues until the final – and initially very distant – goal of EFL membership is achieved. It shouldn’t have happened, end of story. AFC Wimbledon – the Phoenix of the original club, we must remember – have had to do this the hard way.

Last time the Milton Keynes outfit crossed the path of Morecambe FC, I wrote nothing about them at all and I’m going to follow that example again today. I would like to say that my objection to the cuckoo club which was allowed to steal the old Wimbledon’s identity lock, stock and barrel is so powerful that I made an ethical stand today to boycott the match. But that would not be true. I was actually working on my Better Half’s stall at the Drill Hall in Ulverston all day as part of the Dickensian Festival in the town as I promised her I would long before I knew who the Shrimps’ opponents would be today.  But if I had to deliberately select a game I did not want to see this season, this would be the one.

Morecambe lost. Two-nil down at half time; four-nil down at the end. As a result, they fell to twentieth place in League One; two points above the drop zone.

As for the opposition – who cares?

I have only one thing to say about them:

LONG LIVE AFC WIMBLEDON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (22 Liam Gibson 45’); 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones; 7 Wes McDonald; 15 Ryan Delaney; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 19 Shane McLoughlin (Y); 25 Alfie McCalmont; 28 Courtney Duffus (24 Arthur Gnahoua 45’).

Subs Not Used:  12 André da Silva Mendes; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 18 Adam Phillips; 21 Ryan Cooney; 31 Scott Wooten.

Ref: Rebecca Welch.

Att: 3,700.

Can the Buxton Bucks Buck The Trend?

Morecambe travelled from the shores of the Irish Sea to the highest football ground in England (at one thousand feet above Irish or any other sea level), the Silverlands today. At Buxton’s tidy little ground on the outskirts of this picturesque Peak District Spa town, they would face the club which led the Northern Premier League until a week ago in the Second Round of the FA Cup. This is only the third time that the Bucks have reached this stage of the competition. They drew 2-2 against Barrow in the Bluebirds’ original incarnation as a League club in 1962 and then lost the replay 3-1 at Holker Street. They had already played at Peel Park against the original Accrington Stanley four years earlier, where they were mauled by six goals to one.

For Manager Steve Cunningham and his assistant Damien Crossley, the First Round win by a single Diego de Girolamo goal away at York City was their first game in the hot seat at Buxton. Since then, their team had beaten Atherton Collieries 2-0 and Hyde United 3-0 (with goals from de Girolamo in both games) at home to remain top of the Northern Premier League. The Saturday before last, they visited our neighbours Lancaster City and lost for the first time in recent memory by the only goal of the game.  (City are currently to be found in lucky thirteenth place in the NPL.) Buxton’s game against Witton Albion last Saturday was then postponed due to bad weather. Volunteers cleared the artificial 4G pitch of snow – using only plastic and not metal shovels which could damage the surface by strict order of the club – but nearby roads were still impassable as kick-off time approached. They have fallen to fourth place in the league as a result but have games in hand over all their nearest rivals. For the Derbyshire club, though, today’s tie allowed them to walk down Memory Lane: Morecambe was the first team they ever played in the Northern Premier League way back when in August 1973.

The Shrimps, on the other hand, had been redeeming some poor recent performances in League One by winning with an almost supernatural goal by Cole the Goal Stockton at Fleetwood two weeks ago. They came from 0-2 down to draw with Charlton Athletic after that but were then hammered nil-four at home by a team from Milton Keynes last time out. But one of only two victories they have enjoyed in recent time was against Newport County in the last round of the FA Cup: a victory which owed more to goalkeeper Jökull Andrésson’s inspired performance than it did to their overall display. Since then, sadly, the young Icelander has shown his inexperience with at least a couple of poor games. But Morecambe remain five whole levels above the Northern Premier League and today – as the game went out live on terrestrial television – there should be not even the sniff of an upset in deepest Derbyshire.

Would there be, though? Last night, fellow League One sides failed to fall at the second hurdle as Charlton (still without Sam Lavelle) won relatively easily 0-2 at Gateshead whilst leaders Rotherham were disposing of Stockport County by the only goal of the game in South Yorkshire. So the League One relay baton was handed-on to Morecambe today. The question was would they keep it safe – or could the Bucks Buck The Trend of the senior teams exerting their superiority so far?

Following their defeat last Saturday, Morecambe Manager Stephen Robinson singled–out midfielders Alfie McCalmont, Shane McLoughlin and Callum Jones for praise. He said they were let down by their team-mates both in defence and attack, neither of which units operated properly and constantly – in his view – got the simple things in football wrong. Robbo said:

“They need to learn quickly, we are repeating ourselves over and over again to some people, they need to learn what they are very good at. The hardest thing in football is simplicity and realising what you are good at, and some think they are good at things they are not. We have worked with them and we will continue to work with them as the season goes on, but they really need to learn quickly.”

As far as today’s match is concerned, he added:

“Buxton are the lowest ranked side still left in the FA Cup and they are up against a League One side, we have to make sure we are not on the end of an upset. I have had that a lot during my time in Scotland when we played a lot of the lower teams, it is about mentality and attitude to do things well. That’s just the magic of the FA Cup, it is special for players and the atmosphere is incredible – there is a real opportunity for some players to put their name in lights.”

For the opposition, Stephen Cunningham said:

“I’ve done things quite special with smaller football clubs before. But in terms of personal achievement – and also for players to achieve a Second Round live BBC game – yeah; it’s pretty special. There’s always one team that does it in the FA Cup – and why not Buxton this year?”

The biggest worry prior to the game was that the weather might again intervene. But having a plastic pitch makes snowfall far less of a problem than it could be for a grass surface. Providing that players, teams and TV crews alike could reach the stadium, the fact that this match would go ahead on schedule was never in serious doubt – barring a snowstorm of truly Siberian proportions. The biggest worry for the away Manager was the potential absence of goal machine Cole Stockton, who failed to play in Morecambe’s latest League One game with hamstring problems. But he was passed fit to play today – which turned-out to be very important for the team from Lancashire. The rock at the heart of the home defence in recent times – with the very appropriate name of Josh Granite – was unavailable for Buxton due to injury but Bucks’ Skipper and Northern Ireland International Jamie Ward – who the Shrimps’ current Manager once tried to sign for Motherwell – was in the starting line-up for the hosts.

It was wet and really windy as the match kicked-off following all the players and officials Taking the Knee. The visitors started brightly with the gale blasting slightly downhill into Morecambe’s faces. But the home team had the better chances early on. After Toumani Diagouraga had given the ball away carelessly on the left of his own penalty area in the twelfth minute, Diego de Girolamo’s instant and brilliant shot hit Kyle Letheren’s left hand post with the big Welsh stopper simply a bystander. The visiting goalkeeper was busy again as the Bucks forced four corners in a row in quick succession as he managed to push balls been blown into the back of his net as they curved-in from the edge of the pitch away to safety. This was after about twenty-two minutes. But just four minutes later, the visitors took the lead with their first meaningful attempt of the game. The Goal Machine was offside as the ball was initially played forward but he ran towards goal from an on-side position seconds later to win the ball with a determined effort on the Shrimps’ right and scored with a perfectly judged shot from a difficult angle. Arthur Gnahoua then belted a wild shot out of the ground after half an hour. The home keeper excelled himself with a smart double save with thirty-eight minutes on the clock. Wes McDonald cut in from the right and took a shot which the goalie pushed back into play at the near post to Alfie McCalmont who should have buried it but Richardson recovered promptly to push the ball away for a corner. Jamie Ward shot fairly well wide from the Buxton left after forty-three minutes but a fairly bitty half ended with the visitors just shading it.

With the wind behind them, the Shrimps continued to try and play positively right from the off in the second half. They were helped as Buxton danger man de Girolamo – who had caught his studs in the artificial surface during the first half and hurt himself – was not able to continue early on. The match was still scrappy and McDonald’s clever turn on the Morecambe right after almost an hour followed by a truly hopeless shot into the crowd probably personified this in one poor move. Robbo shook things up with a double change after 66 minutes as Jonah Ayunga and Callum Jones were thrown into the fray. Ayunga immediately made a difference, causing the home defence increasing problems particularly on their left flank in particular as the part-timers seemed to be tiring. He was actually brought-down by the home goalkeeper after 67 minutes in their penalty area but the Referee blew for another infringement instead to let Buxton off the hook. Then Richardson pulled off a simply sublime save low down to his right to prevent Cole the Goal scoring another one after 76 minutes. The ball fell to the Morecambe Goal Machine again two minutes later but Cole blasted it way over the top when well placed. He had an even better chance just a minute later after Jonah put it on a plate for him after brilliant play on the Morecambe right. But League One’s leading scorer again blasted the ball high over the bar. Richardson denied McDonald with another smart save to his right at the cost of a corner which he punched confidently away after 78 minutes. Ayunga could have put the game beyond doubt right at the death with an unmarked effort from close in – but he, too, blasted the ball over the bar.

So it ended with the narrowest of victories for the visitors. Morecambe didn’t drop the League One baton and will be in the hat for the Third Round as a result. At the end of the game, their Manager summed-up today’s performance with these words:

“I thought it was a professional performance, credit to Buxton, I thought they put up a great fight. We had numerous chances to win the game, we should have been out of sight, but in the end it’s a professional performance and the main thing’s getting through to the next round. Everything was set up for a cup upset today – the wind, the rain, the sleet, on top of a mountain, astroturf – but we did a real professional job so I’m proud of the boys today.”

Amen to that…

Buxton: 1 Theo Richardson; 2 Matt Curley; 3 Nathan Fox; 4 Ben Middleton; 6 Lindon Meikle (Y); 7 Jamie Ward (C); 8 Chris Dawson (17 Dom Tear 80’); 9 Diego de Girolamo (14 Ash Chambers 47’); 10 Tom Elliot (Y); 11 Warren Clarke; 12 James Hurst.

Subs Not Used:  16 Ben Milnes; 18 Akeem Hinds; 19 Heath Richardson; 20 Jack Dillingham; 21 Ewan Catt.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 7 Wes McDonald; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 15 Ryan Delaney; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 66’); 25 Alfie McCalmont (6 Callum Jones 66’).

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 14 Jonathan Obika; 18 Adam Phillips; 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Liam Gibson; 28 Courtney Duffus; 31 Scott Wooten.

Ref: Lee Swabey.

Att: 3,642 (about 500 from Morecambe)

Morecambe blown-away by Sunderland storm

Funny old Game, football – as the saying goes. Sunderland is a big place with a huge potential fanbase. The city’s main club is virtually everyone’s favourites every season to start the return to the Big Time which many Black Cats supporters seem to think is their birthright. But they are also – in recent times – perennial underachievers. A succession of high profile Managers – Paulo Di Canio; Gus Poyet; Sam Allardyce; Chris Coleman; David Moyes and others in the last eight years alone – have come to the Stadium of Light. And left again with their tails between their legs because the club’s position was no better when they left or were sacked than it had been when they had arrived.

So the Black Cats have faced life in League One this time for the third season in a row. The New Manager Buzz which current boss Lee Johnson injected into the club a year or so ago seemed to have fizzled-out in recent times. Last Saturday, Oxford United came from behind to draw 1-1 with the North East team on their own patch.

In his Programme Notes for tonight’s game, Lee Johnson wrote the following:

“Yesterday marked the one-year anniversary of my appointment as Head Coach of this fantastic football club. We still have a lot of work to do, but I’ve loved the experience and I hope I am here for a long time because that means we will have been successful in fulfilling our long-term plan. There are some great people here behind the scenes and I am incredibly grateful for the way they continue to support me and the team day in, day out. That gratitude extends to you as supporters because I know you are desperate to believe in us and trust in us, which hasn’t always been the case in the past.”

This reads like a politician’s speech. At the end of their last game, the same person who wrote these words responded angrily and clearly made a very rude gesture at some of the people he suggests he owes so much `gratitude’ to. Some home fans in the crowd had been noisily calling for his name to be added to the seemingly endless list of names who have been sacked by the club in recent times. So – despite the warm words in the latest club magazine – not all is Sweetness and Light at the Stadium of almost the same name at the moment. In their last five league games, the Mackems have only won one and lost two. They found themselves in fifth position prior to kick-off this evening.

Tonight’s visitors Morecambe, on the other hand, have been most punters’ favourites for relegation ever since they reached the hallowed ground of the EFL fifteen long years ago. The Shrimps have a small fanbase and a tiny budget in comparison to the fortune available to the opposition they would face this evening. The Shrimps arrived in twentieth position in the league, just two points above the drop zone. . Morecambe’s own form – following their win in the FA Cup at Buxton last Saturday – is not good. They have lost three of their last five League One matches and won only once. Be that as it may, it is the Shrimps and not Sunderland that will be facing Tottenham Hotspur in the Third Round of the FA Cup in London next month. The Black Cats lost at home against League Two strugglers Mansfield for the second year in a row to see their FA Cup ambitions fail at the first hurdle. This was their fourth straight defeat in all competitions only last month: so Mr Johnson’s side are far from invulnerable if teams take the game to them and don’t sit back and invite the inevitable instead.

So what is the history of previous encounters at the Stadium of Light?

(And who on earth chose such a pretentious name for the ground which has succeeded the old Roker Park? It was inevitable that Newcastle and Middlesboro fans would immediately rhyme `Light’ with a very similar word which begins with an `S’ – and I don’t mean `sight’, either.)

This history is not very promising: a two-nil defeat in the League Cup nine years ago followed by a 0-1 home reverse in the more or less meaningless Football League Trophy three years ago. So would it be Third Time Lucky for the Shrimps tonight?

Morecambe Manager Stephen Robinson assessed the task facing his men this evening in these words:

“We are not frightened of anyone in this division, for me there is no one that has come and rolled us over. Granted the scoreline against MK Dons suggests that, but the performance didn’t. We have absolutely nothing to fear. We have only lost one game in our last five and we are starting to get a settled back four. We won’t play any differently because we are going to the Stadium of Light. Sometimes it is what you do on the ball rather than what you do off it. We have shown already this season that we can perform against some of the best sides in this division and Tuesday night will be no different.” 

Robbo was forced to replace the suspended Shane McLoughlin with Aaron Wildig for a rare start this season. For the home team, though, there were a lot of absences. Aiden McGeady, Luke O’Nien, Dennis Cirkin, Corry Evans and Denver Hume were all unavailable due to injury or illness. However, Lee Burge was available for selection tonight and Alex Pritchard was expected to play after being taken off during the game against Oxford with what was described as `fatigue’.

The weather on the east coast was quite wild as Storm Barra was approaching from the west as the game started. A Yellow Weather Warning had been issued as winds of up to 60mph were predicted to hit the city and possibly cause flooding in certain areas.

Morecambe Took the Knee at kick-off – but Sunderland didn’t for whatever reason. Right from the start, the Shrimps had trouble clearing their lines. It became clear that their game plan was to have Cole Stockton and Jonah Ayunga playing together up front with Aaron Wildig pushed forward on the right and Callum Jones on the left. But the ball rarely reached any of them in the opening period as Sunderland dominated possession and played most of the football. Kyle Letheren struggled to punch a corner from the Black Cats’ left away for another corner from the right after just two minutes. But he redeemed himself with a good save just two minutes later from Nathan Broadhead on the Sunderland right. After six minutes, another corner led to an effort being cleared off the visitors goal-line as it continued to be one-way traffic. Ayunga did well after seven minutes to get past Tom Flanaghan on the Morecambe left and weave his way into the opposition penalty area. But he delayed his shot probably marginally too long and it was finally blocked. Two minutes later, the Shrimps forward was clearly body-checked in a promising position but Referee Ollie Yates waved play-on. Just nine minutes were on the clock when the hosts took the lead they had been threatening to do for the whole of the match so far. Lynden Gooch easily beat Ryan McLaughlin on the Sunderland left, galloped forwards and found an unmarked Ross Stewart, who slotted home easily. They continued to press and scored again after sixteen minutes after McLaughlin was left for dead again by Gooch who this time picked-out a totally unmarked Nathan Broadhead, who headed past the away keeper as if he wasn’t there. Just a minute later, the hosts were marauding forward again and this time, Daniel Neil only just missed Letheren’s left post with a low shot from a long way out. With Manchester City loanee Callum Doyle too strong for Cole the Goal more often than not, the visitors were offering little going forward. Having said that, Stockton had the ball in the back of the net after 23 minutes only to be ruled offside. But the Shrimps could – and should – have reduced the arrears after twenty-four minutes when Alfie McCalmont played a superb ball from the left flank on the half way line straight over the Black Cats’ rearguard to Aaron Wildig, who should have buried it. But he didn’t. Shortly afterwards, Leon Dajaku was on his bike down the Sunderland right and found an unmarked Ross Stewart in the middle. He might have done better as well. Our Welsh stopper was at full stretch low down to push a dangerous cross away after half an hour and got away with pushing the ball back into play. Cole had his eye on another miraculous goal when he tried an overhead kick in the hosts’ penalty area after seeing Ron-Horben Hoffmann off his line after 38 minutes. This time, he missed though.

So Morecambe trailed back to the Dressing Rooms at half time looking well beaten. They were outplayed by the men in the red striped shirts in the first period and were perhaps lucky to be only two goals down.

Robbo shook things up at half time and withdrew Callum Jones and Arthur Gnahoua. Toumani Diagouraga played reasonably well as a midfield replacement but Courtney Duffus had very little impact further up the field. In fact, `Toums’ almost scored within two minutes of the restart when he blasted Stockton’s brilliant cross from the right just wide of the target at the near post. Later, Adam Phillips also came on and flapped his arms about a lot but offered even less than Courtney did – at least the latter tried. The Shrimps looked briefly better for a while as a unit but it wasn’t long before the Mackems took control again.  They scored again after an hour when Neil fed an unmarked Alex Pritchard to fire home from within the Morecambe penalty area. They increased their lead with twenty minutes left when Broadhead dummied the entire visiting defence before scoring with a clever shot. Then they got a lucky fifth goal when Dajaku’s shot hit Shrimps’ Skipper Anthony O’Connor and looped over the visiting keeper to nestle in the back of the net right at the end of the match. The home team’s German goalkeeper didn’t have a shot to save and the nearest the visitors came to troubling him was when Cole’s effort after 74 minutes just missed his left-hand post.

Stephen Robinson said before the game that no other team has rolled Morecambe over this season. He can’t say that now. His team were completely outclassed tonight by a side which you fear never really got out of about second gear. They didn’t have to. Only the fact that other scores this evening went their way kept Morecambe out of the relegation zone at the end of proceedings. They are just a single point above Fleetwood now. On this showing, though, they will be relegated. Saturday’s game against another strong side – Portsmouth – demands an immediate response from Robbo’s men. Otherwise, this could be a very long Winter for the club and its fans. In the meantime, Sunderland deservedly went up to third in League One. 

There was an even sourer note at the end of the game. Some idiot among our supporters threw a flare into the home crowd during the match. This could have seriously injured somebody and whoever did it should be locked-up. Worse still, this act of unbelievable stupidity will have ramifications for the club who will have to carry the can for this literally criminal act.

Proud of yourself now you complete moron?

Sunderland: 39 Ron-Horben Hoffmann; 3 Tom Flanagan; 6 Callum Doyle; 7 Leon Dajaku; 9 Nathan Broadhead (48 Benjamin Mbunga-Kimpioka 74’); 11 Lynden Gooch; 14 Ross Stewart (10 Aiden O’Brien 74’); 15 Carl Winchester (8 Elliot Embleton 57’); 21 Alex Pritchard; 24 Daniel Neil; 26 Bailey Wright (C).

Subs Not Used:   5 Frederik Alves; 20 Anthony Patterson; 25 Ollie Younger; 36 Ceiran Dunne.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones (8 Toumani Diagouraga 45’); 9 Cole Stockton; 10 Aaron Wildig (18 Adam Phillips 63’); 15 Ryan Delaney; 17 Jonah Ayunga (Y); 24 Arthur Gnahoua (28 Courtney Duffus 45’); 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 7 Wes McDonald; 21 Ryan Cooney; 31 Scott Wooten.

Ref: Ollie Yates.

Att: 26,516.

Morecambe not All At Sea at Portsmouth – but still lose.

Let’s start with an update about the appalling incident when some psycho among our ranks at the Stadium of Light threw a flare into the middle of the home fans below them in the ground. Morecambe Football Club made this statement after the game:

“Morecambe Football Club will take the strongest possible action against the perpetrator(s), if it emerges that they are our ‘supporter(s)’. We pride ourselves on being a family friendly club and are in dialogue with Sunderland AFC over the incident so action can be taken against the culprit(s). This kind of behaviour has no place at football grounds and both Sunderland AFC and Morecambe are as one in condemning action of this nature.”

Northumbria Police are involved in the investigation of this indefensible criminal act, which could have blinded or disfigured completely innocent individuals. I personally hope that whichever idiot actually did this is not only banned from football grounds altogether but prosecuted for what they have done. People are in prison for less. Anybody who condones this lunacy needs to have their head examined – and someone (and probably several somebodies) knows who did it. Shop them before this moron seriously injures somebody – we do not want people like this at our club: they are not welcome.

Proper fans of the Shrimps made the long trek to the south coast today to see if their heroes could improve on their woeful performance in the North East last Tuesday night. It wouldn’t be difficult to do so: the Shrimps lost five-nil and it could have been a lot more. This was one of the most feeble performances I have ever personally witnessed from any Morecambe FC team and it required an instant reaction today. Manager Stephen Robinson said this after the humiliation by the Black Cats:

“The excuses need to be put away. It seems to be that when we go a couple of goals down, if we don’t get straight back into it, we’re quite weak. As I’ve said millions of times, we’re a very quiet squad. I need some leaders in the team. We have to try and get people to take responsibility and not accept conceding goals and accepting defeats. Yeah we’re at a bigger stadium (and) at a bigger club with a bigger fan base and resources, but a lot of the things we can still control that we didn’t tonight.”  

He has broken the season’s league programme down into bite-sized sequences of five matches. Currently, they have lost three of their last five League One games and won only one. Robbo reckons they need to win a minimum of two from every five to stay in the Division. So you don’t have to be Einstein to see that they are on the wrong trajectory altogether at the moment. They arrived in Hampshire in twentieth position in the table – just a point above Fleetwood, who occupied the highest of the relegation positions at the bottom of League One. Bearing all this in mind, Mr Robinson promised that his team would press high up the field and `have a right go’ today. He said before the game:

“We need to get six points from the next three games to be exactly where I thought we would be, so it is not a mad crisis. There was nobody more humiliated after the (Sunderland) result than me. I take it personally. I don’t think I left my house for 48 hours. But we are back in, it is a case of bouncing back again – motivating the players because they are human, they make mistakes. We just need to be braver and make better decisions.”

As for Pompey, they started the game on the back of four victories in their last five league games and no defeats at all. This fine form has propelled them to the edge of the Play-Off positions at ninth place in the table. Having said that, they were only able to draw in a goal-less game against Sheffield Wednesday at home last Tuesday and faced the embarrassment of being dumped out of the FA Cup at Fratton Park last Saturday by League Two Harrogate Town. However, Portsmouth, like Sunderland, is a once mighty club fallen on relatively hard times. But their fanbase remains enormous and their potential to improve their league standing is virtually limitless. In previous encounters, the record is good given the massive disparity in the resources available to each club: two wins and four draws each.

Portsmouth Manager Danny Cowley was announced as the EFL’s League One Manager of the Month this week. The award was made not just to recognise his team’s sparking form in the competition, it also reflected the reality that the boss has had to manage both Covid and a sickness bug which has laid many of his squad low in recent weeks.  He said:

“It’s a real challenge and we’re still feeling the unavailability we have in the group – through illness and injury. I received another text message early on Thursday morning from a player who had to pull out of training. The situation is what it is, though, and we’ve done well in recent weeks to find some solutions to that. We’re all feeling extremely focused and determined to find even more answers on Saturday afternoon. Every precaution is being taken – which is something we’ve all become used to since the outbreak of Covid. You have to be more vigilant, but some of these viruses are difficult to stop.”

As far as today’s opponents were concerned, he added:

“I’ve got a lot of respect for them and thought they were the most organised side in League Two last season. They were particularly good against the ball and gave away very little space before winning it and countering quickly. Morecambe had a positive start to the current season and although there’s been a difficult run of late, we know they’ll be motivated to put that disappointment behind them.”

He’s probably right to say that Morecambe were the most organised team in League Two last season. But this was when Derek Adams was in charge. Since then, defending has been a constant problem for Stephen Robinson’s team. They looked uncertain and vulnerable – I hesitate to add `overawed’ as well but I fear it may be true – at the Stadium of Light last Tuesday. Would the same thing happen today against a team which is arguably even better than Sunderland’s based on current performances?

There were no changes in the Portsmouth line-up which drew against the Owls on Tuesday. Inevitably, there were changes in Morecambe’s line-up today, though. Callum Jones, Aaron Wildig, Ryan Delaney, Arthur Gnahoua and – perhaps harshly – Jonah Ayunga – were all dropped to the bench. Liam Gibson and Scott Wooten were added to stiffen-up the defence and Jonathan Obika was given a chance to show what he can do up front with Cole Stockton after recovering from a long-term injury. Obika stated his intention before the match to be more vocal, making the point that older players such as himself had a duty to encourage many of the youngsters in the team in a way that has been missing in many games so far this season.

It was dry but grey as the match kicked-off close to the Solent. It was noisy too as the massed ranks of almost fifteen thousand home fans (complete with hand-bell) made their presence felt in the early stages of the contest. Ronan Curtis had the first shot of the game after about five minutes but it flew over the bar harmlessly from a long way out. He missed again a few minutes later having been set-up by Miguel Azeez. But Pompey took the lead as the ball was simply played over the top to George Hirst, who took the ball around Kyle Letheren as he came out to meet him and then slammed it against the crossbar. Azeez reacted first to then hit the rebound against a post before – as the Shrimps’ rearguard still failed to react – leading scorer Marcus Harness slammed the loose ball home. This was a comedy of errors which meant that – after just eleven minutes – the visitors seemed yet again to be facing a mountain to climb with hardly any of the game played. Manchester City loanee and Irish International Gavin Bazunu in the Pompey net was not troubled until Cole The Goal turned and shot after having been found by Adam Phillips with 16 minutes on the clock: it was a good save low to his right although not a particularly difficult one to make.  Stockton then made a total mess of a half-decent opportunity about three minutes later. The men in the blue shirts were not dominating the play in the way Sunderland did the other night, though. Nice approach play by them saw Letheren make a routine save from Ronan Curtis after half an hour. Then Obika and Phillips combined well for the Shrimps to set-up a shot from Alfie McCalmont which was deflected for a corner a little while later.  Connor Ogilvie then made a tremendous tackle on Cole the Goal to prevent him scoring with about 35 minutes played before Pompey had an immediate chance at the other end which came to nothing. Phillips wasted a free-kick from a promising position with a poor shot straight into the home wall after thirty-eight minutes. The hosts won another free-kick in a dangerous position with about a minute of the half remaining. Reeco Hackett managed to swerve it around the Morecambe wall but Letheren again saved the shot without too much trouble. Then Liam Gibson almost played-in the Goal Machine once more but a blue-clad leg managed to reach the ball just before Cole was able to pull the trigger.

So Morecambe went back to the changing room in arrears once more. So far, though, they didn’t ever look like falling apart in the way they had done earlier in the week. With Fleetwood winning at home against fellow-strugglers Gillingham, though, they were actually in the relegation zone as they prepared for the second half.

The visitors started the second period quite brightly. Alfie took over free-kick duties from Adam Phillips and sent over a good one after 48 minutes which the hosts’ rear-guard struggled to clear. As the home crowd fell increasingly silent, Morecambe continued to press without seriously testing Bazunu in the home goal. Curtis then headed Harness’s cross from the left tamely straight at the visiting goalkeeper when well placed after 54 minutes in a move which saw Scott Wooten’s match end with some sort of painful leg injury off the ball. As the rain started to fall, Stockton played Phillips in for a shot which was deflected for a corner after 56 minutes. With the pitch getting heavier and with thoughts of overdoing it clearly in the Manager’s mind, Obika was withdrawn after an hour. His replacement, Jonah Ayunga, wasted no time having a punt at goal which didn’t trouble the home goalkeeper. Arsenal loanee Azeez then missed the target for Pompey with a shot which went over the bar with sixty-four minutes played. Jonah got away from the home defence shortly afterwards but his cross into the middle eluded both Stockton and Phillips with the home defence – appropriately I suppose – all at sea for once. Then Phillips headed McCalmont’s latest free-kick straight at the home goalkeeper on sixty-nine minutes as the Shrimps enjoyed their best period of the match so far. Cole then headed right at Bazunu from Ryan McLaughlin’s cross a couple of minutes later. But Pompey won another corner with just fourteen minutes left. Azeez sent it over and Ogilvie headed it in unchallenged as the Shrimps conceded yet another poor goal from a set piece.

Morecambe could have reduced the arrears after 82 minutes as Bazunu pulled-off a world-class save to keep out a twenty-five yard thunderbolt from Adam Phillips; somehow pushing it against his crossbar from where it bounced away to safety. Ryan McLaughlin missed with a shot right at the death and then the home goalie made a rare mistake, booting the ball against Phillips when trying to clear it only to see it bounce harmlessly wide.

So the game ended with Morecambe’s third league defeat in a row and with no goals to show from their recent efforts. They found themselves in the bottom four of League One for the first time ever this evening. But it’s not all doom and gloom. Pompey are a good side and Morecambe matched them for most of the game today. But for a miraculous save by Portsmouth’s young Manchester City goalkeeper, they would have at least scored as well.

Next Saturday’s game against rapidly-improving Fleetwood thus assumes even more significance than it had done prior to the game. The Cod Army beat Gillingham by the odd goal in three after being two goals to the good at Highbury today. Elsewhere, Doncaster beat Shrewsbury in Yorkshire and Crewe lost at home to Sheffield Wednesday. Accrington did us a favour by beating Bolton Wanderers as well. So Morecambe are level on points with the Shrews, who are above them only on goal difference. The Gills are two points behind them but have played a game more. Doncaster are three points worse off and Dave Artell’s Railwaymen remain rock-bottom with four points fewer than the Shrimps. So it’s still all to play for at the bottom of League One. 

Near the top of it, Pompey moved up to eighth position.

Portsmouth: 1 Gavin Bazunu; 6 Shaun Williams; 10 Marcus Harness (17 Ellis Harrison 80’); 11 Ronan Curtis; 13 Keiron Freeman; 15 Mahlon Romeo; 16 Connor Ogilvie; 18 Reeco Hackett-Fairchild (Y); 19 George Hirst (9 John Marquis 69’); 20 Sean Raggett (C); 27 Miguel Azeez. 

Subs Not Used:  7 Gassam Ahadme; 24 Michael Jacobs; 26 Paul Downing; 35 Alex Bass; 38 Harry Jewitt-White.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (Y); 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 14 Jonathan Obika (17 Jonah Ayunga 58’); 9 Cole Stockton; 18 Adam Phillips; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 22 Liam Gibson (Y); 25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Scott Wooten (15 Ryan Delaney (Y) 54’). 

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 6 Callum Jones; 10 Aaron Wildig; 21 Ryan Cooney; 24 Arthur Gnahoua.

Ref: Charles Breakspear.

Att: 15,001 (182 from Morecambe)

Into the Gloom for Morecambe

Unusually, the EFL computer decided in its no doubt artificial  intelligence-driven wisdom that Morecambe would face Fleetwood Town for the second time this season in League One just four weeks after they did so for the first time at Highbury. The Shrimps won there – with an injury time wonder goal from Cole Stockton which anyone who saw it will never forget.

As predicted on these pages, Town Manager of the time – Simon Grayson – was sacked within a week of this defeat for a club fearing a return to the fourth tier of the EFL for the first time in seven years. Since he went, the Cod Army’s form has been very mixed. They drew against AFC Wimbledon away; beat fellow-strugglers Bolton three-nil at home – and – in their latest fixture – overcame Gillingham in a game which could prove pivotal at the end of the season. 

(As a Morecambe fan, I just pray to the Football Gods that the Gills don‘t sack their manager. Steve Evans was booked on Saturday for a typical display of the sort of feral behaviour which we have all seen for decades from this particular gentleman. Perhaps more importantly, Gillingham is looking at relegation back to League Two in a pattern which has been repeated by the club from Kent for as long as anyone can remember. Given our own team’s current form, we need all the help we can get to avoid a similar fate…) 

But back to Fleetwood: despite their upturn in form, they also lost 3-1 at Oxford and even more heavily to Accrington, where they were hammered 5-1. However, the win last Saturday saw them piggy-back today’s opponents to escape from the relegation positions for virtually the first time this season. So they started this afternoon’s clash in nineteenth place in the table. Interim Manager Stephen Crainey had this to say before today’s game: 

“Every game in this league is tough. I’ve been around League One for a couple of years now under different managers and you can see that there are no easy games. We’re expecting a tough game against Morecambe as they beat us not long ago at Highbury. They’ve got some strengths in their team – and so have we at the same time – but we are looking forward to it and we are hoping to come away with the three points. We need to prepare properly and do our due diligence for the game, they’ve got some top players and we need to try and combat that and, hopefully, put our stamp on the game at the other end of the pitch as well. We’ve got our blinkers on and are focusing on the game. The lads have been training really well and I thought the results were just around the corner and that’s proved to be the case. In the two games that we’ve won, I thought we deserved to win them. The results have warranted the lads to be out of the bottom four. I reiterated to the squad that we want to be looking up the table, rather than down, and that is what we are going to do moving forwards. It’s pleasing as their work ethic off the ball has been good and they have also shown some good quality on the ball as well. We’re looking forward to the game on Saturday against Morecambe and hopefully, we can back it up once again.”

The hosts were two places below them at the top of the relegation league prior to kick-off. Since King Cole scored his Wonder Goal at Highbury to win the game for the Shrimps right at the last moment last month, Morecambe have struggled in League One. Manager Stephen Robinson potentially made a Rod for his own back (no offence, Mr Chairman) by stating last week: `We need to get six points from the next three games to be exactly where I thought we would be.’ Given that his team immediately went on to lose at Portsmouth, he has created a situation where Shrimps must not only beat Fleetwood today but also win at Bolton next time out in order to keep on track. Robbo said about the opposition before the game that they:

“Had two very good results and a nice style of football as well, so we know what to expect, but we’re at home, we’ll try and take the game to them, we’ll come and press them, and try to stamp our authority on the game. We’ve shown we can beat them; we’ve shown we were very comfortable against them at times. They haven’t changed loads. We look at their style of play, it’s very, very similar to the previous manager; the same team as the previous manager; so there’s not going to be any surprises.”

As far as upcoming games over the Festive Season against Bolton and bottom of the table Crewe are concerned, he added:

“We’re playing the teams in and around us which gives us the chance to claw back some points (to) climb up the table. These are the games where we have to pick up points, and it’s a big game starting with Fleetwood on Saturday. We always knew these were going to be the big games that not make or break you, but have a real determination in where you are at the end of the season. We’ve played two very hard away games in Pompey and Sunderland, but we’re not being judged on them. I judge myself and judge the players, but overall, as a whole season, we won’t be judged on that.”

The day dawned foggy and cold in North Lancashire – and stayed like that. Given the ravages of the latest Covid viral mutation, the biggest threat to today’s match, however, was the spread of the infection which saw so many football and rugby matches postponed right across the British leagues today.

But – in defiance of viral clouds and actual ones – the match went ahead.

There’s not a lot to say about it for two reasons. First of all, not a lot happened. Secondly, it was difficult to see what actually did, particularly at the far end of the pitch.

The fact that the visitors were clad in a black strip with red shorts didn’t really help as dark figures moved in the gloom in the same way that stupid, self-absorbed motorists without any lights on had all the way to the match. But the misty conditions did give the opportunity to use the awful play on words concerning Town’s nippy and tricky number 41. Yes, Cian Hayes was frequently to be seen emerging from the other sort of haze, often with the ball at his feet and usually to the discomfort of the home defence. With a bit more maturity and experience, here we have a potentially tremendous footballer.

Anyway, the hosts created the first proper opportunity of the game after just six minutes. Ryan Cooney slung over a lovely cross and Adam Phillips headed the ball only just wide of Alex Cairns’ goal. The Shrimps probably just about shaded the first half but the visitors squandered the absolutely best chance of the first period. Paddy Lane (didn’t the Beatles once write a song about him?) played a peach of a ball into the space between the Morecambe goal and its defence which an unmarked Shayden Morris ran onto. Fortunately for the home team, Kyle Letheren also raced from his goal with purpose and pulled-off a truly tremendous save to keep the game goal-less.

In the second half, though, the home team’s Goal Machine Cole Stockton had both of the outstanding chances of that period. He headed a lovely cross from the right wide of the target when well placed just after the restart.  Right at the end, he looked certain to bulge the back of the net when he worked a position for himself brilliantly just to the left of the target from his point of view. But Cairns – who probably still has nightmares about what this player did to him a month ago further down the Irish Sea coast – somehow or other managed to keep his effort out this time. Fleetwood had been the better team for most of the second period: playing the ball accurately and effectively at times as Morecambe constantly gave it away and frequently hoofed it aimlessly forwards time and time again. The withdrawal of the yet again largely ineffectual Phillips and Jonathan Obika – who is being nursed back to match fitness – with Aaron Wildig and Jonah Ayunga with about twenty minutes left changed the dynamic of the game entirely. For the first and only time in the contest, Morecambe were on top. They fashioned a few chances of which Stockton’s was the best but couldn’t take advantage of any of them.

So it ended goal-less. Stephen Crainey will be the happier of the two Managers tonight. Fleetwood found themselves two points better-off than Morecambe in seventeenth place in League One at the end of the contest. Shrewsbury beat Cheltenham 3-1 this afternoon as well to increase their lead over the Shrimps to two points. So Stephen Robinson’s team will spend Xmas at the top of the relegation section of League One. It could be worse. We could be Crewe…

Whatever – stay safe and have a lovely Xmas yourselves everyone.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (Y); 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 14 Jonathan Obika (17 Jonah Ayunga 54’); 9 Cole Stockton; 18 Adam Phillips (10 Aaron Wildig 75’); 19 Shane McLoughlin (Y); 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Liam Gibson; 25 Alfie McCalmont (8 Toumani Diagouraga 63’). 

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 6 Callum Jones; 16 Jacob Mensah; 20 Jay Matete (Y); 24 Arthur Gnahoua.

Fleetwood Town: 1 Alex Cairns; 3 Danny Andrew; 4 Conor McLaughlin; 5 Tom Clarke (C); 19 Gerard Garner ; 20 Jay Matete(Y); 22 Shayden Morris (34 Chris Conn-Clarke 72’); 27 Harrison Biggins (Y) (10 Callum Camps 80’); 32 Paddy Lane; 38 Carl Johnston; 41 Cian Hayes.

Subs Not Used:  13 Billy Crellin; 17 Ryan Edmondson; 28 Max Clark; 37 Dylan Boyle; 42 Tom Bird.

Ref: Christopher Pollock.

 Att: 4,018 (559 from Fleetwood).

Bolton Postponement and Morecambe’s Covid Policy

Morecambe should be travelling to Andy Burnham’s Christmas Covid Kingdom of Greater Manchester on Boxing Day to visit the University of Bolton Stadium at Horwich and celebrate the festive season. But they won’t be doing: the match has been postponed due to an outbreak of Coronavirus at the host club.

Bolton as both a place and a football club has been severely hit by the latest Omicron version of the pandemic. The Trotters had to postpone their last fixture against Wycombe due to the impact of the virus on its squad, when it was unable to raise the requisite thirteen fit outfield players and a goalkeeper which current regulations demand is a minimum for any game to go ahead.

The EFL produced figures last week which – very alarmingly – said that 31% of professional footballers registered with it did not have even a single anti-Coronavirus inoculation. Bizarrely, 25% of professional players in the EFL have apparently stated that they don’t intend to get one either. That’s one in four; the figures for the population at large suggest that only one in ten people over the age of twelve have not had a first jab and eighty percent of us have had two.

So why this massive discrepancy? Footballers have kids who go to schools, where Coronavirus is widespread. Footballers have friends and relations. Footballers socialise. They don’t live in a sanitised hermetically-sealed bubble. They are not immune. So why have so few of them been vaccinated and what on earth persuades so many of them that getting a jab isn’t necessary?

I don’t pretend to know the answer to this but I find the figures actually mind-boggling. Given the lack of protection which clearly exists in most squads, nobody can be surprised that the pandemic has ravaged so much of the recent fixture list. In my view, it’s amazing that even more games have not had to be postponed. In Bolton alone, 1,156 people are known to have contracted the virus between the 7^th and 13^th December despite 79% of residents over 12 having had at least their first anti-Covid inoculation. Since then, almost two thousand cases – 1,955 – have been detected and four deaths recorded locally due to the infection. (In Lancaster & Morecambe, the figures were a mere fraction of this at 371 cases in the same period and 79% again. Very worryingly though, the infection rate has leapt in one single week to 972 known cases by December 21^st, with three recorded fatalities.)

Source: https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ You can enter your own postcode at the bottom of the page to see the situation in your own area.

Wanderers remain tight-lipped about how many players and staff have been infected but Manager Ian Evatt has gone on record to say:

“Football players, staff, and the club’s workforce could be related to someone that is at risk. When they come into work every day with that on their mind it isn’t easy for them but for now it just feels slightly morally wrong that we’re continuing as normal when the rest of the UK is where it is.”

Morecambe FC has been far more forthcoming and proactive about the Covid status at the club. Manager Stephen Robinson announced after the Fleetwood game last week:

“It’s a worry when you see the amount of games that have been called off recently. We are very lucky here that we have every single player here double vaccinated. Every player will have their booster on Tuesday (21^st December) as well, so we are really counting ourselves lucky on that front. In terms of the general aspect of football, we have seen a lot of games called off this weekend and it is a concern. Hopefully we can get through this period. No-one wants to see football cancelled, no-one wants to see football without fans because it is not real; that was certainly something that was really unenjoyable. We want fans in stadiums, we have to find a way around it but ultimately people’s health is the most important thing.”

Wise words indeed. Ernie would be proud of them. But seriously though folks: do be careful. Some idiots have told us that the Coronavirus pandemic is a conspiracy or a myth or whatever and refuse to take the inoculations even though they know that not doing so means that they pose a risk to other people’s health. But they clearly don’t care about other people. Many of these morons are now in hospital suffering from an infection which they have previously claimed doesn’t exist. It’s a hard lesson to learn – and for some of them, it will be the last lesson they will ever learn. So if you haven’t had a jab – get one now for your own sake and everyone else’s. If it’s good enough for Robbo and his players – it’s good enough for you…

Dismal Performance against Crewe

There have been several changes since the last time Morecambe played Crewe Alexandra in September. John McMahon – who was Derek Adam’s right-hand man during their successful promotion campaign last season – has left the club. With him went a little bit more of the continuity which existed since Jim Bentley’s times and he has been a loyal servant to the club who will be missed. Rangers loanee Josh McPake has followed him – to Tranmere Rovers. There have been changes in personnel at Crewe as well. Ex -Morecambe Captain Dave Artell has been joined in the dugout by Alex Neil, sacked as Preston North End Manager not all that long ago. This was in a bid to improve the fortunes of the Railwaymen, who have been in the relegation section of League One since the start of the season. In a sense – in comparison to this evening’s opponents – they actually have improved. They have picked-up six points from their last five league games with two wins. Morecambe have only managed to scrape together two from two draws – and have lost the other three of their previous five games. But the Cheshire side arrived rock-bottom of the Division with five fewer points than the Shrimps but the same number of games played.

Crewe have beaten the Shrimps eight times in fifteen previous meetings and lost only four. The outcome of the sixteenth meeting could thus prove to be pivotal for both teams.

Three points for Crewe could put them closer to the teams struggling to put clear water between themselves and the Shrimps in the lower half of the table. A win for Morecambe, conversely, could see the Shrimps begin 2022 out of the relegation positions altogether, depending on results elsewhere.

Because of Covid infection, both clubs’ last fixtures – Crewe’s against Wigan and Morecambe’s at Bolton – were postponed on Boxing Day. At the same time, Shrewsbury were convincingly winning away from home for the first time this season, nil-three at Fleetwood. This result dragged the Cod Army back well within range of the Shrimps, who were just two points behind them but had played one game fewer at the start of tonight’s match. Lincoln City also threw away a two-nil lead to lose at home to remain just two points better off than the club from North Lancashire. To ensure that at least the three clubs lower in the table than we are there on (de)merit (and we only need one more to be, don’t we?),  Doncaster also lost heavily at home to Sunderland last Monday night.

So there was a lot to play for tonight as far as both clubs’ futures as League One members are concerned.

Dave Artell is a very bright guy and what he says has always been well worth listening to. In his pre-match Press Conference, he said little about tonight’s game or the opponents his side were about to face. Instead, he made a far more political statement about Covid and the government’s response to the pandemic:

 “I am not a scientist and there must be a reason behind it, although I do believe that the Prime Minister is not in a good position to restrict anyone after what he and others have done in his government over the last 18 months. I don’t follow the restrictions because the Prime Minister tells me to – I do it to protect myself and others. I am hoping that we can get back to playing some football again. We are in a position to play. We were in a position to play Gillingham and we were in a position to play Wigan, so we are all hoping it is third time lucky.”

Opposite number Stephen Robinson spoke before the game about the difficulty of attracting new players to the club a week before the Transfer Window opens. But he insisted – even without any new faces:

“We’ve got a squad which can go on a run of results; I’ve no doubt about that. We have to defend better. We have to cut out mistakes and that has to start against Crewe because it’s a huge game for us.”

It was indeed a huge game for the Shrimps. Things weren’t made any easier by the unexplained absence of Morecambe’s Goal Machine Cole Stockton from the squad tonight. My spies spotted him in the ground still wearing a Shrimps’ kit during the game, though so he hasn’t departed for Pastures New. Yet.

It had been wet and windy earlier in North Lancashire prior to the game. But the wind had dropped a bit and the rain had subsided by the time the match kicked-off.

Before it did so, there was an enthusiastic round of applause for a minute in memory of Tony Webber. Tony was a schoolteacher from Wigan who played in Dave Roberts’ semi-professional side which won the FA Trophy at Wembley in 1974. In the final itself, he set-up both goals for the Shrimps in a 2-1 win. Altogether, he was a very fine player and a tremendous ambassador for the club on and off the pitch. The club’s record appearance holder, Steve Done (who was also a teacher and could have certainly played at a higher level as well) said of his former team-mate this week: “He was a great goalscorer and really well liked. He was a very outgoing, quick-witted and intelligent lad.” R.I.P. Tony.

The visitors started brightly and played some neat one-touch football for the first ten minutes or so. They forced a succession of corners and after six minutes, a fierce shot from Tom Lowery only just missed the target for Crewe. Morecambe slowly stepped up the pace though, and started to get a foothold in the match after Aaron Wildig’s wild strike went wide after nine minutes. Jonah Ayunga forced a decent save from visiting goalkeeper Dave Richards after almost a quarter of an hour. Five minutes later, Callum Ainley’s shot for Alex was deflected for another corner. Then Shrimps’ Skipper Anthony O’Connor headed Callum Jones’ deep cross just wide with 25 minutes on the clock. It was end-to-end stuff and had been quite entertaining before the hosts struck the first blow of the night after thirty-six minutes. Adam Phillips put over a lovely cross from the Shrimps’ right and a stooping Greg Leigh steered it home at the far post. Morecambe were on top for most of the rest of the half and had a decent shout for a penalty in injury time as Wildig seemed to be fouled in the opposition box. Referee Seb Stockbridge, however, waved all claims away.

I thought Morecambe were the better team at the beginning of the second half too. They didn’t create any chances but they looked fairly comfortable in possession as Crewe offered little going forward. But that all changed after fifty-two minutes. Out of nothing, Lowery weaved his way down the Crewe right and then slung over a perfect cross for tall centre forward Chris Porter to head home all too easily at the far post. Seven minutes later, the visitors were ahead. Luke Murphy fairly walloped the ball home from distance to send both Alex’s massed ranks and the black-clad team  into a sort of collective frenzy. It was a tremendous strike without any doubt. But you could see what this goal meant to the Crewe team – and you could also see in this moment alone which of the two sides actually wanted the win more.

The Referee added-on eight minutes of extra time at the end. But the only time the visitors looked even vaguely troubled after they went ahead was when Ayunga’s shot was brilliantly saved by Richards low to his left after 66 minutes. Wildig – who was unusually ineffective tonight – missed again with another wild effort but altogether, the team looked weak, disorganised and woefully short of either confidence or ideas. This was a really dire performance tonight. Against the team at the bottom of the Division, the Shrimps looked inferior almost right across the pitch. Robbo may have confidently said prior to the game that his squad is good enough to remain in League One. On this utterly hopeless performance though, they would struggle to win in League Two.

Despite the dismal display, the Shrimps remained in twenty-first position in League One. But Dave Artell’s men are now breathing right down their necks in twenty-second place, just two points behind. The game next Sunday against Doncaster now becomes even more pivotal to their chances of survival in the summer of 2022.

And – talking about the New Year – have a good one everybody… despite today’s disappointment…

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 6 Callum Jones; 10 Aaron Wildig (7 Wes McDonald 69’); 14 Jonathan Obika (24 Arthur Gnahoua 67’); 17 Jonah Ayunga; 18 Adam Phillips (8 Toumani Diagouraga 47’); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 22 Liam Gibson

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 15 Ryan Delaney; 16 Jacob Mensah; 27 Shayon Harrison.

Crewe Alexandra:  31 Dave Richards; 3 Rio Adebisi (Y) (2 Kayne Ramsay 51’); 6 Luke Offord; 8 Tom Lowery; 9 Chris Porter; 11 Callum Ainley (23 Travis Johnson 76’); 12 Mikael Mandron; 14 Oliver Finney (35 Scott Robertson 84’); 16 Luke Murphy (Y); 22 Billy Sass-Davies; 28 Michael Williams.

Subs not used: 1 Will Jääskeläinen; 17 Madger Gomes; 21 Donervon Daniels; 29 Connor O’Rierdon.

Ref:  Seb Stockbridge.

Att: 3,831 (423 from Crewe).

Words and images: Roger Fitton.

Game of Two Halves at Morecambe

It was grim enough to witness Morecambe’s humiliation – for that is what it was – against Crewe last Tuesday night. But to read on the fans’ forums afterwards reports of racist insults been hurled at some of our own players by our own alleged `supporters’ just puts the tin lid on it.

Anyone who has ever watched the Shrimps play this season will see that Wes McDonald, for instance, isn’t good enough for League One. Against Crewe, he clearly didn’t even try a lot of the time. But he wasn’t alone in this.

So why single him out for abuse simply because he is black and some of the other slackers aren’t?

It doesn’t make sense apart from anything else. The Neanderthals in our crowd shout racist slurs because they are less advanced along the spectrum of human evolution than the black players they are shouting this nonsense at. I suppose we should actually feel sorry for these Throwbacks for being forced by whatever it is in their pea-sized brains as their knuckles drag along the floor to behave in this way in the first place. But I would personally like to see them banned permanently from the Maz – we have enough white idiots who throw flares and whatnot already without adding racist morons to the list as well.

It’s truly depressing – and actually shameful – to read on the net remarks such as “My 8 year old son watching football with his dad does not deserve to ask me what a certain racist comment means at a football match.”

Absolutely. But the black guys in our squad – or in anyone else’s for that matter – deserve it even less…

Oh – and on that uplifting and very positive note – Happy New Year to (almost) everybody…

Anyway… Stephen Robinson went on record straight after the Crewe fiasco and said the following:

“I am extremely disappointed with the way that we defended, their player is heading nowhere and he manages to get a cross into the box and it lands on a player who has a free header.  We didn’t land on the second ball for their second goal, so you deserve to lose when you defend like that, we have been conceding too many goals and we have tried to get more bodies in there.  We didn’t pass the ball (either). I have said previously it was a big game and it was a big game for a lot of players, but a lot of them froze, they were hiding from the ball unfortunately. I have to compliment the fans. They got behind the team for 90 minutes on Wednesday night and they expressed their views after the game, which is the right thing to do. I live in the real world and I’m a very down-to-earth person who understands that people want to see passion and desire, you see me in the dugout and I try and do that as much as I can. So I agree with them to a certain extent, but with some of the younger players it is about fear rather than not trying, and I think we saw some players playing with fear.”

He’s in a difficult position, really. It may be true to say that some of his players froze (although that begs the question – why? – because Crewe’s certainly didn’t) but it was obvious to anyone who watched the game that several of them didn’t put in a shift either. I’m also personally puzzled by the Manager’s constant relegating of Toumani Diagouraga to the bench. He is one of only about three players in the squad in my opinion with any obvious class. Perhaps more importantly, he always leads by example on the field too – and that can’t be said for too many among the Morecambe squad at this moment in time.

Robbo has also bemoaned the fact that Burnley loanee Adam Phillips was injured last Wednesday and faces a long lay-off. This man has offered virtually nothing on the field this season and he never gets stuck-in plus rarely tracks-back into the bargain. All I can say is that he must be absolutely brilliant in training to have the Manager place so much faith in him, week-in and week-out.

The jury is still out on Jonas Ayunga – who was scintillating earlier in the season before having a serious injury – and strike partner Jonathan Obika is clearly not match fit yet either. We know we have a gem in Aaron Wildig but his fitness and form has been poor all season so far. Anthony O’Connor is a decent central defender most of the time and I think his commitment to the cause is beyond doubt. But that can’t be said of too many other members of the Morecambe squad.

Stephen Robinson has made too many rods for his own back this season so far. Early on, he defined the parameters of success and failure of the campaign ahead by saying that the Shrimps must win a minimum of two from each batch of five games they play. They have consistently failed to do this recently. I also think it was a mistake for him to say before the Fleetwood game two weeks ago `we need to get six points from the next three games to be exactly where I thought we would be.’ So far, his players have earned just one point from two of these games and can now only obtain a maximum of four. So why set an unattainable goal publicly in the first place? Sadly, Robbo also increasingly sounds like a broken record. He has repeatedly called for mistakes at the back to be cut-out – but the team is arguably weaker at the back now than they were when he first started chanting this mantra several months ago. He is the Coach when all is said and done. So why is this happening? Before the game, he repeated the `must do better’ message yet again:

“I think every game is huge. You’re not going to stay up based on wining this game or losing this game. We simply have to perform better. We have to have more people stand up and be counted. We’ve tried to knock the pass backwards as many times in our final third, but no one’s ever told them to slice balls 60 yards up the pitch with no curve or no quality. But sometimes that’s an easier option when you’re playing with no confidence. People go missing and hiding from the game. We need brave people at this moment in time. We’re losing people around tonsillitis. I was in the hospital with tonsillitis; it was quite bad. Things aren’t going our way at this moment in time in terms of getting any kind of consistency with selections or injuries, but saying that, the players on the pitch have to be better. It’s probably been the story of our season. Individual errors. Different people each week are struggling to cope with the quality at this level. The truth be told, it’s been a different person every week making individual mistakes. I have to look at myself as well – and the players have to look at themselves. Everybody has to look at themselves. That’s the industry we’re in. The fans voice their opinion at the end of the games. I fully accept that.”

Mr Robinson has already tried to dampen-down speculation of new signings to help alleviate the crisis the club is clearly facing. One of his problems is that – with the exception of Greg Leigh and Cole Stockton – most of the players currently on the books (and the majority are his signings, we mustn’t forget) would struggle to find new employers on current form. So they ain’t going anywhere, are they?

Without Cole the Goal, the Shrimps would already be in even worse straits than they are and I think that most fans see it as inevitable that he leaves the club sooner or later. But he was included in Morecambe’s starting eleven this afternoon. In the absence of the injured Phillips, Toums also started.

The Shrimps began the game in twenty-first place in League One. Donny were rock-bottom; four points behind their hosts but with one fewer game played. In terms of form, Rovers were also better-placed than their opponents today, with one victory in their last five league games as opposed to a single point for Morecambe. In previous contests, the Shrimps have met Doncaster three times. They have never beaten them. The best they have achieved was a draw against the Yorkshire club.  Their most recent loss was last September at the Keepmoat Stadium, where the Shrimps turned-in what is becoming an increasingly familiar really feeble display on the day.

All things considered, then, the prospect for the New Year looked pretty bleak even before a ball was kicked today. Would it look any better two hours later?

Previous Caretaker Gary McSheffrey was confirmed as the permanent occupant of the Manager’s hot seat for Donny earlier this week. One of his first moves was to appoint Frank Sinclair as his assistant. Their joint mission is to save Rovers’ League One status. So far this season, Doncaster have picked-up only a single point on the road – at Crewe. So the team’s fortunes need improving immediately. The new Manager expressed these thoughts prior to the clash by the Irish Sea coast today:

“I expect aggression and for them to be on the front foot, with a front two that press well. They’ve got physical strikers who cause defenders problems and fast wingbacks who like to join in attacks. We’ve been doing work on the training ground, putting over the messages we want to give our team and working on things so we can get the results. It’s a game against a team that is around us and it’s important when you’re down that end of the table that you take points off teams around you. We’ll be going there and trying to get the win.”

It had rained very heavily during the first full night of 2022 in North Lancashire. But it was dry under sometimes very dark skies as the daylight gradually faded and the match wore on. Rovers must have won the toss because they chose to play facing their own supporters during the first half. Right from the off, they were the better team. They took the game to Morecambe and were clearly pumped-up for the fray in the way the home team equally clearly weren’t.

This was the team at the bottom of the division but against the men in the red strip, they looked accomplished and slick. Only four minutes were on the clock when Aidan Barlow shrugged-off the home defence as if they weren’t there and drew a good save from Kyle Letheren. Just six minutes of away pressure had passed when the team in the blue striped strip took the lead. The Shrimps conceded the first corner of the game on their left; Branden Horton slung the ball over and ping-pong ensued on the goal-line. For the millionth time this season, the home defence yet again failed to clear the ball before Barlow walloped it home at the far post to register his first ever goal for the club.

Cole Stockton missed the target with a scissors kick after eighteen minutes but it was largely still one-way traffic in the opposite direction. Alfie McCalmont started for the Shrimps today and after twenty-four minutes, he took a free kick from a promising position and then sent a really weak effort way over Louis Jones’ goal. Not long afterwards, Rovers found themselves in uncharted waters this term when Horton’s ball from the left fell to a well-placed Dan Gardner whose shot went straight through Letheren’s hands to make it nil-two to the visitors as the massed ranks of supporters from Yorkshire behind him taunted the large Welshman for having too good a Xmas: “You fat so-and-so!” They were at it again in the twenty-ninth minute when another low ball from the left was converted by Joe Olowu.

The home support was shell-shocked. Our team was being completely outplayed and actually hammered by a club which has not won away from the Keepmoat all season. In doing so, they had scored three goals – and this was a team which had only hit the net on their travels eight times in the previous five months.  Could it get any worse? It could have – Gardner dragged a shot wide when he might have done better a few minutes before the break.

The men in the red shirts were rightly booed off the pitch at half time. As we joked among ourselves that our boys would score four goals in the second half to win, Gallows Humour was the order of the day. On this performance, Morecambe would struggle to win in the Northern Premier League. Goodness only knows what any spies from Spurs – who the Shrimps will face a week today in London – must have made of this car-crash of a performance. Maybe if they just fielded five men against us or played a blind-folded team, we might have at least a sporting chance of avoiding a cricket score against them.

McCalmont – who had a shocker today – was withdrawn at half time to be replaced by Aaron Wildig.  But whatever Stephen Robinson had said to his men at half time clearly went home. They didn’t look like the same team. Right from the off, they pressed Donny in their own half and not only threw the kitchen sink at them but kept them pinned there for the rest of the game.

The visitors had only one answer to it: to cheat. Sheffield-based Referee James Bell did nothing to stop this and was rightly booed off at the end. Substitute Joe Dodoo led with a straight left arm in challenge after challenge when he made no attempt to head the ball but constantly fouled whichever Morecambe player was up against him. He should have been sent off. But the Referee was happy to book him once and wag his finger at him when he kept on doing it. Equally, Jordy Hiwula-Mayifuila kept infringing on free-kicks awarded to the home team throughout the second half. He was booked only after he had done this for perhaps a fifth or sixth time. As soon as the next infringement by his team-mates was penalised, he kicked the ball away. He should have enjoyed an Early Bath too. But the sub-standard Man in the Middle let him get away with it.

However, it didn’t do the away team any good. Cole the Goal reduced the arrears after seven minutes of the restart. A cross from the left was beautifully headed towards the Morecambe Goal Machine by Skipper Anthony O’Connor and Cole did the rest. With just over an hour on the clock, he almost scored again when he headed Shane McLoughlin’s free-kick only just wide. Then Greg Leigh headed just over the bar after 67 minutes. Five minutes later, visiting custodian Jones earned his corn with a good save from the Shrimps’ leading scorer. But Morecambe’s talismanic Number Nine wasn’t going to be denied much longer. Toumani Diagouraga won the ball bravely in midfield and set McLoughlin away again to set-up Cole to almost burst the net after 74 minutes. Jonathan Obika came on as a substitute just three minutes later and opened his League account for the Shrimps with a well-taken goal as the Doncaster defence was again at sixes and sevens with eight minutes left to play.

As their team fell apart in front of their eyes, there was trouble on the terraces shortly afterwards as Doncaster fans appeared to fight among themselves. In truth, their team had been losing the fight on the field long before the fisticuffs occurred. Deserved Man of the Match Toumani scored a magnificent winning goal for the Shrimps with a superb and powerful shot with just four minutes left. And still the home team pushed forward after that as Donny laid down and died.

This was a tremendous victory for Morecambe. To be able to transform the gloom of being taken to the cleaners by a weak team at half time and show the resilience and sheer drive to turn things around in the second half was a fantastic achievement in itself. It showed that Robbo is able to inspire his men in adversity and gives credence to his claim last week that the squad is good enough to survive in League One. If they play like they did during the second half, they almost certainly will. If they play as they did in the first half, they wouldn’t survive in League Two.

This tremendous win saw Morecambe escape from the relegation zone in League One altogether tonight. This evening, they sat in nineteenth position in the table. Meanwhile, what must have been a really demoralising body-blow to the Rovers if only because of the way they were simply blown-away in the second half saw them in even more trouble right at the foot of the Division.

Morecambe: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 17 Jonah Ayunga (Y) (21 Ryan Cooney 94’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 22 Liam Gibson; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (14 Jonathan Obika 77’); 25 Alfie McCalmont (10 Aaron Wildig 45’);

Subs Not Used:  20 Jökull Andrésson; 6 Callum Jones; 15 Ryan Delaney; 16 Jacob Mensah; 33 Jamie Nicholson.

Doncaster Rovers: 1 Louis Jones; 2 Kyle Knoyle; 5 Joe Olowu (Y); 7 Omar Bogle (20 Joe Dodoo 33’); 10 Tommy Rowe; 16 Aidan Barlow (21 Tiago Cukur 60’); 14 Matt Smith; 17 Jordy Hiwula-Mayifuila (Y); 22 Ethan Galbraith; 23 Dan Gardner (31 Liam Ravenhill 45’); 28 Branden Horton.

Subs Not Used:   12 Pontus Dahlberg; 6 Ro-Shaun Williams; 29 Lirak Hisani; 30 Ben Blythe. 

Ref: James Bell.

Att: 4,001 (392 from Doncaster).

A Walk Down White Hart Memory Lane…

For the first time ever, Tottenham Hotspur face Morecambe FC on a football pitch on Sunday.

Indulge me – please – as I make an admission to you which I am truly ashamed of.

When I was young and knew no better, if anyone had asked me which football team I supported, I would have answered “Tottenham and Morecambe”. Yes – two – and in that order.

I supported Spurs – as many people of my generation did – because the Bill Nicholson team of the 1960s played the Beautiful Game and were good on the eye. (I was also determined not to support Manchester United – which so many of my contemporaries in northern England did at the time.)

I saw Spurs in the flesh at White Hart Lane as long ago as 1959 – when I was five. My Mother’s sister lived in relatively nearby Leyton and we were visiting her for Christmas. So my dad took me along to see one of the best-known teams in Britain at the time.

But he also occasionally dragged me along to Deepdale to see a Preston North End which still featured the great Tom Finney and I never had my head turned by them.

He also regularly took me to watch Morecambe at a rapidly-developing Christie Park in the Lancashire Combination. I remember the Main Stand when it was new; the first floodlights; the cinder banks in the South (later Umbro) Stand and what became known as the Car Wash Terrace. I even remember walking across the foundations for the Auxiliary Supporters Club on Lancaster Road after one particular match. But every season, I would manage to watch Tottenham as well.

At Everton. At Old Trafford several times. At Stoke City’s old Victoria Ground once. Blackpool. Anfield – and occasionally in London as well. Turf Moor was a regular trip as I went with my class-mates Peter Watson and John Houston in Peter’s dad’s blue Austin Cambridge (or was it a Morris Oxford? Watson Senior was a fireman who drove us to Burnley to worship our heroes, bless him, on no less than three occasions).

By this time – as a teenager – I usually watched Morecambe on my own. It was a regular pilgrimage as I rode Walter – my knackered old Raleigh bike – all the way from my parents’ house in Bolton-le-Sands to Christie Park. Then back again, occasionally in the rain and frequently in pitch blackness stuck in fourth gear as I ground my weary way up Hasty Brow Lane over the canal bridge towards Slyne on a Tuesday night.

That all changed when I moved to London in 1973. I took the bike with me.

I was living in a hovel in pre-yuppy-fied Islington in Norf London before long. There, I would get on Walter and grind through the imaginary gears again as I cycled through places like Stamford Hill up the A10 towards Tottenham High Road and the White Hart Lane stadium.

It was a very different experience to cycling through the leafy lanes of North Lancashire, as you can probably imagine. Traffic. Noise. People everywhere.

I had very long hair at the time (I had moved to London in an ill-fated bid to become a professional bass player in some rock band somewhere and the mullet was part of the package).

One of my clearest memories of going to White Hart Lane was when I had just about peaked the top of Stamford Hill (Gasp! – yes, it was still stuck in fourth gear) only to be spat at by about four teenage Skinheads – little white Cockney geezers clad in denim and Doc Martins who suggested that I was `a fackin’ ‘ippy!”.

I don’t think even one of them missed.

Coming away again, I remember being directed back into the heavy two lanes of traffic near Seven Sisters by a female policewoman – a Sow, I supposed at the time partially because of the way she looked. It is wasn’t for her enormous bust, this would have been a real-life embodiment of a Rugby League Prop Forward with a pink face like a bag of spanners and a uniform. And she stopped me trying to avoid the perennially angry London motorists and murderous taxi drivers by cycling down a bus lane instead.

Thankyou Madam. Come to think of it, she probably didn’t like Hippies either…

I fitted a horn – you know, one with a round rubber thing to squeeze – to the bike precisely in order to navigate the crowds leaving White Hart Lane. And soon took it off again. It was really loud but I only used it once – and I swear the guy I was honking at nearly had a heart attack as he virtually swooned right in front of me: “Fort you was a bleedin’ truck, mate!”

In the ground, things were little better. At Christie Park – even with only two hundred other sad people with nothing better to do like myself in the ground – there was always a good atmosphere. And – win, lose or draw – I always had a good laugh. Not so at White Hot Lane. The home crowd were nasty – and angry.  England star Martin Chivers was their Centre Forward at the time. But if he didn’t score after about ten minutes, the Park Lane End (where I usually stood) would yell “Chivers is a Fairy” at him en masse. (Nobody would dream of shouting anything like that at dear old Charlie Wroth back home at Christie Park…)

They hated regular substitute John Pratt – probably just because of his surname.

Local derbies were like wars – West Ham Skinheads versus Spurs Bovver Boys, for instance.

I remember when Crowd Control measures and the segregation we all take for granted these days were first being introduced. To get around it, visiting fans bought Spurs scarves outside the ground in order to get in with the home fans. Then the trouble would start.

Before a game against Chelsea, the violence on the terraces was so intense that the Public Address announcer threatened to have the game abandoned if it didn’t stop. This was at a point just before kick-off when little girl Majorettes who had already been subjected to the lewdest imaginable comments from the delightful Cockneys who filled all corners of the ground were marching across the middle of the pitch.

Suddenly, a wall of blue-clad Chelsea supporters was charging towards them from the away Paxton Road end as the visiting hordes invaded the playing surface to be confronted by home-grown hooligans charging towards them from the opposite direction.

They must be scarred for life, poor kids.

I saw a bloke get genuinely scarred for life – or possibly worse – as he was stabbed in the free-for-all which ensued. I still have a memory of him laid out – covered in blood – in the home goalmouth before he was finally stretchered away.

Down the road at Highbury, an indelible memory of an Arsenal-Spurs match is imprinted on my brain. I was standing in the Paddock at the front of the Art Deco main stand. Behind me, sitting in the interior, was the Metropolitan Police Brass Band. A big copper who really did look like a Pig was wearing full dress uniform and conducting. This was bizarre enough in itself. But at a certain point, he picked-up a microphone and started to sing!

I had to pinch myself.

I pinched myself even harder when I realised that what he was singing was a hymn!: Ave Maria. I looked towards the North Bank, where World War Three had already started as the two local tribes were kicking hell out of each other as the heavenly words floated in the ether above them. Beam me up, Scotty!

So I started to get a bit disillusioned. It didn’t help when the morons around me yelled `You dirty Northern Bastards` at any visiting team which was to be found on the wrong side of the Thirty-Eighth Parallel otherwise known as Watford.

One day, I saw Spurs beat Aston Villa five-nil. I remember two things about the match.

First of all – at half time – I bought a cup of tea.

I used to have loads of sugar in any hot drink but during the 1970s there was a period in London when you couldn’t get any. So I had to give it up.

But at White Hart Lane, the crisis had passed and the large, scary women behind the counter automatically added sugar to the tea whether you wanted it or not. I couldn’t drink it: it tasted like two separate drinks: something vaguely tea-like and a cloyingly syrupy instant tooth-rot additive. I’ve never used sugar in drinks since.

Later – and I cringe now to think that I used to wear a blue and white Tottenham scarf to their home games – I was leaving the ground to find Walter the bike. As I did so, a big, burly Villa supporter stopped me.

“Do you support Spurs?” he asked in a very strong – and quite threatening – Black Country accent.

(I thought about trying to get out of what I expected to be a difficult situation by replying: “No – I actually support Morecambe but I am on a spying mission on behalf of a match which will happen almost a half a century from now!” – but then thought that might not be such a good idea.) So I told him the shameful – the actually very shameful – truth: “Yes”.

At which point, he took his grubby scarf off and wrapped it around my neck and said: “Take this my dear fellow – our team are a bunch of overpaid chaps who are not terribly good and with whom I am much displeased!” Well – it was a variation on this phrase which I’m sure you can imagine.

(Later, I actually wore this thing occasionally even though it shrunk by about a third when I first washed it. I was cycling home from work in Very Agreeable Hampstead along the Heath road towards Highgate – where I lived in a poky bedsit at the time – one day in the winter when a car passed. Voices yelled from within it: “Up the ‘Ammers!” when they saw the scarf I was wearing. I stuck my fist in the air and yelled “Burnley for ever!” All because of a Claret & Blue Aston Villa accessory – my, what a twisted road life can take us down – even on a clapped-out old bike – says he very philosophically…)

But talking about Burnley, I was at Shite Fart Lane (as my Arsenal-supporting drummer in the last band I played with in London always referred to it) one day when the team from East Lancashire were the visitors. This must have been in about 1976 or 1977 and Spurs were struggling to stay in the old First Division as some of their star players – Mike England; Alan Mullery and Alan Gilzean for instance – were already beyond their Sell-By dates. (This may well have been the year that outstanding Spurs Goalkeeper Pat Jennings won the First Division Player of the Year award. Asked how he managed this, he replied: “With a defence like ours, I didn’t have much choice!”)

This was Back In The Day when only a single substitute was allowed in football matches. So Tottenham crippled Burnley’s star player (either Ralphy Coates – who they signed later on – or Welsh international and later Morecambe legend Leighton James – I can’t remember which). This was at a time when Burnley had already brought-on their only substitute and whoever Spurs had nobbled spent the rest of the match literally limping up and down the touchline, just to keep up the numbers. Despite effectively only having ten men, Burnley took the lead. But Spurs kicked their way back into the match and won it with a goal near the end 2-1. Boo!!! Despite the fact that their brave lads were losing, a group of visiting fans somewhere in the ground started chanting: “Lancashire La La La!; Lancashire La La La!”

 I felt – as someone actually born in Morecambe – like Judas.

Coming away from the game, I shoved my Spurs scarf in a bin and decided that enough was enough.

Hell, we are told, hath no fury like a woman scorned. Well – I have an update on that: Hell Has no Fury like a football fan scorned. I still love Morecambe but I positively hateTottenham these days.

I was delighted when they were relegated to Division Two back in the day and even more thrilled when Liverpool beat them in the European Cup Final a couple of seasons ago. I’m not keen on Chelsea either – but I was at least subconsciously egging them on as they won 2-0 in their first leg semi-final League Cup win last Tuesday at Stamford Bridge.  Tee-hee…

So for me personally, attending a Spurs’ home game for the very first time as a committed away supporter will be a truly weird experience on Sunday. Morecambe may well end-up getting Totten-hammered.

But on the other hand – who knows? Stranger things have happened, after all…

A Taste of Things To Come at Tottenham?

Two universes collided today at the new multi-million pound Tottenham Hotspur stadium in north London. The obscenely overpaid prima donnas who live their pampered lives in a parallel dimension to that which the rest of us mere mortals inhabit faced a football team from the Coal Face of soccer as it is played and watched by the majority of the population in this country. So – to be brutal – on the one hand, a team of underachievers which never wins any trophies worth mentioning and most people see as a joke anyway would take the field at two o’clock today with nothing to fear other than humiliation and thus a reputation for repeated failure being extended even further. Spurs, after all, have won precisely nothing this century.

But facing them would be a club which has constantly been on an upwards trajectory since the year 2000. Morecambe would start the game with a brand new goalkeeper and central defender at the lower part of the spine of the team and a centre forward at the top of it who has scored better goals this season – and far more of them – than some bloke who plays for England and allegedly leads the Tottenham front line. So remember – they might have the occasional world superstar in their vastly bloated and overpaid squad – but we have Cole Stockton!

Collectively, Cole the Goal plus New Boys Trevor Carson and Jacob Bedeau would be praying for a clean sheet today. Could it actually happen? Stranger things have done, after all – earlier this weekend, Cambridge had already won the Battle of the Uniteds by beating Newcastle on their own patch to well and truly upset the apple cart…

Usually, I would go into details about current form and previous meetings before a regular match report. But there never have been any previous meetings between Morecambe and what former star Osvaldo Ardiles (and latterly the Shrimps’ boss’ first Manager at White Hart Lane) always referred to as `Tottingham Hotspur’. Form in today’s context is an irrelevance anyway. Oh – other than to say that the Shrimps came back from three-nil down in their last outing to win 4-3 at home eight days ago in League One. Spurs were given the run-around in their previous match at relatively nearby Stamford Bridge, when they lost two-nil to Chelsea in the League Cup semi-final last Tuesday night. It could have been a lot more, apparently.

So – as has been the case for all of this century so far – Tottenham fell at the final hurdle yet again. There is a second leg of the semi-final yet to come but the fatal flaws (no resilience; no determination and absolutely no bottle) which exist at the heart of the perennially under-achieving north London outfit makes that a formality even before a ball has been kicked. (I know it’s a bit harsh, but I owe a lot of money to a life-long Arsenal fan and he’s beginning to hassle me to pay it back. Best to try and keep him happy…)

STOP PRESS: Spurs lost the second leg 0-1. (Why am I not surprised?…)

Today, though – they should win. And win easily. Let’s dispense with the hype and deal with some pure facts for a moment.

Spurs squander more than the entire yearly budget (except for Cole Stockton’s wages) of the north Lancashire club’s on just a fraction of lots of individual players’ wages in their stable every minute of every working day. Man for man, Spurs are physically and technically superior by a factor of about a trillion percent right across the pitch. (Barring Cole Stockton.) Their manager is paid about a zillion times more in an hour than virtually the entire staff at Morecambe will receive altogether in their entire lifetimes. Ever. (Apart from Cole Stockton.) The training ground Spurs have at their disposal in Cheshunt is worth more per square metre than Morecambe’s entire stadium is by a factor of a million percent (apart from the bit where Cole Stockton gets changed.) The facilities to be found there include cryogenic pods for their better players to be `retired’ into. (So now you really know where Steve Perryman and Gary Mabutt went…)  They are also leading the creation of new, undamaged, replacement body parts by state-of-the-art laser technology which is at the cutting edge of science. So there is literally no comparison to be made between them and the Lancaster University Sports Centre which the Shrimps use other than the Cole Stockton Science Laboratory – which can be found slightly further away and up the hill from Bailrigg village itself near Bowland College. All in all, then – to go back to the introduction – this was a collision between one huge and powerful Solar System and a very small and relatively impoverished one (with the exception of Lord of the Universe, Cole Stockton.)

Last season, Morecambe played in front of an empty stadium at Stamford Bridge at this stage – the third round of the FA Cup. Derek Adams’ team at no point even attempted to take the game to their more illustrious opponents and thus lost quite tamely. But Robbo’s style of football is totally different to his predecessor’s.

Very few away supporters would actually expect their team to win today – but all of us would at least hope that Morecambe would give Spurs a run for their money.

As mentioned above, Stephen Robinson has managed to persuade goalkeeper and former stalwart, the ex-Motherwell Club Captain Trevor Carson to rejoin him on loan for the rest of the season from Dundee United. Jacob Bedeau has also signed from Burnley for the same period. For both of them – what an introduction to the world of League One football!

Robbo himself wasn’t able to travel to what even for him must have been one of the biggest games of a career because he tested positive for Coronavirus at the Eleventh Hour. What a shame for him personally. Back in the day, he explained:

“My dad got phone calls off Sir Alex Ferguson and then Graeme Souness at Rangers. My brother-in-law wasn’t happy when I chose Spurs as he was a massive Rangers fan, so that didn’t go down well in the family.  At fourteen, I had the chance to sign a six-year contract with Manchester United, Rangers and Tottenham, something which is unheard of now. I chose to go to Spurs and actually started when I was fifteen. I had a really bad back injury, a disk problem that needed rehab. I had an operation in Northern Ireland by someone who was considered one of the best surgeons and signed for Spurs injured. It was a difficult start for me as I wasn’t playing. I was in rehab with Gazza. It was the time that he did his knee, so we did our rehab together. He was just an incredible guy, one of the nicest blokes you could ever want to meet and he just knew everybody. He was mad, crazy, funny but he kept everyone going. In terms of his work ethic and class, he was just brilliant. He was great with the young lads. We used to go swimming together when we were both struggling with our injuries. You look back on it now and you took it for granted at the time. He was probably, for me, one of the first superstars in football.”

That was then, though – and this is now. Before being isolated prior to the game today, he said this:

“It’s something that, especially for the fans that they’ve waited for a long, long time. They missed out on Chelsea last year.  They missed out on the vast majority of getting promoted. It’s going to be fantastic for them to travel down and enjoy the day. I’ve had nothing but positivity from people since I came here, even when we’ve had a few weeks previously before Saturday where we couldn’t get a win, (and) we weren’t playing particularly well either. I’ve had nothing but positivity from people around the town; from the supporters; from the directors. It’s nice that they get their day in the sun so-to-speak and really, really enjoy the occasion. We are not going there to try and make up the numbers and take pictures and all that stuff which I hate. You can do all that afterwards. We want to make a game of it as much as we can and that’s what we will try and do on the day.”

Opposite number Antonio Conte offered these pre-match thoughts:

“I think for sure this game could be a good opportunity to make rotations and give chances to players who didn’t play so much in the last period. But as you know very well, the FA Cup is an important competition and we want to try to go to the next step and it will be important for us to win the game. It’s always difficult to think, to decide not to start with Harry. But at the same time, in some games if we can take the risk, it’s right to take.”

Harry who?

In the match programme, he added:

“We have to be at our best today. There have been some big cup upsets over the years and we have to respect our opponents and respect the competition to ensure we progress to the next round.”

For the visitors, this was also a trip along White Hart Memory Lane for Jonathan Obika. The local Enfield boy and current Morecambe striker was given his first professional contract by Harry Redknapp at Spurs and spent the whole of his youth career with the club. Jon, indeed, got a bigger feature in the match programme, with a two—page spread – than did his Manager, who was relegated to the Pen Pictures page with a short entry:

Seems a bit disrespectful to me. The biggest photo of our heroes was reserved for Burney loanee Adam Phillips, who wasn’t even in the squad today due to injury. How does he manage this? Can someone send me the number of his Agent, please?…

Whatever, it was sunny and dry in North London as kick-off approached. We wandered through the busy streets of Edmonton from where we had parked and encountered Spurs supporters on the way. None of them were hostile and most of them were friendly – welcoming even. Fellow Morecambe supporters also on Missionary Work told us that the away pub recommended by Tottenham was shut – as in closed-down. Not very helpful, really. So – wanting to soak-up a bit of the local flavour in more ways than one – we chose the Bill Nicholson at random very close to the stadium. One of the bouncers on the door explained – very politely – that it was for home supporters only.

Could he make an exception? We wouldn’t cause any trouble, we promised.

He leant towards us conspiratorially and added, in a whisper: “It’s not you I’m worried about. You really don’t want to come in here!” So we didn’t.

Cheerful security bods at the ground told us that Spurs have their own brewery within the new stadium: (https://beavertownbrewery.co.uk/) “Why not try it?” they suggested.

Why not indeed? But first of all, we wandered around and soaked up the atmosphere. And admired the new stadium. White Hart Lane had more in common with late, lamented Christie Park than it did even with our own increasingly beloved new ground. But this place is in a league all of its own…

Another Spurs fan – unbidden – asked if we wanted him to take a group photo of the four of us – and wished us luck. Then we went in through the security checks and the frankly laughable Covid Pass scanning and entered the hallowed ground of one of Britain’s real religion’s latest Cathedrals. In the Atrium – note the word – were marble floors and an interior straight out of the Amazing Architecture Annual of 2022. Central to the lower part of it was a State-of the Art Bar which would not be out of place on the Queen Mary. This offered lager and their own homebrew in glasses of a type none of us simple Northern Hicks had seen before. The barman put one of these strong plastic things (which felt like a real glass and had REUSABLE stamped all over it) onto a stainless steel dispenser and a hidden jet squirted beer from underneath into it through the bottom of the glass. Red lights flashed. When a green one came on, the process stopped. A fellow fan – watching this space-age process with his gob probably as wide open as mine was – lifted the resultant miracle up into the air to marvel at it. Sadly, the hole in the bottom of the glass hadn’t closed and brown liquid was spurting from it like an incontinent Rhino all over the counter. “Er…” he said to the bemused barman and to me: “It’s no wonder I can never get pissed!” Anyway, I bought us all a pint of “Neck Oil” for over a fiver a throw (well – it is London at an elite venue after all…) It was pale, tasted like Grapefruit to one of our number – but I thought it was like the IPA it was supposed to be and actually very quaffable (nothing like the disgusting Ben Truman  stuff I used to drink in places like dingy football club bars in London during the 1970s – which looked and tasted like cold tea with a distinct aftertaste of boot polish…)

We wandered around and were admitted to the Safe Standing area (in use for the very first time today) by this absolutely charming young lady:

Lots of us turned-up. The huge ground was filling up as a presentation was made by legendary Tottenham Skipper Gary Mabutt to officials from our old pals Marine in recognition of the tremendous reception Spurs had received in Merseyside last year in Lockdown for their FA Cup game there. What a nice touch.

But back to Morecambe and our fans. You can spot the fair weather supporters among the visiting crowd which events like this inevitably attract by their lack of any Morecambe regalia. These are the Manchester United and Liverpool oiks who live in Morecambe but you never see at the Maz. And – very sadly – you can often also tell it by their behaviour too: foul-mouthed, aggressive and – often – obviously drunk as well. But it takes all sorts and here we are, warts and all:

Morecambe started a little hesitantly and conceded a corner after a brilliant last-minute block by Captain Anthony O’Connor (who again led by example today throughout) on Tanguy Ndombele almost straight away. But they settled down quickly and were soon taking the game to their supposedly far more illustrious opponents. Cole the Goal did what he does and was a problem for the home defence all afternoon and also created a few chances for himself one of which in particular went very close indeed after fifty minutes. He was ably assisted by strike partner Jonah Ayunga, who seems to be regaining the sort of sparkling form he exhibited before being injured earlier in the season. New boys Trevor Carson and Jacob Bedeau looked comfortable in their new roles at the club and I think it’s true to say that any objective observer would have thought that the team in the red strip was the Premiership one as the match grew older. Tottenham’s stars did little; Harry Winks was largely anonymous; Ryan Sessegnon was heckled by his own crowd and the extremely dislikeable Dele Alli lived down to his increasingly poor reputation by doing what you expected him to do: cheat. He should have been booked for diving at least once in the first half in which case he would have been sent off in the sixty-first minute when he was guilty of an almost laughable attempt to gain a penalty but weak referee John Brooks allowed him to get away with both offences. Apparently, only League One players can be booked in FA Cup ties. So Ryan Cooney deserved the routine yellow card he picked-up in the second half but the foul Toumani Diagouraga was on the receiving end of from Alli  at one point was far worse than the one he clumsily committed to be booked himself later on.  

Morecambe had already been giving at least as good as they were getting in front of a noticeably silent home crowd when they actually took the lead after 33 minutes. Alfie McCalmont slung over a fine corner kick from the Shrimps’ left and an unmarked O’Connor was able to steer it past a static Pierluigi Gollini to the horror of the massed ranks of the home support behind him. The away contingent predictably went mad. Until half time, the Shrimps remained the better team. They were quicker to the ball and more committed in everything they did.

The fear, of course, was that they would finally tire. That Spurs’ superstars would be sent on eventually to turn the match around. But until the seventy-fifth minute, the scoreboard in the ground still looked like this:

Home Coach Conte sent on Harry Kane; Lucas Moura and the lesser-known Oliver Skipp after seventy minutes. Alli was replaced and Sessegnon was roundly booed by the home supporters as he took his time to leave the field at a time when his team were still losing and he needed to get off quickly. Winks then scored directly from a free-kick which Carson might have done better with after 74 minutes.  The new Morecambe goalkeeper then redeemed himself with a top-drawer save from Giovani Lo Celso  with ten minutes left to play. Ryan McLaughlin then lost the ball to Moura on the half-way line with just four minutes left. The Brazil international covered the distance between himself and the Morecambe goal in an instant, cleverly took the ball around the visiting goalkeeper and slotted it home to put Tottenham into the lead for the first time with the game almost at an end. Then the England Captain wrapped it up for Spurs with a good finish right at the death. For what it’s worth, I think this goal should have been disallowed. Replays show that Emerson Royle clearly fouled Greg Leigh out on the Spurs’ right to set-up the move from which Kane scored seconds later. And 3-1 distinctly flattered the team in the white strip at the end of the match.

But Spurs go into the hat for the next round all the same. For Morecambe, though, this was a moral victory. The players and staff were a credit to themselves. It was a tremendous effort by everyone concerned and augurs well for the league campaign for the rest of the season.

Much later – as I was driving back from Morecambe to home in Carnforth in freezing fog, I passed a young lad who was carrying a bike with an immobile back wheel in the darkness along the Coastal Road in Hest Bank. I took pity on the poor devil (he had carried it almost as far as the petrol station all the way from Westgate in Morecambe) and picked him up, shoved the bike in the back of the van and took him home to a house at the north end of Bolton-le-Sands.

Guess what? He and his family are all Spurs supporters who have just moved to this area.

“Morecambe humiliated us today!” he said. I think that’s probably slightly overstating it – but I didn’t argue…

Finally,  a big thankyou to my mate Graham for taking me and finding a ticket which David Freear provided. Thanks for that too David.

Tottenham Hotspur: 22 Pierluigi Gollini; 2 Matt Doherty; 8 Harry Winks; 11 Bryan Gil (27 Lucas Moura 69’); 18 Giovanio Celso  (44 Dane Scarlett 88’); 14 Joe Rodon; 19 Ryan Sessegnon (12 Emerson Royal 86’); 20 Dele Alli (10 Harry Kane 69’); 25 Japhet Tanganga; 28 Tanguy Ndombele (29 Oliver Skipp 69’); 33 Ben Davies (C).

Subs Not Used:  1 Hugo Lloris; 5 Pierre-Emile Højberg; 6 Davinson Sanchez; 48 Maksim Paskotsi.

Morecambe: 30 Trevor Carson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau (22 Liam Gibson 65’): 17 Jonah Ayunga (14 Jonathan Obika 58’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga (Y) (10 Aaron Wildig 77’); 9 Cole Stockton; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney (Y) (6 Callum Jones 77’); 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 7 Wes McDonald; 15 Ryan Delaney; 16 Jacob Mensah.

Ref: John Brooks.

Att: 40,310. (Un-known thousands from Morecambe. This is the biggest football crowd any Shrimps team has ever played in front of.)

All-Square at AFC Wimbledon

Well – before we start – let me be completely honest with you. Last night, I thought it would be a good idea to watch all the episodes of the latest series of The Bay which are currently available on ITV Hub.

I had no idea before watching this drama/documentary series that Heysham was so ethnically diverse – even though my son and one of my best pals live there. Nor did I previously know that there was a Mosque there, let alone one which looks so remarkably like one to be found in Preston. But you live and learn…

However, the cold-blooded bludgeoning and stabbings which seem to be a regular feature around our neck of the woods as portrayed by the series caused me to lock and barricade my front door after I had watched the latest instalment of the drama. I ended-up sleeping under the bed instead of on top of it last night and if this report suddenly and unexpectedly stops – you know where I’ve retreated to.

In the meantime Morecambe’s football club found themselves back in the nation’s capital – where drug-dealing, stabbings and attempted murder of the sort which are apparently commonplace in north Lancashire are totally unknown of course – for the second time in a week today as they visited AFC Wimbledon’s new stadium on Plough Lane for the first time.

After a bright start to the season, the latest incarnation of the old Crazy Gang has struggled on the field recently. The club’s most recent game was last Tuesday against the outfit which was allowed by the Football League to steal its identity and its very soul back in the day – the rightly detested so-called MK Dons.

Even though they are one of our rivals for The Drop, I really wanted the Wombles to win.

(In my view, indeed, they should be given a Bye every time they are drawn against these utterly despicable imposters.)

But the real Dons lost, leaving them just one place higher than today’s opponents in League One but with two fewer games played. Worse still for them, left-back Nesta Guinness-Walker was sent off against the Cuckoos and would be suspended for today’s visit by Morecambe.

Talk about rubbing it in…

Last Saturday, Wimbledon was on the wrong end of a shock in the FA Cup too: losing by two goals to nil against non-league Boreham Wood. No shame there – they could have competed against them as equals a few years ago in the way the equally unashamed opportunists from Milton Keynes has never been obliged to.

Excuse me whilst I spit…

All in all, the Dons have won two and lost two of their five latest League One games. Because of postponements caused by Covid, today’s game was AFC Wimbledon’s first home match for 49 long days. Manager Mark Robinson said he didn’t expect Terry Ablade to play today because of an ankle injury. He also expressed his concerns for Anthony Hartigan, who complained of severe stomach pains after the fixture at Milton Keynes and has been in hospital for tests since then. Good luck to the lad – let’s hope it’s nothing serious. The Wombles signed young Lithuanian winger Tomas Kalinauskas on-loan from Barnsley this week  but he didn’t feature in the line-up today. The Wombles’ very own Robbo expressed the way he was having to address self-doubts among some of the members of his own squad in these terms:

“A lot of it was around people thinking (that) things are possibly broken which they’re not. But that’s understandable when you’ve had a few disappointing results. It’s my job to kind of just re-align them and make sure we’re ready for Saturday, which we are. It’s important to have an open environment where people feel free to talk. It led on to a really interesting conversation and I think we’ve got real clarity going into Saturday’s game.”

As far as the match against Morecambe is concerned, he added:

“I’m sure it will be a really good game. They are full of energy – absolutely full of energy. I think that game (in Morecambe) was probably one of the best – we’ve had lots of exciting games – but that was unbelievable. I said that to the boys as well. When we went to get back on the coach, some of their fans were waiting for autographs and said “You’re the best side that we’ve had down here” and I told them: “That’s what you are at your best but you have to remember what your best is!” I’m fully expecting a really exciting game but I’d like it to be more comfortable, obviously.”

As for the Shrimps themselves, they were leading against Premiership Tottenham Hotspur not a million miles away from today’s venue until the seventy-fourth minute last Sunday. In a battling and determined display, they were unfortunate to finally lose to the multi-million pound superstars on their own patch. If they were to play anything like as well as they had then, the Shrimps would be confident of taking at least a point out of today’s match – and hopefully three.

In previous fixtures against the Wombles, Morecambe have managed to win four, lose four and draw three. Most recently – and despite a wonder strike from the Shrimps’ Goal Machine Cole Stockton – they came from behind only to lose 3-4 in injury time at the Maz last September.

Our own Robbo missed the FA Cup match in north London against his first employers as a professional footballer last Sunday. Assistant Manager Diarmuid O’Carroll was in charge against Spurs and said this prior to the match against the new Crazy Gang today, starting with an update on the boss’ health:

“He had to isolate because of the positive test, he’s a head cold for a few days but he is okay. He’s been itching to get out and he’s been able to have a bit more time to look at the Wimbledon game. He’ll still be able to do all the build up to the game with the team when he returns which is good. That was the best thing about last week, he was still able to do all the work with the lads, but just missed the main event. He will be like a coiled spring when he returns, he is buzzing to get back in and I am more than happy to go back into the background. The players were a little bit stiff, they covered some serious distance on Sunday, it was huge intensity against top, top players, but their heads have been on Wimbledon since Monday. We let them have a day with their families to soak it in and they have come back with their head on and straight back on it. This is massive now, the Tottenham game was always a bonus, now we kick on. We have tried to learn from every game that we have been in. You have to learn from those games against your likes of Wimbledon and Wycombe’s where you come up on the wrong side of the result. Small tweaks (are needed) here and there but I am confident you’ll see us move up the table shortly.”

Their FA Cup heroics had seen the north Lancashire side slip back into the highest of the relegation positions in League One as teams around them continued to play. Three points today, however, would see them leap-frog the Wombles and hopefully see them escape from the Legion of the Doomed at the bottom of the table altogether.

It was dry under a sometimes cloudless sky in Wimbledon this afternoon. The match started with a minute’s silence and the Dons went straight onto the front foot. Morecambe seemed happy to simply back off and let the hosts have the ball in the opening minutes. Wimbledon forced the first corner after eight minutes but it was well dealt with by the visiting defence. The Shrimps looked sluggish and off the pace for the first quarter of an hour or so and Skipper Anthony O’Connor needlessly gave the ball away a couple of times into the bargain. Nikola Tzanev in the home goal made a poor throw straight to Jonah Ayunga after fourteen minutes but the Morecambe forward barely tested the errant home custodian with a weak shot. For the first time, the visitors managed to string a few passes together involving Greg Leigh and Toumani Diagouraga after 22 minutes but ex-Womble Shane McLoughlin’s eventual shot was poor and went into the side netting. Morecambe then attacked effectively down the left but Leigh’s cross into the centre towards Ayunga was deflected away from the danger area by a good block by a Dons’ defender. Cole Stockton was being tightly marked by the home defence but he cleverly got the better of them after 27 minutes only for Ben Heneghan to stop him with a tremendous tackle which saw the ball go out for a corner. Wimbledon won a free-kick on the edge of the Morecambe box on their left after a half an hour or so but – in common with the game so far – it was poorly worked. Arthur Gnahoua forced Tzanev to punch the ball away from a free-kick after 37 minutes. However, the poor quality of the game so far was emphasised when the Dons took their first shot at the target with only a couple of minutes left. But Jack Rudoni’s attempt sailed harmlessly wide of the Morecambe goal.  So a scrappy game of few chances ended goal-less at half time.

Cole the Goal turned brilliantly and smashed the ball just over the top of the target within a minute of the restart. Then Trevor Carson had to make his first save of the afternoon after 50 minutes, pushing George Marsh’s shot away for a corner. He did even better to push Ollie Palmer’s looping header away from a second corner with his left hand after 51 minutes. This was a tremendous piece of goalkeeping. Wimbledon were starting to apply some concerted pressure at this point. Although they enjoyed most of the possession until an hour or so had been played, the Dons didn’t do a lot with it, however. The closest they came to opening the scoring was when Ayoub Assa’s shot-come-cross hit the top of the bar with Carson stranded after 74 minutes. Three minutes later, in a rare foray into the home team’s half, Ayunga’s wayward shot was roundly jeered by the Wimbledon fans. Morecambe won their first corner of the second half after eighty-one minutes from which Leigh headed narrowly wide. There were a few half-chances after this and Carson was obliged to punch a corner powerfully away from the danger area in the third of four minutes of extra time.

So a disappointingly poor game ended goal-less. Stephen will be the happiest of the Robinsons tonight in that he avoided a Wimbledon double over his side this season – and a point on the road is always an achievement. Furthermore, League debutants Carson and Bedeau contributed to a far more sound defensive display by the Shrimps than has been the case for quite some time. In terms of league positions, though, the game didn’t change anything. Elsewhere, though, Doncaster , Lincoln and Gillingham all lost at home and Crewe held Shrewsbury at Gresty Road. Fleetwood did themselves a real favour, though, when they beat leaders Rotherham right at the death at Highbury.  So Morecambe remain in the relegation positions – twenty-first – tonight. Wimbledon are still one place higher, two points better off but still with two games in hand as well.

AFC Wimbledon: 1 Nikola Tzanev; 4 Alex Woodyard (C); 5 Will Nightingale; 6 George Marsh (Y); 7 Cheye Alexander; 9 Ollie Palmer (17 Terry Ablade (Y) 88’); 10  Ayoub Assal (25 Egli Kaja 84‘); 12 Jack Rudoni (16 Adedapo Awokoya-Mebude 84’); 21 Luke McCormick; 22 Ben Heneghan; 37 Paul Osew.

Subs Not Used: 38 Aaron Cosgrave; 11 Ethan Chislett; 31 Zaki Oulah; 38 Aaron Cosgrave.

Morecambe: 30 Trevor Carson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh (Y); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 17 Jonah Ayunga (25 Alfie McCalmont 90’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 10 Aaron Wildig (Y) (21 Ryan Cooney 75’); 9 Cole Stockton; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (7 Wes McDonald 68’).

Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 6 Callum Jones; 15 Ryan Delaney; 22 Liam Gibson.

Ref:  Ben Speedie.

Att: 7,128 (318 from Morecambe. One of my spies was secreted in the home crowd today. I will receive a full debrief on his findings next Tuesday…)

Wigan Survive Seaside Scare

Well, it was another walk down Memory Lane for some of us today. For the already partially fossilised element of Morecambe’s support such as Yours Truly, Wigan Athletic bring back memories of a key moment in the club’s history – and that is the creation of the Northern Premier League in 1968.

This is when the better clubs in the Lancashire Combination – of which Morecambe was a member – linked-up with the cream of other major non-league competitions in the north of England. These ambitious clubs organised in this way to start to apply pressure to the completely moribund and appallingly conservative Football League to finally open-up their Closed Shop to progressive new clubs.

Of these, there is no doubt that the members of the Cheshire League – and Wigan Athletic, Stafford Rangers and Macclesfield Town in particular – were better-run and stronger than the dregs which had been coming bottom of the old Fourth Division for year after predictably dreary  year. Yet however hopeless these clubs – York City and Workington among many others – were, they suffered no consequences whatsoever season after unending season in the Football League. This was the reality of League Football in this country for as long as anyone could remember right up until 1987 in a seemingly endless celebration and reward of mediocrity – and exclusivity – decade after unchanging decade.

The ex-Cheshire League clubs – and certainly Morecambe even at the time as well – were also stronger and better run off the field than most of their northern non-league counterparts. But former members of  the Cheshire League won the NPL in its first four season of operation. The Silkmen were Champions in its inaugural and second season. Wigan won it after the third campaign. Stafford Rangers were Champions in its fourth edition.

But Wigan were the first to break the mould when – after several years of failing – they were finally `elected’ (note the word) to the Football League in 1978, when they replaced their nearby club Southport, who were kicked out of the Old Boys’ Club. The fact that they were not actually good enough to be there in the first place has been proved by the fact that Southport has never featured in that exalted company ever since. 

In breaking into the Closed Shop, Wigan showed non-league clubs right across the country that the Football League’s Fortress had at least a few weaknesses in its usually impenetrable battlements.  So they acted as a beacon for all fans of smaller clubs eager for change – including ourselves.

I thus love Wigan Athletic. Without them, it is possible that Morecambe would still be members of the Northern Premier League even today.

And who would have thought that a club once plying its trade at the pretty primitive old Springfield Park would one day grace the Premier League in a brand new, State-of the-Art stadium and also win the FA Cup? Mismanagement and particular dodgy ownership issues which the EFL – as ever – overlooked until it was too late has seen the club’s halcyon days come and go. Despite this, Wigan seems to be on an upward trajectory again at the moment.

The way they were relegated from the Championship two seasons ago seems to me at least to show that they are still regarded as interlopers by the same reactionaries at the EFL who blocked their repeated applications to join a Closed Shop in the first place. (I personally believe in Cock-Up rather than Conspiracy theories – but I also think that the way Macclesfield was allowed to go bust altogether because of one man’s folly off the field fits an EFL pattern of prejudice on the one hand and utter incompetence on the other.) 

Discuss.

(Bury fans might have something to say about this.)

So – OK – point conceded: the EFL are simply not Fit for Purpose when deciding if owners of football clubs pass the so-called `fit and proper’ test…

But these same incompetent individuals at the EFL were obviously only all too keen to apply sanctions to Wigan for misdemeanours in the Boardroom which the same sinecures in that organisation are paid a fortune to avoid in the first place. So Athletic was relegated at the Eleventh Hour two years ago when the authorities hit them with a twelve-point penalty for going into administration.

It stinks: the same overpaid EFL nobodies had approved the acquisition of the club by the very people who completely mismanaged it only a short while earlier….

I personally saw Wigan Athletic for the first time on Saturday, November 29^th 1969 at Christie Park. Morecambe beat them 2:1. Since then, though, Athletic have usually beaten us when it really mattered. I could only get onto the South Umbro Stand at a Christie Park packed like Sardines instead of where I usually stood when Wigan forced a one-all draw in the F.A. Trophy Quarter-Final on Saturday 10^th March 1973. Athletic went on to win – and at the time, my own mindset – as I am sure was the case with most of my fellow fans – was that was likely to be as good as it was ever going to get for the Shrimps.

The Football League was a Closed Shop. Getting so close to the FA Cup Final – which was what the FA Trophy signified at the time – might not come around for a little club like ours ever again.

But Dave Roberts’ Shrimps won it the very next season. And we all know what has happened since…

The number Four seemed to be regularly recurring as far as Wigan is concerned as I did my research for tonight’s clash. Athletic were fourth in League One; had only lost four of twenty-two League One games this season so far and had won four out of their last five matches in this competition, having drawn the other. However, this was the first time that the two clubs resumed their acquaintanceship since they last met in the Northern Premier League all those decades ago. Wigan – no stranger to crises themselves – have furthermore benefited quickly from the utter shambles at Derby County at the moment and signed Scottish International Graeme Shinnie from them on a two-year contract. This follows the loan signing from Hull of Northern Ireland international Josh Magennis last week. Tonight’s game would also mark a welcome return to the Mazuma Stadium by Callum Lang, who played a pivotal – and very popular – role at Morecambe to keep the Shrimps in the EFL during the 2016-17 season.

So tonight, beating Wigan would be a Big Ask for the Shrimps. Our boys went into this contest on the back of a single win in their last five League One outings; two draws and obviously two defeats as well. But the way they fought-back after a truly pathetic display in the first half to beat Doncaster Rovers 4-3 last time out at this venue showed that Manager Stephen Robinson still has the support of the Dressing Room. Ten days ago, the scare they gave Tottenham Hotspur in their Billion Pound new stadium was a further statement of intent not to lie down and die in the club’s first ever attempt to preserve League One status. In a truly dreary match at Wimbledon last time out, the Shrimps – with New Boys goalkeeper Trevor Carson and Centre Half Jacob Bedeau in the side for the first time in a league game – at least didn’t lose.

Manager Stephen Robinson said before tonight’s game:

“Wigan have sold out their end, so it will be a similar atmosphere to the Sheffield Wednesday game. You only have to look at their two recent signings to see how big of an attraction they are. They are going to be up there all season. It is up to us to make sure that we try and compete with them. It is a difficult challenge but we do not fear anyone in this division. If we implement our style of play on the game and rule out the individual errors that we’ve made on occasions, then we’ll be okay.” 

He said this about Opposite Number Leam Richardson:

“Leam has built a squad, I say that they are going to be up there because of their finances, but you have to get the right players. He has a good style of play. They are really well organised, He came in at a really difficult time, he has helped stabilise things and they have gone from strength to strength.  Wigan are a good club, a substantial club who have had financial problems at times but they are a club aiming for the Championship, as Wycombe will be on Saturday.”

It was dry but cold as the match started. Both teams Took the Knee and then Morecambe immediately went onto the front foot – and stayed there. For the first fifteen minutes, the visitors hardly ever crossed the half-way line and found themselves pinned back in their bit of the field. Arthur Gnahoua missed with a shot in the second minute and it was virtually one-way traffic until the seventh minute. Then, Ryan McLaughlin seemed to over-hit a cross from the Shrimps’ right but it found its way to Greg Leigh on the left wing. Greg dropped a shoulder and went on a run before slinging a low cross into the centre which Morecambe’s Goal Machine Cole Stockton duly dispatched past a helpless Ben Amos in the visiting goal to score for the nineteenth time this season. Aaron Wildig then tried his luck after eleven minutes but his shot went too high over the target before Gnahoua’s free-kick was nodded by Jacob Bedeau to Anthony O’Connor but the Shrimps’ Captain also headed the ball over the crossbar. But Wigan showed they were not here just to make up the numbers when Max Power took one of his notoriously brilliant spot-kicks after eighteen minutes. He swerved the ball wickedly under Trevor Carson’s bar into the near top corner but the Morecambe stopper made a last ditch effort to punch the ball away via the woodwork.  In my view though – and I was sitting in line with this – two of Wigan’s forwards were clearly offside before the corner was awarded. But the man with the yellow flag – either Ivan Stankovic or Graeme Fyvie – I’m not sure which – kept it down. According to whichever was the guilty man, though, Wigan didn’t stray offside even once during the first half.

The visitors won a corner on their right this time after 20 minutes but James McClean’s in-swinger was well held by the home keeper. Two minutes later, another good Gnahoua free-kick was headed goalwards by Jacob Bedeau but Amos caught it without too much trouble. At the other end, Callum Lang cleverly set himself up for a shot which was well saved by Carson at the cost of a corner. The action swung to the other end again and Amos did brilliantly to push a deflected effort from Leigh – as Morecambe played on the break – away for a corner. Lang then received the ball from Power on the Wigan right and he swung over a cross which McClean headed wide. But it seemed that the Shrimps would take a deserved lead back to the Dressing Rooms until extra time. Then, Will Keane seemed to be offside by a country mile but the linesman again didn’t flag and the Referee allowed his simple finish to stand.

Wigan – attacking a sell-out 1700+ away crowd in the second half – stepped up the pace.

They were the better team for most of the second period. Lang committed a really bad foul on Leigh with about fifty minutes gone. A better referee than the extremely erratic Samuel Barrott might have sent him off for this but the Man in the Middle didn’t even speak to, let alone book him. After that, Greg had to leave the field as Callum went on to encroach on every free-kick Morecambe were awarded – and Mr Barrott repeatedly let him get away with that as well. Despite this, the hosts came closest to re-taking the lead after 53 minutes when Jonah Ayunga couldn’t quite control the ball to lob it over Amos when well-found by Cole the Goal and unmarked: the goalkeeper made a tremendous save to keep it out. They came closer still four minutes later when Cole worked his magic on the Morecambe left and swerved in a shot from a long way out which beat the visiting goalkeeper all ends up only to see the ball bounce harmlessly away from his far post. With just over an hour played, Leam Richardson shuffled his pack with a double substitution. As the away support belatedly came to life, Athletic started to dominate the game. Morecambe substitute Liam Gibson fouled Lang after 64 minutes and Power’s delivery again lived-up to the player’s name. As the home defence struggled to deal with it, the ball ended-up smashing against the underside of bar as Lang tried to convert Tom Naylor’s nod forwards – but the Shrimps survived this time. It wasn’t to last much longer, though. As the visitors continued to ask all the questions, Power missed with a wayward shot with 68 minutes on the clock. Then Wigan substitute Stephen Humphrys put the visitors into the lead after 74 minutes, rising highest to connect with a cross from Lang  and heading purposefully home. They could have extended their lead just two minutes later when the latest scorer’s cross was deflected by Bedeau towards his own goal only for Carson to pull-off a truly miraculous reaction save with his right foot as he was moving rapidly to his left. At the other end, though, it seemed to me at least that Wigan got away with another key blunder with about ten minutes left. One of their defenders clearly handled the ball in the Morecambe penalty area when trying to clear it. But linesmen’s flags stayed down and the Clown in Chief waved play-on. Again. I thought that the Shrimps actually re-grouped and started to make a game of it for about the last eight minutes or so of the match. But it was too little, too late.

So Wigan won again. They are a good side and looked dangerous every time they attacked tonight. But they struggled early on and I thought that they were lucky to be level at half time. Despite the loss, this was far from being a poor performance from Stephen Robinson’s men. With new signing Ousmane Fané – who apparently performed a role similar to Yann Songo’o’s for the Shrimps last year when he played for Robbo at Oldham Athletic – likely to add a bit more steel to the team, there are fewer clouds on the horizon at the Maz than there were just three weeks or so ago.  Despite the loss, Morecambe remain in twenty-first position in League One tonight. Wigan went up to second. I hope we beat them at their place. But I also hope they get promoted again.

I’ve been told that the links I made to my report on Morecambe’s draw at Wimbledon disappeared into the ether for reasons completely beyond me last Saturday. You can read this – and reports on all other Morecambe matches this season at

shrimplythebestfootball.com

Morecambe: 30 Trevor Carson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (Y); 3 Greg Leigh (22 Liam Gibson 56’); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 17 Jonah Ayunga (21 Ryan Cooney 68’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 10 Aaron Wildig; 9 Cole Stockton; 19 Shane McLoughlin (18 Adam Phillips 77’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua.

Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 15 Ryan Delaney; 7 Wes McDonald; 25 Alfie McCalmont; 27 Ousmane Fané.

Wigan Athletic: 12 Ben Amos; 2 Kelland Watts (Y); 3 Tom Pearce (7 Gwion Edwards 61’); 4 Tom Naylor; 5 Jack Whatmough; 8 Max Power; 10 Will Keane; 11 Gavin Massey (39 Stephen Humphrys 61’); 19 Callum Lang (15 Jason Kerr 84’); 23 James McClean; 27 Tendayi Darikwa.

Subs Not Used: 1 Jamie Jones; 18  Graeme Shinnie; 20 Tom Bayliss; 30 Thelo Aasgaard.

Ref: Samuel Barrott.

Att: 5,359 (1,760 from Wigan.)

No Double Trouble for the Shrimps…

Morecambe welcomed League One leaders Wycombe Wanderers to the Mazuma Stadium today. Gareth Ainsworth’s impressive team show every sign of a quick return to a Championship from which they were relegated last season. Wanderers have only lost one and drawn one of their last five league games. Morecambe, on the other hand, have won only one and lost two of their last five. In previous meetings between the two clubs, the Chairboys have won ten and lost only four. Perhaps the most memorable of these nineteen fixtures altogether was last October, when Morecambe contrived to fritter-away a winning position of two goals to the good at half time at Adams Park to finally lose the game 4-3. Their defensive frailties were there for all to see on the day. Since then, though, Burnley loanee Jacob Bedeau and Dundee United’s goalkeeper Trevor Carson have brought some much-needed stability to the core of the team at the back. Against Wigan last Tuesday, Morecambe were unlucky to lose 1-2 against one of League One’s better sides. Today, Manager Stephen Robinson would also introduce what I think could be politely described as a `hard-tackling midfield stopper’ in the shape of Frenchman Ousmane Fané for his club debut late on in the second half. He’s a big, tough lad who showed in one perfectly executed movement in injury time that he can play a bit as well. Better still – if the Urban Dictionary is to be believed, his first name means:

“Extremely attractive male, typically a Leo, women often compete for him, very intelligent, athletic, great sense of humor, successful in life.”

Not a lot to live up to there, then, eh?

I don’t know it he’s a Leo or not but this description could equally apply to the opposition Manager, who said about the forthcoming encounter:

“I’m from up that way – I know what it’s like. I know what the conditions will be at this time of year and I also know that Morecambe hasn’t been a Happy Hunting Ground really, home or away. I say Happy Hunting Ground – it’s been an Average Hunting Ground and we’ve got to be at our best for this one. They are a good side. They had a good result midweek although they got beat. I think Wigan are one of the strongest teams in the league and they scared them; they took them all the way – and who can forget the 4-3 at Adams Park? It’s going to be a tough game – as always. It’s about getting the squad together which we think will beat the team on Saturday.”

Off the field, Wycombe have been in the headlines for lots of other reasons this week. They banned an 18-year-old-`supporter’ from Adams Park for life for running onto the field during a match against Oxford. They – at least – seem to take the law seriously. This could be because Wanderers’ Chairman Roy Douhig is not only an American lawyer but a fully-paid up Judge on the other side of the Pond. He has been obliged to make a public statement this week about claims by crisis-hit Derby County that Wanderers are endangering the Rams’ very existence.  How? By demanding massive compensation (a rumoured twenty million pounds) for alleged dodgy dealings by the Derbyshire club’s Administrators. Apparently, they `deliberately’ (Mr Douhig’s words, not mine) held-off Administration until a point in time when Wycombe had already been relegated last season. In doing so, they obliged the Chairboys to pick-up the tab for all the disastrous consequences to budgets and player numbers which this triggered-off at the Buckinghamshire club. The argument – simply stated – is that Derby would have gone down in Wanderers’ stead if County’s Administrators had been more transparent about the club’s actually perilous financial state last season. If they had – the argument continues – points deductions would been applied by the EFL then rather than this season as actually happened.

Just remind me – what’s the root of all evil?

So – if what the opposition Chairman claims has any basis in fact, we would have been welcoming Derby rather than themselves to our stadium today.

Anyway…

Talking about money, Robbo went on record earlier this week and announced:

“It’s proving difficult to attract players to the club. There’s a crazy amount of money being thrown about and we’ve got targets that seem to be disappearing. If you look at the stats over the last five years or so, if you get 49 or 50 points then it usually keeps you in the division. That’s what we’re aiming for and we think it’s more than achievable but I want to strengthen the squad if we can. We want to keep the boys fit who have come in and, if possible, try to bring two in which everyone is trying to do. Because we can’t afford that certain calibre of player, we either have to go with what we’ve got or add someone – but only if it’s better than what we’ve got.”

As far as today’s challenge is concerned, he added:

“The games don’t get any easier at this level. I think out of the teams we have faced this season, Rotherham and Wycombe were our two biggest challenges. We went 2-0 up against Wycombe last time out, so we have proved that we can play against them. We competed against them but they are a tough, tough side to play against. They are different to Wigan. They will be getting balls into our box at every opportunity. They go a little bit more direct and they are very good at what they do.” 

Outside the ground, the NHS was offering injections to anybody who wanted a Covid Booster. What a good idea – well done to both them and the club.

It was cold and grey with rain in the air as the game kicked-off. Wycombe must have won the toss because they elected to change ends and play towards their own supporters during the first half.

What’s the opposite of a Secret Weapon? Adebayo Akinfenwa is. In the absence of the injured Sam Vokes, Adebayo was Centre Forward as well as Captain of the Chairboys today. Everybody knows what he can do – this Man Mountain has scored loads of goals against Morecambe in the past – and virtually every other team in the EFL as well, come to think of it. He had played against the Shrimps in Lancashire twice before for the Chairboys – and found the net on both occasions.

So how come was he completely unmarked in the centre of the pitch with just over a minute of the game played? Visiting goalkeeper David Stockdale launched a howitzer down the field; Jordan Obita controlled it well and took it down the Wanderers’ left before slinging over a perfect cross which The Beast headed home via the crossbar.

It was an appalling start by the hosts. Basic errors; basic errors; basic errors…

Morecambe responded well though. With Jonah Ayunga a perfect foil for Cole Stockton, the Shrimps took the game to Wycombe from the first minute to the last. Arthur Gnahoua forced a really good save from Stockdale only for Ayunga’s follow-up to be blocked for a corner after seven minutes. The same player narrowly missed the target four minutes later but every time the ball was played forward, a wrestling match ensued between Cole the Goal and even bigger, even more aggressive Wycombe defender Ryan Tafazolli. It took over twenty minutes for weak Referee Ben Toner to even penalise the visiting defender. Later, he wagged his finger at the same player but only booked him well into the second half. Even then, Tafazolli seemed to think he was playing Rugby – but he was allowed to get away with it time and time again. He should have been sent off instead. Wycombe are a big team with no shame about employing the Dark Arts of time wasting and diving when it suits them. Every time the ball was played forwards by Morecambe, Tafazolli and Anthony Stewart were masters of the smallest nudge or slightest push at the moment of contact with their opponents in the red strip. But Mr Toner – who was rightly booed-off at the end – constantly let them get away with it.

Wanderers conceded a corner on the Morecambe left after 39 minutes. Aaron Wildig took it and Skipper Anthony O’Connor (who was again imperious throughout today) headed it firmly home to deservedly equalise for his team. There had been chances for both sides up until this point. Brandon Hanlan blasted wide after 34 minutes following a swift counter-attack by the visitors. Stockdale also had to be on his toes to punch a dangerous cross by Wildig away from the danger area at about the same time. But a game which had always been good to watch ended up level at one goal each at half time.

The visitors had the first chance of the second half when Joe Jacobson won the ball, found Garath McCleary and saw him play-in Hanlan, whose low shot from close in was brilliantly blocked by the combined efforts of O’Connor and Jacob Bedeau. But there was no denying Jack Grimmer’s tremendous low shot after 54 minutes which whistled through the home defence and went into the net via a post to put the visitors back into the lead. 

Adversity, however,  seemed to simply galvanise Morecambe. With an hour on the clock, Stockdale did well to beat away Gnahoua’s free kick after Cole had been fouled for the millionth time by the visiting Number Six. Almost immediately, though, the visiting keeper was in the thick of the action again. Gnahoua found Cole in the centre and his shot was blocked by Stockdale only for Ayunga to simply blast the loose ball past him to put the Shrimps onto level footing again. Shortly afterwards – in the sixty-sixth minute – Ayunga brilliantly found the Goal Machine with a lobbed pass forwards. Stockton had finally been able to escape from Tafazolli and did what he does for the twentieth time this season with a tremendously powerful finish.

So Morecambe were in the lead for the first time. They never looked like relinquishing it. Wycombe play a very direct, quite brutal style of football. Unlike Wigan, there is little finesse and you wonder if they have a Plan B. Morecambe beat them today – despite an appalling start – because they were technically better right across the pitch. The win didn’t lift them out of the relegation zone but if they continue to play like this, they  will still be in League One at the end of the season.

The defeat saw Wycombe fall to fourth from the highest perch in the Division – a spot which is now occupied by Wigan Athletic, whose team looked much stronger in every department at today’s venue last Tuesday night.

At the end of the game, Robbo suggested the win `had been coming’ and was richly deserved. Gareth Ainsworth blamed the pitch for the defeat. It was `terrible’ and `spongy’.

Pull the other one, Gareth – his lads were beaten by a more committed team which played better football throughout. There was rarely any fear about his team doing the Double over ours this afternoon. To be fair though, he also said:

“Mistakes have cost us today. But you have to credit Morecambe; they fought for their lives and deserved it today. We were unrecognisable and go back down the road with our tail between our legs. You have to give credit to their forwards. I am a North West Boy. This is a North West Team. I hope they stay up – I really do.”

So do we…

Morecambe: 30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh (Y); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 10 Aaron Wildig (27 Ousmane Fané 80’); 9 Cole Stockton (28 Courtney Duffus 91’); 17 Jonah Ayunga (Y); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney; 24 Arthur Gnahoua.

Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 7 Wes McDonald; 18 Adam Phillips; 22 Liam Gibson; 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Wycombe Wanderers:  13 David Stockdale; 2 Jack Grimmer; 3 Joe Jacobson (29 Tjay De  Barr 74’); 5 Anthony Stewart; 6 Ryan Tafazolli (Y); 8 Curtis Thompson (17 Daryl Horgan 74’); 12 Garath McCleary; 18 Brandon Hanlan;  19 Anis Mehmeti (7 David Wheeler 64’); 20 Adebayo Akinfenwa (C); 23 Jordan Obita.

Subs Not Used:  31 Adam Przybek; 26 Jason McCarthy; 33 Oliver Pendlebury; 38 Chris Forino.

Ref: Ben Toner.

Att: 3,865 (328 from Wycombe.)

Accrington Stanley Hoodoo Continues

Morecambe travelled south and east across the storm-blasted county of Lancashire today to visit their all time Nemesis in the shape of Accrington Stanley. Since the Shrimps entered the EFL, the club (usually) managed by the Shrimps’ leading scorer of all time – John Coleman – has beaten them no less than a quite astonishing fourteen times out of twenty-three matches altogether. Morecambe have won only two. Accrington were thirteenth in League One today but have only won one of their last five league games. They have drawn three of them and lost the most recent one last Saturday 2-1 at Ipswich in a very feisty game after initially taking the lead.

Morecambe, meanwhile, were coming from behind twice to beat Wycombe Wanderers – the leaders of the Division prior to kick-off – by three goals to two. We all saw what The Beast (Adebayo Akinfenwa) has been doing for his entire career when he scored – yet again – against us, this time after barely ninety seconds were on the clock. It’s a shame that some idiots in our midst chose to shout abuse at this man on the basis of what barely passes for a rhyme for his surname and I’m glad to see that the club has apologised to him for this truly brainless insult. Just think of the damage that could be done to League One defences if a player of this calibre could link-up with our own Goal Machine, Cole Stockton.

So – to move onto more positive matters, I am thus truly delighted to exclusively reveal on these pages that Cole the Goal now has a new strike partner. The Beast was unavailable – so please put your hands together for… The Bear:

(Thanks to Katie at Bear’s Doggy Day Care in Lancaster for the photograph.)

EFL League One Manager of the week Stephen Robinson was unable to name Greg Leigh in his starting eleven due to an international call-up. So Liam Gibson started in his place this afternoon, even though injury on the field meant that he didn’t last all that long. Robbo has also signed ex-Gillingham defender Rhys Bennett on a deal which will last until the end of the season. Rhys got an early Baptism of Fire when he had to replace his crocked team-mate after less than half an hour.

However, the Morecambe Manager would have been hoping for a positive result today to lift his team out of the Relegation Zone of League One where they were precariously poised at the top of the pack of the four clubs marked down for damnation at the end of the season. Morecambe were in twenty-first place in the table and went into the match on the back of two wins and two defeats in their last five league games. Robbo said prior to the game:

“This is a really big game for us. I have been really impressed with Accrington and they have been unlucky with results in recent weeks. John always has them fired up. They are a big, big strong side and it will be a challenge for us. There will be a great atmosphere on Saturday I am sure but it will be a tough game for us. There is not a lot of differences between teams at this level. Every game is competitive. We need to carry on playing with the confidence we have played with in recent games. I still don’t think I have picked the same team twice in a row, with Greg now away on international duty that isn’t going to happen. Ryan McLaughlin is still a doubt for Saturday as well, but the lads who have come in through the season – the likes of Liam Gibson and Ryan Cooney – have done well for us. Some people’s misfortune are other people’s opportunities and it is up to those players to come in and grab that opportunity.” 

John Coleman’s affection for Morecambe has never been in doubt. Here are his thoughts prior to the game:

“Having played in the fixture for Morecambe against Accrington, I know it’s a special game and I know they will be buoyed by a good win last week. It will be a bumper crowd and a good atmosphere. I did the Play-Off semi-finals for Radio Lancashire and there was no one happier than me that Morecambe got promoted. Everyone knows my affinity to them and I had my best footballing years there. I met a lot of really good people who I am still good friends with. I want Morecambe to do well, just not against us. Stephen Robinson is a good lad, I did my coaching badges with him. He is a good footballing person, he knows his onions, he has done remarkably well to get a team going and they have had some great results this season. They have got one of the leading goal-scorers in Cole Stockton and they have good footballers and he will be scratching his head about why it goes awry, as we all do, but that’s life in League One.”

During the week, midfielder and Stanley Captain – the quite abrasive Sean McConville – added the following about the forthcoming clash:

“The new players have been made aware of the local rivalry between Morecambe and Accrington and will be made more aware today and tomorrow going into a big game on Saturday. Our fans will let you know this is a big one, they will get behind us from the first minute to the last regardless of the scoreline and we want to send them home happy with three points. I have always had a good record against Morecambe over two spells, luckily enough. We had a good record when Jim Bentley was manager. Even though I like Jim, we always seemed to beat his sides. I also feel we owe Morecambe one, they nicked a point off us at their place with ten men and that was down to our naivety towards the end of the game. That still stings a little bit but being back at home, in front of our fans, in a derby, we will be going 110 per cent to get three points. We are at a stage of the season where we need the three points. We were on a good run, we lost on Saturday and I don’t think we deserved to lose. If you look at the points total over the last few games, we have drawn a few and we feel like we need to pick three points up to get us back on another run.”

As mentioned, Storm Malik has been ravaging parts of northern and eastern Britain all day today. In Accrington, although the weather was sunny a lot of the time, it remained very windy both before and during the game.

The gale was blowing straight into the visitors’ faces in the first half but they played the better football during it in my humble opinion. Having said that, Trevor Carson in the away goal made the first good save of the contest; pushing huge, lumbering Centre Back Ross Sykes’ effort on target over the bar after six minutes. By this time, the die was set.

John Coleman’s Stanley sides have always followed a particular style: big; aggressive and prepared to lump the ball forwards at all times. In Ethan Hamilton, you have a big guy at the back with little finesse who was constantly prepared to leave his foot in when tackling and then exchange verbals with whoever had been on the receiving end of his attentions. Sykes headed and otherwise blocked the ball with whatever was required physically to do so but seemed to lack the basic skills of getting rid of it effectively once he had done so. Harry Pell and particularly Colby Bishop are old-fashioned centre forward types: big; rough and very direct.

But this pretty Neanderthal approach to the Beautiful Game works for Stanley and that is presumably why – with their limited resources and constant changes of personnel – their Manager sticks with it.

It didn’t work particularly well today though, at least early on. The best chance of the game so far fell to Jonah Ayunga after seven minutes, when Cole Stockton’s excellent run from the Morecambe left and unselfish pass to him resulted in a wild swing at the ball which missed the target by about a mile. He should have scored then. But he did atone for this mistake with almost a quarter of an hour on the clock. Cole the Goal was again instrumental in this, forcing his way into a good position before unleashing a shot which home keeper Toby Savin could only parry and his defence struggled to clear. There was a bit of ping-pong before the ball  finally fell to Jonah on the right hand edge of the Accrington penalty area from his point of view – and he buried it.

He scored again after twenty-six minutes when strike partner Stockton again set him up to smash home a tremendous shot from the right which seemed to go under Savin’s body.

So Morecambe found themselves two goals to the good with less than a third of the game played. We people from North Lancashire were on Cloud Nine – this simply doesn’t happen against Accrington Stanley, does it?

It has to be said that the visitors had ridden their luck to some extent up to this point. After twelve minutes, Accies’ Skipper Sean McConville was in on goal and seemed to slip as he took a shot which didn’t even test the visiting keeper. But when Stanley pulled a goal back after 35 minutes, the gods were certainly smiling on them. The ball clearly went way over the goal-line on the Stanley right just before they were awarded a corner on their left as weak officiating again allowed them to play-on in a situation where a goal-kick should have been awarded. Having said that, though, Bishop clearly told McConville where he expected the dead ball kick to go. He wasn’t disappointed and headed home far too easily as the Shrimps yet again failed to defend properly from a set piece.

It got worse. In injury time, Hamilton clearly dived on the Stanley left just outside the penalty area and Referee Sam Purkiss fell for it almost as theatrically as the player had thrown himself to the ground. McConville again took it. Morecambe again failed to defend it properly. And Accrington scored again – this time through Michael Nottingham.

So the Shrimps had basically thrown the win away – yet again against a club that has basically always played Route One football against them.

Stanley were undoubtedly the better and more assertive of the two teams throughout the second half as they successfully dragged the visitors down to their own Cavemen level and out-Neanderthal-led them. There is little to add.

Carson did well a couple of times to single-handedly keep his team in the match. Morecambe looked shaky every time the home team won a set-piece: and they won loads of corners. Forays into the Accrington half were few and far between for the visitors but the Cole Machine was a handful for the home defence all of the time. Savin did really well to keep an effort from him out after 54 minutes. Adam Phillips came on for a while near the end and offered little other than a back-heel in injury time which rolled agonisingly across the unprotected home goal line with nobody in a black strip there to convert it.

Overall, though, a draw was probably a fair result.

Morecambe could – and should – have won today. The point they earned left them stuck in twenty-first place in League One. But the gap between themselves and the three teams above them narrowed following results elsewhere. Stanley, meanwhile, remained exactly where they were prior to the game: lucky thirteenth.

Accrington Stanley: 40 Toby Savin; 4 Ethan Hamilton; 5 Ross Sykes; 6 Matt Butcher (Y); 7 John O’Sullivan; 8 Harry Pell; 9 Colby Bishop (3 Jay Rich-Baghuelou (Y) 45’); 36 Mitch Clark; 11 Sean McConville (C); 12 Michael Nottingham; 38 Yeboah Amankwah.

Subs Not Used:  30 Liam Isherwood; 2 Harvey Rodgers; 26 Lewis Mansell; 32 Rosaire Longelo; 35 Jack Nolan; 37 David Morgan.

Morecambe: 30 Trevor Carson (Y); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 8 Toumani Diagouraga (Y); 10 Aaron Wildig (18 Adam Phillips 62’); 9 Cole Stockton; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Liam Gibson (31 Rhys Bennett 27’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua.

Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 14 Jonathan Obika; 16  Jacob Mensah; 27 Ousmane Fané; 28 Courtney Duffus.

Ref:  Sam Purkiss.

Att: 3,527 (1.168 from Morecambe).

Not Quite Enough at Sheffield Wednesday

Morecambe crossed the Pennines today to actually visit the future.

Well – how else could they be playing Sheffield Wednesday on a Tuesday?

This is the first time ever that Morecambe FC has played at Hillsborough. I don’t know about you, but I am uneasy about the fact that a place where almost one hundred Liverpool fans were unlawfully killed in a few hours of utter horror almost 33 years ago still hosts football matches at all. I’ve no affinity to Liverpool Football Club and no axe to grind as far as the city itself is concerned. But it seems yet another slap in the face for the people who died and all their relatives that is it still possible to watch football from the infamous Leppings Lane end. It is a scandal that there are people in prison at this moment for not paying their TV licenses – but nobody has ever been locked-up for the mass killing which happened on 15^th April 1989. That simply can’t be right. Humanity alone dictates that the Leppings Lane end of the ground should have been demolished and the site turned into a Remembrance Park – at the very least, surely.  If one of my loved ones had died there, I’m not sure that I would consider having a white instead of a blue seat installed in a place where they can’t even be seen from some other parts of the ground would be sufficient to mark their passing.

Just a thought…

Anyway: the Owls were eighth in League One before the match started but have lost three of their last five league games. Last Saturday, though, they overcame Ipswich Town 1-0 at home. The Shrimps, by contrast, drew 2-2 at Accrington last time out and have lost only one of their last five League One matches, drawing two of them.

In previous meetings, Wednesday won at the Maz 1-2 eleven years ago in the FA Cup but in their one-and-only ever league match, Morecambe took the spoils against a previously unbeaten team last August by the only goal of the game in North Lancashire.

Stephen Robinson signed a fellow Ulsterman in the shape of winger Dylan Connolly on Deadline Day yesterday. Most fans, however, will be far more interested – and immensely relieved –by the fact that our very own Goal Machine Cole Stockton has not been poached away by the myriad of other clubs who are reputedly interested in signing him.

As far as tonight’s match is concerned, Robbo said about the opposition:

“They are a good team; they are a huge football club obviously. But on the pitch we have shown that there is not a lot of difference as we have beaten them before. There is no reason why we can’t do that again. I feel like we are on a good run of form. The confidence is building and growing. We have changed a lot of things over the last six month and we are starting to reap rewards. This is a bonus game for me. We have absolutely nothing to lose. Nobody expects anything outside of our dressing room. We have learned a lot about ourselves recently and we will go there with a lot of confidence.”

Opposite Number Darren Moore has recently signed defenders Harlee Dean from Birmingham City and Jordan Storey from Preston as well as Arsenal forward Tyreece John-Jules all on-loan until the end of the season. But he also lost Lewis Wing’s services to rivals Wycombe Wanderers yesterday and fellow midfielder Dennis Adeniran to injury and an operation earlier in the week. The Owls Manager had these thoughts before the match:

“Morecambe are a team used to winning given their promotion last season and a club that’s made huge strides over the last couple of years. They are brave on the ball, they try and play the game at a good tempo which is great to see. They are not in League One to make up the numbers, they are a good, well organised team and if you’re not on your game they will cause problems for you. We have to make sure we are at our absolute best and continue to build on performances.”

It was cold and windy but dry in the Steel City as the game kicked-off. Several hundred visiting fans were in the Leppings Lane end and paid their own respects to the ghosts of 96 – and now 97 – fellow football supporters by not sitting in any of the white seats at the front of the stand.

The home side started on the front foot and their first chance fell to the impressive Marvin Johnson, whose shot was well blocked by Morecambe Skipper Anthony O’Connor after four minutes. Three minutes later, Harlee Dean went down off the ball and last season’s Birmingham City Player of the Year was unable to continue. Wednesday had the next chance when Barry Bannan took a free kick on the Owls’ right quickly and found Josh Windass, whose instant shot smashed into the face of Trevor Carson in the away goal and went for a corner which was taken once the visiting goalkeeper had received prolonged treatment on the pitch.

The pattern of the half had been established by a quarter of an hour. Morecambe sat back and let Wednesday have the ball and tried – and failed – to play on the break. Far too often, they just lofted aimless long balls forward from the back or ran out of steam or options when they tried to play their way into the Wednesday half.

Nathaniel Mendez-Laing and Florian Kamberi combined well after sixteen minutes as the former received a one-two from the latter as he drifted in from the Wednesday right but his eventual shot went over the bar. Eighteen minutes were on the clock when Adam Phillips’ lofted pass to Cole Stockton was brilliantly saved by an onrushing Bailey Peacock-Farrell before the loose ball finally found its way back to the Goal Machine again and he buried it. Sadly, he was clearly off-side second time of asking. Up the other end, O’Connor again did well with twenty minutes on the clock to get a toe to a dangerous cross from the Sheffield left and avert another threat. After 21 minutes, Trevor Carson’s evening was over as he was clearly suffering from concussion or perhaps even double vision and he had to come off to be replaced by Kyle Letheren. Kyle didn’t have a lot to do initially as Wednesday stroked the ball around but had little or no penetration. However, Ryan McLaughlin was too slow to react as the ball was passed towards him by O’Connor near the half way line after 37 minutes. Mendez-Lang was far too fast for him, accelerated down the Wednesday right like an express train, exchanged passes with Kamberi and had a certain goal blocked by a miraculous sliding intervention by Ryan Cooney.

Then it was the home side’s turn to have a goal disallowed after Barry Bannan played-in an off-side Johnson to put the ball in the net after forty minutes. Letheren was at full stretch as he managed to push a low ball away from the danger area a minute later – O’Connor completed the job by booting it up the field. There were a few more half-chances – most notably for the Owls in injury time when a cross from their right by Mendez-Laing was only just missed by an on-rushing Johnson at full stretch. There were also a couple more delays for injuries to Phillips and – far more seriously – to Dele-Bashiru, who was unable to carry-on in the second half. Referee Ollie Yates – who I thought had an excellent game tonight – consequently awarded seven minutes extra time which actually lasted for nine.

So Morecambe went in level at half time. Sheffield had enjoyed more of the ball and had the better chances but the Shrimps had ridden their luck and experienced some bad luck as well as their first-choice goalkeeper had to retire hurt. The point of most of the Owls’ attacks, though, was focused on the left-back position in the opposition team. With regular Left Back Greg Leigh away on international duty and obvious replacement Liam Gibson injured, emergency defender Ryan McLaughlin was being given a really hard time by the home side tonight.

Stephen Robinson thus stiffened-up his team defensively for the second half by taking Arthur Gnahoua off and introducing Rhys Bennett, who looked solid throughout in the classic centre-half berth. The visitors had the first chance of the game as Ayunga worked some magic on the left and slung over a cross which was cleared for a corner which Peacock-Farrell punched away. Wednesday netted again two minutes later but Kamberi’s header from George Byers’ cross was again ruled to be off-side. Then Mendez-Laing turned McLaughlin inside-out and was brought down by the same player just short of the penalty area on the Sheffield right with almost fifty minutes played. Wednesday then forced a succession of corners as their pressure increased and in the fifty-second minute, the visiting goalkeeper did well not to be caught-out as Johnson sent a pile-driver towards his near post from the Owls’s left. But a goal which seemed inevitable finally arrived in the fifty-fourth minute. Byers walloped a simply sublime shot into the top corner of the net from a central position when about 30 yards out. They had another couple of chances in quick succession after this and the fear was that Morecambe would again capitulate in the way they did at Sunderland not too many weeks ago. But in reality, the visitors played better after going behind than they had done at any time previously. They started playing the short passing game which had been so effective against Accrington early doors last Saturday. And for the first time, they looked as if they might get back into the match against the team with the best home defensive record in League One. Wednesday were lucky in the 75^th minute when Peacock-Farrell tried to punch the ball away from Ayunga in his own penalty area and seemed to me at least to connect only with the Morecambe forward. He was lucky that our man didn’t make a meal of it. The home goalkeeper got luckier still – twice – in the eighty-third minute. Substitute Jonathan Obika’s shot at goal hit Cole the Goal and bounced off him only to be brilliantly cleared by Skipper Hutchinson off the Sheffield goal-line straight back to him. Jonathan fairly hammered the ball back – and it was again cleared off the line by the same Owls’ player. Two minutes later, Phillips bravely challenged the home goalkeeper as he attempted to clear the ball. It hit Adam and then bounced narrowly wide of the target as the gods again smiled on the man with the double-barrelled name. The visitors were the better side for the last ten minutes or so but the match was put beyond doubt with a truly appalling bit of bad luck in injury time right at the death. In the ninety-first minute, Mendez-Laing took a speculative shot from the Wednesday right. It hit Jacob Bedau and spun agonisingly and slowly wide of a wrong-footed Kyle Letheren to his right and flukily went into the net via the post.

So a soft goal and a fantastic one was the difference between the two teams tonight. Overall, Wednesday had more chances and more of the possession than did their visitors. But Morecambe put up a spirited fight particularly in the second half. This was not relegation form. The loss, however, saw them still rooted within the Dead Zone at the bottom of League One. Gillingham beat Crewe to see both clubs six points worse off than the Shrimps whilst seemingly doomed Doncaster lost at home 0-5 to Rotherham. So it could be worse…

Wednesday, meanwhile, remained in eighth position in the table.

Sheffield Wednesday: 1 Bailey Peacock-Farrell; 5 Sam Hutchinson (C) (Y); 10 Barry Bannan; 11 Josh Windass (24 Saido Berahino 74’); 14 George Byers; 16 Harlee Dean (2 Liam Palmer 6’); 17 Fisayo Dele-Bashiru (13 Callum Paterson 45’); 18 Marvin Johnson; 20 Florian Kamberi (40 Sylla Sow 65’); 38 Jordan Storey; 41 Nathaniel Mendez-Laing.

Subs Not Used:  28 Joe Wildsmith; 32 Jack Hunt; 34 Ciaran Brennan.

Morecambe: 30 Trevor Carson (1 Kyle Letheren 33’); 2 Ryan McLaughlin (Y); 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 17 Jonah Ayunga (14 Jonathan Obika 79’); 18 Adam Phillips; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney (11 Dylan Connolly 79’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua (31 Rhys Bennett 45’).

 Subs Not Used:  10 Aaron Wildig; 25 Alfie McCalmont; 27 Ousmane Fané.

 Ref: Ollie Yates.

Att: 19,261.

Bad Taste in the Mouth at Morecambe

Bolton Wanderers made the relatively short trip to north Lancashire today to play Morecambe for the first time ever in League One and only the third time in the club’s history. Last season, they drew in Horwich and then won the penultimate game of the season against Derek Adams’ men in a bad-tempered game at the Mazuma Stadium which helped the Trotters to gain a place closer to the Big Time which they were once a member of by winning promotion automatically.

Wanderers arrived in eleventh position in the table, having lost only one of their last five league games but winning four in a row since then. They were active in the transfer window which closed earlier in the week and must have been hoping for another three points against a team rooted in the relegation positions in League One in twenty-first place.

Morecambe, on the other hand, have lost two and only won one of their previous five League One matches. Although they were beaten at Hillsborough in mid-week, Shrimps’ Boss Stephen Robinson was far from downhearted afterwards, saying that his team had

“Pressed them, took the game to them. (There are) fine lines in football again: they score a 30-yard wonder goal; we have a goal disallowed in the first half that comes off them so Cole can’t be offside. We have to take the positives from that and take the performance into Saturday against Bolton because – if we go and press them the same way as we did against Sheffield Wednesday; if we can go and press a club like that with players of that calibre away from home – we can certainly do it at home against Bolton.”

Trevor Carson was concussed during the Wednesday game and apparently also had his nose broken when the ball was blasted at point-blank range straight into his face. He was thus unavailable for selection today. The quite extraordinarily unsupportive message posted on social media earlier this week by the partner of his replacement on Tuesday – Kyle Letheren – will not have gone un-noticed at the club. The Welshman seemingly has subsequently departed under something of a cloud which is a shame, given his undoubtedly positive contribution to the promotion campaign last season.  Adam Smith was signed yesterday as replacement for Kyle after training for some time with the squad.

As for the opposition, Robbo’s Opposite Number Ian Evatt said earlier in the week:

“It’s going to be a challenging game on Saturday – a different type of game to what we’ve had at home but we have to go there with the right mind-set and personality and attack the game the best we can and try and get the three points. We’ve got a squad of players who are all ch(a)mping at the bit and ready to play and make an impression – especially the new ones, so we’ve got decisions to make. We’ll take each game as it comes, really, and see the opponents’ strengths and weaknesses and pick a team accordingly. We’ve got some good options. We’re pleased with everybody; we’re pleased with the business we’ve done; pleased with the returning players and we’re pleased with the run we’re on. But we’re hungry for more and want to carry on winning games. We’ve got lots of hard work to go but the boys are really bouncing at the moment. It’s great to have options and then I have to pick the right team for the right game. You have to earn the right in every game and we’ve got to do that again on Saturday.”

As far as today’s opponents were specifically concerned, he added:

“They are a team very much in touch and capable of staying up with some very good players. We’re going to have to find a way to win. It might not be our usual fluid attacking game but we have to make sure we are positive and we keep doing the things we’ve been doing and set the right standards. And if we do that, we can hopefully get three points.”

The Shrimps’ Boss assessed today’s task in these terms:

“Bolton have been fantastic, I’ve watched three of their last four games. They’re a very good football side. They’ve got a set way of playing and they won’t change that for anybody which is credit to them. They’re a real threat.”

Bolton quickly sold-out their allocation of 1700 tickets for today’s clash and the Mazuma Stadium was packed to the rafters in front of a record crowd for this venue. On the way to the game, I saw angry waves crashing over onto the promenade from a choppy grey sea. I also saw visiting fans trying to push an obviously totally inebriated one of their number into a taxi.

When I arrived, a gale was blowing straight from the Bay under glowering skies from which heavy, freezing  squalls of rain fell regularly and eventually constantly as the match progressed.

I had walked from nearby Regent Park and got talking to a Bolton fan of about my own age who complained about the brutal way his team play these days. I also came across another desperate-looking visitor with a green face who was clinging to a fence as his drunken mates tried to prevent whatever was clearly going to happen next .

I didn’t realise it at the time, but this basically set the tone for what was going to occur in the next two hours or so.

Both sides Took the Knee and then the game started.

You know in advance what to expect from any Ian Evatt side: in the image of their Manager, they are big, aggressive and will bully you if you let them.

Oladapo Afolayan has a well-deserved reputation for trying every trick in the Book of Dark Arts but you can see that this man is blessed with more ability than most footballers. So why does he waste it by constantly cheating?

He had perhaps the first half chance of the contest after eight minutes when his shot was well blocked by Shrimps’ Skipper Anthony O’Connor. Anthony was impressive and led by example again today. Up-front, Jonah Ayunga also played really well throughout. He registered the home team’s first meaningful opportunity after eight minutes when he took a shot which went narrowly wide of the target after good approach play down the right flank by the men in the red strip.

Kieran Lee walloped a shot way over the bar for the visitors after eighteen minutes. Immediately afterwards, Cole the Goal had his first – really good – chance of the game. He received a perfect lofted ball from Jonah in the centre of the visitors’ penalty area but – uncharacteristically – dragged his shot to the right of James Trafford’s goal from his own point of view. Eight minutes later, Adam Phillips played a good pass to Ryan McLaughlin on the right and he set Cole up for another shot which was deflected wide.

The visitors had the next chance after half an hour. The confident-looking Adam Smith was forced into action for virtually the first time when he saved a not particularly testing effort from Declan John.

After good play by the Shrimps in midfield, Arthur Gnahoua shot over the target against his former team from a long way out almost at the end of the first half.

It was thus goal-less at half time and not a lot in it.

Bolton had the strong wind behind their backs in the second half.

Aaron Morley sent a woeful effort from a free-kick when well-placed after 54 minutes way over the bar. Then Stockton set-up O’Connor for a shot which was saved by Trafford a couple of minutes later.  The visiting goalkeeper then did well to smother a fierce free kick which seemed to go straight through the Bolton wall with just over an hour played. He did well then. But the way he deliberately goaded the home crowd at the end of the match is something he will probably regret when he grows up.

By the time he denied Adam, Morecambe had been asking all the questions for most of the half. A goal seemed to be coming and it should have arrived when huge Bolton Captain Ricardo Almeida Santos handled the ball to prevent his net bulging after panic stations had broken-out in the away penalty area following a Phillips’ corner with sixty-eight minutes on the clock. Off he went – eventually. The very aggressive way this giant argued the toss with diminutive Referee Ross Joyce didn’t do him any favours and clearly added to an increasingly feral atmosphere in the ground.

Cole the Goal stepped up to take the kick – and sent a weak shot right at Trafford which the man in blue saved far too easily. 

But Bolton were faced with a situation where they needed to survive with ten men for the last twenty minutes of the game.

Almost immediately, Morecambe were on the attack again. Ayunga played brilliantly on the right; combined with Phillips and then Cole who made no mistake this time by finishing-off a sublime move by the Shrimps after 72 minutes. I personally thought they had gone even further ahead straight afterwards when O’Connor headed home from another corner as the home team kept up the pressure.  But Mr Joyce disallowed it.

Shortly afterwards, he was faced with a real dilemma. The rowdy visiting crowd behind Adam Smith’s goal started throwing things at the home goalkeeper. So he stopped the game for a while. Then he spent ages speaking to Ian Evatt on the touchline. The Bolton Manager was apparently complaining about racist abuse being shouted at his substitutes from the home crowd behind him. If this is true, he did the right thing and we should all be ashamed of it. If it isn’t, it smacks of yet more gamesmanship by a man who clearly coaches it into  all of his players.

Ross Joyce took both teams off. Some of the away supporters responded to this by running onto the pitch and basically doing a pretty passable impression of morons who routinely did things like this during the 1970s.

One obviously drunk visiting idiot eluded the home security as the away hordes egged him on only to slip and fall over in the centre circle and be dragged away. It was a very darkly comic moment.

No communication with the crowd was made by anybody as this melodrama was enacted. To be fair to him, our home announcer was probably as much in the dark as to what was going on as the rest of us were. (He should have played `Why are we Waiting?’ by Bis. Come on Mark – get a grip, mate…)

But eventually, the players came back on again.

The break had robbed Morecambe of their momentum and the ten men in the white strip undeservedly equalised.

So the three points Morecambe so richly deserved were reduced to just one.

It left a very bad taste in the mouth.

The Referee was placed in an invidious position today. The way a lot of the visiting fans behaved – a minority, admittedly – but a very significant minority – was completely Out of Order.

Characteristically, though, their Manager didn’t criticise them at the end of the game. I’m just relieved that he isn’t in charge of our club.

The Trotters slipped to tenth in League One tonight. Morecambe remain in Twenty-First position. Stephen Robinson was clearly struggling to bite his tongue when he said after the game:

“We should have won. We were the better team with eleven men. We were the better team with ten men. We totally dominated and created all the chances.”

I don’t think anybody who actually witnessed this game will fail to have any sympathy with this view.

Morecambe: 41 Adam Smith (Y); 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C): 5 Jacob Bedeau; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 18 Adam Phillips (27 Ousmane Fané sixth minute of extra time); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (11 Dylan Connolly 84’).

Subs Not Used:  12 André da Silva Mendes; 21 Ryan Cooney; 14 Jonathan Obika; 25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Rhys Bennett.

Bolton Wanderers: 19 James Trafford; 3 Declan John; 4 MJ Williams; 5 Ricardo Almeida Santos (C) (R); 6 George Johnston (Y); 10 Dion Charles (11 Amadou Bakayoko 77’); 13 Marlon Fossey; 15 Will Aimson; 16 Aaron Morley; 17 Oladapo Afolayan (32 Kyle Demsey 66’); 20 Kieran Lee (9 Jón Dadi Bövarsson 45’).

Subs Not Used:  12 Joel Dixon; 22 Keiran Sadlier; 25 George Thomason; 27 Alex Baptiste.

Ref: Ross Joyce.

 Att: 5,617 (1,757 from Bolton).

Nothing in the Bank at the Bank.

It’s a real shame when a football report should be overshadowed by the disgraceful scenes which occurred last Saturday at the Mazuma Stadium. Those of us who were there saw an object being thrown from the Bolton end and hitting our goalkeeper, Adam Smith. He then picked-up another object – apparently a cigarette lighter – and handed both missiles to Referee Ross Joyce. A rumpus on the touchline then ensued and following talks with the Bolton Manager Ian Evatt, Referee Joyce took all players off the pitch. This prompted a wide-scale invasion of the playing surface by visiting so-called `fans’. One of these idiots – obviously drunk – made even more of a fool of himself by running down the pitch and then slipping in the centre circle and falling over in a heap. All this as Morecambe fans looked on and did not respond. Nobody from our ranks ran onto the field. Nobody from our ranks threw anything at opposition players. This is a matter of fact which I saw with my own eyes.

I was thus astounded that – when EFL on Quest covered the game later on, not even one of the things I have just described was mentioned. Instead, one of the presenters – Clinton Morrison – was given a soapbox in which he branded Morecambe FA as racist over an alleged incident in the crowd where Ian Evatt claims one of his players was racially abused. This may or may not have happened. So far, there is no proof one way or the other. But for the television programme to find the club guilty of this offence without any proof whatsoever is absolutely Out Of Order. The fact that they didn’t even mention the violent disorder indulged in by morons from Bolton which was certainly filmed by their cameras is in itself a dereliction on their primary duty to report events in the real world accurately, objectively and without pre-judgement. Shame on them for not doing so. The local police made this statement about the events yesterday:

“We have today arrested a 61-year-old man from Morecambe on suspicion of racially aggravated public order and he remains in custody. Other lines of enquiry relating to the allegations of racism are being developed and we continue to take the matter extremely seriously. A number of Bolton fans who were arrested for assault, pitch encroachment or being drunk and disorderly have been bailed, released under investigation or given penalty notices. One (Bolton supporter) has been charged with pitch encroachment and is due to appear before magistrates in Lancaster on March 1st. We are also looking into two separate allegations of assaults following the match. Anyone with any information should contact police on 101 quoting log 470 of February 5^th.”

If you have footage of any of the things which happened – send it to them. They may not do anything with the footage – but if you don’t they certainly won’t. And we must remember that one of our number who is generally liked by one and all faces a serious charge of aggravated racial disorder as a result of the allegations of a Bolton bench which may not have any basis in reality.

I hope that – if the allegations of racist abuse by Morecambe fans are investigated and then dismissed – EFL on Quest will withdraw the accusations it made on Saturday night.

I’m not going to hold my breath though…

Anyway, let’s move on – those of us that are lucky enough to be able to, that is.

Morecambe travelled to Lincoln today to face City for the fifteenth time in all competitions at Sincil Bank. They have only beaten the Imps three times before – the last time in September at the Maz – but have lost seven out of fifteen previous meetings. Lincoln were in eighteenth place in the League One table at the start of proceedings but – crucially – have played two fewer league games than the Shrimps. Morecambe were worse-off by two points which meant that if they could actually win tonight, the Shrimps would overtake their hosts in the standings.

City have lost their last two League One matches and three out of five altogether; winning the other two. They have the worst home record of any team in League One, however, having won just three games and losing eight so far.

Morecambe, on the other hand, have drawn two and won one of their last five fixtures. They should – and would – have won on Saturday if they hadn’t lost their momentum during the long delay that the riotous behaviour of the visiting hordes caused. But that was then and this was now…

It had been dry and at times sunny in Lincolnshire prior to the match tonight. Reflecting partly on Saturday’s controversy at home, Manager Stephen Robinson said before the game:

“We look like a team that believes in each other now. We look like a team that has got a bit of momentum and we can’t let Saturday’s disappointment derail us. Coming back on the pitch after the break in play, the weather was atrocious. That’s not us making excuses – we could have controlled the game better. Overall, it is hard for me to be critical about a bunch of boys who give absolutely everything for me and this football Club. I think people can see how hard the lads are working. I think Lincoln are a good side, they are a good footballing side and have stuck to their principles throughout the season. They are similar to ourselves; they have had a lot of injuries and have been unfortunate in a few games but I rate them. They have an excellent manager in Michael Appleton, so it will be a tough game with both sides wanting to play football the right way in a great stadium with a big atmosphere.”

Trevor Carson was fit enough to retake goalkeeping duties as Adam Smith dropped to the beck and Ryan McLaughlin was not named in the squad tonight because he has a hamstring injury which will make him unavailable for at least four weeks. Robbo also put Dylan Connolly into the starting eleven for the first time at the expense of Arthur Gnahoua, who was named as a substitute. For the hosts, Manager Michael Appleton promoted Joe Walsh; Max Sanders and Chris McGuire to his starting eleven.  His simple statement before the game was:

“The reality is if we do the business in these next five or six games, we know that we’re more than capable of beating sides at the top of the table and that will put us in a really comfortable position. We have to make sure that we pick up points over the next five or six games and make sure we have a strong end to the season.”

Lincoln kicked-off after both teams Took the Knee and Morecambe seemed to be pressing well at least at the start of the game. Ryan Cooney, however, made a stray pass from his right touchline after four minutes. Morgan Whittaker pounced on it and tried but failed to lob Trevor Carson from all of thirty yards. Immediately, there was an overlap on the Lincoln left and Cohen Bramall played a low cross right across the area. Fortunately for the visitors, nobody in a red striped shirt was there to get on the end of it. Then Regan Poole played a short pass back towards his goalkeeper on the Imps’ left. Cole the Goal was on it in a flash and played his way forward into the penalty area but his eventual shot was blocked and then cleared by the home defence. Seven minutes had been played when Jonah Ayunga did well to make progress on the Morecambe right but his final effort – a weak shot – was well wide of the target. The visitors, however, were looking vulnerable and static at the back every time Lincoln played forward and after just nine minutes, they fell behind. A seemingly innocuous ball played low just right of centre from the Imps’ point of view was cleverly back-heeled by Anthony Scully to TJ Eyoma, who played it back to him as he ran forward and he then sold a clever dummy before taking a shot which Morecambe Captain Anthony O’Connor did well to block on the line. Sadly for him, the deflected ball fell into the path of an onrushing Morgan Whittaker, who swept it home.

Toumani Diagouraga almost played-in the Goal Machine after seventeen minutes but his forward pass was just over-hit. The home team responded by sweeping back down the pitch and scoring again. This time, they worked the ball effectively down their right flank, passed the ball right across the field until Scully had it on their left. He waited for a run from deep by left-back Whittaker, who took the ball further in and scored with a low shot from an acute angle. Both goals were sloppy from the visitors’ point of view and their failure to close their opponents down properly or take the game to them made a team not used to winning in front of its own fans look pretty good. Up front, Stockton and Ayunga huffed and puffed as Dylan Connolly ran around to very little effect. As is so often the case this season, too much was asked of `Toums’ in the middle – and too little was provided yet again by Adam Phillips. For me, his match was summed-up in just one incident. After twenty-six minutes, he did well to take the ball off Regan Poole but Poole’s recovery to overtake him and win it back far too easily said everything about which player was more committed to the cause. Time and again, Jacob Bedeau won and tried to use the ball intelligently at the back but – finding no options nearby for him to choose – was reduced to lumping the ball forward towards Cole and Jonah and seeing City win back possession more often than not. In fact, thirty-seven minutes were on the clock when Josh Griffiths in the home goal had to make any sort of save. He easily fielded a weak header from Greg Leigh, whose performance again throughout this evening was exemplary. It took until injury time for the visitors to win their first corner kick of the game and that basically summed-up their play in the first half: weak; disjointed, uncommitted by too many players and way off the pace.

They needed to up their game by several notches when the second half started. Robbo took the ineffectual Dylan Connolly off at half time, replaced him with Alfie McCalmont and also changed the shape to three at the back with two wingbacks. Immediately, they looked – and played – better. For the first time, the Imps weren’t having things all their own way. Morecambe dominated the play early doors. But still there was no penetration and Stockton and Ayunga occasionally got in each other’s way. After fifty two minutes, though, Jonah was nearly found by an excellent forward pass on the Lincoln left. But Poole appeared from nowhere at speed to clear the danger. Two minutes later, Ayunga was fouled; Phillips took a clever free-kick to his right where Cooney’s lob forwards was beautifully chested down by Jonah to Toumani who fairly walloped home a volley from just outside the penalty area to reduce the arrears. It was a really well-worked goal and a fantastic strike into the bargain. In the meantime, the Imps offered little as their crowd fell noticeably silent. After an hour, a cross from their right was just too high for Chris McGuire to reach but other than that, the home team offered virtually nothing. 62 minutes were on the clock when the visitors should have equalised. Under renewed pressure, the Imps were struggling to clear the ball. It was played in panic back to Griffiths, who took a wild swing at it which hit the Goal Machine and bounced into the path of Ayunga. Jonah should have walloped it but he tried to place the ball, giving the goalkeeper the opportunity to redeem his error of a moment earlier by pulling off a truly fantastic save. Morecambe continued to play on the front foot but they never had a better chance to equalise. Indeed, the hosts could have gone even further ahead when substitute Ben House’s virtual first contribution to the game was to make a fine run down the Lincoln left and force a tremendous save from Carson from an acute angle. This was after 79 minutes. Six minutes later, Morecambe were again unlucky not to equalise. First of all, Leigh received the ball on the Shrimps’ left, played a long cross which was headed-on by substitute Jonathan Obika to Shane McLaughlin on the right. Shane instantly played the ball into the centre where Imps’ defender Max Sanders swung a leg at it. It shot off him behind for a corner but on another occasion, it would have gone straight into the back of the net: he hadn’t a clue what he was doing. Greg took the resulting corner from the Morecambe right and an inrushing Obika’s header at the far post was cleared off the line before Alfie’s follow-up shot was also blocked. And that was basically that.

So you could say that Lincoln rode their luck tonight. I would say, though, that Morecambe threw this game away. You can’t give any team a two-goal start and expect to win in any league, let alone League One. The Shrimps were by far the better team for the final 45 minutes – but a football match lasts for 90…

The latest loss saw tonight’s opponents in a far more comfortable position in the table – five points better off and with two fewer games played than Morecambe in seventeenth position. Morecambe remain obstinately in 21^st place. Results elsewhere – with only one of the teams around them winning and Doncaster losing at home yet again – meant that little changed at the bottom of the pile. Gillingham managed to beat Cambridge United tonight by the only goal of the game to close the gap between themselves and the Shrimps to just four points. And the Gills will be the next team to visit the Maz on Saturday…

 Lincoln City: 1 Josh Griffiths; 2 Regan Poole; 6 Max Sanders; 7 Morgan Whittaker (17 Ben House 74’); 10 Chris McGuire (Y); 11 Anthony Scully (8 Liam Cullen 88’); 15 Cohen Bramall; 16 Joe Walsh (Y); 18 Conor McGrandles (C); 22 T J Eyoma (20 Brooke Norton-Cuffy 82’); 27 John Marquis.

 Subs Not Used:   19 Lewis Fiorini; 21 Lasse Sorensen.

 Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C): 5 Jacob Bedeau (Y); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 11 Dylan Connolly (25 Alfie McCalmont 45’); 17 Jonah Ayunga (14 Jonathan Obika 66’); 18 Adam Phillips; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 27 Ousmane Fané; 28 Courtney Duffus; 31 Rhys Bennett.

Ref: Anthony Backhouse.

Att:  7,571 (140 from Morecambe)

Bore Draw at Morecambe

Before we start, here’s an update concerning developments about the disorder which occurred at the match against Bolton last Saturday in Morecambe. Six Trotters’ supporters were arrested after the game on charges ranging from assault to criminal damage. One Morecambe supporter was arrested on suspicion of racist abuse. That doesn’t mean that any of those charged are guilty of any offence but what is significant is the difference in the nature of the charges brought by the police. An unproven accusation of racist behaviour on one hand – and several instances of violence on the other. I would suggest that this reflects what anyone who was there actually saw with their own eyes last Saturday. Shrimps’ fans didn’t pelt the visiting goalkeeper with missiles; invade the pitch or attack a disabled fan on a mobility scooter outside the ground later on. They didn’t smash-up a train on the way to the game either. My spies tell me there was trouble with the visiting fans elsewhere as well – at Preston station, for example, where the police had to intervene to restore order.  More importantly, Bolton Wanderers itself has applied lifetime bans to eight of their own so-called supporters for what occurred on the day. Morecambe FC, on the other hand, have banned precisely nobody. This is all a matter of fact.

As such these facts will – of course – all be duly acknowledged on EFL on Quest later tonight. The presenter of the programme – Colin Murray – will wear the Morecambe FC shirt he bought last season and pay a tribute to the club’s fabulous catering by eating a special Humble Pie live in the studio. Then the director of the show will personally apologise for not showing any of the riotous behaviour which was filmed by the programme-makers last week and then not even bothering to mention the missile-throwing incident.  The absolute highlight of the broadcast will follow next. Professor Clinton Morrison will deliver a lecture about the problems besetting policing and the key element of community consent in any modern representative post-industrial democracy (once the Big Words have been explained to him). Don’t miss it: I personally can’t wait…

Seriously though folks, I emailed Colin Murray last Saturday as soon as I saw the completely unbalanced and factually inaccurate report he and his accomplices made of the match. He hasn’t bothered to reply. Neither has anyone from the production team of the show.

How pathetic and spineless is that?

But let’s move on again…

Ex-Millwall legend Neil Harris brought the Gillingham team he inherited when the very cuddly Steve Evans was sacked last month to the Mazuma Stadium today. Mr Harris is well-known to be very much the club’s second choice as a replacement for everybody’s favourite Glaswegian of all time.  The job was offered to National League club Bromley’s Andy Woodman – who promptly turned it down on the basis that he would rather his first experience of League Two to be on the up with his current employers than on a downward trajectory with a different Kentish club altogether.

So in a sense, Neil is on a hiding to nothing: if he fails to keep the Gills In League One, everybody will say he wasn’t considered to be up to it in the first place. But the club is also on a hiding to nothing as well at the moment and today, Neil Harris would be hoping to make ground on one of their rivals for relegation back to League Two. Under his tutelage, the Gills have improved a bit and actually beat Cambridge United by the only goal of the game at Priestfield last Tuesday night. This win – their second in their last five, of which they have also lost two – placed them one place and just four points behind today’s hosts in twenty-second position in League One. However, they are still far from being a fully rejuvenated team. Their defeat at home against Oxford United two weeks ago – where they scored two goals but conceded seven – indicates that they remain very fragile at the back. Prior to the game, Mr Harris had the following simple message:

“Away from home we have to make sure we manage games well. Morecambe is a tough place to go. It will be a competitive game. Physically, we need to be strong. We need to win more games – we know that – but it’s my job to take pressure off the players.”

Morecambe, meanwhile, were contriving to lose against a very ordinary Lincoln City side at Sincil Bank at the same time Gillingham were winning last Tuesday. They have won only a single match out of their last five and lost two. In previous meetings, the Shrimps also have a poor record against the Gills. They lost last September in Kent against them, putting on a really anaemic display against a team which had failed to beat anyone else in League One in three times of asking up to that point. They also lost their first-ever meeting with the team from Kent five-nil at Priestfield. Since then, they have lost another four; drawn three and only ever won one, ten years ago in North Lancashire. So the Gills seem to have the same sort of Indian Sign as far as Morecambe are concerned which is normally reserved only for Accrington Stanley. Having said that though, the Shrimps are certainly currently capable of beating the visitors today. But this depends upon which home team turns-up this afternoon.

If the one that played so ineptly in the first half at Sincil Bank shows-up, even Gillingham will be likely to beat them yet again. If the one which played in the second half and throughout last Saturday’s game against Bolton Wanderers takes the field though, they will win.

Robbo said the following before the game started:

“Gillingham have had a little bounce in the last two games. They’re probably looking and thinking ‘we’ll try and catch Morecambe first and foremost’. (But) we can almost keep them a good distance away from us and, again, bring people back to the race. We’ve got to finish one place above that bottom four. That’s all we have to aim for – and for me, that would be the biggest achievement of my managerial career. It’s a huge task to stay in this division. Do I think that we can? I certainly do. (There are) fifteen games to go. There’s going to be a lot of twists and turns in the season. We’ll beat teams we’re not expected to or lose to teams we’re probably expected to compete with and beat that are down at the bottom of the table. There’s nothing set in stone yet, there’s a long way to go. As I say, Fifteen games (is) a lot of points to play for.”

Rhys Bennett – playing against his previous employers and a Manager who decided he was Surplus to Requirements just a few short weeks ago – was named on the bench today but didn’t feature at any time as things turned-out. Vadaine Oliver – who scored the decisive goal of the game when Gillingham beat the Shrimps 2-1 last September – returned to his former stomping ground as well as he led the visitors’ attack.

There’s not much to say about the game except that here were two poor sides playing rubbishy football that wouldn’t be good enough for League Two. The weather – wet and grey in north Lancashire all day today – didn’t help. The pitch was soggy underfoot and it was quite misty at times as well.

The Gills had obviously come for a draw and the only positive thing you can say about them is that they were not afraid to take a punt when within shooting distance of the Morecambe goal. Conor Masterson tried his luck from a long way out but missed after eleven minutes and then forced a save from Trevor Carson in the twentieth. Fourteen minutes had been played when Ben Thompson came closer with another thunderbolt from distance. Vadaine Oliver – who else? – then headed a clever pass to Robbie McKenzie after 38 minutes but his shot was relatively easily saved by the home goalkeeper. You feared, though, that if the visitors  kept taking a pop, one of these chances would be converted eventually. And so it proved. Vadaine set-up Ryan Jackson on the Gillingham right after seventy-two minutes and the substitute fairly walloped a howitzer of a shot which swerved into the top corner of Trevor Carson’s net to his left – nobody could have saved it. This was virtually the only moment of actual class during the entire dreary game.

As for Morecambe, they seemed to be trying to bore the opposition into submission with a weak display where the ball was given away far too often and the team in the red strip seemed terrified to try their luck by testing the visiting goalkeeper – the absolutely gigantic Aaron Chapman. There were chances – twice in goal-mouth scrambles during the first half, for instance – as the visitors struggled to clear their lines. Cole the Goal had an uncharacteristically poor game today. But – even in adversity – he never gives up. Jonah Ayunga and Shane McLoughlin can’t be faulted for effort either. Arthur Gnahoua troubled the Gills’ defence at times – but those times weren’t often enough in my opinion. Greg Leigh did a good job as always but Toumani Diagouraga was quiet as well today and Adam Phillips offered nothing at all. Only when he was finally substituted after just over an hour by Aaron Wildig did Morecambe seem to show any urgency going forward. However, the key move from Stephen Robinson was to send on Jonathan Obika after seventy-odd minutes. As Morecambe very belatedly started to actually put the men in the blue strips under any meaningful pressure, he equalised with a fine effort with only six minutes left to play. The impressive Jacob Bedeau played an excellent cross-field ball to Captain Anthony O’Connor (who was assured and dependable again today). He slipped it towards Jon, who managed to spin and outpace his marker to shoot past the colossus in the away goal with an assured finish. The Shrimps could then have won it with only two minutes left following a blocked shot and a general scramble in the away penalty area before Masterson managed to clear the ball away from danger. In injury time – as the home team finally started to swamp the Gillingham defence – Chapman made a truly superb save from Obika to ensure that his team returned southwards with a single point.

You couldn’t really begrudge them this. Neil Harris said at the end of the match:

“We battled and we were resolute when we had to be. It builds the momentum, belief, and keeps us going. It was backs to the wall at times in tough conditions.”

The Manager of the hosts blamed the heavy pitch for his men’s failure to win today. He said that they passed the ball well; pressed effectively and played some `super, super’ football.

I must have been watching a different match. This game was a cure for insomnia: it was absolutely dreadful. I suspect that any objective observer would fear for both of these clubs on this performance. But it seems that there might be even more dire teams in League One this season.

Elsewhere, Doncaster predictably lost again – this time 4-0 at Portsmouth. Crewe lost 4-1 at Accrington as well. Above today’s contenders for the League One Wooden Spoon, Fleetwood and Shrewsbury also lost and Lincoln and Wimbledon could only draw.

So at the end of it all, nothing really changed as far as Morecambe and Gillingham were concerned. It could have saved everybody concerned – and particularly the stalwarts from Kent who made the long journey to north Lancashire today – a lot of time and effort if they had simply agreed to divide the spoils beforehand and not play this bore draw at all…

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C): 5 Jacob Bedeau; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 18 Adam Phillips (10 Aaron Wildig 64’); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (14 Jonathan Obika 73’); 21 Ryan Cooney.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 11 Dylan Connolly 25 Alfie McCalmont; 27 Ousmane Fané;  31 Rhys Bennett.

Gillingham: 12 Aaron Chapman; 3 David Tutonda (Y) (2 Ryan Jackson 60’); 4 Stuart O’Keefe; 5 Max Ehmer; 6 Jack Tucker; 8 Ben Thompson; 9 Thomas Dickson-Peters (33 Charlie Kelman (Y) 85’); 10 Olly Lee (20 Daniel Phillips 76’); 14 Robbie McKenzie; 15 Conor Masterson; 19 Vadaine Oliver.

Subs Not Used:  1 Pontus Dahlberg; 23 Harvey Lintott; 26 Christian Maghoma; 32 Josh Chambers.

Ref: Peter Wright.

Att: 4,499 (279 from Kent.)

It never rains but it pours: Robbo’s defection overshadows Rotherham fixture.

Morecambe made the wet and windy journey over the Pennines tonight to face Rotherham United in the White Rose County without a Manager.

Stephen Robinson and his Assistant, Diarmuid O’Carroll have both left to take over at Scottish Premiership club St Mirren in Paisley. Sinking Ship? Rats? Did they jump? Or were they pushed? Who knows? I’d like to be a Fly On The Wall in the Morecambe Board Room to hear what they collectively think about this development.

Anyway, long-term stalwart Barry Roche has taken temporary charge of the team.  Again. Will Kevin Ellison be invited back to help him long-term? Or will the Chairman be on the blower to previous Manager Derek Adams, who is currently unemployed? Derek remains the best Manager Morecambe FC has ever had by a country mile despite being sacked by Bradford City last week.  I wonder if he would be prepared to come back – or if the Powers That Be at the club would even welcome his return in the first place…

Whatever, the club visited the New York Stadium tonight facing an uncertain future. They went by coach – as usual. But anyone who wanted to travel to the town by train today would be sadly disappointed: Rotherham Central Station was still closed due to flooding caused by the successions of storms – Dudley; Eunice and Franklin – which have wracked the British Isles during the last few days.

Blimey! – six named episodes of wild weather already this year and it’s still only February…

United, however, had ridden-out all the literal and figurative storms that have been thrown at them so far this season and were proudly sitting right at the pinnacle of League One prior to the match. United had won four of their last five games and came from behind to draw their most recent match 1-1 against rivals for the title Wigan Athletic last Friday in South Yorkshire.

As far as tonight’s opponents are concerned, the Millers have met the Shrimps on sixteen previous occasions; losing five games and winning seven, most recently at the Maz last August. There, Paul Warne’s overly negative approach to the Beautiful Game was plain for all to see: once his men went ahead, they shut-up shop instead of looking for the more emphatic win which the quality of their squad would probably have guaranteed them.  Instead – as weak Referee David Webb indulged them – Rotherham applied the Book of Dark Football Arts and dived; feigned injury and constantly time-wasted in the way that clubs with philosophies like Mr Warne’s invariably do.

What a shame. Unlike people such as the currently unemployed former Manger of Salford City from the last time we met them and the present incumbent at Bolton Wanderers, Paul Warne is a bright and multi-dimensional individual. But giving in to The Dark Side has clearly worked for him – his club are top of the pile after all.

Pep Guardiola and Jürgen Klopp have shown one and all of us that the Ugly Game doesn’t win in the long run. What – if anything – does this tell us? Is cheating an admirable trait in any sphere of life? (No more than 3000 word answers please; your time starts now…) .

Morecambe would be hoping to do rather better tonight than they managed to last August.

They didn’t play on Saturday because of waterlogging of the Shrewsbury pitch. Results elsewhere then – Donny losing at home yet again and AFC Wimbledon being thrashed by the appalling Bolton Wanderers away – saw them remain in the same place in the table which they have occupied for most of this year: twenty-first position. They have now lost two of their last five League One games and drawn three of them. But just one win could well push them out of the relegation positions at the bottom of the Division. Stephen Robinson’s parting gift to the club was to fail to live-up to his own calculation as to what is needed in terms of form to stay in League One: at least two wins out of every five league games according to him. The Shrimps won only seven out of 32 and lost half of them under his leadership. According to his own calculation, they should have won at least eleven games altogether at the precise moment that he chose to leave the club. This, we must remember – along with a goal Difference of Minus Eighteen – is the Northern Irishman’s legacy as far as Morecambe is concerned. Would the elusive next win arrive tonight in his absence?

Whatever, Assistant Coach Diarmuid O’Carroll fronted-up to say the following about tonight’s game before leaving the club altogether:

“They don’t come much harder than Rotherham to be honest. We are a big fan of the way that they play and they impressed us when they came to the Mazuma earlier on in the season. They are well coached. They play with a lot of intensity. They are well organised and have a clear style. It is a big test for us but we back ourselves against anybody in this division. Regardless of where we are in the league; regardless of form; regardless of what people externally think, we feel like we are playing well. We will go into the game and attack it.” 

Rotherham native and assistant First Team Coach Matt Hamshaw said this before the game prior to Robbo’s move North of the Border:

“It will be tough, first and foremost. I think you’ve only got to look at their results – although I know they’re having a little bit of a bad run at the minute. We’ve got huge respect for Stephen Robinson and the players they’ve got. Cole Stockton has been a massive threat for them. Diagouraga has had a good career and a lot goes through him. We ended up winning 1-0 up there but it was tough. A wind-assisted goal by Smudge (Michael Smith) did it. There’s been a lot of teams played them and struggled against them and they do like to play football.”

Baz – with Academy Coach Neil Wainwright assisting him on the touch-line tonight – started with a different line-up to that which might have been expected under the former regime. Robbo’s favourite – Adam Phillips – was relegated to the bench and both Ousmane Fané and Rhys Bennett promoted to the starting eleven.

The match kicked-off after a minute’s applause to remember former Millers’ players Billy McEwan and Trevor Swift.

It had been wet in South Yorkshire at times today following the drenching the town has received over the last few days. So the pitch was understandably soft underfoot as a result.

Morecambe started lively enough but were behind almost before they knew it. Just three minutes were on the clock when Freddie Ladapo was found on the left side of the Morecambe penalty area from his point of view by a nice lofted pass from Ollie Rathbone in the centre. He had his back to goal but found the composure to chest the ball down; step back and then swivel to hit an unstoppable shot into the top of the net to Trevor Carson’s right. The visiting goalkeeper was given absolutely no chance.

His opposite number – Josh Vickers – had to play Sweeper two minutes later when a long ball down the centre was being chased down by Jonah Ayunga. Jonah was hurt after seven minutes and – following a very promising start – offered little after this during the first half. Cole Stockton, though, looked sharp throughout. He had an early pop at goal after about ten minutes which was blocked but Morecambe played cleverly on their left after eleven minutes as Carson passed the ball to Jacob Bedeau who fed it to the yet again impressive Shane McLoughlin. Shane played the ball to the Goal Machine who set himself up for a shot which had the sting taken out of it by a defender’s challenge and allowed Vickers to field it without too much trouble. The Shrimps then came close to equalising with fourteen minutes played. McLoughlin anticipated a pass out of defence brilliantly on the Morecambe right; took the ball up the wing and played a perfect low cross to Cole whose instant, powerful volley was absolutely brilliantly saved by the home goalkeeper at the cost of a corner. But the hosts came close to extending their lead two minutes later when Michael Ihiekwe headed a long ball against the underside of Carson’s crossbar with the goalkeeper beaten. Down the other end, good play on the Morecambe right after nineteen minutes led to Ayunga playing a cross right across the home goal but nobody was there to take advantage of it. Rotherham were then lucky when a long cross by Greg Leigh was caught by Vickers only for one of his own defenders to head the ball out of his hands. On another occasion, the ball would have gone into the home net or fallen for an attacking player – but not tonight. The game swung from one end to the other but after 29 minutes, a simple low pass from the half-way line by Dan Barlaser fell perfectly for Ladapo to score his second of the night with a low shot which went into the net off Carson’s left-hand post. Shane Ferguson then tried his luck with a blockbuster from the United left which only just missed the far post with thirty-seven minutes played. The next excellent chance then fell to the visitors. McLoughlin was instrumental again on the right, setting-up Cole for a clever cross which Ayunga back-heeled right on the goal-line only for Vickers to make another phenomenally good stop. Rotherham’s leading scorer – Michael Smith – then narrowly missed with a powerful shot from the left flank. So a match played in a good spirit and which was always entertaining to watch saw the league leaders return to their Dressing Rooms two goals to the good.

They almost made it three right at the start of the second half. Barlaser and Ben Wiles combined well before Smith tried his luck from the Rotherham right. The ball just missed Carson’s right-hand post but Rathbone was a mere fraction away from turning it in as it blasted across the goal mouth.  After 50 minutes, Leigh went on a run down the Morecambe left and found The Goal Machine. His initial and follow-up efforts were both blocked but Greg won the ball back, made space for himself and tested Vickers with a decent effort of his own. Then Stockton blasted the ball over the bar from the tightest of angles after 53 minutes when McLoughlin again found him with an excellent cross from the Shrimps’ left to the far post. Two minutes later, another strike by The Goal Machine had the sting taken out of it by a Millers’ defender to make an easy save for the home goalkeeper. But Ladapo could have completed his hat-trick after turning the left side of the away defence inside-out and following it up with a powerful shot which Carson somehow managed to deflect onto his right post and away. This was just before the hour. On it, substitute Jon Obika made good progress on the left flank and sent in a low cross which McLoughlin would have connected with were it not for a fine interception by Vickers, who pushed the ball towards Cole. The goalkeeper then bravely launched himself forward and managed to scoop the ball away from the onrushing centre forward just in the nick of time. He pulled-off perhaps an even better save in the 62^nd minute when he managed to push Obika’s thunderbolt from the Morecambe right away for a corner after a mistake by one of his own defenders which set Jon up for a perfect strike. At this stage of the game, the visitors were asking all the questions and the ground had fallen silent apart from the loud chanting of the 183 away fans. Rhys Bennett thought he had scored his first goal for the Shrimps after about 65 minutes but his header at the far post was ruled-out by the Referee for an earlier foul in the centre of the home penalty area. Vickers earned his corn yet again with another fine save from Obika’s header after good play on the left had led to Anthony O’Connor finding him with a perfect cross from just right of centre after 77 minutes. The final chance of the game fell to Ryan Cooney in injury time. Having had a long-throw from the right returned to him by the home defence, he cut in not just once but twice to give himself space for a shot which finally beat the home goalkeeper. But as Vickers lay on the ground and looked behind him, the ball hit his right-hand post and bounced straight back into his gloves. To be fair to him, he had probably earned this large slice of luck by his outstanding display throughout the ninety minutes.

This was a good game in which both sides were totally committed and there was no play-acting or cheating at any time by either side. Part of this was due to the performance of the Referee, Simon Mather, who had an excellent game tonight. For the hosts, goalkeeper Josh Vickers was the difference between the two sides with a truly inspired performance. Morecambe may have lost again but if they continue to play like they did this evening, their League One status doesn’t have to written-off just yet. The players were clearly giving their all for their new interim Manager. Nobody could ask for more. At the end of the evening, Morecambe found themselves still stuck in that pesky twenty-first position in the League One table.

Elsewhere, Crewe and Lincoln both lost and AFC Wimbledon drew their match at Gillingham – the best possible result for the Shrimps. Doncaster surprisingly beat Accrington though to narrow the gap between themselves and the north Lancashire club to just two points. Meanwhile, Rotherham stretched their lead at the top of the pack to six points, albeit with two more games played than second-placed Wigan Athletic.

Rotherham United: 31 Josh Vickers; 2 Wes Harding; 4 Dan Barlaser (22 Hakeem Odoffin 70’); 6 Richard Wood (C); 7 Jordi Osei-Tutu (11 Chiedozie Ogbene 58’); 8 Ben Wiles (Y); 10 Freddie Ladapo; 17 Shane Ferguson (21 Angus MacDonald 83’); 18 Oliver Rathbone; 20 Michael Ihiekwe; 24 Michael Smith.

Subs not used: 1 Viktor Johansson; 15 Tolaji Bola; 16 Jamie Lindsay; 19 Joshua Kayode.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C): 5 Jacob Bedeau (Y); 8 Toumani Diagouraga (28 Courtney Duffus 80’); 9 Cole Stockton; 17 Jonah Ayunga (14 Jonathan Obika 60’); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney; 27 Ousmane Fané (10 Aaron Wildig 68’); 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 11 Dylan Connolly 18 Adam Phillips; 22 Liam Gibson.

Ref: Simon Mather.

Att: 8,376 (183 from Morecambe)

Who ate all the pies? – Ipswich Town didn’t…

Let’s start this report with the brilliant news that Derek Adams has returned to Morecambe FC following the departure of Stephen Robinson earlier in the week. That is to say – I thought he had until I read the breaking news on the BBC Sport website last Thursday and learned that the man who has taken over was actually in charge at Southend United last term:

“League One strugglers Morecambe have reappointed Derek Adams as manager, less than nine months after he left the club to join Bradford City. Adams led the Shrimpers to the third tier for the first time in their history last season, via the play-offs.”

Some things never change, do they? But let’s continue with two updates and a bit more good news too. First of all, Rotherham Manager Paul Warne had this to say after Morecambe’s visit to the New York Arena last Tuesday night – a game which Barry Roche’s Shrimps unluckily lost 2-0:

“It could have been more but we could have lost. First half we were okay but not at our absolute best, but that’s respect to Morecambe. They’ve come here and made it difficult for us and Stockton up front is always a handful. Josh [Vickers] pulled off an amazing save from him in the first half. I’m sounding greedy but you always feel like you need that third goal. I thought in fairness to the opposition, it is probably the hardest game we’ve had at home all season. They kept peppering our goal and I think they had more corners and more shots than us. It just turned into a bit of a basketball match, which isn’t like us.”

High praise indeed from the Manager of the League One leaders. Elsewhere, as the controversy about the disorder which occurred when Bolton Wanderers visited Morecambe last month rumbles on, local police made this statement during the week:

Good afternoon folks !

We just wanted to give you an update regarding the investigation into the incident near to the Bolton Wanderers bench during the later stages of the Morecambe Vs Bolton football match on 5th of February.

One male aged 61 from Morecambe remains on police bail after being arrested on suspicious of racially aggravated public order. Enquiries are very much still ongoing into the events within the ground during the match. We are working along side both clubs and the FA.

We are aware that there has been an image circulated on social media of a Bolton player interacting with a man and women in the seats directly behind the Bolton bench. We would like to state that at this stage of the investigation, there is no evidence that has come to light thus far that these individuals have been involved in the racially aggravated public order. We are aware that a number of comments have been made towards the individuals assuming they are involved.

I ask that we be allowed to investigate the matter thoroughly and we will update you on the outcome.

Stay safe Folks ! Detective Sergeant Adie Knowles , Lancaster CID

Let’s just repeat the key part of that statement: “We are aware that there has been an image circulated on social media of a Bolton player interacting with a man and women in the seats directly behind the Bolton bench. We would like to state that at this stage of the investigation, there is no evidence that has come to light thus far that these individuals have been involved in the racially aggravated public order (offence).”

It would be interesting (to put it mildly) to compare this remark with the statements made by Bolton Manager Ian Evatt at the time of the alleged `incident’ and what this gentleman has insisted actually happened subsequently…

The good news is that the TV programme which slavishly repeated Evatt’s unsubstantiated accusations without even mentioning the crowd trouble and missile-throwing at the home goalkeeper indulged in by a minority of Bolton Wanderers’ alleged `fans’ beforehand is for the chop. ITV has won the right to broadcast highlights of EFL games as from the beginning of next season. So as for EFL on Quest – good riddance. Let’s just hope they get a better set of pundits than the likes of Professor Clinton Morrison who feature on the current show and dispense with the services of the extremely slippery Colin Murray altogether. (Let’s also hope that they, too, don’t constantly refer to us as the `Shrimpers’ as every incarnation of EFL coverage on terrestrial television has done so far on a depressingly regular basis…)

Anyway, Morecambe welcomed Ipswich Town to the Mazuma Stadium for the first time today to complete the reverse fixture of the opening day of the season. At Portman Road, the Shrimps led twice before finally coming away with a 2-2 draw as the Tractor Boys equalised with virtually the last kick of the game.  Town arrived in north Lancashire today in League One’s ninth position and on an unbeaten streak, having won three and drawn two of their last five league games. So their relatively new Manager – Ulsterman Kieran McKenna – has an established track record far superior to his countryman who decided to jump ship this week after leading Morecambe into the relegation positions at the moment he chose to leave. The Record will indelibly state that Stephen Robinson’s final contribution to the Shrimps’ parlous position in League One currently was to lose two of his last five games, in which the Shrimps picked-up only three points out of a possible fifteen: relegation form indeed…

This is just the fourth time that the clubs have played each other. The first meetings occurred a long time ago when Morecambe was a non-league club and Ipswich was a member of the Premiership. Morecambe lost both FA Cup matches. But as we have seen, there is nothing between them as far as league games are concerned. The Ipswich Manager – implying that Morecambe’s renowned catering is not up to his high standards – said the following prior to the match:

“This is one of the longest journeys we have, but preparation has been good. The distance can be a challenge and we have to adapt the schedule slightly, but the players are used to it. Some things like meal times might change, so that we can get on the road and things like that, but it’s small things and we adapt as best we can in terms of nutrition and preparing for the game. Paul, our chef, travels as well and looks after the team as best as possible. We look after every little detail as best as possible, and we’re not the only team in a position where there is lots of travelling. Morecambe will be in a similar position when they have away games down South, so it’s a factor for most teams. We’ve moved on quickly from Tuesday and the preparation has been good. We’re well aware we are in for a test against Morecambe, but we are really looking forward to the challenge.”

Opposite Number Derek Adams had things other than the catering arrangements at the club on his mind prior to the match. He said about his re-appointment as Manager and his hopes for the next thirteen games:

“I got a phone call late on Tuesday night from the chairman. I spoke to him and when I got the call, it was something that I wanted to do. I left on a high the first time round and we had a great day at Wembley and obviously a great season. Now, coming back here in League One, we’ve got another mission to accomplish We’re in the relegation places at this moment in time, and we want to get out of that and my job, between now and the end of the season along with the players (and) the staff is to get enough points to stay in League One. You would’ve hoped to have been in a better position than we are now. We’ve got three wins in the last 23 games. So that has to improve because we have to pick up wins now to get ourselves enough points to stay in the division. We’ve got really good characters in the squad, I know a number of the players that will have been here from last season which is great. They’ll help me and I’ll help the ones that haven’t been here before as well. I’ve got a really good relationship with the co-chairmen, the owners as well as the other board members. I obviously know the staff that are already here and some of the players, so that really helps. I know the environment as well, I know the stadium, the training facilities and that will help me get going really quickly, and that’s what we have to do.”

As far as today’s game specifically is concerned, he added:

“We’ve got Ipswich on Saturday which is the first game. It’s a game that we’re going to have to go out and win to give us that opportunity of catching the teams above us. We know that. Over the years – even last season – we had a really good home record and this season we’ve got the supporters back in the stadium. We’ve all seen how much that can affect this football club. We’ve seen the uptake in season tickets. We’ve seen the atmosphere that’s been here and I’m really looking forward to having them here and seeing them on Saturday.”

One of the first things the returning hero did was persuade his previous assistant – John McMahon – to return to the club after the latter had been effectively edged-out by the regime which was in charge just five short days ago. Personally, I was absolutely delighted by this news.

Today represented a potential New Beginning for the club as far as I am concerned. Derek needs to work with the players left behind by the previous Manager as he abandoned his failing project and sought Pastures New for himself instead.

But we can all remember a time when Derek inherited what was bequeathed to him by Jim Bentley only three short years ago. The Shrimps faced oblivion as they languished near the bottom of League Two at the time. He made a Silk Purse out what was basically of a Sow’s Ear – no offence to Saint Jim – then. He might or might not be able to do so again but in Derek Adams, I believe we have a man who can get us back into League One again if we stick with him even if the Shrimps are relegated this season.

But hopefully, it won’t come to that…

Derek came onto the pitch prior to kick-off to acknowledge the adulation of a crowd he last stood in front of at Wembley last summer.

There was a minute’s silence before the game to commemorate Life Vice President Ken Ormrod, who was instrumental back in the day for keeping a struggling Shrimps’ heads above water for several years almost single-handed. Without him, the club could have gone under altogether. So we all owe him a large debt of gratitude.

Both sides then Took the Knee – and the second instalment of the Derek Adams Era began under suitably sunny skies.

It was instructive to see the way Derek set the team up today. Captain Anthony O’Connor was moved to Right Back as Greg Leigh took his usual Left Back berth whilst Ousmane Fané and Rhys Bennett played across the middle at the back with Jacob Bedeau.

And right from the off, it was All Hands To The Pump for Morecambe as the visitors opened brightly and played some neat, progressive football on a soft surface on which players of both teams kept losing their footing during the first half in particular. Man of the Match Trevor Carson was busy throughout the game and pulled-off some simply superb saves this afternoon. At the other end of the pitch, Opposite Number Christian Walton had virtually nothing to do in the first half – and no saves to make. Cole the Goal was out of sorts today and Jonah Ayunga huffed and puffed but had little impact on the match.

For the visitors, the tricky Tyreeq Bakinson found James Norwood with a perfect lofted pass after about ten minutes but the latter completely missed the target. Efforts from Sone Aluko were then well blocked by a very committed home defence after both eighteen and twenty-five minutes. Three minutes later, a curling shot from Sam Morsy was brilliantly saved by the home goalkeeper at full stretch. About half an hour had been played when Bakinson found a different team-mate with another sublime pass. This time, Macaukley Bonne missed with a header. Then Bakinson tried his luck himself with a shot from about twenty yards out which Carson did really well to save low to his right.

So that was it for the first half. Ipswich – with a lot of traffic coming through both Bakinson and impressive Captain Morsy in midfield – were undoubtedly the dominant side. But Morecambe – for almost the first time this season – looked organised,  solid and  resolute at the back.

The second half followed a similar pattern to the first. Town had most of the ball and the hosts were on the back foot most of the time with Trevor Carson still performing the occasional miraculous save to keep the visitors out. He made his first of the second period after almost an hour from Bonne’s powerful long-distance strike. He pushed a really fierce shot away from his top corner when the net seemed to be about to bulge. But – in a typical Soak Up The Pressure and Hit On the Break classic Derek Adams’ move – the hosts took the lead right on the hour itself.

Derek had sent both Aaron Wildig and Adam Phillips on as substitutes at half time.

Under Stephen Robinson’s regime, Phillips didn’t have a single effective game for the club and Wildig was injured most of the time. Last season, though, these two players combined well (before Phillips defected to Accrington Stanley) to contribute significantly to the eventual promotion of the team. Today, they did it again. Adam was fed the ball on the Shrimps’ right and looked-up before sending over a lovely cross which Aaron headed home at the far post with a perfectly-judged header.

After this, visiting goalkeeper Walton was rarely tested and the match was played largely in the home half – as it had been most of the time until this point. A combination of defensive determination, luck and Trevor Carson kept Ipswich out, despite their domination of possession and attempt after attempt on the home goal. I was personally still holding my breath in the eighty-sixth minute and hoping for the three points which would push us out of the relegation zone when the visitors eventually got the equaliser which nobody could begrudge them. This time, Carson was finally beaten when – following ping-pong in the home penalty area, Wes Burns managed to slot a shot from the centre of the box past a despairing home goalkeeper into the corner of the target. The massed ranks of visiting supporters behind his goal went mad – and why not? It’s a hell of a long way to travel – and I just hope that the catering they encountered generally in north Lancashire whilst they were here was up to their Manager’s clearly very exacting standards.

The visitors could have won it even at this late stage of the game as Janoi Donacien’s fierce strike was again miraculously kept-out by Carson right at the death but the game finally ended one goal each.

Derek Adams was honest enough to admit afterwards that Ipswich had lots of opportunities to win this afternoon and conceded that “Just to get a point today – we have to be happy with that.”

Town’s Manager bemoaned his team’s bad luck and said that Morecambe offered `nothing’ in the first half. This is true. But at least his team didn’t lose – and they came perilously close to doing so. As a result, the Tractor Boys remained in ninth position in League One. Morecambe also remain where they were before the game – very obstinately stuck in twenty-first place.

With Crewe and improving Gillingham both winning away from home today, the jeopardy at the bottom of the Division was far more evenly spread this evening than it had been earlier in the day.

But it could have been worse. A Stephen Robinson team would have lost this fixture for sure: Ipswich would have certainly overrun the defence he had assembled, probably time and time again. Robbo would then perform the Parrot/Broken Record routine which he has indulged in all season by saying that mistakes at the back need to be eliminated.

North of the Border, his new employers saw him preside over a home defeat against Hearts, 0-2. I suspect that mistakes at the back need to be eliminated.

No further comment required.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C): 5 Jacob Bedeau; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 17 Jonah Ayunga (18 Adam Phillips 45’); 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney (10 Aaron Wildig 45’); 27 Ousmane Fané; 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 11 Dylan Connolly 14 Jonathan Obika; 22 Liam Gibson; 28 Courtney Duffus.

Ipswich Town: 28 Christian Walton; 5 George Edmundson; 6 Luke Wolfenden; 7 Wes Burns; 10 James Norwood (21 Conor Chaplin 68’); 12 Tyreeq Bakinson (Y); 18 Macaukley Bonne (Y) (19 Kayden Jackson 68’); 22 Dominic Thompson; 23 Sone Aluko (43 Bersant Celina 68’); 44 Janoi Donacien; 55 Sam Morsy (C).

Subs Not Used:  31 Vaclav Hladky; 9 Joe Pigott; 18 Macauley Bonne; 25 Tom Carroll; 26 Cameron Burgess.

Ref: Matt Donohue.

 Att: 4,928  (Including a quite amazing 1,270 perfectly behaved away fans.)

Down at Ply-mouth…

Last Tuesday, an idiot whose name I will not dignify with a mention on these pages appeared in front of Lancaster Magistrates charged with disorder when he ran onto the field at the Mazuma Stadium during Bolton Wanderers’ recent visit to Morecambe. I mention this here because – if you relied for your information about what happens in our region on the local TV news – you would have heard nothing about this latest development in the ongoing saga as far as the things that happened on the day is concerned. Finding out what happened to this moron and what sentence he received has proved impossible to discover: local papers in both Bolton and north Lancashire haven’t mentioned the trial; I can’t find the result in the local Court Records and local media have equally ignored it. In the greater scheme of things – and we need to look no further than the appalling situation in Ukraine – this may seem like a trivial matter. But the fact remains that – whilst the media in general were quick to pick-up on the Bolton Manager’s totally unsupported allegations of racist abuse by Shrimps’ fans on the day – the disorder caused by visiting hooligans which occurred inside and outside the stadium in January has barely merited a mention. But let’s move on…

Morecambe made the longest League One trip of their season to Devon today to face a Plymouth Argyle team which was at the top of League One earlier in the season. Then, their Manager was Ryan Lowe, who returned to the North when Preston offered him the vacant Boss’ position in early December of last year. Mr Lowe’s greatest achievement whilst in Devon was to take Argyle from the bottom Division of the EFL to League One for the second time in three years.

Since he left, this has been a topsy-turvy season for the Pilgrims. Today, the man who had taken them into the old Third Division before Ryan Lowe replaced him – Derek Adams – returned to his former club. Most of their fans still love the Scotsman and I think it’s true to say that nearly all Morecambe fans do too. Derek left the club only when he had succeeded in the `project’ he had committed himself to – promotion – was achieved last season. He could have left earlier in exactly the same way that his successor – Stephen Robinson – actually has done. Dundee would have taken him shortly after he arrived in north Lancashire. Bradford City wanted him to abandon Morecambe months before he actually left. So I am personally delighted – for what it’s worth – that Derek chose to return to a club where he has been the most successful Manager ever rather than take opportunities elsewhere.

As for today’s opponents, Plymouth have suffered a dip in form during recent times. In their last five League One matches, they have lost their previous two – last Saturday at home against leaders Rotherham United and the one before that at Cambridge. Prior to that, they were on a tremendous run of form which saw them win three games in a row. Today, they had fallen out of the Play-Off positions to eighth place in the table.

In previous encounters, Morecambe have struggled against the Devon club. They have lost seven of fourteen EFL matches and won only three. In October, the Pilgrims escaped from the Mazuma Stadium with a 1-1 draw against Stephen Robinson’s men. Now – with Derek Adams saddled with his predecessor’s squad until the end of the season whether he likes it or not – The Shrimps really could not afford to lose. Derek said before the game about this particular issue:

“We’ve got to assess the squad and, though I know some of the players already here, some of them weren’t here before. I think it’s important, when you come to a club, that you don’t make early judgements on players because it’s important every player is given that opportunity and I’ll be looking at what I’ve got.”

As far as his previous employers are concerned, he added:

“Plymouth have done very well this season. They are an excellent football club, who are run very well, and they are trying to push into the promotion places. They have got a lot of good players in their squad but we have to approach the game by going to try and win it. We need the win as much as Plymouth need the win at this moment in time, so it should be a game where it’s quite open and end-to-end at times. At this stage of the season, you’re trying to get the three points whether, in Plymouth’s case, they’re trying to reach the play-offs or, in our case, trying to get away from the bottom four to climb the table.”

Because of an unspecified illness within the camp, Derek had Toumani Diagouraga, Greg Leigh and Aaron Wildig all missing from the line-up from his first game back in Morecambe last Saturday. He chose Liam Gibson, Dylan Connelly and Alfie McCalmont – who have presumably impressed him in training this week – to start today instead and added Arthur Gnahoua to a substitutes’ bench to which Jonah Ayunga was relegated.

His Opposite Number, Steven Schumacher – who rejected the offer to join PNE with his previous boss in order to take up the Managerial reins at Home Park – said about today’s clash:

“We’re really looking forward to it. It’s a good chance for us to hopefully pick up some points. I felt the performance last week against Rotherham was really good; we just didn’t get the result we wanted. But the players are excited for the challenge against Morecambe. Hopefully, it’s a big crowd again and we put on a good performance.

They’re always a tough team to face. We had a real tough game earlier in the season when Steven Robinson was in charge. Now Derek’s gone back there, it’ll be no different. They had a good result at the weekend against Ipswich. We know what they’re all about, when Derek had them in League Two they were well organised. They were quite direct as a team with structure behind it and were good on the counterattack so we’re expecting something of the same. We need to be on our best with the ball and not be careless with it to stop those counter-attacks and try and be patient and break them down. If we get an opportunity – if we get as many opportunities as we did last Saturday – then hopefully we’ll take one.”

It was sunny on the south coast of Britain today although deceptively cold in the shadows. Both sides Took the Knee as the game kicked-off on an immaculate Home Park surface. Argyle were soon on the attack and won the first corner of the game after four minutes. The ball was played short to Conor Grant, whose cross was struck sweetly on the volley by Pilgrims’ Captain Joe Edwards only for the visiting goalkeeper to deny him with a superb save with his fists. Then Cole Stockton tried his luck with a lob which missed the target after seven minutes but the Referee pulled play back for a foul by Morecambe’s leading scorer earlier in the move. Only fourteen minutes had been played when Broom got away on the Plymouth right and sent over a perfect cross which Grant headed home by guiding the ball back across the goal. Trevor Carson – playing on his thirty-fourth birthday today – had no chance. Almost straight from kick-off, Dylan Connolly was fed by Cole the Goal – who, in turn, had received a lovely weighted ball from Shane McLoughlin – and would have equalised were it not for a really good save by Michael Cooper. Plymouth were asking nearly all the questions, though and using the full width of the pitch throughout the first period. They were noticeably trying to play the ball on the deck rather than hoofing it up the field and Connolly got a ticking-off from the Referee after a late, clumsy challenge on the impressive Broom with about twenty-four minutes on the clock. As the wind started to gust quite strongly at times, the visitors were offering little offensively and even when they did, the Pilgrims continued to play constructively every time they won the ball back and constantly sought to probe on both flanks. However, Cole set-up Dylan with just over half an hour played but Plymouth managed to clear the ball for a corner which came to nothing. Almost forty minutes had been played when good play from Adam Phillips set-up a chance for Stockton – who had his back to goal – to make one of his trade-mark turns and send a ball across the Plymouth box which nobody in a red shirt was quite able to get on the end of – despite the best efforts of Alfie McCalmont at full stretch. . It looked as if the Shrimps might be able to hold on to a one-goal deficit until half time but with just four minutes left to the break, a cross from Mayor on the Plymouth left received the slightest touch from leading scorer Ryan Hardie’s head, caught Carson completely flat-footed and settled in the corner of the Birthday Boy’s net. 

It was thus a familiar story at half time as far as this season has been concerned: Morecambe struggling away from home and looking lightweight up-front into the bargain.

They upped their game in the second half, though. The visitors started to press the home defence right at the beginning of the second period and after 56 minutes, Phillips forced a tremendous save from home custodian Michael Cooper in response to a powerful strike from about 25 yards. But it wasn’t one-way traffic. With 64 minutes on the clock, Hardie only just missed the target with a Cole Stockton-like turn and shot which went just over the bar. But Morecambe could have reduced the arrears after sixty-seven minutes when Connolly found substitute Jon Obika whose instant shot was only just too high. They came even closer eleven minutes later when Cooper excelled himself to keep out a header from Morecambe Skipper Anthony O’Connor, who had arrived on the end of a Phillips’ cross after a corner kick had been cleared by the home defence. But – try as they might – the visitors were just unable to penetrate the Argyle defence today and ended-up losing the game two-nil.

Having said that, Morecambe upped their game considerably in the second half and at least made a match of it by the end. Plymouth are a good side and to lose to them is no disgrace. Results elsewhere – with Fleetwood, Crewe and Gillingham all being defeated at home and AFC Wimbledon losing and Doncaster being hammered away – meant that the Shrimps remained stubbornly in twenty-first place in League One tonight. Despite their victory, Argyle remained in eighth position in the table.

It could be worse though: we could be fans of St Mirren instead. Today, they lost their third game in a row in the Scottish Premiership – and their third successive game under Stephen Robinson’s Management as well. This time, another of our current Manager’s former clubs – Ross County – beat them by the only goal of the game. Before Robbo arrived, the club had lost only seven of 28 games – a loss rate of 25%. Now it’s 100% with three games played and not a single goal scored. This is the transformation that Mr Robinson has brought to his new club.

Anybody missing him?

Plymouth Argyle: 1 Michael Cooper; 2 James Bolton; 3 Macaulay Gillesphey; 4 Jordan Houghton (20 Adam Randell 82’); 5 James Wilson; 7 Ryan Broom; 8 Joe Edwards (C); 9 Ryan Hardie (14 Jordon Garrick 79’); 10 Danny Mayor; 15 Conor Grant; 31 Luke Jephcott (11 Niall Ennis 65’).

Subs Not Used:   25 Callum Burton; 17 Steven Sessegnon; 25 Callum Burton; 28 Panutche Pereira Camará; 33 Romoney Crichlow.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C) (Y); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 9 Cole Stockton (14 Jonathan Obika 59’); 11 Dylan Connolly (Y) (17 Jonah Ayunga 88’); 18 Adam Phillips; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Liam Gibson; 25 Alfie McCalmont; 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 28 Courtney Duffus; 27 Ousmane Fané. 

Ref: Alan Young.

Att: 12,288  (122 from Morecambe).

Bolton Wanderers – Do the Ends Justify The Means? – Discuss…

I’m not very keen on Bolton Wanderers to be perfectly honest.

There it is – I’ve admitted it.

They are cheats. They cheated last season in the penultimate game of Morecambe’s League Two season as Oladapo Afolayan winked at his team-mates to say `Job Done!” as the alleged perpetrator  of the `foul’ on him –  Kelvin Mellor – was sent-off after just 23 minutes. Morecambe’s Manager, Derek Adams, made his displeasure about this development very well-known at the time.

Bolton, though, were promoted as a direct result of what happened. Against a ten-man team, they won 0-1. Morecambe, on the other hand, had to endure the ordeal of the Play-Offs to join them in League One this season.

Tonight’s game should have been played last Boxing Day. But Bolton mysteriously were unable to raise enough fit players out of one of the biggest squads in League One to fulfil the fixture. A cynic might suggest that the fact that key players would be unable to play on the day had more influence on the decision to postpone it than following the rules in place at the time concerning Coronavirus and whatnot. Whatever, a lot has happened in the meantime…

There was already No Love Lost when Stephen Robinson’s Shrimps hosted The Trotters at the Mazuma Stadium in February. By the 76^th minute, Bolton were behind, had seen one of their number sent off and were being overrun. At the Away End, new Morecambe goalkeeper Adam Smith – on his debut – was struck by objects thrown at him from the massed Trotters’ ranks behind him.

In his head at this moment, Bolton Boss Ian Evatt must have been fearing that his team was heading towards defeat on the field. Off it, he must have also foreseen the potential of sanctions being taken against his club as the Referee made a note of the missile-throwing incident.

What should he do? Go onto the Back Foot and take the defeat on the chin? Have the backbone – as a Role Model for Bolton fans – to criticise the behaviour of a minority of their number for unacceptable behaviour towards the end of the game?

It is a matter of record that he didn’t – even though several of their alleged `supporters’ ran onto the field once the game was stopped as Shrimps’ fans looked on and commendably did nothing to react.

Instead, Ian Evatt chose to go onto the Front Foot and completely ignore what had already happened. He has a right to do so. He also had a right to spin a different version of events which everyone who was present at the match saw with their own eyes. He had a right to claim – instead – that Morecambe fans had abused one of his substitutes in a racist manner. Some people would see it as actually clever of him to get the game abandoned for a while as a result – and then go on to take advantage of the loss of momentum by the home team to undeservedly equalise late into the game.  

I don’t think it’s clever, personally: to me, it is blatant gamesmanship of the worst imaginable sort. It is cheating. But this is what Mr Evatt does. He told the BBC after the last meeting between the clubs that there had been a `barrage’ of abuse from directly behind the dugout `from minute one’ and throughout the proceedings. He claimed: “The racism is absolutely appalling. There were eighty-nine minutes of constant abuse before that.” Strangely, there is no evidence to support what he has claimed – either on video or audio. On the contrary, Lancashire Constabulary commented about an element of other claims made by the Bolton Manager just over a week ago: “We are aware that there has been an image circulated on social media of a Bolton player interacting with a man and women in the seats directly behind the Bolton bench. We would like to state that at this stage of the investigation, there is no evidence that has come to light thus far that these individuals have been involved in the racially aggravated public order (offence).”

As we’ve already noted though – this is what Ian Evatt does. He was at it again when his team lost away from home subsequent to the pitch invasion and violence by away `supporters’ at Morecambe. The Bolton News tells us:

“WANDERERS’ complaint against referee Sebastian Stockbridge looks unlikely to progress any further. Ian Evatt maintained after Saturday’s 2-0 defeat at MK Dons that he had been unhappy with something said by the Tyne and Wear official during the game. The Bolton boss refused to go into specifics but claimed at the time that the comment had been heard by the fourth official and that Stockbridge had apologised during the half time break. Nevertheless, Wanderers have yet to escalate the matter at time of writing and have declined to comment further.”

Why not? Former Premier League and FIFA referee Keith Hackett almost certainly provides the answer:

“What that manager has got to have is proof of what that referee has said. Without proof, nothing will happen.”

 And – guess what? – nothing has happened. Nothing will happen, either.

In his pre-match package on the Bolton website yesterday, Ian Evatt was given a cop-out by the interviewer who said of the controversy surrounding their game at Morecambe in February: “We know what happened there; that’s been dealt with – it’s a clean slate so let’s concentrate on the football”.  None of this is true – we don’t know what happened precisely because the police among others are still trying to establish the actual facts. However, Mr Evatt took the cue to avoid saying anything that might embarrass himself further with this response:

“I’ve got no interest in discussing what happened at Morecambe; my focus is on my team and performance tomorrow night to get three points.”

And that was that.

All this leaves a really bad taste in the mouth – the Bolton Manager seems to be an expert in making unspecified and unsupported accusations against third parties in adversity – but pathetically weak in terms of either justifying them or following them up once the heat of the moment has been replaced by a cooling-off period.

But some things are far more important than football, however despicable some practitioners of its Dark Arts might be. In Bolton, there is a significant Ukrainian community. A spokesman from the Bolton Ukrainian Cultural Centre has gone on record to say:

“The Ukrainian community is delighted and thankful for the response from Bolton Wanderers. The club has a tradition of family values and the situation with families in the Ukraine is dire. We want to be in solidarity with Ukrainians in our community at this time. We are one club, one community, one town. We’re all together. Our thoughts and prayers are with all those affected at this difficult time. All our support from our local club, and its fans, is very much appreciated.”

Tonight, there was rare unanimity between both sides of supporters as everyone in the stadium stood to applaud representatives of the Bolton Ukrainian Cultural Centre and the Association of Ukrainians in Great Britain prior to the start of the game. They would have probably preferred a No Fly Zone over their country but our own and other allegedly `advanced’ countries have clearly decided that having Ukraine and its population bombed potentially out of existence altogether is preferable to calling Vladimir Putin’s bluff about World War Three.

Anyway – Morecambe have played the Trotters just three times previously. Bolton have won one and drawn two of them. In each game, a player has been sent off: one from Morecambe so far and two from the Trotters. So would tonight’s match break the mould and end with a full complement of players still on the pitch?

Prior to the game, Wanderers were eleventh in League One, having won three and lost two of their last five games , winning away at seemingly doomed ten-man Gillingham by three goals to nil last Saturday.

Morecambe started the game on the back of one loss and a draw in Derek Adam’s second spell at the helm of the north Lancashire club. They remain stubbornly stuck in 21^st position in League One – which had been departing Manager Stephen Robinson’s legacy to be remembered by. Derek said:

“We obviously need three points. We have got to pick up a good number of wins between now and the end of the season to make us safe. There are two teams above us that we think we can catch. Could we catch a third team above us in Lincoln City? It is a possibility. We can only do that by winning football matches. We have to look at ourselves but we are obviously helped by other results in the league. We are looking to win the game and hope that the teams above us lose to jump those places above them.” 

As far as tonight’s opponents are concerned, he was generous enough to add:

“What I have seen of them, they are a very, very good team. They pass the ball well, their rotation is excellent and the way that they push the wing-backs; I think one of them ended up as a centre-forward in the last game. That just shows the freedom they have got to go and play, they have done that very well and they are obviously high in confidence. They have got a really good squad and they are trying hard to push into those promotion places. They have been on an excellent run and we understand how difficult this game will be.”

Under a very dark sky and in freezing conditions, it was soon all too obvious how difficult this game really was going to be for the visitors.

Right from the off, the men in the yellow strip went onto the front foot and pressed the visitors back into their own half. The statistics for the first period tell most of the story: Bolton enjoyed 80% of the possession; had 24 shots altogether to the visitors’ four and thirteen corner kicks to Morecambe’s single one.

But what really mattered was the shots on target: Bolton had four and the Shrimps had three. The first of these, though, was also the first real chance of the game. After just three minutes, tricky and very nippy winger Dylan Connolly was fed by Adam Phillips to be one-on-one with home custodian James Trafford as he bore down on him just to the right of centre from his point of view. Dylan should have buried the ball but he allowed Trafford to make a save instead.

This was right at the start of the half. By the end of it, Phillips was again instrumental in playing the ball across the Wanderers’ area to an unmarked Cole Stockton, who promptly clocked his twentieth League One goal of the season. In the interim, the Trotters could have conceivable gone four up. After seven minutes, good approach play set-up Dion Charles for a shot which he curled away from the target from twelve yards out. Four minutes later, Trevor Carson did well to hold onto a header by Amadou Bakayoko. The hosts came closer still when Charles’ powerful shot bounced off Carson’s crossbar with the goalkeeper beaten and eighteen minutes on the clock. The pattern of the game was thus set early on: Bolton attacked; Morecambe defended and Referee Christopher Sarginson indulged the diving and feigning injury which Bolton predictably indulged in right from the first minute. Marlon Fossey was the worse cheat in a Trotters’ shirt this evening and constantly fell over or dived as the utterly clueless Referee gave a free kick every time he did so. Morecambe Manager Derek Adams appeared to be pushed by his much larger Opposite Number with just over half an hour played as he attempted to protest against the one-sided officiating by the Man in the Middle. What happened? Sarginson booked our Manager. But he seemed to be afraid of Ian Evatt because he got away with it scot-free. Again.

By the end of the match, there were four Shrimps’ players’ names in his little book. How many from Bolton? Not one. Yes, I admit I’m totally biased – but the referee’s performance tonight was completely one-sided and wholly unacceptable.

Right at the beginning of the second half, huge Bolton Centre-Half Ricardo Almeida Santos clearly brought-down Dylan Connolly with a crude sliding challenge which went right through Morecambe’s diminutive Number Eleven. A clearer penalty could not be more obvious. But the incompetent in the middle again inexplicably waved play-on. There’s not a lot more to say. Bolton still dominated the possession in the second half and their players regularly dived and rolled about as if pole-axed whilst the man with the whistle effectively encouraged them to keep doing so by never penalising any of the play-acting or blatant cheating.

The ground was emptying of home supporters long before the end as it seemed that the increasingly effective rear-guard action by the Shrimps was going to reward them with three points. But it was not to be. In the third minute of injury time, Jón Dadi Bövarsson scored a barely-deserved equaliser for the hosts.

There were a lot of positives – and one negative – to be taken out of this game tonight. The negative is that Aaron Wildig twisted his ankle early on and had to be taken off after just over twenty minutes. The positives are how well the team played defensively as a unit but also struck on the break. Dylan Connolly had by far his best game for the club so far tonight. And as for Adam Phillips… He is a changed man since mentor Derek Adams returned to the club and his performance tonight – committed; brave and skilful – made him my Man of the Match at least. Well done sir.

After the game, the Morecambe Manager chose his words very carefully as he said that the Referee has a history of missing big moments in games – citing when a Plymouth ball boy was pushed off the field by a Leyton Orient player who remained on the pitch despite doing it in the past – and questioned why so many of his players were booked tonight when the behaviour of Bolton players was at times worse for all to see. He added:

“We’ve had a stonewall penalty kick not given at 1-0. I think the referee has to see that it is a penalty. I don’t know if they thought they had to send the player off because he was sliding in. It’s a really bad challenge from their player. Connolly is in full momentum, takes the ball past him and gets wiped out. I don’t understand why the penalty hasn’t been given. We played well tonight and dominated a team who’d won five on the bounce. For long spells we didn’t even let them near our goal. I thought Bolton Wanderers got a lot of decisions going their way for whatever reason. We had a lot of players booked tonight. One of their players on the far side of the pitch actually threw the ball towards – even though he had the ball in his hands – towards one of our players’ faces and pulls it back – and nothing happens. That is a booking. I think that tonight was very disappointing.”

As for Ian Evatt – who cares what he says or thinks about anything?

In the ninetieth minute tonight, Morecambe were nineteenth in League One. Three minutes later, they had dropped back again into the twenty-first position that they just don’t seem to be able to shake-off. However – with rivals Crewe, Lincoln, AFC Wimbledon and Fleetwood all losing this evening – their place among The Damned improved at least a little bit.

Bolton Wanderers: 19 James Trafford; 3 Declan John; 4 MJ Williams (22 Keiran Sadlier 66’); 5 Ricardo Almeida Santos (C); 6 George Johnston; 10 Dion Charles; 11 Amadou Bakayoko (9 Jón Dadi Bövarsson 71’); 13 Marlon Fossey; 15 Will Aimson; 16 Aaron Morley; 17 Oladapo Afolayan (14 Xavier Amaechi 82’).

Subs Not Used:  12 Joel Dixon; 25 George Thomason; 27 Alex Baptiste; 29 Liam Gordon.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau (Y); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton (Y); 10 Aaron Wildig (27 Ousmane Fané 13’); 11 Dylan Connolly (Y); 18 Adam Phillips; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 22 Liam Gibson (Y) (3 Greg Leigh 45’); 31 Rhys Bennett (21 Ryan Cooney 64’).

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 14 Jonathan Obika; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 25 Alfie McCalmont; 28 Courtney Duffus. 

Ref: Christopher Sarginson.

Att: 14,559 ( 885 from Morecambe).

Morecambe Duffed-Up by Cheltenham Town.

Before we go any further, I would like to add some more information to my last report about Morecambe’s draw at Bolton last Tuesday night.

I mentioned that our Manager was pushed by the appalling Ian Evatt about half an hour into the game. Although the irony in what he said would certainly be lost on him, the Neanderthal which is the Bolton Manager justified pushing – sorry; `handling’ – his Opposite Number by saying:

“I won’t stand for anybody handling my players”.

Have a look at this clip and make your own minds up about who `handled’ who and whether or not Derek Adams actually laid a hand on anybody, let alone anyone wearing a yellow strip:

https://fanbanter.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/QCnyXur-sZECGngd.mp4?_=1

Double standard – or just another deliberate lie?

How does this big Oik continually get away with this sort of behaviour? He does it because the officials at far too many EFL games are intimidated by his bullying manner and very aggressive approach to them. But Oikish behaviour seems to be all the rage currently…

I am indebted to one of my spies who provided the result of the trial of the Bolton-supporting clod who ran onto the hallowed pitch at the Mazuma Stadium which I couldn’t track-down after Bolton came to town last month. The first part of the quote is from the Manchester Evening News; the second part are his own words which I can’t improve upon:

“After pleading guilty to going onto the playing area without lawful authority or excuse, (the 29-year old Oik) of Worsley was given a conditional discharge at Lancaster Magistrates Court.

Just one fan in court, given a slap on the wrist and sent home!! So much for punishing crowd disorder.”

I might return to the ongoing fall-out from what happened on the day when Bolton came to town if only to balance the utterly unjustified `racist’ accusations which have been heaped on our club by the media in general ever since. 

As I came away from their ground last Tuesday, large numbers of police piled-in to prevent violence between our own contingent and Bolton regulars who accused us in general of being `Effing Racists!”

The attempted argy-bargy is entirely the responsibility of the idiots who came out with this nonsense and then attempted to behave in the way they did. The question must be asked, though: would they have done this if their numbskull of a Manager hadn’t created the storm in a teacup he chose to create a few short weeks ago in Morecambe?

I promise not to mention this man or the club he is in charge of again this season.

He – at least – is simply not worth it.

I also promise not to mention Stephen Robinson on these pages again either. He probably is worth it to be honest – at least Robbo is not a thug or a bully after all – but it’s probably time for us all to move on…

Cheltenham Town arrived at what their website describes as the `Manzuma Stadium’ in north Lancashire today occupying fourteenth position in League One. Michael Duff’s team had lost two of their previous league games and won just one. In their previous 25 meetings with the Shrimps, the Robins had won eleven and lost seven. Mr Duff had this to say prior to their latest meeting:

“They are a really hard team to beat. They proved it last year – they beat us twice last year. It’s a tough place to go and we’ve just been on a winless run as well and we didn’t think we were doing that bad. They’re very similar. They haven’t just managed to nick (a win). They know where they are in the table, we’re getting down to single figures (of games left to play) after Saturday so they’ll be fighting and scrapping. They’ve got quality as well. They’re quite happy to give the ball up but they get the ball into Cole Stockton who has obviously been the platform and they get really good runners off him. They are fighting for each other; they are fighting for the manager; they are fighting for the club to stay in this League. There are people running around doing the hard work and it is going to be a really tough game so it’s important that we prepare right and prepare for what is going to come at us.

For the hosts, Derek Adams reflected on how things have gone since his return to the club and concluded:

“I’ve obviously been in for three games now. We’ve had two draws and a defeat. From the squad, we tried to change it about a bit and what I’ve seen from the ones that have played; they’ve had that fighting spirit. They’ve had to show that in the last three games they’ve played in. Come Tuesday night against Bolton Wanderers they did that in abundance and were unfortunate not to have taken the maximum points.”

As far as today’s visitors are concerned, he added:

“Cheltenham have done really well this season. (They were) promoted with us last year and they’ve been able to pick up some really good points. They’re nearly safe now and we’ve got to try and win this game to try and leapfrog the teams above us. There’s still clubs below us that are involved in the fight to get out the relegation zone. There might be one more club that comes into it (although) that might be highly unlikely. There are still a few clubs that can get to safety.”  

Cheltenham started the game without the services of regulars Conor Thomas, Charlie Brown and Dan Nlundulu, who are all injured.  George Lloyd – returning from the treatment room – was named on the bench today. For the Shrimps, Aaron Wildig was unavailable after his ankle injury at Bolton. Derek re-organised his defence as well, with Jacob Bedeau playing Centre Half with Greg Leigh to his left; Anthony O’Connor to his right and Liam Gibson pushed slightly further forwards.

It had been wet and windy at times in North Lancashire earlier but by three o’clock, the sun had come out and it was quite mild with it. There was a minutes’ applause prior to kick-off to jointly remember record Shrimps’ goal-scorer Keith Borrowdale and also to make at least a nod to the people of Ukraine and their current appalling plight. The home programme had a yellow and blue cover today and the scoreboard also sported the Ukrainian national colours throughout the match.

The visitors – in a Royal Blue strip with white socks – immediately went onto the attack. They could and probably should have scored within three minutes when – following snappy and precise approach play – Andy Williams headed the ball perfectly to set-up Leicester City loanee Callum Wright for a shot which he steered wide when he should have at least hit the target. Wright did better after 28 minutes though – but Trevor Carson gathered his shot quite comfortably in the home goal. There were a couple of wild efforts from both sides – Cole the Goal Stockton later managed to blast the ball right out of the ground to get an even higher trajectory than Andy Williams had managed with a wild shot after just over half an hour. The two teams looked quite well matched with both of them playing some stuff that was nice on the eye at times. But just as the game seemed to be heading for a stalemate at half time, Liam Sercombe took a speculative shot after 44 minutes which took a wicked deflection off Jacob Bedeau and looped over a stranded and helpless home goalkeeper. It was a bit of a fluke – but they all count.

So all Morecambe fans were hoping for a quick goal once the game restarted for the second half. There was one – but – very sadly from our point of view, it was scored by the other side. Almost immediately, a throw defined by Sean Long’s surname was flicked on by Robins’ Skipper Will Boyle to Elliot Bonds, whose instant shot was well-saved by Carson. Unfortunately for the Shrimps, Wright was quickest to react to the Second Ball and he smashed it home to increase Cheltenham’s lead to two goals.

Morecambe played their best football of the game for about twenty minutes after this. There was a melee in the visitors’ penalty area after fifty minutes. At least two shots were cleared off the line and it seemed inevitable that Morecambe would score as the visitors were at Panic Stations – but the ball just wouldn’t go in.   But just two minutes later – as the Robins remained totally disorganised at the back – the goal was peppered again and this time Greg Leigh was able to force a low ball from Cole the Goal on the Morecambe right over the line from very close range to reduce the arrears to just one goal.

At this juncture, the visitors had been playing for time for quite a while. I suppose that nobody can really blame any football team in the position that they found themselves from doing so – it is up to the Referee to stop it. But officious and incompetent Andrew Kitchen didn’t. Owen Evans in the away goal single-handedly wasted at least seven minutes this afternoon – from being corpse-like in his own penalty area in the fifty-fifth minute, for instance, he was obviously miraculously able to carry-on totally unaffected a little while later. By play-acting in the way he did, however, he caused a break in play lasting perhaps three minutes when Morecambe were clearly on top and an equaliser seemed only a matter of time. Referee Kitchen should have booked him for time-wasting at every goal and free-kick which he took subsequently. But he didn’t. When a Cheltenham player put his arm right across Shane McLoughlin’s throat as he broke away later in the play, the Referee didn’t even give a foul, let alone the Yellow Card which should have been issued. Similarly, when substitute Jonah Ayunga was tripped by the corner flag almost as soon as he came on, the Man in Black didn’t penalise the Cheltenham offender either. Possibly the most contentious decision the Referee failed to give arrived just two minutes after Morecambe had reduced the arrears. Charlie Raglan clearly upended Connolly in the Robins’ penalty area – but once again, the Referee took no action.

The nearest the hosts came to equalising was in the sixty-fourth minute, when a corner fell to Adam Phillips; his shot was deflected to Cole Stockton and he hit the underside of the bar with a fierce shot which Evans was miles away from.  It wouldn’t have counted if it had gone in, though – the Goal Machine was off-side. Derek Adams went for broke by sending on both Ayunga and Jonathan Obika in the second half; sacrificing Liam Gibson and Alfie McCalmont to do so.

The gamble didn’t work. Cheltenham had already created a couple of chances – as Carson saved well from Andy Williams after almost an hour, having made a mistake to give him the chance in the first place just beforehand. Shortly afterwards, League One EFL Player of the Month Alfie May – who was a real handful for the Shrimps’ defence throughout the game – tried and failed to lob the home custodian. At the other end, Cole the Goal forced an excellent save from Evans at the cost of a corner with seventy minutes on the clock. But the man who was leading the line for the other side made no mistake with just ten minutes left. The Long Throw reached Wright, whose scuffed shot was blocked. But the ball fell to May and he fairly walloped it home to put the result beyond doubt.

Cheltenham was the better team this afternoon. A bit more luck and a better Referee might have affected the result slightly but I thought that the visitors had just a bit too much nous for our lads today. The win meant that the Robins remained in lucky Thirteenth position in League One tonight. Most of Morecambe’s rivals for The Drop also lost. Unfortunately, one of these was Doncaster, who were defeated at home by Gillingham. The three points pushed the Gills into the Twenty-First position hogged by the Shrimps for several weeks now; one point better-off than us. Derek Adams summed-up what had happened after the game thus:

“I think that over the game, we had some really good opportunities; we did give it a go. But we can’t concede the goals that were conceded. That’s a huge problem and it has been throughout the season. We have to be more solid (and) we had been against the likes of Plymouth Argyle, Bolton and Ipswich. But today, they were really soft goals that we lost.”

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 11 Dylan Connolly; 18 Adam Phillips; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 22 Liam Gibson (17 Jonah Ayunga 76’); 25 Alfie McCalmont (14 Jonathan Obika 52’).

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 16 Jacob Mensah; 21 Ryan Cooney; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 27 Ousmane Fané.

Cheltenham: 1 Owen Evans; 2 Sean Long; 5 Charlie Raglan; 8 Liam Sercombe; 10 Alfie May; 14 Andy Williams (19 George Lloyd 84’); 15 William Boyle (C); 16 Callum Wright; 17 Matty Blair; 23 Elliot Bonds (Y) (40 Charlie Colkett 60’); 28 Ben Williams (6 Lewis Freestone 84’).

Subs Not Used:  20 Scott Flinders; 4 Mattie Pollock; 11 Ellis Chapman; 27 Aaron Ramsey.

Ref: Andrew Kitchen.

Att: 3,733 (199 from Cheltenham).

MORECAMBE DROWN IN MONTGOMERY WATERS

Morecambe should have played Shrewsbury Town on Saturday, February 19^th last but couldn’t because The Montgomery Waters New Meadow was waterlogged. Many fans who had travelled visited Chester City instead – a gesture which was greatly appreciated by the Cheshire club. This is the preamble I wrote for the game at the time – and it’s extraordinary to see how much things can change in just a very few weeks:

“Morecambe travelled to Shrewsbury today for a potentially crucial League One fixture which could drastically affect both clubs’ fortunes in the Division. The Shrews started the game in eighteenth position in the league, on the same number of games played as their opponents this afternoon but with four more points in the bag. They haven’t won even one of their last five games and lost at Plymouth last Saturday after drawing their previous four matches. The Shrimps’ recent form is even worse: three fixtures drawn and two lost out of their last five league games. Previously, Morecambe have played Town fifteen times in all competitions. They have lost seven of these but won five; most recently when they defeated the Shropshire club 2-0 at the Maz last August. Another win tonight would totally transform their prospects near the bottom of League One. A draw wouldn’t really help things a lot – and a loss really wouldn’t bear thinking about. So there was a lot of pressure on a team which constantly blows hot and cold to play on the front foot and go for a victory.

Manager Stephen Robinson said this prior to the game:

“Shrewsbury is an opportunity for us. We have beaten them at home: they are a big, strong, physical side who put a lot of balls into the area. I worked with Ryan Bowman at Motherwell and sold him, so we know their threats. It is a big, big game for us. If we could get a point there it would be good. Three points bring Shrewsbury right into the mix with us and it is another body fighting for survival.”

He was able to include the winner of January’s EFL Goal of the Month for the tremendous winning volley which turned-round a 0-3 deficit to a 4-3 win for the Shrimps at the Maz. `Toums’ commented on the award:

“After a long career, that’s one thing I’ve never won, and never thought I would.”

Robbo’s Opposite Number – Steve Cotterill – had this to say about today’s clash:

“Obviously having the clear run up to Morecambe helps the players to rest and recuperate and to not be doing a lot of travelling is good too. I think we’ve had six of the last eight games away from home which has been difficult, but if you look at the form table in the last six games, we’re ninth at home and we’re tenth in the form table away.”

One of his own players – Club Captain Ethan Ebanks-Landell – added:

“It’s a big game, some would say a six-pointer and I’d probably agree. We’ve had a good week of preparation after a long week last week so hopefully, we can go out and get the job done in front of our home fans. It’s always good to be at home and get your home comforts. Obviously, away is a bit different and there are a lot of variables – but you can’t control those. Gaffer’s had a full week to get his game plan in place and hopefully, we can execute it on Saturday.””

Tonight, though, the situation outlined above has changed markedly. Shrewsbury remain eighteenth in League One, having won only one of their last five games and lost two. But Morecambe are now four places lower and seven – not just four – points adrift of them. Since the return of the Messiah – Derek Adams – the Shrimps have managed only two draws in four games and lost the other two, most recently at home against Cheltenham last Saturday where they went down by three goals to one. With just nine games left of the League One campaign, tonight’s game was even more a `six-pointer’ than it had been when Ethan Ebanks-Landell made his appraisal of things last month.

King Derek’s assessment of the opposition tonight was as follows:

“They’ve changed their shape. On Saturday, they started in a 3-4-3 formation and then they changed to a 3-5-2. They’ve played the majority of their time that way this season. They’ve been able to pull away from the bottom four and it looks like they’re nearly safe now. It’s a tough encounter, they’ve got a number of really good players. We need wins. The three points are massive at this stage in the season – that can pull you a good bit ahead.”

Steve Cotterill said about the recent change in Management at Morecambe that there

“Won’t be too much difference because Derek hasn’t been back there long. I think, even if they do change in styles or whatever; I’m sure the Morecambe lads can drop back into it. So I’m sure it’s a pretty seamless swap, really. He ended up leaving for another job, and that happens. But now he’s back and it was a good fit in the first place so I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be a good fit for them going forward.”

Mr Cotterill named the same starting eleven which lost at home 1-2 to Oxford last Saturday. Adam Phillips was missing from the latest Morecambe squad due to a severely bruised foot but Aaron Wildig made a welcome return to the starting eleven against his former club after an ankle injury picked-up a week ago in Horwich.

It was dry with barely a breath of wind as the match kicked-off. The home team started with a wild shot by Daniel Udoh which went high and wide of Trevor Carson’s goal after just two minutes. Then Dylan Connolly did really well to win a header against much bigger Shrews’ defenders a minute later; ran after the ball at lightning-quick speed but then spoiled all his hard work with a weak cross from the Morecambe right. George Nurse then tried an instant volley as the ball looped in from the Town right from the left side of the penalty box from his point of view only to see his shot blocked. This was in the eighth minute which ended with Cole The Goal Stockton spinning and shooting all in one movement in trademark style from the Morecambe left. He also struck the ball high and wide of the target.

A couple of minutes later, he did the same thing on the right flank this time but his attempted shot went tamely away towards the left hand side of the pitch.

The hosts had enjoyed  a fair bit of possession with quarter of an hour on the clock but the Shrimps’ shape bore all the hallmarks of a Derek Adams team from last season. Aaron Wildig and Alfie McCalmont pressed high up as their team-mates compressed the space behind them. The result was that Shrewsbury were reduced to passing the ball between their back four and often simply lumping it forwards to very little effect.

However, they broke the press after 22 minutes when Liam Gibson slipped on the Shrimps’ left and allowed Josh Vela to get past him and find Ryan Bowman in the centre. He should have buried the ball but he blazed it over the bar instead. There was a concerted period of home pressure after this miss but no further alarms at the back for the visitors. Well – not until almost the whole of the half had passed at least.

In the meantime, Wildig had been presented with a golden opportunity to score after 31 minutes when Stockton did brilliantly to get past several Shrews’ defenders on the Shrimps’ right and found him unmarked on the far side of the penalty area. But Aaron – who had a poor and unusually tetchy game tonight – totally fluffed his lines and put the ball way over the bar.

Greg Leigh then did well to set-up Connolly with a killer pass into No Man’s Land for a clear run on goal. But imposing Shrews’ goalkeeper Marko Marosi – in his fluorescent orange strip – rushed from his area and seemingly intimidated Dylan, who appeared to stop in mid-stride instead of playing the ball around the much bigger man and chasing after it. So the braver player – the goalkeeper – created the opportunity to clear the ball away from the danger area altogether.

The game seemed to be meandering to a goal-less draw: just as the match against Cheltenham seemed to be doing last Saturday. But out of nothing, the hosts found themselves ahead with just two minutes left to play. Nurse was allowed to make progress down the Morecambe right, look up and send over a peach of a cross which a totally unmarked Udoh buried easily past a helpless Carson at the far post.

The sequence of events seen at the Maz last Saturday seemed to be repeating themselves even earlier than had been the case then when Morecambe fell further behind within a minute of the restart. It seemed to me that Jacob Bedeau controlled a shot from a long way out by Tyrese Fornah perfectly with the upper part of his chest on the right-hand side. But Referee Darren Drysdale – and his is the opinion which actually matters, after all – saw things differently. He awarded a penalty for hand-ball which Luke Leahy converted with an unstoppable strike.

I thought it was very harsh and hoped it would galvanise the visitors in the way that Derek Adams’ teams have traditionally always responded to adversity in the past. But we must remember – this is not Derek’s team; it is the one he has inherited.

This one fell apart. They laid down and died without a whimper. Their heads went down too – and their discipline went with them. The Red Mist descended on Wildig at least in the forty-ninth minute; just before the hosts went 3-0 up. In my view, he was lucky only to be booked for a really bad scissors-tackle on Luke Pennington.

Leahy scored again shortly after his penalty success with a lovely shot right into Carson’s top right-hand corner after being allowed to control the ball with his back to goal and then turn on the edge of the Morecambe penalty area. Just over an hour had been played when Udoh took-on Morecambe Skipper Anthony O’Connor on the Morecambe right. Anthony slipped and Utoh swerved a peach of a shot past the visiting stopper to his left to make the score four-nil. After sixty-eight minutes, Bowman scored again as Leahy’s long-range free-kick from the Shrewsbury left reached him at the far post and he nodded it home far too easily.

So that was five-nil with over twenty minutes left.

It could have been even more in all truth. And this was against a team which I suspect is at best very ordinary: Town wasted at least three other good chances in the second half and Leigh seemed to genuinely handle the ball in the away penalty area with 62 minutes on the clock – but got away with it. At this point, though,  Shrews’ Manager Steve Cotterill had already withdrawn some of his better players – to save them for another day, presumably, with a job already all too easily done.

The Montgomery Waters Stadium wasn’t waterlogged this evening – but Morecambe sank beneath the waves almost without trace tonight.

On this performance they won’t get – and won’t deserve – any more points this season. To call them pathetic after their second half collapse would be a compliment: they were just ten outfield men running around like headless chickens most of the time.

Yet – so tight are things in the basement of League One – and so dire are a minimum of five other clubs as well – that all is not lost yet.

The Shrimps remain just one point short of safety given that all their rivals who played tonight – Fleetwood; Doncaster and Crewe – contrived to lose as well.

None of these clubs have conceded 75 goals this season, though – Morecambe alone in the Division have managed to clock-up so many.

None of them face second-placed Wigan Athletic away from home on Saturday either.

But Morecambe do.

If they play then like they did tonight, the Wigan Warriors scoreboard will be needed.

I’m sure that Derek Adams was as lost for words tonight to say anything positive about his men’s utterly abject performance as I have been. As usual, though, he was realistic and accentuated the good stuff. He said:

“I was really happy with the first-half performance because we limited Shrewsbury to two attempts on goal and created some good openings. We passed the ball well at times in midfield. To lose a goal in the way we did was really disappointing. When they got the penalty kick, it deflated us. We have conceded far too many goals. Tonight has definitely not helped us. Defensively, we haven’t been good enough. The gap between us and the two teams or three teams above us is very small and it’s a real setback tonight.  I knew the job I was coming into was difficult. It’s become even more difficult. But the points gap is still the same.”

Shrewsbury Town: 1 Marko Marosi; 3 Luke Leahy; 5 Matthew Pennington; 4 Ethan Ebanks-Landell(C); 8 Tyrese Fornah; 10 Josh Vela (7 Shaun Whalley 63’); 11 Daniel Udoh18 Tom Bloxham 63’); 12 Ryan Bowman; 17 Elliott Bennett (22 Joshua Daniels 73’); 23 George Nurse; 33 Tom Flanagan.

 Substitutes not used: 13 Harry Burgoyne; 6 Aaron Pierre; 14 Matthew Bondswell; 28 Saikow Janneh.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 10 Aaron Wildig (Y); 11 Dylan Connolly (17 Jonah Ayunga 73’); 19 Shane McLoughlin (Y); 22 Liam Gibson (16 Jacob Mensah 83’); 25 Alfie McCalmont (21 Ryan Cooney 68’).

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 27 Ousmane Fané. 14 Jonathan Obika.

Ref:  Darren Drysdale.

Att: 5804.

Too Easy for Wigan Athletic 

Morecambe have played Wigan Athletic loads of times in the past. But this was almost exclusively last century in the Northern Premier League. Morecambe was the first club ever to visit the DW Stadium, however, being invited to play a friendly against the Latics during August 1999.

During this century though, the clubs have met just once in a competitive match. This was last January at the Mazuma Stadium, where Wigan won 1-2.

Athletic started today’s game in `Wiggin’ almost at the top of League One. They were in second position, just four points behind leaders Rotherham United but with two games in hand. So a win today could put them even closer to the pinnacle of the Division – motivation enough on its own. It would also add to their record of recent wins – three out of five plus a single loss in their last five League One matches, including a 0-2 win at seemingly doomed Crewe Alexandra last Tuesday evening.

What a contrast to today’s visitors. Morecambe were also desperate for points this afternoon for totally different reasons. Since Derek Adams’ return to the club, Stephen Robinson’s squad has lost three and drawn two of the games during which he has been at the helm. Derek is far too canny to blame his predecessor for the team’s current position – the facts say this for themselves after all – and he has consistently refused to criticise individual members of the group of players he has inherited, too. He insisted he was `pleased’ with the Shrimps’ performance at Shrewsbury for most of the first half last Tuesday but `disappointed’ that they fell apart (my words; not his) in the second half and were lucky in my view to lose by only – yes, only – five goals to nil.

But there is still all to play for at the bottom of the Division, even with only eight games – including today’s – still to contest. So even a point away from home at this stage of the season could prove to be priceless in terms of the Shrimps’ hopes for survival in Wigan’s exalted company. OK – other formerly `big’ teams’ exalted company (Latics will almost certainly be back in a Championship where they deserve to be next term, whatever happens today.) King Derek said before the game:

“It is extremely tight down the bottom of the league and that is a huge positive for us. Of the teams that are down at the bottom, they aren’t doing enough to get clear of one another. Ourselves, Gillingham, Doncaster and Crewe are in the bottom four, we are not winning the games to catch the teams above us, and if we would have done that, we would have been out of the relegation zone by now. You look back at the Ipswich game and the Bolton game and if you see them out you could have claimed some big points. We have eight games left to go and we will see where it takes us. We have to remain positive. We have to pick up wins and I have spoken a lot about that since I’ve come in.” 

Survival – or the first relegation EVER for Morecambe could be in the balance today.

But far worse things could be happening. In Ukraine, whether or not a football club might be relegated is hardly worth worrying about in the greater scheme of things.

So Hats Off to everyone who has responded to Morecambe FC’s appeal to help the people of Ukraine in their dire time of need currently. To repeat our club’s website:

“Special thanks go to Alison & John Herd of Thornton Road Spar for the use of the storage facility, Chris Morrow of Homestyle Carpets of Torrisholme for loading and transporting the goods, and the staff at SJ Bargh for helping unload and accepting this van full for transportation.

We would also like to thank everyone who has brought donations to the Stadium. The appeal continues and donations can be dropped off at the Mazuma or Thornton Road Spar.

Items urgently required: Towels, sleeping bags, airbeds, bandages, nappies, formula milk, dried milk, female hygiene products, colouring books and crayons, toiletries, soft toys/teddy bears.”

In the absence of NATO – god help anyone Ukrainian. But for the sheer lottery of where we were born, their fate could befall any one of us…

It’s reassuring to know that there are good people in the world as well as bad ‘uns. So well done to the five Wigan supporters – Stuart Cadman, Darren Bolton, Neil Myers, Robert Holcroft and Paul Kendrick – who took part in a 47-mile trek from the Mazuma to the DW Stadium over the last two days with the support of other football fans:

They did this for Joseph’s Goal, a charity which supports ten-year old Joseph Michael Kendrick, who suffers from a serious genetic condition called Non-Ketotic Hyperglycinemia. You can make a donation to help research into this condition at

https://www.justgiving.com/team/walk4josephmorecambe

The walkers were lucky enough to choose two perfect days for walking: dry; sunny and neither too cold nor too hot.

So, under bright blue skies, the Latics kicked-off in front of a crowd in which could be found several fans with very sore feet.

Wigan have a good side – and it shows. Here was a team which could probably easily hold its own in the Championship. Right from the off, you could see that the men in the blue striped shirts were quicker to think; quicker to react and more skilful on the ball than the men in the red strip. Will Keane headed a Tom Naylor cross from the right just over the bar with only three minutes played as Wigan looked the more threatening team right from the off. From a free-kick awarded after thirteen minutes, Jason Kerr got his head to James McLean’s dead ball kick but guided it straight at Trevor Carson in the away net. Just six minutes later, the Latics were in the lead. Tendayi Darikwa got away far too easily on the Wigan right and played a perfect cross for Josh Magennis to glance the ball out of Carson’s reach. Yet again, it was a really bad goal to concede as Datikwa wasn’t challenged as he made progress down the flank and nobody in a red shirt made Maginnis’ finish any harder than it actually was. Having said that, the visitors created the occasional decent chance of their own as well. With twenty-six minutes played, home keeper Ben Amos did brilliantly to deny Aaron Wildig’s goal-bound effort after he had misjudged a cross into his area. Forty minutes were on the clock when a tremendous volley from Cole the Goal Stockton was then deflected just over the Wigan crossbar for a corner kick.

Sadly, though, the Shrimps have been making a habit of conceding just before half time in recent games. They had a warning after 43 minutes when Carson did well to push an effort from Stephen Humphrys away for a corner. From it, for the third match in a row, they conceded again – this time, in very peculiar style. McClean’s kick was flicked-on by Tom Naylor and it somehow-or-other ended-up going over the goal-line. It seems that Jason Kerr turned it just over that magic line although I personally thought that the Referee had awarded a free-kick to Morecambe before I realised he was actually pointing back towards the centre circle for the game to restart.

So there we had it: a familiar story at half time in recent times. Morecambe had played some reasonably effective stuff at times but were basically second best when it really mattered.

However, they came out and actually played a lot better at the start of the second half. They were the better side in my opinion for perhaps fifteen minutes and during this time, Athletic looked distinctly beatable. The visitors reduced the arrears in the forty-ninth minute, when a shot by Cole Stockton was clearly handled by a Latics defender in the home area. Dylan Connolly scored emphatically with the penalty kick. There was a fleeting belief amongst the noisy visiting contingent that the Shrimps might play their way back into the game at this point.

But it wasn’t to be. Did they run out of steam? Or did Wigan move up a gear? Perhaps it was a bit of both.

Morecambe looked increasingly vulnerable at the back as the game grew older and Will Keane scored for the twentieth time this season by redirecting Naylor’s goal-bound header into the net after an hour. It was another sloppy goal to concede. But two minutes later, things got even worse for the visitors. Morecambe defenders were Absent Without Leave as Humphrys received the ball on the right edge of the away penalty area from his point of view. Nobody challenged him so he let fly with a fierce shot which beat Carson all ends up.(He had only just missed with another effort just four minutes earlier.)

As the away supporters started chanting `We Are Going Down!’, Wigan made it 4-1 after 47 minutes. Darikwa crossed the ball; Naylor headed it back from where it had come – and Keane nodded it home. After this, the home team looked likely to score every time they attacked, so shambolic had Morecambe’s defending become yet again. There was a slightly comical moment in the eighty-first minute when Keane did all the hard work to set-up another goal for himself and then fell flat on his face trying to do so. But the Latics had finished their scoring jamboree.

It was far too easy for Wigan today. The difference in class – and we must remember that they were missing one of their best players in Morecambe Old Boy Callum Lang – was plain for all to see.  So there are just seven games left for Morecambe to save themselves now. The good news is that Crewe and Wimbledon (who fell into the relegation places tonight) both lost today as well. Less good news is that Fleetwood drew with Doncaster. Worse news still was that Gillingham actually held Sheffield Wednesday in a goal-less game in Kent – and thus crawled out of the relegation zone altogether.

It got worse still after the game. Drunken Morecambe idiots pushed roadwork cones into the traffic as they marched back towards Wigan town centre. I found myself among other Shrimps supporters moving them back out of the way again to allow the traffic to pass. This sort of stupidity puts both our club and our town in a really bad light – this is no way to behave in any circumstances, let alone support a team which is in an increasingly parlous position.

Back at the DW Stadium, Derek Adams admitted that yet again, his team had been found wanting at the back. He said:

“I was speaking to the staff just now and they said that’s been the story of the season. Crossed balls into the box (and) we haven’t been strong enough.”

No such worries for Wigan, though. With Shrewsbury carrying on from where they left-off with us last Tuesday by winning 0-3 at leaders Rotherham, Latics find themselves where they deserve to be: just a point behind them with two games in hand. Manager Leam Richardson said afterwards:

“It was a pleasing and professional performance. We’ve got a lot of senior lads on the pitch to manage situations and the pleasing thing was after Morecambe’s goal, we controlled the game and got another couple of goals.”

Wigan Athletic: 12 Ben Amos; 4 Tom Naylor; 5 Jack Whatmough; 8 Max Power (18 Graeme Shinnie 78’); 10 Will Keane; (61’); 15 Jason Kerr; 16 Curtis Tilt; 23 James McClean; 27 Tendayi Darikwa; 28 Josh Magennis; 39 Stephen Humphrys (7 Gwion Edwards 88’).

Subs Not Used: 1 Jamie Jones; 2 Kelland Watts; 3 Tom Pearce; 11 Gavin Massey; 21 Joe Bennett.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau (22 Liam Gibson 88’); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton (Y); 10 Aaron Wildig; 11 Dylan Connolly; 19 Shane McLoughlin (18 Adam Phillips 74’); 21 Ryan Cooney; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 88’). 

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 14 Jonathan Obika. 16 Jacob Mensah; 27 Ousmane Fané.

Ref: James Oldham.

Att: 10,073 (904 from Morecambe).

A pier – sorry – Peer at Wigan.

If you were to hear the word `Wigan’, what would come into your mind as far as this town is concerned?

Let’s put that another way.

What is the collective noun for natives of Wigan?

Give yourself ten out of ten if you said `Wiganers’. But also give yourself full marks if your answer is `Pie-Eaters’…

Wigan has a reputation for being the pie-eating capital of the Universe. It is even acknowledged by this artwork, which I snapped at Wigan Museum when I visited last Saturday:

I remember once seeing a photograph of people queuing out of the doors at a pie-shop called Arkwright’s; Higginbottom’s;  Postelthwaite’s Perfect Pies  or something Suitably Northern with the caption: “Black Friday in Wigan”.

Is this reputation for pie-eating deserved, though – or is it a bit of a myth?

Here’s David Barnett, a Wigan-born journalist who once wrote the following in the Guardian:

Some years ago I brought an entire newsroom to a standstill. This wasn’t, sadly, due to any stunning journalistic achievement. I was simply having my lunch. And it was a pie barm.

I didn’t even know I’d done anything until I became aware of the slow draining away of the hubbub that typifies a local newspaper office at midday. I looked up from what I was doing – tapping at my keyboard with one hand, pie barm in the other – and realised everyone was staring at me. Then they began to leave their desks, to walk over to mine, until I was surrounded by uncomprehending faces. What, they wanted to know, was I eating?

I blinked and looked at the meat-and-potato pie sandwiched between a buttered white roll. It was just a pie barm. I looked behind me to see if there was someone eating something exotic and outrageous. But no. It was me. Me and my pie barm.

But when you’re from Wigan, you never really stop eating pies. You might be said to be resting, or in remission, or recovering. Eating pies is part of our DNA, our heritage, our birthright. And a pie barm – also fondly known as a Wigan Kebab – is the epitome of our gastronomic culture.

I don’t want to teach David or his Grandma how to suck eggs but I think he has got his terminology a little bit mixed-up.

The thing he has described as a `Wigan Kebab’ is apparently actually a `Wigan Slappy’. (A pie slapped between two slices of invariably white, buttered bread.) A Wigan Kebab is apparently no less than three pies impaled on a skewer and considered to be a local delicacy.

The Manc takes-up the story:

The town’s penchant for pastry is everywhere. I noticed it from the moment I first set foot in Wigan’s sport stadium as a kid – from the pie posters slapped across the walls of the concourse to the pastry offer announcements crackling across the PA system. An advert for ‘POOLE’S PIES!’ (a company which produced pies in Wigan for 171 years) even danced its way across the scoreboard during the game. Poole’s has sadly folded since then. But there’s still a minimum of 20 listed pie shops operating in the Wigan region today (with dozens of local cafes and food stores serving up pies as part of their wider menus). Since 1992, Wigan has also been the prideful host of the World Pie-Eating Championships – where contestants aim to wolf down as many of these crumbly concoctions as quickly as possible (historically held at Harry’s Bar on Wallgate).Ahead of the 2016 edition of the competition, a pie was launched into space to commemorate the occasion.

(I wonder if it was a Potato Pie – you know: a Spudnik…)

Anyway – there we have it. Oh – other than Baldy’s pies (which are cooked on Clayton Street in the town) are apparently the best available these days. (That plug must be worth a Free Sample or two, mustn’t it?) 

Maybe not. The brilliantly entitled Life of Pies website has its Top Ten of Wigan pies in which Baldy’s doesn’t even get a mention. Here it is:

The Top Ten Pies in Wigan

(For anyone likely to watch either soccer or Rugby League in the town in the future, you might like to make a note of this:

“6. Rolling Pin. Based just a stone’s throw * from the DW Stadium in the heart of Newtown, it’s a shame more visiting fans don’t get the chance to sample these fine pies instead of the overpriced Hollands they sell at the ground. A sturdy, golden crust gives way to sloppy potato filling and tasty pinkish ringlets of mince in their meat and potato pie which is a true throwback to yesteryear. (*if you’ve got arms like Geoff Capes.)” 

Ah – I almost forgot. This is a picture of Wigan Athletic’s Mascot – as chosen by their own supporters. What do you think his (or her) name might be?

At Morecambe, we’ve got Crusty –sorry, Christie the Cat; Wigan Athletic have got Crusty the Pie…

I was in the centre of Wigan prior to the Latic’s demolition of Morecambe by four goals to one last Saturday.

Match Report at

Not Good Enough…

There, I discovered a cafe in the large indoor Market which promised the hungry punter a delicacy I have never come across before – anywhere. It was a `Cauliflower Cheese Toastie’. (I imagined that this would be a Heart Attack on a plate but thought it could be potentially absolutely delicious – particularly with a smear or two of English Mustard on it.) So, having walked around the town centre for a couple of hours, “Ah wur fair clemm’t”

Pardon?

It means I was rather hungry.

For other examples of Wiganese – such as an observation concerning unfortunate people with large teeth: “Art breighkin um in fer an ‘orse?” – see `Wigan Speyk’ at  

https://www.wiganworld.co.uk/stuff/dialect2.php?opt=dialect2

I had already taken-in the sights and smells of their Street Market (where I had discovered a vast range of foods from all over the world).

Ignoring the temptation to buy something else entirely, I went back there to try one of their special Toasties. Sadly, to no avail: they had run out of Cauliflower Cheese…

But the ladies at the cafe were suitably sympathetic to my plight.

“Ast ad thi tay er dust wantsum?” they said.

(They didn’t really…)

So what other culinary delights is Wigan famous for? Something sweet this time.  Want a clue? OK – here it is: Uncle Joe.

No, not `Uncle Joe’ Stalin (although Wigan has certainly had plenty of admirers of the Soviet tyrant among their inhabitants over the years) but one produced by a company called Santus and whose factory can be found near the railway stations. They produce such delights as Uncle Joe’s Mint Balls which are so popular that you can buy empty tins to hold them in, as shown in this picture of a sweet shop in one of the town’s numerous Arcades:

What else is Wigan famous for?

It has to be its Rugby League Club.

“Three Points to Wigan!” is an expression that has entered the national consciousness. The club – known these days as Wigan Warriors – merits its own exhibition at the town’s Museum (entrance through a red-painted turnstile from their old ground at Central Park.)

Rightly so: Wigan is the most successful English Rugby League club of all time and has produced some of its greatest players, from legendary Billy Boston (whose statue can be found in the middle of the town just off The Wiend) to Ellery Hanley and Andy Farrell in more recent times.

So what else are we left with as far as Wigan is concerned?

Culture?

Cheeky Chappie George Formby – with his little Ukulele in his hand – came from Wigan. He was one of the first genuinely funny stars of the Silver Screen. His humour was always slightly risqué – but acceptable to the Lord Chancellor’s Office, who censored things like this at the time.

Not so that of his contemporary Frank Randle, who was born in Wigan Borough at Aspull in 1901 to an unmarried mother – a scandal at the time. Scandal – Randle – the two words went together and he toured as a comedian presenting Randle’s Scandals before he found greater fame – or notoriety – in film. Frank’s humour was far more anti-Establishment and arguably even subversive than George Formby’s ever was and he had several run-ins with the Chief of Police in Blackpool during the 1950s, who had him both banned and arrested several times for alleged obscenity in his stage acts on the piers and theatres of the resort. He died there, bankrupt and apparently both alcoholic and quite dissolute, very sadly, during 1957.

Given the earnestness with which all media in the UK – particularly the BBC – are currently trying to divulge themselves of any association with their racist and misogynistic  pasts, it might be instructive to watch Frank’s 1953 film It’s a Grand Life . In this, Diana Dors – one of the first genuine British Sex Symbols – is a co-star. But extraordinarily talented black female pianist Winifred Evans is also heavily featured right at the end of the film.

Where else could you have heard of her at the time? Well – not on the BBC for a start…

You can see the whole film here:

I personally suspect that Frank was simply ahead of his time…

But let’s go back to George Formby. Are there any other Georges with a link to Wigan which you can think of? Someone who wrote about Wigan way back in the 1930s, for instance?

George Orwell is actually a Pen Name. The writer of such famous tomes as The Road to Wigan Pier was actually an Old Etonian whose real name was Eric Blair. At the time, the idea that any of the masses of people actually from Wigan might express their own thoughts about the town they lived in were considered to be preposterous by The Powers That Be. You can just imagine it, can’t you?:

“Good Lord – have you ever heard any of these barbarians actually speak, old boy? If you have, you will know that these people can barely express themselves in English, let alone put pen to paper to write anything even vaguely sensible – let alone profound or insightful – in said language. Any sensible chap can see that the proper way to understand the real situation of the Northern English Working Class is to ask a man from the Southern Elite to live among them for a relatively short time and then report back about the experience. Obviously!”

So – just before the Second World War – Eric Blair did. He had the luxury – it goes without saying – of being able to return to the privileged life he had led up until that point. And – once he’d had enough of the grinding poverty which was a Life Sentence for the people he briefly lived amongst – he duly did so.

If you choose to actually read Orwell’s words – well; pontifications, really – about Wigan, I promise you a book utterly dreary and very, very boring. Try Animal Farm instead: it is both a much better read and it is also (mercifully) far shorter… The man who wrote it might have had his heart in the right place. But he had about as much idea about the real struggles of the Working Class he was parachuted in to live amongst as his fellow Southerner and Old Etonian who is in charge of `levelling-up’ in our country at this moment in time has. And – before you ask – Boris is definitely not from Wigan…

Anyway… Wigan Pier was actually a wharf on the Leeds to Liverpool Canal where the coal hacked from the neighbouring countryside was loaded onto barges to fire-up the factories spawned by the Industrial Revolution all around Lancashire and Yorkshire. Alternatively, the canal allowed the Black Gold to be exported all over the world from the docks at the mouth of the Mersey.

I walked past it on the way back from Morecambe’s defeat by Wigan Athletic the other day and it’s huge.  I didn’t have time to visit – and even if I had, I don’t think the recent redevelopment of this site is finished yet. The Wigan Post provides this photograph of just a small portion of the `Canal Quarter’:

The redevelopment will include things like a Microbrewery. This could hardly be expected to replace any of the large Breweries which Wigan once boasted: Airey’s; Albion Brewery (which had 24 tied houses in the town alone); James Fairhurst; Oldfields (29 pubs in central Wigan)and Henry Robinson’s (28 tied houses in Wigan itself)for example.

No trace of these Breweries can be found in the vicinity anymore except the occasional unexplained initials of the defunct companies in a random pub’s brickwork. Here are two from `AB’ – Albion Brewery and (under the date) two `OB’ and `OBLd’ which both once belonged to Oldfield’s Brewery Ltd:

At the Pier, though, there will also be some sort of tribute to the man who put it on the map in the first place. Before the Morecambe game, I had found time to visit Wigan Museum. Here, George Orwell has a corner of the Reading Room upstairs dedicated specifically to him:

So – what else is Wigan famous for?

Oops – I’ve just given it away by writing about `coal hacked from the neighbouring countryside’.

I’m so ancient that I can actually remember `Wiggin’ when it was even more famous for coal mining than it was for Rugby League. In the 1920s, sixty-five collieries could be found in the Wigan Coalfield. Forty years later, I can remember seeing a huge spoil heap towering like a mountain to the east of an unfinished M6 to the west of the town. This was apparently excavated and moved to fill-in the gaps needed to lift the same road onto the level (more or less) across valleys and dips in the motorway as it ploughed its way remorselessly northwards through Cumbria during the 1970s.

You could still see loads of Pit Head machinery in Wigan and its environs right up until the 1990s, when Margaret `Milk Snatcher’ Thatcher shut them all down. This wasn’t due to any environmental considerations the Tory Prime Minister might have had: she wasn’t trying to save the planet. It was a matter of simple political revenge: the Miners and their union – the NUM (National Union of Mineworkers) – had brought-down her predecessor as Tory leader of Britain, Ted Heath. They weren’t going to do it to her, whatever the economic and social cost to the country and the Miners themselves. But we must remember, to quote the Iron Lady herself: “There is no such thing as society”. So that’s all right, then.

Mining takes us back Full Circle again to pies. Cornish Pasties were invented by the wives of Cornish Tin Miners because they were an excellent way to get decent nutrition to men working in filthy and dangerous conditions far underground. It has been claimed that the term `eating Humble Pie’ has its origins in Wigan. Miners from the Wigan coalfield were the first to return to work once the government had basically starved them into submission during the National Strike of 1926.

The NUM went on strike again as Mrs Thatcher started to deprive Miners right across Britain of their livelihoods throughout the 1980s. In Wigan’s Museum, there are many mementos of this time, including plaques to commemorate the closure of individual coal mines. There is also a framed poster parodying the Conservative government’s insistence at the time about the primacy of something they called `Victorian Values’. (This was a concept which came completely unstuck when it turned-out that local Carnforth Lad and Thatcher favourite Cecil Parkinson – who had bleated on endlessly about the values of high ethical standards – had fathered an illegitimate child in an adulterous relationship whilst serving in the government):

In case this is not clear, the photograph shows a mounted policeman about to strike a woman – photographer Lesley Boulton – on 18^th June 1984 during the Orgreave Coking Plant protest:

The poster in the Museum contrasts this image with a view of the Peterloo Massacre in Manchester of 1819 which involved the death of eighteen people – including four women and a child – and injuries to as many as 700 others as they were literally cut-down by other representatives of the state at the time. (In case you’re interested, the fearless Upholder of Law and Order on horseback in the photograph missed when a bystander pulled Lesley and her camera out of the way at the very last moment.)

But let’s move quickly on. Although they will always live in the shadow of the Rugby League club whose ground they share, Wigan Athletic is worth a mention all of its own. Back in the 1960s, they were playing in the obscurity of the Northern Premier League on a level par with Morecambe. Since then, though, the Latics have played in every Division of the EFL and reached the mighty heights of the Premiership in 2005. Even more amazingly for a relatively small club, they beat overwhelming favourites Manchester City in the FA Cup Final during 2013 – and were promptly then relegated as well. Dave Whelan was born in Bradford but grew-up in Wigan and started his phenomenal retail career – following a serious injury which ended his days as a professional footballer plying his trade at the highest level in England – on a stall in the Market there. The statue of him which features outside the DW (Dave Whelan) Stadium which Athletic now share with Wigan Warriors is a fitting tribute to a man who turned a Cheshire League club playing at run-down Springfield Park into a member of the elite of English soccer in recent times. Skulduggery off the field since Dave and then his son relinquished control of the club has seen Wigan relegated once more and even face financial extinction altogether in recent times, though.  But now they seem to be back on track and heading for the Championship yet again.

Good luck to them. I have always had a strong affection for their club, which has done even greater things from the same humble beginnings than Morecambe FC have been able to. I’ve also yet to meet a Pie-Eater Wiganer who I haven’t personally taken to.

Wigan is a remarkable place. The Town Motto is Progress with Unity.  Maybe it‘s time for a change, though – with all deference to the website I have already quoted in this article and with due apologies to Yann Martel and his extraordinary book – to The Life of Pies…

What do you think?

Brewers’ Product Goes Flat

Before we go any further, let’s send Best Wishes to Les Dewhirst – Morecambe’s Kitman for as long as virtually anyone can remember – who suffered a heart attack during the game at Wigan Athletic two weeks ago. He was operated on at Wythenshaw Hospital later in the day and has started the long road back to recovery. I personally wish Les all the best – I have recovered from major heart surgery myself and therefore know that it can be a long and potentially difficult process. I hope his road to recovery is short and without too many turns in it.

Burton Albion and Morecambe have met fourteen previous times in the EFL. As non-league teams, Burton were unable ever to beat Morecambe but things have changed since they entered League Two in 2009. They have won eight of the subsequent games – most recently in the reverse fixture last October, where Albion were victorious by the odd goal in five. Morecambe, on the other hand, have managed to win just half that number: four.

The Brewers arrived in north Lancashire in seventeenth position in League One – far enough from the relegation positions to have no worries but also too far from the Play-Offs to entertain any realistic hopes of promotion. They have won only one of their last five league games and lost four; most recently 2-0 against Charlton in London two weeks ago. It was clearly a very feisty performance by Albion. Six of their players were booked and Tom Hamer was apparently lucky not to get a straight red card for a two-footed lunge within the first ten minutes. (In contrast, Charlton – with Sam Lavelle in the starting line-up – didn’t pick-up a single booking.) Whatever the misplaced commitment of his players, in a sense, however, Jimmy-Floyd Hasselbaink’s men had nothing to play for today – except not to get individually or collectively suspended…

The same could not be said for their opponents. Morecambe haven’t won any sort of football match since 22^nd January this year. That’s twelve games ago. In their last two games alone, they have conceded nine goals. They have not kept a clean sheet for even longer – fourteen games ago at AFC Wimbledon. In the six games that Derek Adams has been in charge, the Shrimps have picked-up a paltry two out of a potential eighteen points. This is not so much relegation as Kamikaze form.

Derek himself put on record before the Wigan game that he considered the squad he had in League Two to be stronger than the one he is having to work with now, a whole division higher. But having said all that, Morecambe could actually escape the relegation positions in the Division if they were able to win three points today and all of their rivals lost. Prior to the game, he made the joke that the enforced break from football recently had brought Morecambe’s longest unbeaten run of the season. He also explained his hopes for the seven games which remain between now and the final match against Sunderland:

“I think we’ll definitely need three wins between now and the end of the season. That would take us over the forty point mark – and I see other teams being able to do that. We’ll have to win a good number of our games remaining. We haven’t done that for a long period of time now and it’s something (with which) we have to galvanise the squad.”

Midfield dynamo Aaron Wildig – on whose shoulders a lot of responsibility will fall if Morecambe are to survive in League One – expressed his own view of what is needed in these simple terms earlier in the week:

“Let’s look forward to Saturday. There’s three points on offer. I know it’s a cliché in football but you’ve literally got to take one game at a time right now and put all your effort into getting three points in your next game.”

Derek completely shook things up today. Wildig took over the Captain’s armband from Anthony O’Connor – for whom there was no place in the starting line-up today – and the Irishman was replaced as Centre Half by Rhys Bennett.  Greg Leigh didn’t feature either and Shane McLoughlin was relegated to the bench.  

For the opposition, Manager Jimmy-Floyd Hasselbaink said prior to the match:

“There are no new injuries, everybody is fit. It will be a learning curve for us playing against teams that are fighting their hardest for points. There will be pressure because it is a must win for opponents, but we also want to win. These kind of situations are needed for our players and that is the same for (today’s) game. You can score goals, but knowing you concede a few can become a psychological problem for a team. We need to make sure that we can keep a clean sheet. We need a clean sheet, we are overdue one and I am confident (that) with one, we can go on and win the game. Clean sheets need to become a part of our game again. We need to look at ourselves before we look at our opponents, and it has been way too long since our last clean sheet.”

It was sunny but very cold as the game started. Right from kick-off, the home team went onto the front foot and Burton never seemed to have any answer to it. The Shrimps won a corner after four minutes and Ousmane Fané managed to get his head to it only for the Albion defence to clear. Adam Phillips then found Rhys Bennett’s head from a free kick after seven minutes but the central defender guided the ball wide of the target. From another corner, an effort by Aaron Wildig was blocked after just over quarter of an hour. The hosts came closer still with nineteen minutes on the clock when Fané’s low cross into the box drew a fantastic save from Ben Garrett in the Brewers’ goal to keep the game goal-less. With Dylan Connolly’s speed and skill posing problems for the visiting defence throughout, Garrett made another tremendous save – this time with his feet – to keep out Liam Gibson’s effort after half an hour. Albion were offering little going forward but continued to concede corner after corner as the half grew older. A goal was becoming seemingly inevitable and it duly arrived with just four minutes of the first period still to play. Official Man of the Match Wildig found Arthur Gnahoua with a pinpoint pass in the centre of the field and his shot hit Sam Hughes and looped agonisingly over Garratt into the net. It was a bit lucky but there is no doubt that the Shrimps’ play until that point had deserved it.

Things rapidly got worse for the visitors. First, Conor Shaughnessy’s bone-juddering over-the-top tackle on fellow-Irishman Connolly led to a straight red card in the forty-third minute. Then – underlining the discipline problems which are clearly a real issue for the Brewers at the moment – Goalkeeping Coach Jake Kean was also sent off following an altercation on the touchline just a couple of minutes later. Assistant Morecambe Manager John McMahon was booked, too.  But to really rub it in, the Shrimps then went even further ahead in injury time. Cole Stockton’s precise through-ball was perfectly finished by Phillips as he bore down on the visiting goalkeeper and buried it low to his right. As a man, the entire Morecambe team ran over to Kitman Les to celebrate. This in itself is a perfect tribute to Les’ popularity at the club.

So the Shrimps returned to the Dressing Rooms at half time in the unusual position of being in the lead in a League One match.

Once the match restarted, it soon got even better. Virtually straight from kick-off, Gnahoua was attacking up the Morecambe left. He took a shot from just outside the penalty area which Garratt did well to parry. But the goalkeeper couldn’t hold the ball and it fell perfectly for Cole the Goal to register his twentieth League One strike of the season so far. As a contest, that was game, set and match to the men in the red shirts.

Garratt pulled-off another tremendous save from Phillips’ header after 53 minutes and the home team fashioned a number of other chances as well. Connolly might have scored after an hour after a lightning-fast break from his own half. He should have squared the ball to Cole but he chanced his arm instead and missed the target entirely. And so it went on.

Burton rallied a little before the end and Trevor Carson made at least one good save. But the hosts ended on the front foot and were very good value for the welcome three points this afternoon.

So: maximum points in the bag; Derek’s first win since he returned to the club and a clean sheet into the bargain. Could it get any better? Yes, it could: all the teams around Morecambe in the table could have lost too. Well – actually, they couldn’t: Crewe and Fleetwood played each other and the Cod Army won 1-3 at Gresty Road. AFC Wimbledon lost, though, 2-1 at Sheffield Wednesday. Doncaster also lost again; this time 2-0 to Wycombe in Buckinghamshire.

The Morecambe Manager’s conclusion after the game was:

“It was a performance that I’m delighted with. I thought that the way we passed the ball; the way we created chances – is what we wanted to see. It was a terrific performance from us.”

His opposite number said this:

“Before the red card, we were still not in the game which is disappointing for us. We never calmed down on the ball which is something we practiced all week. That was the most disappointing thing for us.”

Despite the loss, Burton remained in seventeenth position in the table. Morecambe moved up a place to twenty-first. So there’s still all to play for: only two points separated nineteenth from twenty-first place in the Division tonight.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin; 5 Jacob Bedeau; 9 Cole Stockton; 10 Aaron Wildig (C); 11 Dylan Connolly (Y); 18 Adam Phillips (17 Jonah Ayunga 84’); 22 Liam Gibson (21 Ryan Cooney 75’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 27 Ousmane Fané (8 Toumani Diagouraga 45’); 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 14 Jonathan Obika; 16 Jacob Mensah; 19 Shane McLoughlin.

Burton Albion: 24 Ben Garratt; 2 John Brayford (C); 3 Cameron Borthwick-Jackson; 4 Deji Oshilaja (Y); 11 Jonny Smith; 12 Sam Hughes; 15 Christian Saydee (10 Harry Chapman 56’); 16 Conor Shaughnessy (R); 25 Ciaran Gilligan (23 Terry Taylor 67’); 31 Louis Moult (9 Adiène Gassan Ahadme 67’); 37 Tom Hamer.

Subs Not Used:   1 Matej Kovar; 8 Joe Powell; 40 Charlie Lakin.

Ref: Ross Joyce.

Att: 5,238 (228 from Burton).

U’s Have The (Kozmic) Blues…

Oxford United arrived in north Lancashire today in seventh place in League One and on the back of two wins and two defeats in their last five league games. They dropped out of the Play-Off positions last Saturday, when they lost a critical match against key rivals for promotion Plymouth Argyle by the only goal of the game at Home Park. So the `U’s’ would be looking to get back on track  tonight in order to keep in touch with the leaders of the pack of League One. Past meetings between Oxford and Morecambe would give Karl Robinson and his men cause for optimism: United have won six out of fourteen of them and lost only two.

For Morecambe, however, the job in hand tonight was the diametric opposite of their visitors’. They found themselves in twenty-first – the highest of the relegation positions in the table – and urgently needed to try and put some clear blue water between themselves and all the other clubs at the other end of the table. Last Saturday, they won for the first time under Derek Adams’ renewed leadership, beating Burton Albion fairly comprehensively by three goals to nil. Derek said, prior to tonight’s game:

“There are other fixtures that affect us on Tuesday night as well, so we are aware of that as well. Gillingham don’t play and that is what we are looking at. Three points gets us out of the drop zone and that is what we are targeting, we are trying to use that to our advantage. We respect and understand what Oxford United are about. We have got home advantage, the home supporters were here on Saturday in really good numbers once again, and it will be the same again on Tuesday.” 

Supporters’ Man of the Match last Saturday – Liam Gibson – added the following:

“I think it was one of my better performances this season. Hopefully I can put in some performances that will enable myself to stay in the team. Us as a defensive unit are under no illusions that we haven’t been good enough this season. We have conceded too many goals. But keeping a clean sheet at the weekend will hopefully help us going into the game on Tuesday.” 

As far as the return of Mr Adams to Managerial duties at Morecambe is concerned, he added:

“Having the international break certainly helped, he has managed to get his stamp on the team and hopefully we can start picking up some more positive results.”

One of the few things shared by Saturday’s visitors and tonight’s is that they both normally play in a yellow strip.  Other than that, United is a far more accomplished side. So tonight would be an even stiffer test for the Shrimps than Albion had been three days ago.

This evening’s game was dedicated to a group called Her Game Too, which aims to end discrimination against woman and girls in all things to do with football and elsewhere in society too. Good luck to them. As part of the celebration of women’s’ achievements, an all-female playlist was broadcast before the game. I’m still waiting for Janis Joplin and Joan Armatrading to feature – but that probably shows my age. So would I be thinking I Got Dem Ol’ Kozmic Blues Again Mama! if Morecambe were to lose tonight – or Bring Me Sunshine (which I’m not sure either Janis or Joan  did a cover of) if not?

The weather in north Lancashire had been windy, wet and cold all day and it didn’t relent as the game started. Oxford must have won the toss because they chose to change ends and play towards a very commendable (given the weather; the distance and the fact that this was a mid-week fixture) 304 of their own supporters during the first half. Right from the start, they looked slick, organised – and quick. They immediately went onto the front foot and it took them just three minutes to take the lead. Mark Sykes made progress down the wing and sent over a cross which Centre-Forward and Skipper Matty Taylor managed to control and then shoot almost in Cole Stockton style – with the same usual result: a goal. The men in the all-white strip were marauding forwards again straight from kick-off and forced a corner which was cleared by the men in red. For the first ten minutes or so, the visitors frankly looked in a different class and I personally was beginning to fear that another hammering was in the offing. But I’d forgotten that this wasn’t a Stephen Robinson side United were playing against: brittle at the back and generally disorganised. This was a Derek Adams side with all its usual hallmarks: organised; disciplined and a threat every time it attacked. Arthur Gnahoua has been a man transformed since Mr Adams returned to the club. Tonight, he posed difficulties for the United defence throughout the game but particularly in the first half. Every time he got the ball, Morecambe looked – and were – dangerous. Although Oxford still played some nice, lively stuff, Morecambe were starting to put some of their own moves together and the visitors gradually looked less assured as time went on. Almost a quarter of an hour had been played when a red wall was moving forwards towards the away penalty area. Official Man of the Match Adam Phillips played in a cross; the U’s struggled to clear the ball and it fell to Captain Aaron Wildig to score with a clever shot which hit a defender and looped past a stranded Jack Stephens and into his net to equalise.

The home crowd stood in the twenty-second minute to applaud in memory of Adam Stutchbury who sadly lost his life last month at just twenty-two years of age. Adam was a Shrimps’ fan and one of the original presenters of Beyond Radio who struggled bravely against quadriplegic cerebral palsy his entire short life. He will be greatly missed.

On the field, a game which was always good to watch was not being helped by the heavy surface, with slips and mistakes by both teams. With twenty-five minutes on the clock, Phillips did brilliantly to anticipate and intercept a ball meant for a United defender to the right of the opposing penalty area from his point of view. He looked up and found Cole with a pinpoint pass which The Goal Machine walloped past a helpless Stephens to turn the match on its head. The game continued to swing from one end to the other, with the visitors probably dominating possession right until half time when the Shrimps went in with a tremendous one goal advantage.

The second half followed the same pattern. Oxford had most of the ball and also created the better chances. They would have scored after an hour if my own Man of the Match – Trevor Carson – hadn’t pulled off a superb save to keep out Herbie Kane’s fierce shot from close-in. Five minutes later, he did brilliantly again to stop what looked like a certain goal by Nathan Holland with his foot. Cole the Goal had another half-chance after 76 minutes but he rushed his shot and missed quite tamely. However, Phillips unleashed a pile-driver of a shot from distance with 84 minutes played. Stephens made a superb save from it; somehow managing to deflect the howitzer over his own bar for a corner. At the other end, though, Oxford were asking most of the questions. Morecambe continued to defend resolutely but the white tide kept on coming as the Shrimps found it increasingly difficult to keep hold of the ball. The man between the home sticks, however, had one more trick up his sleeve. He kept his best work until the ninetieth minute, somehow managing to keep out an effort by substitute Sam Winnall with a world-class last second reaction save.

In doing so, he made sure that his team kept all the points. Derek Adams said prior to Saturday’s match that his team needed to win at least three games to stay in League One. They have now won two in a row. Following the victory, these were his thoughts:

“We need a resilience and the players showed that in abundance tonight. I was delighted for them because they put a lot of hard work into the game – as they did probably against the likes of Ipswich and Bolton as well when they probably didn’t get the three points we might have got. Tonight, we have been able to get that three points and it lifts us out of the bottom four tonight.”

Both Fleetwood and AFC Wimbledon could only draw at home tonight and Crewe lost yet again away from home. Morecambe’s win puts them a point above the four teams at the bottom of League One with the same number of games played. The Cod Army are just one place ahead of the Shrimps on goal difference alone, albeit they have a game in hand. If the season ended today, I’m sure we’d all be happy with that.

The opposition Manager claimed after the game that Oxford had not only been the better team tonight; they had also been the better side when they lost to Plymouth on Saturday.

He said:

“At the end of the day, my players couldn’t have done any more. Other than take their chances. And that’s just down to human error. I can accept human error.”

United slipped to eight in the table as a result of their second defeat on the spin.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 2 Ryan McLaughlin (Y) (21 Ryan Cooney 61’); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 9 Cole Stockton; 10 Aaron Wildig (C); 11 Dylan Connolly; 18 Adam Phillips (8 Toumani Diagouraga 85’); 22 Liam Gibson; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (19 Shane McLoughlin 65’); 27 Ousmane Fané (Y); 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 14 Jonathan Obika; 16 Jacob Mensah; 17 Jonah Ayunga.

Oxford United:  13 Jack Stevens; 2 Sam Long; 16 Luke McNally; 4 Ciaron Brown; 7 Ryan Williams (Y); 9 Matty Taylor (C); 10 Mark Sykes; 18 Marcus McGuane (17 James Henry 63’); 26 Herbie Kane; 27 Nathan Holland (11 Sam Winnall 75’); 21 Gavin Whyte (23 Billy Bodin 63’).

Subs Not Used:  1 Simon Eastwood; 14 Anthony Forde; 15 John Mousinho; 42 Steve Seddon.

Ref: Robert Lewis.

Att: 3882 (304 from Oxford).

Ironside sinks Shrimps at Cambridge.

Morecambe made the long journey southwards today to face a Cambridge United team which – following promotion last season – have established themselves quite nicely in thirteenth position in the League One table. They have won only two of their last five league games, though and lost three, most recently at home last Saturday where Wycombe Wanderers swept them aside by four goals to one. Morecambe, on the other hand, arrived with an identical record in League One over their last five games but their last two victories – crucially – have come in a row. These wins have propelled the Shrimps out of the Dead Zone at the bottom of the Division for the first time this year. The overall statistics as far as former meetings are concerned are almost equal, with Cambridge edging things on seven victories as opposed to the Shrimps’ six and three other games drawn. In the reverse fixture last November, United won all too easily 0-2 against a truly pathetic Morecambe team led by the man who has taken St Mirren to the very brink of relegation in the Scottish Premier League since abandoning SS Shrimps as it was sinking towards a watery grave last February. Since then, Derek Adams has totally rejuvenated the players left behind as Robbo sought Pastures New.

Whilst Aaron Wildig is performing regularly again and leading by example as Captain; Adam Phillips has shown the form he did when he was such a key part of the Shrimps’ early promotion campaign last term. Rhys Bennett is a rock at the heart of the Reds’ defence; Liam Gibson is showing the promise he has always clearly possessed with first-rate performances in recent games and players such as Arthur Gnahoua and Dylan Connolly have flourished under the new regime. At the back, Trevor Carson and Jacob Bedeau in particular are proving that not all Stephen Robinson’s signings were duds. So – from being all but doomed just two short months ago, Morecambe suddenly look like a team which might just conceivably yet be able to avoid an immediate return to League Two.

Cambridge United Assistant Manager Mark Gary Waddock came out with the following insightful analysis of the opposition prior to the match:

“Morecambe have had a positive upturn on results recently, so they’ll arrive at the Abbey on Saturday in a real good frame of mind and in high spirits. Derek has gone in there and has got them winning games. They’re in a better mental space now, and Derek will demand that of them if they are to get over the line this season. Stockton’s done an incredible job there in terms of his goal return, but goals haven’t really been a problem for the club. They’re stronger now in defence than they were in the first part of the season. Morecambe have played and beat a team on Tuesday who were fighting for promotion. It just shows that anything can happen in this league. There’s still so much to play for and they’ve shown a lot of fight and desire to pick up the points to keep themselves out the bottom four. We know how hard of a game it is going to be against a team that have picked up two wins on the bounce, so we’ll have to be at our best, which we will be.”

Derek Adams himself had these thoughts about his own players:

“There is a togetherness in the squad and that has shone through, I think they have stuck together and I have made changes which have helped us in certain aspects. I just think the players are seeing an avenue now for us to be safe, that is what we are trying to do – the other promoted teams are safe and that is what we have to do as well. We have got some really good characters in that dressing room, some of them who I have had before, some I haven’t, and they are rising to the challenge now.”

As far as the opposition specifically are concerned, he added:

“Cambridge obviously come into this game on the back of a defeat in midweek, but they had a magnificent result away from home against Ipswich Town, they have done really well this season. They are on 51 points and are 13th in the league; they are safe in League One for another season. They have been outstanding and we will have to be ready for it.”

Ryan McLaughlin was injured in last Tuesday’s game against Oxford and his place was taken in the starting eleven by Greg Leigh, who played Right instead of Left Back this afternoon. Other than that change, Derek started with the same men who have basically changed the fortunes of the club altogether during the last two weeks.

The weather was dry and quite sunny at the Abbey Stadium although deceptively both windy and cold as the match kicked-off. The Shrimps won a free-kick almost immediately which came to nothing. The first clear chance of the game, though, fell to the hosts after eight minutes when Sam Smith’s header from James Brophy’s cross was well-held by Trevor Carson in the away goal. The visiting goalkeeper did even better after thirteen minutes when he managed to prevent what looked to be a certain tap-in for United’s Joe Ironside with another tremendous reaction save with his foot as he rushed from his line to narrow the angle. Two minutes later, Arthur Gnahoua tried his luck with a shot so wild that it went for a throw instead of a goal kick.  He did better as he ran at the Cambridge defence after 23 minutes. He passed to Aaron Wildig whose brilliant reverse pass was played on to Dylan Connolly who stole forward and found Cole the Goal. His shot beat Dmitar Mitov but was cleared off the line by Liam Bennett only for the goalkeeper to brilliantly stop Gnahoua’s follow-up shot with Bennett offering him cover again on the line. Lloyd Jones headed over the bar for United from a corner after twenty-eight minutes. Liam Gibson then found Adam Phillips in the home penalty area with a superb ball after half an hour but Adam hurried his shot and Mitov this time had an easy save to make. There were a couple more chances for Ironside who missed with two fairly routine headers and then Cole was caught offside after forty minutes. But the home side finally took the lead with 42 minutes on the clock when Lewis Simper’s attempt was saved by the visiting goalkeeper only for the ball to land perfectly in leading scorer Smith’s path on the Cambridge left and even Trevor Carson was unable to keep his fierce close-range shot out of the net this time.  

So Morecambe went in one goal in arrears but with hopes still high that they might yet get something out of the game.

The second period started with United on the front foot. They won a free kick after five minutes of the re-start after a crude challenge by Ousmane Fané for which the Shrimps’ defender was booked. Subsequent shots and a header by the home team during the opening ten minutes or so either missed or caused Carson no problems. For Morecambe, Cole the Goal tried an overhead kick after 55 minutes which came to nothing. Then Connolly made good progress into the home half only to waste the final attempted pass to his Centre Forward. Adam Phillips then had another shot blocked before Knibbs set-up a chance for Morecambe after an hour with a bad foul, However, Phillips wasted the free kick by putting it too close to the home goalkeeper. Morecambe nevertheless were applying a little bit of concerted pressure on the home team at this point. Stockton forced Mitov into another excellent save low to his right after 62 minutes. A couple of minutes earlier, Phillips had done well to capitalise on a mistake by the home goalkeeper but his shot went agonisingly wide of the post. The game changed, though, when Cole came up with another phenomenal strike to equalise for the visitors. His instant volley following a United clearance from about thirty years out beat Mitov all ends up and slammed into the top corner of his net after sixty-eight minutes.

Almost immediately, though, Harvey Knibbs went down under what Referee Carl Boyeson deemed to be  challenge from Leigh and  he duly pointed to the penalty spot. Joe Ironside scored with an assured finish to restore Cambridge’s lead. As light rain began to fall, substitute Jonah Ayunga then latched on to a quick free-kick from Phillips after 75 minutes but his shot-come-cross went across the home penalty area with no man in red shirt anywhere near it. Wildig then missed the target with a shot before Carson made a routine save from Smith after 78 minutes. Derek shook things up with a double substitution with just over eighty minutes played. In injury time, Mitov shovelled another effort from Cole over his bar. But that was as close as the visitors came to clawing things back again this afternoon.

So Cambridge completed a double over the Shrimps this season and remained in thirteenth position as a result. Morecambe’s fate was very much in the hands of the others down in the realm of the Dead Men this afternoon. Doomed Crewe lost yet again – this time 2-0 – to another of the Dead Men Walking in the shape of Doncaster Rovers. But AFC Wimbledon were unable to beat the club which stole its identity at Plough Lane in a game which ended 1-1. That was the same score by which the game at Priestfield between Gillingham and Wycombe finished. At Highbury, Fleetwood went ahead against Accrington but lost 1-2 after their goalkeeper was sent off. So – despite today’s defeat – Morecambe remain one place above the Drop Zone in League One tonight. They are level on points and matches played with the Gills but they have a single goal advantage in terms of goal difference. By such fine margins are ultimate success and failure decided. Fleetwood remain ahead of them only because of their superior goal record but with one fewer game played. So it could be worse…

After the match, Derek Adams insisted that his team were the better side today. He said of Cambridge:

“They got one opportunity from the Referee when he gave a penalty kick. My players say that it wasn’t a penalty. The player got across our defender and fell to the ground. Our player was then going across him but there was no contact. It might have looked (like) that from the position the Referee was in but there was no contact on it. Today, if they don’t score a penalty kick, they don’t score again in the game and we get another point. That’s hard to take. Today, we didn’t get the big decisions in the game. You just feel over the ninety minutes, we deserved to win. I didn’t think they deserved three points today.”

Cambridge United: 1 Dmitar Mitov; 3 Jack Iredale (11 Harrison Dunk 81’) ; 4 Paul Digby (C); 6 Lloyd Jones; 7 James Brophy (14 Wes Hoolahan 63’); 9 Joe Ironside;10 Sam Smith; 22 Lewis Simper; 24 Sam Sherring (15 Jubril Okedina 72’); 26 Harvey Knibbs; 28 Liam Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  25 William Mannion; 18 Shilow Tracey; 19 Adam May; 23 Jack Lankester.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 5 Jacob Bedeau; 9 Cole Stockton; 10 Aaron Wildig (C) (14 Jonathan Obika 81’); 11 Dylan Connolly; 18 Adam Phillips; 22 Liam Gibson; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 67’); 27 Ousmane Fané (Y); 31 Rhys Bennett (19 Shane McLoughlin 81’).

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 16 Jacob Mensah; 21 Ryan Cooney.

Ref: Carl Boyeson.

Att:  5,813 (217 from Morecambe).

LEAGUE ONE. SATURDAY, 15th APRIL 2022.

Happy Valley – or Valley of Death for Morecambe?

Morecambe visited The Valley in south east London for the first time ever today. They arrived to face Charlton Athletic with the hope of keeping out of the relegation zone in League One – a position they were avoiding prior to the game by virtue of a single more goal scored than twenty- first placed Gillingham. In their last five League One games, their two-game winning streak following two hammerings away from home came to an end when they narrowly lost 2-1 against Cambridge last Saturday.

Critically, they would renew an acquaintance – at least off the field – with former Club Captain Sam Lavelle. When Sam left the club earlier in the season, his absence immediately had a profound effect on the way the Shrimps performed at the back. It could be argued, indeed, that it has taken Derek Adams’ return to the club to stabilise a Back Four which looked like rabbits in headlights more often than not in the absence of their departed Skipper. Sam’s new club found themselves comfortably in fifteenth place in the division before kick-off – a position his presence will certainly have helped to achieve after Athletic’s very poor start to this season’s campaign. He was absent with a groin injury as Morecambe came from two nil down to draw with the Addicks last November at the Maz, which was the only other meeting between the two clubs ever. Sam has picked-up a shoulder injury subsequently and missed Charlton’s fantastic win at promotion-chasing Rotherham by the only goal of the game last Saturday as well. He won’t play again this term. For his new employers, though, this was one of three victories in their last five league games, during which run they have lost just once.

Charlton Manager Johnnie Johnson said about his own hopes for what is left of the season:

“I told the players this morning, there are four games to go, can we get twelve points? That is the aim: can we try and win every game? We are in a decent place; form-wise we are playing well; we have bodies coming back and a decent squad to pick from. Every game we go into I expect and want us to win and finish the season strong. I’m not really focussed on what position we finish or who we finish above. It is more on us and can we win every game we play? We have known that we are not going to get promoted or relegated for a few games now. I want (it) to be the case with every game – that it is not apparent that we are not playing for promotion or relegation. I don’t want that to be a factor within the game. Your players also have self-motivation as well and should have the desire to play well and win every game. That should come from within. That is how we have approached every game and I don’t expect that to change at all.”

As far as today’s opposition is concerned, he added:

“We won’t be taking them lightly at all. They’re another team that is fighting for their lives, they are going to bring that to The Valley, they are going to be scrapping for everything so we know that we have to match that and be in the game. I expect my players to get on top and take the game to them because we are at home. That is how I like to play against whoever we do. We will respect them. They have the top scorer of the league in their team, they have got goals and Stockton is a threat at any given time so we have to be wary of that. They are where they are and have conceded goals and lost games because they have vulnerabilities that we need to exploit. We will respect the fact that they are fighting for their lives and it is important that we match that.”

Before talking about what might happen over the Easter weekend, Mr Johnson’s Opposite Number Derek Adams looked back to his initial stint at Morecambe. He arrived for the first time to deal with a reality where the Shrimps were in dire straits and looking at the distinct possibility of losing their EFL status altogether. Derek said:

“When I came to this football club, we were in a situation where it was very similar, and we had to get ourselves away from the bottom of the table. Let’s see how it pans out after this weekend. We’ll have a better idea going into Monday, and then after Monday, we’ll have a really good idea how it goes for the next two games. We’ve got ourselves into a situation where we’re out of the bottom four at this moment in time, that’s where we want to be. We understand the fixtures that are coming up, but you just never know in football what you can do. I’ve been a manager for so many years; I’ve played against a lot of big teams and been able to get results. So as a player going onto that pitch, you just never know when that win’s going to come along, and hopefully it is Friday.”

Acknowledging that Goal Machine Cole Stockton had scored his twenty-fifth goal in all competitions this season last time out, he added:

“It’s important that other players score goals as well. We’ve had that with Arthur (Gnahoua); Phillips and Wildig at this moment in time helping Cole. We obviously need Connolly to get a goal as well because that would help us even further. He’s been a great outlet for us on the right-hand side because of his pace and direct play, and over the games that I’ve seen, we are starting to click.”

There was little change to the Morecambe starting eleven from recent times. On the bench, however, there was a welcome return after a prolonged illness for Anthony O’Connor.

It was sunny and actually warm – 21˚C – in the capital as the game started. Watching from afar on i-follow, it was a relief to see King Derek shaking hands with the opposition before kick-off: the caption on the screen assured that that “Caretaker Manager Mark Trueman” was in charge of the north Lancashire team today.

The game started at a cracking pace and the outstanding Corey Blackett-Taylor was away down the Addicks’ left straight from the start but was no match for Greg Leigh. Athletic switched the play to their right straight after this as Alex Gilbey ran rings around Ousmane Fané and slung over a low, dangerous cross which drew the first save from Trevor Carson at the near post. Just three minutes were on the clock when Greg beat Blackett-Taylor again, this time in the air. After six minutes, Jayden Stockley latched–on to a long ball into the visitors’ penalty are but Rhys Bennett did brilliantly to block his resulting shot. Then Mr B-T skinned Leigh on the Charlton left and put a ball right across the Morecambe goal-mouth just a minute later before he took a wild punt at the goal a minute after that and missed – by a mile. The tenth minute had been reached before the away side made their presence felt going forward. Captain Aaron Wildig fed Dylan Connolly on the Shrimps’ right and his excellent cross into the centre found Cole Stockton, who was just unable to sort his feet out before the ball was cleared. At the other end, Chelsea loanee Mason Burstow did well to control the ball and shoot after eleven minutes but Bennett did even better to deflect his effort on goal for a corner. Arthur Gnahoua then tried a shot from about thirty yards out and missed as almost a quarter of an hour had been played but straight after this point in the game, the best chance so far fell to the visitors. Arthur was instrumental again as he played in Cole the Goal centrally. He made progress and set himself up for a tremendous shot which home custodian Craig McGillivray did brilliantly to paw away from his top left-hand corner.  The Shrimps were in again after eighteen minutes as Connolly put on the after burners to reach a seemingly over-hit ball far up the Morecambe right and slung over a cross which Cole failed to head towards the target. He then got in a muddle with Wildig and Gnahoua after eighteen minutes when the ball reached them in the centre of the opposition penalty area. The visitors had well and truly come into a game which Charlton had dominated for the first ten minutes at least and the threat to their defence which was gradually mounting as the game grew older paid dividends in the twenty-sixth minute. Excellent play first by Connolly and then by Leigh on the right saw Greg pick-out Cole with a pin-pint cross. The Goal Machine did the rest, sending a shot into the net via McGillivray’s right-hand post as the goalkeeper could only stand and watch. A Twenty-Sixth goal of the season in the Twenty-Sixth minute: what could be more apt?

Charlton attacked straight from kick-off and Carson again excelled with a fine save from Albie Morgan’s close-range shot. Just before the half hour, Blackett-Taylor made space for himself in the penalty area and turned and shot in one movement to send the ball quite high over the bar. Morecambe continued to defend confidently and it seemed that the game was drifting towards a narrow lead for the visitors at half time. But after 42 minutes, Morecambe were attacking down the right flank again. Charlton half-cleared but Bennett lobbed the ball from almost the half way line straight back into the danger area. Arthur did brilliantly to control it and then feint before picking his spot and placing a perfect shot to the right of the home goalkeeper again. Right at the death, Carson stopped the arrears being reduced with another tremendous stop, this time from Stockley’s point-blank header high to his left. So Morecambe retired two-nil up – and deservedly so.

The Shrimps fashioned the first half-chance once the game re-started. Connolly was off like a train up the right yet again and sent over another excellent cross which reached Cole the Goal only for his attempt to be blocked for a throw-in. But the home team reduced the arrears after 52 minutes when a break by danger man Blackett-Taylor led to a cross from the left which Burstow headed towards Carson’s far post only for a suspiciously off-side looking Stockley to sweep it home. As the home crowd – who had been haranguing their own players and Manager at half time – briefly came to life, Corey B-T smashed the ball into the side netting just a minute after his excellent work had set-up the goal. The fifty-seventh minute saw the ball fall to Gnahoua when well-placed but he was unable to do anything with it. Two minutes later, though, Liam Gibson pounced on a mistake by the home defence at the back on their right, found Arthur again with a perfect pass and watched him score an absolute scorcher of a goal with an unstoppable volley into the back of the net from quite close in.

The visitors could have gone even further ahead with just over an hour played. Adam Phillips played a killer ball forward which Cole was bearing down on before McGillivray rushed from his area and booted it away. It fell to Dylan out on the Morecambe right and his instant chip from a long way out only just cleared the home keeper’s bar. The visitors then enjoyed a concerted period of possession high up the pitch as Athletic struggled to win the ball. McGillivray was lucky when he flapped at a corner and missed the ball altogether with 66 minutes on the clock. But the Addicks gradually played themselves back into the game and Carson did well to punch a dangerous cross away to safety after 71 minutes. As the pressure increased, there was a half-decent shout for a penalty for the home team after 78 minutes. Some Referees would have given it but Marc Edwards clearly told George Dobson to get back onto his feet as he waved play-on. Just ten minutes were still scheduled to play when another Chelsea loanee – substitute Chucks Aneke – scored with a tremendous header when found unmarked in the away penalty area by a cross from the left. It was Squeaky Bum time after that as the game lasted another fifteen minutes. Cole had another half-chance at the death and Athletic looked dangerous at times but at the end of the game, Morecambe held out to earn a well-deserved victory.

This was a classic Derek Adams Smash and Grab in the style of those he repeatedly fashioned last season. He told the media afterwards:

“We caused them a lot of trouble. We had to suss them out. I thought we did that really well. We locked high onto their back three. We dealt with their Wing Backs with our Full Backs. Our midfield players then locked onto their players. It stopped them playing. When you stop a side playing, it frustrates them. You then go down the side of them and (we) created some really good opportunities even before we scored. We could have gone ahead two or three nil – even before we got that first goal. In the end, (it was) a thoroughly deserved win for us because we created by far the best opportunities in the game. I think – performance-wise – we were accomplished. I thought that the team spirit; the understanding of the Game Plan; the understanding of the roles was excellent. They have to do it, the players. I thought to a man today, they were in top class for this division.”

Elsewhere, things could hardly have gone better for Morecambe today. Relegated Crewe came from behind to beat AFC Wimbledon 3-1. Fleetwood conceded three goals at home to Oxford United in the opening quarter of an hour and were only able to pull two of them back by the end. Donny lost 1-2 to the appalling Bolton Wanderers. And Gillingham – despite twice leading – were held to a 2-2 draw at Cheltenham. So tonight, the Shrimps find themselves in nineteenth position in League One, three points better off than the highest of the relegation berths which the Cod Army now inhabit.

All 350 Morecambe fans at the Happy Valley this afternoon could be heard noisily encouraging their team throughout the match. I know that some of them intend to celebrate today’s tremendous win with a pub crawl along `the Bermondsey Beer mile’ this evening. I have only one thing to say to them:

Cheers! (And have one – or possibly even two – for me…)

Charlton Athletic: 1 Craig McGillivray; 4 George Dobson; 5 Akin Famewo; 6 Jason Pearce (Y); 9 Jayden Stockley; 10 Albie Morgan (8 Jake Forster-Caskey 68’); 11 Alex Gilbey (14 Conor Washington 59’); 16 Adam Matthews; 23 Corey Blackett-Taylor; 28 Sean Clare; 48 Mason Burstow (22 Chuks Aneke 74’).

Subs Not Used: 31 Nathan Harness; 7 Diallang Jaiyesimi; 18 Jonathan Leko; 31 Nathan Harness.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 5 Jacob Bedeau; 9 Cole Stockton; 10 Aaron Wildig (C) (19 Shane McLoughlin 88’); 11 Dylan Connolly (4 Anthony O’Connor 86’); 18 Adam Phillips; 22 Liam Gibson (21 Ryan Cooney 76’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 27 Ousmane Fané; 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Ref: Marc Edwards.

Att: 10,706 (350 from Morecambe).

Bazuna Chimes at the Mazuma…

Portsmouth made the 266-mile journey from the south coast to north Lancashire to face Morecambe today at the Mazuma stadium. They have never won at this venue, losing one and drawing three of their previous meetings. However, Pompey have beaten Morecambe three times altogether out of nine historical meetings and lost twice. They won the reverse fixture last December 2-0 against a team managed by the man – Stephen Robinson – who has celebrated his subsequent defection to St Mirren North of the Border by losing eight of the nine games his new club has played so far. His replacement at the Maz, on the other hand, has overseen nothing less than a renaissance (`miracle’ might be a better word) at the club using the same players he inherited from the Ulsterman. Just four games ago, Derek said – after his team had shipped nine goals and scored only one from the penalty spot in their previous two matches – that the Shrimps needed to win at least three of their remaining League One games. It seemed an improbable – if not actually impossible – task. But in their last four games, his men have done exactly what he asked for by winning three of them in order to propel the Shrimps three points and two places away from the position Robbo abandoned them in: top of the bottom four in the division.

The visitors, on the other hand, arrived in ninth place in League One on the back of two wins and two losses in their last five matches. With just three games left to play, it is mathematically impossible for the Hampshire club to reach the Play-Offs and they thus had only pride to play for today. However, they beat Rotherham United three-nil last Tuesday at Fratton Park to throw a spanner in someone else’s hopes for success so nobody would be underestimating them at the Maz today – least of all Morecambe Manager Derek Adams. He said prior to the match:

 “It is extremely tight at the bottom of the division. We knew it was going to be difficult, we have three games to go and we understand what we have to do. The players have shown that fighting spirit on the pitch and the supporters have as well. They are willing us to get those points and it is up to us to go and get them. We have to try and keep on winning football matches, there is no doubt about it; win more points against the opposition that are down there and that is what we are trying to do. We are looking forward to the game, another tough test in Portsmouth at home. They are a fantastic football club and I am sure after Friday’s win against Charlton will see us close to capacity at the Mazuma Stadium. We have had three wins in such a short space of time as well as two draws that have really helped us. We have a group of players that are willing and wanting this football club to stay in League One. They have certainly given themselves a fighting chance. I think that we have a togetherness throughout the Club that enabled us to get to League One last season and it is showing that we have quality within this squad.”

Opposition Manager Danny Cowley made these observations about the task facing his team before the game today:

“They will obviously be buoyed by what was a very good victory in London at Charlton on Friday. We know the rules when you play the teams at the bottom of the table towards the end of the season. I can promise everyone that we’ll also be doing what we can to get a positive result and our motivation will be there. Morecambe will be extremely motivated, they’ll be battling and will do everything they can to try to win. We respect that, but we’re on a journey as well and have taken 28 points from our past 14 games, which is a really good record. I can promise everyone that we’ll also be doing what we can to get a positive result and our motivation will be there. We know that we’ll have a lot of supporters travelling all the way up there from the south coast to get behind us. The fact that they’re doing that and putting in so much effort over the Easter weekend means we have to empty the tank. We’re looking to produce a performance that reflects our values because we want to be the best version of ourselves.”

 For the visitors, Mr Cowley was unable to pick Kieron Freeman – who is suffering from a damaged ankle – or Reeco Hackett-Fairchild and Jayden Reid (who both have knee injuries). For Morecambe, Greg Leigh retained his place in the continuing absence of injured Ryan McLaughlin.

It was sunny and dry with a deceptively strong and cold wind blowing from the west as the game started. Portsmouth must have won the toss as they elected to play the first half against the massed ranks of their own fans.

It was one-way traffic almost right from the start although Pompey played some crisp, accurate football in the first ten minutes or so and actually won the first corner of the game after four minutes. But Trevor Carson in the home goal was only tested twice during the entire opening half. The first time was after nineteen minutes, when Shaun Williams’ effort from a fair way out was easily collected by him.

At the other end, though, highly-rated Manchester City loanee Gavin Bazuna and his goal led a charmed life all afternoon. Almost quarter of an hour had been played when Cole Stockton broke the defending rearguard with a smart pass which saw Dylan Connolly bear down on goal and unleash a shot which went just wide of Bazuma’s left hand post. Arthur Gnahoua was a handful again today and he was denied when the visiting goalkeeper got the merest of touches to push a shot from him after nineteen minutes against his left-hand post. The ball spun agonisingly right across his goal-line – and on most other occasions, it would have hit the other post and gone in. But not today. The goalkeeper did brilliantly, however, after 22 minutes. Cole the Goal seemed to be certain to score yet again but was denied by him twice – once from his original close-range shot and again as he somehow managed to keep Stockton’s second effort out of the net as well after first of all doing brilliantly to deal with Gnahoua’s initial shot. On another occasion, either one of these efforts might have gone in. But not today. And so it went on.

Morecambe asked all the questions but – despite some very poor dead ball kicking – the away goalkeeper kept them out. As the Pompey Chimes rang out across the ground from the visiting support, the men in the predominately white strip had their second effort on goal just four minutes before the end of the period. Ronan Curtis nodded Clark Robertson’s cross to Captain Sean Raggett and he controlled the ball well, spun and shot in one motion to see his effort hit the woodwork high up and drop into the net. It might have bounced away from the danger zone instead. But not today. It was a tremendous strike although it made you wonder if Lady Luck had hitched a ride on the Portsmouth team bus today because they went back to the dressing rooms with a lead which they were extremely fortunate to have.

Pompey played much better – and at a far faster pace – in the second half. But still the home team continued to be the more threatening of the two sides – and the visitors continued to ride their luck. Bazuma’s panic-stricken clearance after 55 minutes could have gone virtually anywhere. But not today. As it happened, it hit an onrushing Arthur and bounced past the wrong side of the post from Morecambe’s point of view.  He panicked again after 72 minutes but this time his wild clearance cannoned-off Adam Phillips and could easily have gone under his bar. But not today: it went over it instead. Lucky, lucky boy…

At the other end of the pitch, his Opposite Number continued to have very little to do. The only shot I can remember the visitors having in the entire second period was by George Hirst after 68 minutes – and it missed the target altogether. Cole was man-handled as ever as the useless Referee – Robert Madley – did nothing about it, even when he was being regularly sandwiched by two opponents and even clearly having his hair pulled. The officious nobody with the whistle threatened to spoil yet another match with his usual bucketful of decisions ranging from poor to bad to appalling. This didn’t help either team – or the flow of the game. To be fair to them, Pompey didn’t play for time or feign injury to drag things out as the second half progressed. They simply defended and continued to ride their luck.

Morecambe seemed to have equalised right at the death after substitute Toumani Diagouraga’s effort finally found the back of the Portsmouth net – but the Man in the Middle ruled it out for handball.

So it was beginning to look like one of those games where Morecambe were going to lose despite having the far better chances of the ninety minutes. But in the second of five added minutes right at the end, they finally reduced the arrears. Greg Leigh’s corner was spilled by the Pompey goalkeeper and substitute Jonah Ayunga joyfully swept it home.

It would have been a travesty if the Shrimps had got nothing out of this match today. Visiting Manager Danny Cowley complained long and loud to the incompetent in the middle at the end of proceedings. He was probably claiming that his goalkeeper was fouled when Morecambe equalised. Maybe he had a point – the Man in Black missed almost everything else after all. But Danny should have been asking him to resign – this uniformed clown is (probably literally) not fit to officiate at League One level.

The late draw really helped to keep Morecambe’s survival hopes on track. There were two Red Cards at Gillingham, where Fleetwood managed to escape with a goal-less draw which doesn’t really help either of them at the bottom of the Division. AFC Wimbledon were leading for much of their game against Wycombe but that also ended in a draw with one goal each. Seemingly doomed Doncaster also drew (three each at Shrewsbury) to complete a sequence of just one point gained by all the clubs manoeuvring in the primeval swamp which is the bottom of League One. So Morecambe remain three points clear of the oblivion which still threatens to engulf them despite having consolidated their nineteenth position in League One. Derek Adams told us all after the game:

“Portsmouth are a very good side but they didn’t cause us much trouble today. I think that’s testament to the team.  But on the flip side, the amount of good opportunities we had; if we had won four or five-one today, nobody could have complained. We were outstanding all over the pitch. (It was) an excellent performance from us.”

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 5 Jacob Bedeau; 9 Cole Stockton; 10 Aaron Wildig (C) (17 Jonah Ayunga 59’); 11 Dylan Connolly (8 Toumani Diagouraga 67’); 18 Adam Phillips; 22 Liam Gibson; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 27 Ousmane Fané (25 Alfie McCalmont 76’); 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 4 Anthony O’Connor; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 21 Ryan Cooney.

Portsmouth: 1 Gavin Bazunu; 4 Clark Robertson; 6 Shaun Williams (23 Louis Thompson 62’); 8 Ryan Tunnicliffe; 10 Marcus Harness (15 Mahlon Romeo 71’); 11 Ronan Curtis; 16 Connor Ogilvie; 17 Hayden Carter; 19 George Hirst; 20 Sean Raggett (C); 24 Michael Jacobs (7 Aiden O’Brien 63’).

Subs Not Used:   9 Tyler Walker; 22 Liam Vincent; 25 Jade Jay Mingi; 28 Oliver Webber.

Ref: Robert Madley.

Att: 4893 (including a magnificent 806 from Portsmouth).

Plastic Dons: Enemy Stink, Old Son!

During recent years, whenever Morecambe have played the EFL club based in Milton Keynes, I have only reported on what went on in the games as far as the Shrimps were concerned. I have deliberately not mentioned the name the Plastic Dons like to be known by; their Chairman; their Manager; their players; their league position or their current form. I intend to uphold that approach today. Why?

This outfit should not be in the EFL at all and it is literally a scandal that they are. The Football Association set-up a so-called Independent Commission (of just three unelected and unaccountable people) to create a smokescreen to hide this shameful act behind before the dirty deed was done. It reported:

“We find the cherished and fundamental principles of football in this country in relation to the pyramid structure and promotion and relegation on sporting criteria alone, admirable. Likewise we respect, value and would seek to uphold the community basis of football clubs. We do not wish to see clubs attempting to circumvent the pyramid structure by ditching their communities and metamorphosising in new, more attractive areas.”

Oh really? The FA and the Football League then said that they didn’t agree with the Commission’s ruling – by two votes to one – to ignore the pious sentiments they had just expressed in these terms. But they both stood by and let a deed which undermined everything they claimed to hold so dear actually happen. What a joke. But money talks, doesn’t it?

Subsequently, the man with the deepest pockets who underwrote this extremely dodgy example of football parasitism – nay, cannibalism – admitted:

“I did a deal that was wrong. I’m not proud of the way football came to Milton Keynes.”

So did he give the franchise back? Apologise to the people of Wimbledon and the Crazy Gang’s original fans as his club started all over again at Grass Roots level – just as every other team currently in the EFL once had to do?

No he most certainly didn’t – and hell would freeze over before a person of his sort ever would do anything so principled. Instead, this gentleman is still Chairman of the club he created almost twenty years ago. So much for the sincerity of his apparent regrets subsequently. He must chuckle to himself every time that saps like ourselves; Sutton United or Harrogate Town among others are stupid enough to use the Pyramid route to EFL membership. Why not just throw barrow loads of money at it instead?…

It is certain, very regrettably, that the Cuckoo club that stole the old Wimbledon FC’s very soul as well as its corporate identity will be in at least the Play-Offs for a place in the Championship this season. They could still even win automatic promotion. I really hope that such an eventuality will not happen.  I would like their Play-Off campaign to end in failure as well. I personally wish that it was them struggling at the bottom of League One instead of the phoenix club which battled its way through a succession of non-leagues (six altogether, starting all over again in a Combined Counties League which hardly anybody has ever heard of) over a sustained period. Against all odds, AFC Wimbledon has finally succeeded in re-establishing a Crazy Gang heritage at a brand new stadium on Plough Lane. They have done this as dodgy people at the FA and the English Football League effectively rubber-stamped the sale of their original club to the owners of the Milton Keynes interlopers who have always enjoyed a `special’ relationship with them. The whole thing stinks and it is an insult to all the other clubs who have had to make the long and arduous journey towards EFL membership – such as ourselves – instead of being handed it on a plate without ever having to work their way up from the bottom of the Football Pyramid in this country.

At this stage of the season, though, I need to say more about the Plastic Dons than I would like. I’m delighted to report that they were beaten last Tuesday night by the only goal of the game at Oxford. This meant that they went into today’s match in third position in League One, level on points with stumbling Rotherham but a whole five behind leaders Wigan. Both of the leading clubs have also played one game fewer than the imposters. With just two games left of the league campaign, a win today for the Cuckoos was thus essential to maintain any hope at all of automatic promotion.

But it was even more important for their visitors, albeit for totally different reasons. With just six more points available to them, the Shrimps arrived in Buckinghamshire’s biggest and ugliest New Town three points and two places clear of Fleetwood.

The failing Cod Army occupied the highest of the relegation berths in the division but still had a crucial game in hand. At the bottom, appallingly administered Crewe were relegated a while ago as our own Dave Artell paid the price for a total lack of ambition or investment in the Boardroom who sold his best players and didn’t replace them. Doncaster had no realistic hope of escaping the drop, either.

So that leaves two of ourselves; Fleetwood; AFC Wimbledon and Gillingham to make up the other doomed clubs. The Shrimps were six points better off than the authentic Dons, however – with  a better goal difference and the same number of games played.

So all Morecambe fans had at least one eye focused on Highbury as their own game was progressing today. There, the Cod Army and the Wombles were involved in a Life or Death struggle to see which of them was most likely to drop back into League Two. AFC Wimbledon basically needed to win for the first time in 26 matches to have any hope at all of avoiding the Drop. If Fleetwood won, though, their chances of staying up on the last day next week would improve markedly, particularly as their goal difference is far superior to ours and the fact that they have two – not just one – games still to contest. So for us, a Wombles win or – perhaps better still – a draw would be the best possible outcome.

We would all be looking out for the score from Fratton Park as well, where Pompey were potentially holding the fate of the final member of the Legion of the Almost Damned – Gillingham – in their hands. The Kent club is still clinging on to League One survival largely because of the efforts of leading scorer Vadaine Oliver. He was never allowed to fulfil his potential at Morecambe – where he was played on his own up front more often than not with no support from midfield or anywhere else. With that basic backup provided for him at both Northampton and his current employers, however, he has been doing the same job for the Gills that his replacement at Morecambe – Cole Stockton – has done for us in recent times.

Vadaine’s latest club started proceedings this afternoon just two points behind the Shrimps. They found themselves in twentieth place in the division with the same number of games played but with a slightly inferior Goal Difference. If they lost and Morecambe won this afternoon; the Shrimps would be safe. But if they won and Morecambe lost, Gillingham would be in the Box Seat to stay in League One this term.

King Derek announced before the game:

“We will have to be at our best. If we go there to sit in for long periods of time that won’t help us because of their talent. We’ve got a point (in hand) at this moment in time but we need to try and win the match. We’ve shown we are very good on the counter attack – we’ve got quick players, direct players and players in the final third that can score goals.”

Just to complicate things still further, not too far up the road elsewhere in Buckinghamshire, Wycombe were battling with Sheffield Wednesday today to consolidate their positions in the League One Play-Offs. Wednesday were fourth in the standings prior to the clash; Wanderers sixth. Next Tuesday, the Yorkshire club travel to Lancashire to face Fleetwood for what could be a season-defining game for both clubs. So – for all the teams mentioned above – the stakes could hardly be higher today.

Aaron Wildig was not fit enough to start this afternoon so his place was taken by Toumani Diagouraga and Cole the Goal Stockton assumed the Captaincy of the team.

So – abacus’ as well as notebooks at the ready in the Press Room – the game finally started.

Morecambe had the first half-chance of a poor first forty-five minutes of football when Cole attempted to lob the home goalkeeper after four minutes only to see the ball clear the bar. Adam Phillips was caught off-side straight after this. From then on, however, they offered very little going forward. They failed to test the home custodian at any time during the opening period and they didn’t force even a single corner. Worse still, the hosts scored after just a quarter of an hour as the home team stood off as one of their central defenders was allowed to lumber right up the pitch and  take a shot which beat Trevor Carson all ends up. It was a really sloppy goal to concede. At half time, the score was thus one-nil to the MK outfit.

Elsewhere, Fleetwood went a goal down to AFC Wimbledon, which was the score at the break. Gillingham also fell behind at Portsmouth but pulled themselves back into it to draw one each after 45 minutes. But then Pompey scored again in injury time to leave Gillingham in the mire all over again. Morecambe were thus still in Pole Position, with Fleetwood looking vulnerable and AFC Wimbledon going down fighting. To confuse things even further, seemingly doomed Doncaster were managing to beat Burton Albion by the only goal of the game so far. But how would this situation change during the second half?

Back on the field, Morecambe at least managed to force a corner shortly after the re-start but Adam Phillips’ dead ball kick – as with most of his contribution today – was poor. As news filtered through that Gillingham’s Manager Neil Harris had been sent to the stands at Fratton Park, Carson made a couple of decent saves to keep Morecambe in the match. Then the Shrimps shipped another poor goal as a shot was slightly deflected by Rhys Bennett past his own unsighted goalkeeper with eighty minutes on the clock. The Shrimps Goal Difference – which could still prove to be their Achilles’ Heel – would have worsened even more but for a fantastic save by Trevor after 84 minutes; this time using his feet to keep another shot out of the net. A poor game finally ground to an end with the Shrimps putting on a very disappointing display at a time when they really could not afford to do so.

Derek Adams tried to put a positive spin on it after the game. He said:

“We’re in a much better position than we were before the game. Before the game, there was four team in it; now there’s only three teams in it.”

Very true. He didn’t say this – but it also could have been much worse…

Donny held out for a rare victory, two-nil at the end of the game against Burton. But it’s too little, too late for the Yorkshire club. Wimbledon were winning at Highbury until just two minutes before the end. Then their goalkeeper was penalised for an offence that most of us didn’t know even existed (using his boot to position the ball and then kicking it, which is apparently not allowed); conceded an indirect free-kick in his own area – and Fleetwood equalised against the run of play. The point took the Cod Army out of the relegation positions and they now lay one place and two points behind the Shrimps tonight, still with that magic game in hand. AFC Wimbledon – realistically – are down as a result. Let’s hope they’re back again soon. They can’t overhaul Morecambe in any case now – but both Fleetwood and Gillingham can. On Tuesday, the Cod Army face Sheffield Wednesday, who lost at Wycombe today. Wednesday need to win to get into the League One Play-Offs. On the same night, Sunderland host Rotherham United in a game which has massive implications for the promotion hopes for both sides. So it could be that by the time the Black Cats travel to Morecambe next Saturday; their place in the Play-Offs will be secure. But there again…

I think that – in reality – the real focus of attention next Saturday will be at Priestfield in Kent and The Maz in north Lancashire. Gillingham host Rotherham United who – even if they win at Sunderland on Tuesday – will need all three points to guarantee automatic promotion. If the Gills – with their Manager now banned from the touchline – are beaten; the Shrimps could still lose to Sunderland and stay in League One. But their fate still remains in their own hands: if they simply beat the promotion hopefuls, they will stay up.

As I say, things really could be much worse. Whatever happens, at least we don’t have the magic of Stephen Robinson to contend with any more. If he had remained in charge, Morecambe would without any doubt have been dead and buried long before now. Today, his new team contrived to lose the ninth of the ten games he has been in charge of. St Mirren were defeated this time at home by Hibernian, who scored the only goal of the game. In Paisley, the natives are restless…

As for Morecambe’s opposition today… who cares? The sooner they are relegated to the M25 Outer Orbital Relegation League where they actually belong, the better.

Oh – and why did I write `Enemy Stink Old Son’ as the heading for this article? MK Plastic Dons and the deal that was done to create them in the first place stinks. True enough. But `Enemy Stink Old Son’ is also an anagram of Milton Keynes Dons – the ridiculous name by which they like to be known. (Who says these articles are thrown together at the last moment?…)

Morecambe’s team today:  30 Trevor Carson; 3 Greg Leigh; 5 Jacob Bedeau; 9 Cole Stockton (C); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 11 Dylan Connolly (Y); 18 Adam Phillips (Y); 22 Liam Gibson (Y); 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 60’); 27 Ousmane Fané (19 Shane McLoughlin 73’); 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 4 Anthony O’Connor; 10 Aaron Wildig; 21 Ryan Cooney; 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Ref: Lee Swabey.

401 fans from Morecambe attended this game. Well done to all of them.

Morecambe  Lose the Battle – But Win The War.

Well – here we are. The Great League One Adventure almost over. For now? Or for the foreseeable future?

The Great League One Adventure has meant forty-five games played since last Summer in usually unknown territory in front of often record crowds home and away. Highs and lows. Great wins; sometimes appalling defeats.

And now – at the end of it all – it’s gone right down to the wire. The Eleventh Hour. Last Chance Saloon, etc etc. The final game of the season: ninety minutes between ourselves and potential utter ecstasy – or total despair for all Morecambe supporters. But there I go, getting carried right away and exaggerating into the bargain.

`Total despair’ is what fans of Scunthorpe United have been bracing themselves for all season – and what befell Oldham Athletic as well last Saturday.

Imagine how they must feel. Just think for a single moment what they would give to be in our position now: they’d grab relegation from League One with everything they have, not just both hands.

So – as with all things – there is an Up Side and a Down Side to the situation we find ourselves in today. On the Up Side, if the Shrimps win this afternoon, the club will stay in League One. It’s a simple as that: nobody else among the Legion of the Almost Doomed – Gillingham and Fleetwood – would be able to do anything about it.

Even a draw would do. The jeopardy which has affected so many clubs on the run-in to today’s show-down with Sunderland remains such that it is still possible for Morecambe to lose today and stay in the division. All we needed was for Gillingham to fail to beat their visitors to the Priestfield Stadium – Rotherham United – by more than three clear goals. But United also needed to win to ensure their own promotion to the Championship this afternoon: three points would mean that nobody else could pip them to an automatic return to the Division above. What greater motivation could the Yorkshiremen have? Gillingham were two points behind us in the table at half past midday when the fun started for everybody today and even if they were to win by the odd goal, all we would need is a draw against Sunderland to stay up, given their inferior goal difference.

This was the key contrast between the Gills’ situation and Fleetwood’s before their final games. If the Cod Army won today at serial cheats Bolton Wanderers and we lost, they would overtake us in the table solely on the basis of a better goal ratio.

But Fleetwood – just like Gillingham – haven’t beaten anybody for longer than virtually anyone can remember. And beating Bolton requires an adherence to the Dark Arts for at least ninety minutes which Fleetwood – to their considerable credit – do not stoop to. Last Tuesday, they fell behind to Sheffield Wednesday virtually as soon as a ball had been kicked at Highbury. As a tremendous tribute to their fighting spirit though, they fought back to lead 2-1 at half time. And then – very sadly from their point of view – shipped two more goals to lose yet again.

So Morecambe needed just a draw today to stay up – provided that Gillingham didn’t beat Rotherham United by more than three goals.

Could the Gills achieve this? In my view at least – it was unlikely. In my head, to be totally honest, we were already safe. But a little voice at the back of my mind still niggled away: “Don’t count your chickens, mate: stranger things have happened, after all…”

Whilst Fleetwood were losing yet again on Tuesday night, at the other end of the table, Sunderland also found themselves behind to potential League One Champions Rotherham by a goal to nil for eighty-eight minutes of their match at The Stadium of you-know-what.

Then, Michael Ihiekew’s second goal of the night – this time into his own net – gave them a point which saw them arrive at the Mazuma Stadium today in fifth position in League One.

The draw meant that Rotherham – leading the division for much of the season so far – needed all three points at the Priestfield to potentially deny Wigan the Champions’ Crown and stop the team which plays in Milton Keynes from gaining automatic promotion as well – potentially as Champions themselves. It’s really tight at the top as well as the bottom of the league. So Sunderland actually needed to win today too: anything less could see either Plymouth or Wycombe take their place in the Play-Offs if either of them were to win because both clubs lay just one point in the table behind them prior to the start of play.

Rarely – if ever- has a final day of a season been so finely balanced – and at both ends of the table as well.

So let’s take a breath at this point and wind the clock back to the beginning of the month.

Just three short weeks ago at the start of April, Derek Adams said that three wins between that time and the end of the season could suffice to keep Morecambe’s dreams of remaining a Third Division club a reality. And – three wins (against Burton Albion; Oxford United and Charlton Athletic) have propelled the club from the position they were in then – third from the bottom of the table – to their exalted nineteenth place in the league today. I think it’s true to say we would have all bitten anybody’s hand off then to be in the situation we currently find ourselves in.

In order to win today however, Morecambe would have to turn their historical form against the Black Cats completely on its head. In three former meetings in three separate competitions, the Shrimps have lost every time. Worse still, Morecambe have never scored even once against the team from the North East and have conceded eight goals; five of these when Stephen Robinson was still in charge last December and already seemed to be losing the plot. Two things could be guaranteed today, though. Firstly, if Robbo hadn’t jumped ship and fled to St Mirren for someone else to pick up the mess he left behind, today’s game would be a Wake because Morecambe would already be accompanying – and possible leading – Crewe, Donny and the authentic Dons back into League Two. Secondly, King Derek would pick a team today which would at least give Sunderland a run for their money – unlike the one which capitulated to the Black Cats on their own patch as it fell apart at the back only a few short months ago.

Lee Johnson was in charge of today’s visitors when this happened. His successor in the (very) Hot Seat which is the Sunderland Job – ex PNE boss Alex Neill – started his thoughts prior to the game with a reference to his team’s current very impressive twelve match unbeaten run:

“It’s a positive situation because we have done it ourselves; it hasn’t been handed to us by anyone; no-one has done us a favour. We’ve done what we needed to do make sure it is still in our hands, and that’s the way you would want it going into the last game. Morecambe have a lot to play for as well, so I’m sure they will come up with a gameplan that gives them the best opportunity of getting something from the game to make sure they secure their status. They have done extremely well because it’s not too long ago that Morecambe were in League Two regularly and fighting to stay in there. Having won promotion, if they stay in League One, which in the current situation looks likely, it will be a great achievement. We need to make sure we move the ball really well, and if they press us then we can play through that; play round it; maybe play over it. Equally, when they have got the ball we need to make sure our defensive structure is right. It’s going to be a tough game because of what is at stake for both teams.”

Derek Adams had these thoughts before his team’s vital final match of the campaign:

“We’ve got a core squad that are ready to go and to get us over this final hurdle. I think it’s important having experience in your dressing room, a know-how how to win. We’ve got that within the side. Being at home is fantastic for us because we’ve seen at home last season and the Play-Offs against Tranmere how that can help us. We’ve got that experience of playing here, this season and last season – of winning games that are important to us. We’ve only had one defeat at home in the last eight games. We understand that Sunderland are on a 12-game unbeaten run (but) we’re really confident at home; we’ve got a huge backing. It’s a sell-out crowd for the game on Saturday and we’re all thoroughly looking forward to that. I think that’s important – your home form. We’d always like to have done better away from home, but we understand the league that we’re in. We understand the quality teams that are about but we have shown here the likes of beating Oxford at home, Burton Albion at home, they’ve been big wins for us. We’ve taken points against Ipswich and Portsmouth as well, so we understand Sunderland are a huge football club, and we understand that they’re in the same division as us. That gives us that opportunity to try and get something from the game on Saturday.”

Forward Carl Winchester was missing for the visitors due to injury and Greg Leigh’s place in the home starting eleven was taken by Ryan Cooney for the same reason.

It was sunny with a bitingly cold wind blowing across the pitch as the game kicked off in front of yet another record home crowd. Morecambe went onto the front foot immediately and the massed ranks behind visiting keeper Anthony Patterson’s goal had little to shout about for the first few minutes as the hosts won a couple of corners. The home team pressed the side playing in a sort of inverted Ukrainian strip: yellow shirts with Royal Blue shorts and socks – back into their own half for the first ten minutes. But the mark of a good team is one that takes its chances and with the first attempt on the home goal, the Black Cats took the lead right at the end of this period. Nathan Broadhead did well to force and then pounce upon a rare mistake from Rhys Bennett, took the ball forward and scored with an assured finish which gave home custodian Trevor Carson no chance whatever. Two minutes later, Adam Phillips was rightly booked for a poor challenge on Sunderland Captain Corry Evans. But weak Referee Gavin Ward allowed a succession of fouls on Dylan Connolly – some of them objectively just as bad – to go completely unpunished throughout the game. Derek Adams went mental at the Fourth Official on the touchline as a result. The one thing I would personally gripe about as far as the visitors’ were concerned today was that some of their players appeared to be made of candy floss. The scorer Broadhead was clearly genuinely injured when he broke-down after about twenty-five minutes and had to be replaced. But the way his team-mates fell over at even the hint of a foul – and stayed down – is something a better official than Mr Ward would have nipped in the bud when it started to happen as soon as they had scored. But he didn’t – this is yet another Referee whose decision-making is not good enough for this level of football. Top of the Cheating Charts for the Black Cats? Without any doubt, Ross Stewart. He’s a great big lad who should be able to look after himself but he could probably enter the Olympics Diving Team on the basis of his pathetic performance today. Shame on him. By half time, though, the visitors were in a commanding – and familiar –position as far as Morecambe are concerned.

You wouldn’t have known it from the reaction in the home crowd. A tremor went through us all as Fleetwood took the lead at Bolton after just seventeen minutes. When Rotherham scored at Gillingham after 34 minutes though, the chants of “We are staying up!” started for the first time. Three minutes later, Bolton had equalised and the feeling of relief in the ground was tangible.

The second half followed the same pattern as the first. Morecambe had a lot of possession but in all truth, never forced a save from visiting custodian Anthony Patterson. At the other end, Trevor Carson pulled-off a typical point-blank miracle to keep out Patrick Roberts in the seventieth minute. King Derek was booked in the ninetieth minute for again vociferously complaining about the appalling officiating by the Man in the Middle – but ultimately, it didn’t matter.

Off the field, all ears and eyes were on developments elsewhere.  When Bolton went ahead after 53 minutes, another surge of joy went through the home crowd. There was a collective intake of breath, though, when Fleetwood equalised once more with seventy-nine minutes on the clock. But Wanderers took the lead again with just four minutes left and then scored again in injury time. I’m sure this was all completely Above Board…

Most importantly, though, Rotherham scored again at Priestfield right at the death. This proved to be exactly that – the death of the Kent club’s hopes of survival this term.  But long-suffering Gills fans are used to regular promotions and relegations. They should be doing a lot better than they have done in recent times if only because of the monopoly they have of potential support in a massive geographical Home Counties area. I’m personally delighted that Wigan have been promoted – if only for Old Times’ sake. I bought a Football Annual from 1957-58 last weekend at a Car Boot Sale. There, in the Lancashire Combination, were the Latics in tenth position. Fleetwood were sixteenth out of twenty clubs. We were third. Prescot Cables won the championship. So who would have believed – way back then – the situation we found ourselves in collectively today? – Wigan Champions and both Morecambe and Fleetwood surviving to play in what was then the Third Division. My – how things have changed…

Despite Sunderland extending their perfect record against the Shrimps to a four-game 100% record with no goals conceded, our Saviour Derek had this to say after the match:

“The game was a difficult one for both sides. We lost a poor goal to start with but results on the day have gone our way. Over the season, we’ve picked-up enough points to stay in League One. Financially, it’s huge. The venues you go to; the teams that you play against – is massive. You only have to look at Derby County coming down to League One – there’s a lot of big teams in this division.”

So we can all relax this evening and plan our visit to Pride Park and other new venues later in the year.

Sunderland fans went home happy too. They will now compete to accompany Wigan and Rotherham back into the Championship with Wycombe; Sheffield Wednesday and the team from Milton Keynes in the Play-Offs.

But as for Morecambe…

What a roller-coaster ride it has been. I will write a Review of the Season in the next few days but after that it will be Roger Over and Out at least for now. I hope you have enjoyed my blog but now I am going to shut everything down and celebrate appropriately.

Cheers!…

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 21 Ryan Cooney (Y); 5 Jacob Bedeau; 9 Cole Stockton (Y); 10 Aaron Wildig (C) (Y); 11 Dylan Connolly (14 Jonathan Obika 83’); 18 Adam Phillips (Y); 22 Liam Gibson; 24 Arthur Gnahoua (17 Jonah Ayunga 67’); 27 Ousmane Fané (8 Toumani Diagouraga 70’); 31 Rhys Bennett.

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 4 Anthony O’Connor; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 25 Alfie McCalmont.

Sunderland: 20 Anthony Patterson; 4 Corry Evans (C); 5 Danny Batth; 8 Elliot Embleton; 9 Nathan Broadhead (25 Jack Clarke 25’); 11 Lynden Gooch; 13 Luke O’Nien: 14 Ross Stewart (27 Jay Matete 72’); 21 Alex Pritchard (24 Daniel Neil 81’); 26 Bailey Wright (C); 77 Patrick Roberts.

Subs Not Used:  39 Ron-Horben Hoffmann; 19 Arbenit Xhemajli; 28 Aiden McGeady; 32 Trai Hume.

Ref: Gavin Ward.

Att: 5,831 (Loads from Sunderland).

The season – and arguably life itself – can be divided into two distinct periods. BC (Common Era) and AD.

I’m not entirely sure what the first very Politically Correct acronym actually means but I do know that the other one – AD – very definitely stands for After Derek.

It is a matter of record that Derek Adams left Morecambe Football Club as soon as the job he said he was here to do – promotion to League One – was achieved. That happened less than a year ago at Wembley.

So the first big watershed of this season After Derek was the appointment of a new manager at the Mazuma Stadium. The Morecambe Board chose Stephen Robinson.

It seemed a sound choice at the time. Robbo had a tremendous reputation as a result of his work at Motherwell in the Scottish Premiership. He seemed to establish some sort of reputation for integrity too, by his decision to leave the club once he decided he could take it no further. This sort of principled behaviour is rare in football.

To be fair to him – with less than a handful of players signed-up for the new challenge and lynchpins of the old Derek Adams team (notably Carlos Mendes-Gomes and Yann Songo’o) departed for Pastures New, Stephen had little time to build a squad and not as many resources as lots of even League Two and National League clubs can call upon to do so.

Initially, though, he seemed to have pulled it off. Against all the odds, Bookies’ Favourites for Relegation Morecambe drew at Favourites for Promotion Ipswich’s Portman Road 2-2 in the opening game of the season, having led twice. This match – to mark the difference between the exalted plain which the Shrimps had reached for the first time and everything they had experienced before – was played in front of the biggest crowd that had ever watched a football match they had been involved in at a club ground: 21,309 people. It also marked another regular event as far as Morecambe would be concerned – Cole The Goal Stockton scoring. (Both goals on this occasion…)

It got better. In their very next game, Morecambe travelled east across Lancashire to meet Blackburn Rovers in a competitive football fixture for the first time ever. And deservedly knocked the Championship side out of the League Cup by coming from behind to win 1-2.  

But the excellent results and good performance didn’t last long. There had been rumours right from the start of the season that charismatic Club Captain Sam Lavelle was about to leave. He duly did – on August 31^st last year. His move to rivals Charlton Athletic left a massive gulf which arguably has not been filled even yet. The team started to lose and look repeatedly All At Sea in defence where new Captain Anthony O’Connor clearly struggled to lead by example in the way that Sam had done.

I wrote – as long ago as 18^th December last:

“Morecambe have struggled in League One. Manager Stephen Robinson potentially made a Rod for his own back (no offence, Mr Chairman) by stating last week: `We need to get six points from the next three games to be exactly where I thought we would be.’ Given that his team immediately went on to lose at Portsmouth, he has created a situation where the Shrimps must not only beat Fleetwood today but also win against Bolton next time out in order to keep on track.”

They didn’t. I wrote last November, some time after the departure of Sam Lavelle:

“It’s a concern that Aaron Wildig seems to have returned to a pattern all too familiar to Shrimps’ supporters from when Jim Bentley was in charge of the club. He seemed to be perennially injured or unwell then and rarely played a full ninety minutes. Last season, though, he equally rarely missed a game and usually played the full hour and a half into the bargain. Derek Adams seemed to be able to inspire what has always been one of the club’s better talents to display that skill week-in, week-out. So what’s happened? Robbo also persists with Burnley loanee Adam Phillips, whose languid performances for far too long (not tracking-back; constantly overhitting the ball and numerous other crimes against the Beautiful Game) have not been good enough to earn him a place in a Northern Premier League side.”

Since King Derek returned to the club, Wildig has played virtually every fixture for the full ninety minutes – and recently as Captain.  Aaron – in my view – has been among the Top Three of the obviously Most Talented footballers at the club in recent times. (I include in this exalted company Cole the Goal Stockton; the sadly departed Carlos Mendes-Gomes and my own Player of the [last two] Seasons, Toumani Diagouraga.)  Other players – notably Liam Gibson, Arthur Gnahoua and Rhys Bennett – looked like different people under Derek Adams’ tutelage. And the surprise package of Derek’s renewed reign is undoubtedly Dylan Connolly. From running around like a headless chicken when Robbo was still in charge, the Irishman suddenly looks like a real asset to the team with his phenomenal speed, brilliant ball control and his increasing determination not to be knocked out of his stride. Shades of Carlos once again – from being a bit part player at best before Derek arrived at the club, Dylan now is one of the club’s brightest prospects.

In my view, the biggest mistake Stephen Robinson made was to announce to the world at large that he had worked out an Equation for League One survival. He said that looking at the League One campaign as a whole was a quite mind-boggling prospect. Fair enough. It made more sense, he insisted, to break the season down into bite-sized chunks of five games at a time. The simple equation he then suggested was that if any team could win two of these five games; any extra points would be a bonus. But just two wins and three defeats out of every bunch of five matches would – he insisted – guarantee League One survival. (Socks off, a quick calculation: 46 games divided by 5 is 9. Nine times single packages of six points gives us 54 points in total. This would have placed Morecambe in fifteenth position in the table at the end of the campaign; they actually ended-up in nineteenth with only 42 points.) So Robbo’s calculation allowed a large bit of Wriggle Room because it actually erred on the cautious side. But it made a sort-of sense. However, what made no sense at all was to tell everybody about this. His team – and thus his own performance – could be measured by it. And – once he announced this target – the team consistently failed to meet it.

By the time he left – February this year – his team had only won two of their last ten league games; lost four and drawn four of them. Bear with me. This equates to five points for every five games played: he’d said they needed at least six. So here was a stick measuring success and failure which he created himself which other people could use to beat him with. It was a mistake on every level (not least that five points per five games breaks down to a point per game which would have given Morecambe 46 points for the whole season – four more than they actually achieved.) Stephen didn’t help himself either by employing the Broken Record Technique “We are conceding too many poor goals – this must stop” from roughly the time Captain Sam left until the day he turned his back on the club. It didn’t stop and Morecambe ended-up shipping more goals (88) than any other club in the division.

Many supporters have dubbed Robbo as `Judas’ for abandoning a ship which was definitely sinking when he did. Given the commitments he had made publicly to be here for the long haul, there is some validity to this view. But few people would turn down a much longer contract on far better terms such as the one Mr Robinson was offered to jump ship and defect to St Mirren.  With the benefit of hindsight, though, his decision to leave has turned out to be the absolutely pivotal event of this season. St Mirren must regret it – they have lost eight of the ten games he had been in charge subsequently and are in danger of being relegated from the Scottish Premiership altogether. But Morecambe definitely don’t regret his departure….

The week before Robbo decided to go, Derek Adams had been sacked by new employers Bradford City. He said, when he left, that the Bantams would not find a better Manager than him wherever they looked. He’s right – few if any of his rivals in the UK have a better record of achieving multiple promotions as he did for Ross County in Scotland; nor for taking clubs upwards from League Two in this country, as he has done for both us and Plymouth in the recent past.

And so it has proved. Initially, Morecambe continued to struggle on the field – and perhaps play even worse than previously – with hammerings at both Shrewsbury (five-nil) and Wigan (four-one) where they were simply outclassed on the day by the eventual Title Winners.

But the International Break intervened and this proved to be the Turning Point of the season. Derek was able to properly coach the players left to him by the departed Manager and when League One started again, the set-up of the team and the obvious discipline he had instilled in the defence changed the club’s fortunes entirely. Immediately after the Wigan debacle, Morecambe won three games and drew one in their next magical block of five matches: promotion form. At the beginning of April, Derek announced that three wins would suffice to keep the club in the division. His players duly achieved this aim. Perhaps this is one of the key differences between Derek Adams and his predecessor – he only announces what he actually thinks is possible to the outside world. In typical self-deprecatory style, once the deed was done, King Derek announced last Saturday:

“I came here before and we were going out of the Football League and I think it was more difficult this time because I had less games to do it in, we only had thirteen matches.”

It was a master of understatement: the transformation Mr Adams has overseen at Morecambe Football Club could be better – and more accurately – described as miraculous. The fact that he has personally saved the club twice now from a very uncertain future means that this man is worth at least his own weight in gold.

Now, of course, his task is to do the same thing again – or even improve on this season’s tremendous achievement next term. One good thing is that events at the Maz next time out will no longer be covered by terrestrial TV programme EFL On Quest.

Perhaps the lowest point of the season was reached when – following riotous behaviour by a minority of Bolton Wanderers’ supporters at and around the ground in February – presenter Colin `I’ve made a Mint, suckers’ Murray and his inarticulate, barely literate guest Clinton `I shop at Waitrose, not’ Morrison combined to present a slander of the club to the watching millions. They deliberately totally ignored the evidence of missile-throwing and a pitch invasion by the visiting hordes and instead combined to echo visiting Manager Ian Evatt’s totally unsubstantiated accusations of racist behaviour by the home crowd. In doing so, they labelled Morecambe a Neanderthal, reactionary and wholly prejudiced outfit. This label has stuck even though there was (and still is) not a jot of evidence to support what the boss of serial cheats Wanderers claimed at the time.

So I suspect I was not alone in reaching for the sick bag when the same muppets who accused our club of unacceptable behaviour whilst ignoring the appalling violence of the visiting fans were eulogising about the Shrimps in their penultimate show last Saturday night. I think that an apology would have been more appropriate – but hell will freeze over before hypocrites of this sort ever would do anything like that. But we sail on forward together – as EFL on Quest and its crew effectively founder and then sink without trace altogether. Good riddance to them – and (nearly) all who sailed with them as well…

Derek Adams didn’t mess about this week by announcing the Club’s Retained List on Monday.

The continuing faith he has in Captain Aaron Wildig was indicated by a new contract for the player. Impressive understudy to first-choice custodian Trevor Carson – Adam Smith – has also been retained as has the Academy goalkeeper, André Da Silva Mendes. Much-improved striker Arthur Gnahoua has also accepted a new contract, which is excellent news too. Dylan Connolly; Liam Gibson, Ousmane Fané and Cole Stockton still have a year to run on their contacts. Whether in-demand Cole in particular stays is very much in the lap of the gods – time alone will tell.

However, the new Manager clearly has reservations about the rest of the players he has inherited from Stephen Robinson. Jonah Ayunga, Ryan Cooney, Ryan Delaney, Courtney Duffus, Wes McDonald, Ryan McLaughlin, Shane McLoughlin, Jon Obika, Anthony O’Connor, and Connor Pye are all on the transfer list.

Some of these won’t be missed if they leave. I think we all know who they are.

Jonah Ayunga looked like a first-class acquisition when he started to play for the club. He was injured early doors and has not shown the same promise since. Similarly, Jon Obika has been injured for most of the time he has been at Morecambe. Perhaps they are both worth a second chance, though. I would also say the same about Anthony O’Connor. I thought he improved markedly as a player as the season progressed and his commitment to the cause – particularly after the win at Fleetwood – cannot be doubted. In my view, Shane McLaughlin also performed well when he was played in midfield earlier in the season. But we all have our own views on who should stay and who should go – ultimately, it is the man who sits in the Boss’ chair who decides. And he has allowed Rhys Bennett, Toumani Diagouraga, Greg Leigh, Jacob Mensah and Freddie Price to leave the club. I’m personally surprised to see Bennett being released and `Toums’ has been a loyal – and popular – servant to both Mr Adams over the years at various clubs as well as for the entire time he has been at our club. He and Greg Leigh at least – with no offence intended to Jacob and Freddie, about whom I know very little – will be missed.

Inevitably, the loan players in the squad – Jacob Bedeau, Trevor Carson, Alfie McCalmont and Adam Phillips have now all returned to their parent clubs. I would personally like to see Morecambe move heaven and earth to persuade both Trevor and Jacob to come back next season – or even be signed permanently if such a thing is possible. They are both class acts and Carson has kept the Shrimps in the hunt virtually on his own at times in the short time he has been at the club. For me, both Alfie and Adam in particular were far too inconsistent throughout the season to be borrowed again.

But what will happen during the Closed Season is obviously in the lap of the gods. Behind the scenes, there will be reasons affecting King Derek’s decisions – injuries; age; distance from families; whatever – that we are not party to. We do know, though, that the Boss likes to choose and then negotiate with his targets for next season personally. He did brilliantly last time he was in charge.

Let’s hope he does so again. It will be interesting to see what happens over the summer.

In the meantime, we can all look forward to another Adventure in League One-derland next season.

See you all when the fun begins again. Stay Safe everyone.