LEAGUE ONE. SATURDAY, 7th JANUARY 2023.

Alfie May – But He Really Shouldn’t…

Cheltenham Town travelled from Gloucestershire today to complete a fixture originally scheduled to be played later in the year. Both clubs chose to move the match forward as each has been eliminated from the FA Cup and also wanted to avoid potential fixture pile-ups towards the end of the season. Cheltenham did this to face a team against which they have a hundred percent record in League One so far. Town were victorious in both fixtures against the Shrimps last season by three goals to one. Last October in the reverse fixture, they won again at Whaddon Road by the only goal of the game. Overall, they have beaten Morecambe thirteen times in all competitions; lost seven and drawn seven. The Robins were eighteenth in the table prior to kick-off, having won two of their last five league matches and lost three; most recently when they went down 2-1 at Bristol Rovers last Sunday.

Morecambe started the game this afternoon in twenty-second place in the table, seven points behind the Robins and having played a game more. This would be the Shrimps’ third home game in a row at the Mazuma Stadium and presented them with the opportunity to add to their haul of six points collected; seven goals scored and none conceded during this time. Victory this afternoon for Derek Adams’ men could take them out of the Drop Zone altogether as heavy defeats for rivals for relegation have ensued since Sunday’s tremendous 5-0 thrashing of Burton Albion.  Cambridge United lost by the same score to Sheffield Wednesday and Accrington Stanley were also mauled 4-0 at Derby. That has evened-out some discrepancies in the number of games played so far by all clubs but more importantly, it also gave Morecambe a superior goal difference to all the teams around them. King Derek summed-up his view of the significance of these developments thus:

“It’s really tight in the bottom half of the table now – probably all the way up to Charlton who are on 28 points. We always believed the league table would become a lot closer and tighten up, and that has proved to be the case. The players have done incredibly well over the past two matches to close that gap, but there’s still a long way to go this season. We’re back at home again on Saturday against Cheltenham, and it’s a match the players are all really looking forward to.”

In a week which saw Ousmane Fané’s Morecambe contract cancelled by mutual consent, there were concerns about our star striker. Cole Stockton has been key to the Shrimps’ upturn in form in recent games. Not so much by the goals he has scored but by his brilliant hold-up play and even better choice of a killer pass such as the one that Jensen Weir struck home to score our second against Accrington Stanley on Boxing Day. Cole was injured against Burton Albion last Monday and had to come off with a thigh strain at half time. Since then, the rumour mill – with the Transfer Window now open – has been grinding with speculation that he will be sold to clubs as varied as Forest Green Rovers to Fleetwood to Rotherham. Will he though? Only time will tell but he was not in the squad today.

Meanwhile, 20-year-old central Southampton defender Dynel Simeu had his loan-spell with Tranmere ended earlier this week and he has joined club-mate Caleb Watts on-loan with Morecambe until the end of the season. He went straight onto the bench today.

Off the field, there have been so-far unconfirmed off-stage whisperings that the club is about to be taken-over which have reached such a volume that the Morecambe Board offered a `no comment’ on its website last Wednesday to a report in the Daily Mail that it is about to be bought by an Indian `tycoon’. In its inimitable way, the rag has portrayed this apparent development as a power struggle between this individual – 20 year-old Sarbjot Johal – and Tyson Fury, even though there has never been any solid evidence I am aware of that Tyson has ever been truly interested in buying the club. Again, time will tell what comes of all this speculation but not everybody in the media welcomes it and a cautionary note is struck by one Martin Calladine, author of a book called The Ugly Game: How Football Lost its Magic and what it could learn from the NFL. I don’t endorse what Martin has written; nor do I suggest he has got his facts wrong: – I simply don’t know enough about it. But his views are certainly worth considering; particularly considering Morecambe’s unenviable record of repeatedly attracting the attention of Wide Boys and Dodgy Dealers from near and far in recent years:

Anyway… Back to the action, the Morecambe Manager had this to say before today’s game:

“It’s an opportunity for us to try and close the gap between ourselves and them. They’ve done well so far. We all know it’s a long season and they have come off a number of really positive results.”

For Cheltenham, Wing-Back Will Ferry has been recovering from serious injury for the last two months. He was included in the squad which travelled to north Lancashire from Gloucestershire yesterday, though and played today from the off. These are his thoughts about the opposition:

“I think they’ve had a bit of an upturn in form. They’re at home. They’re obviously in a similar area to us in the league so it’s going to be a big game. They’re going to battle. We’ve just got to match them and hopefully come out on top. I think any game, you’ve just got to give one hundred percent – they’re going to give one hundred percent. You’ve basically – it sounds clichéd – but you have to win the battle before you try and play your own game. So I think they’ll be looking to do the same and hopefully, we just come out on top. I think the overnight (stay) will help. We just have to hope we come out on top. The journey up – the traffic might be difficult to deal with. We might go on the old scenic route rather than on the motorways. You should be able to deal with the journey – whether it is on the day or overnight.”

His Manager, Wade Elliot, added the following about today’s opponents:

“They’re going into it really confident. They’re six unbeaten at home, I think their last two at home, they’ve beat Accy two-nil and Burton five-nil. I’m sure that will have looked at the week; Accy, Burton and ourselves, and they’ll expect to win the game, I’m sure. Us and Morecambe have travelled a similar sort of journey over the last couple of years: we are similar clubs. I certainly have a bit of empathy with them. I think the Manager in there has done a brilliant job. We’re really similar. I understand the constraints he is under and the resources that he has, to do the job that he has done has been remarkable. He’s built a really good team there. They’re scrapping; they’re fighting; you can see in their last couple of results, they’re in a good moment. We will look to go on the front foot and we’ll look to try and win the game. We do believe that if we present the best version of ourselves, no matter who we play or where we go, we’ve got a chance of getting a result.”

It was dry in north Lancashire yesterday. But Normal Service for this time of year – wet and windy – was resumed overnight and this morning although it was like Spring by lunchtime.  It was dry as the match started but heavy rain swept across the pitch in the second half before allowing us all to trail away from the game in the darkness but staying dry.

The teams changed ends for the third home game in a row at the start and Morecambe played against the massed ranks of their own fans during the first half. With a lot of spaces given free to local junior football clubs, the area usually occupied by away fans was also heavily populated by Shrimps’ supporters today.

Welshman Ryan Broom had the first strike on goal of the match after five minutes but his shot from a long way out was well off target. Three minutes later, Liam Shaw also put a shot for the home team into the stands. With twenty minutes played, Town were on the attack. But Morecambe caught them rapidly on the counter and good interplay between Kieran Phillips and Jensen Weir presented the latter with an opportunity which he swept past Luke Southwood in the away goal to put the Shrimps one-up. Eight minutes later, the visiting goalkeeper made a tremendous save from a Farrend Rawson header. It wouldn’t have counted as things turned-out because the central defender was offside. Southwood made another tremendous reaction save six minutes later from Phillips’ superb instinctive bicycle-kick as a cross by Ryan Delaney came over from the Morecambe right. The match had been fairly even by this stage but already, Referee Martin Woods had made a number of inexplicable decisions. Caleb Watts was flattened off the ball; Ryan Jackson clearly controlled the ball at least twice with his arm and then Caleb was clearly pushed from behind as he made progress into the visitors’ penalty area after about thirty-eight minutes. Anywhere else on the field, it would have a free-kick. But on every occasion just mentioned, Mr Woods waved play-on. So – once Watts had been pushed over – the ball fell to Will Ferry, who fed Liam Sercombe who in turn played a sublime pass just beyond the home defence for little Alfie May to run onto, outpace his markers and score emphatically with a really assured finish to put the Robins’ level. It was a great goal – but a better Referee would have stopped the move before it started.

This was as good as it got for both Cheltenham and Mr May though – and the little man’s performance from then on was an embarrassment both to himself and his team. However, the hissy-fit that Daniel N’Lundulu threw just before half-time was almost as impressive in the Spoilt Brat Stakes when he was penalised for an obvious foul and clearly didn’t agree with the decision.

The teams went in level at half time. Cheltenham probably had marginally more of the possession but Morecambe had by far the better chances.

Once the second half started, the Shrimps wasted no time in going ahead again almost immediately. Again, they hit on the break after a Cheltenham throw and Ryan Cooney found Phillips with a tremendous ball into the box – and Kieran did the rest, slotting the ball past Southwood into the corner of the net. He tried his luck again after 53 minutes but the away stopper was equal to it on this occasion.

At the other end, Alfie May decided to take exception to something that happened about an hour into the game I think. It was like watching a little boy throw all his toys out of the pram. He yelled at the Referee; he yelled at Morecambe players and even made the mistake of yelling at Shrimps Skipper Connor Ripley, who is almost literally twice his size. It was actually funny to see Connor lift May off the ground and hold him as if he was a naughty infant. In doing this, our Captain probably saved little Alfie from an early bath. Instead, Referee Woods seemed so astonished that an apparently grown man could behave in this way that he didn’t even book the silly little fellow. At the end of the game, Alfie was still carrying-on, refusing to shake hands even with his own team-mates and pushing his own Manager away as he tried to exert some sort of control over probably the worst tantrum I have previously witnessed at a football ground ever.

Between the histrionics, Broom took a long shot after eighty minutes which again missed the target and substitute Ash Hunter attacked up the Morecambe right and drew a good save from Southwood only for Phillips to follow-up to have his effort brilliantly blocked by a combination of sub Taylor Perry and the post. And that was basically it. Cheltenham huffed and puffed at times but the fact of the matter is that the Shrimps’ goalkeeper didn’t have a single save to make in the second period. It was a well-merited win for the home team played in a fantastic atmosphere at the Maz. All the home fans went home with a feeling of euphoria which has been sadly missing for much of the season so far at this venue.

So Morecambe have now won three games in a row. The victory pushed them into nineteenth position in League One tonight. They are just one place but four points behind today’s visitors, who also still have a game in hand. Because of the FA Cup Third Round, only Cambridge United of the teams around them also played in the league today. They lost at home 1-2 to Bristol Rovers. So United slip below Morecambe in the pack, level on points but behind on goal difference with the same number of games played. And guess who their next opponents at the Abbey Stadium are next Saturday? King Derek was clearly elated by today’s display and his team’s escape from the trapdoor into League Two this evening. After the game he said:

“It’s nothing more than we deserved. Our performances before this run was very good and we should have won more games than we have done. We’ve drawn a number of games when we should have won. We could have had a penalty kick with Caleb Watts through on goal – probably should have been a penalty and a sending-off from where I was. They scored against the run of play. Over the afternoon, the three points were deserved.”

Morecambe: 1 Connor Ripley (C); 4 Liam Gibson; 5 Farrend Rawson; 6 Ryan Delaney (2 Donald Love 67’); 15 Jensen Weir; 16 Jacob Bedeau; 17 Caleb Watts (10 Ash Hunter 80’); 20 Liam Shaw; 21 Ryan Cooney 23 Kieran Phillips (14 Arthur Gnahoua 90’); 25 Adam Mayor (Y).

Subs not used: 12 Adam Smith; 11 Dylan Connolly; 22 Anthony O’Connor; 29 Dynel Simeu.

Cheltenham Town: 1 Luke Southwood; (30 Christian Norton 57’); 2 Sean Long; 4 Tom Bradbury (4 Taylor Perry 61’); 8 Liam Sercombe; 9 Daniel N’Lundulu (7 Charlie Brown 60’); 10 Alfie May; 14 Caleb Taylor (Y); 15 Will Ferry (3 Ben Williams 78’); 22 Ryan Jackson (36 James Olayinka 84’); 23 Elliot Bonds (30 Christian Norton 61’); 32 Ryan Broom.

Subs not used:  20 Shaun MacDonald:26 Dylan Barkers.

Ref: Martin Woods.

Att: 4,677 (180 from Cheltenham).