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)