LEAGUE TWO. TUESDAY, 15th AUGUST 2023.

Rolling Stone – Notts draw in north Lancashire..

Notts County arrived by the Lancashire seaside today in fifteenth place in League Two. They found themselves behind Morecambe in the table only on goal difference because they have almost identical records so far: two games played; one won and one lost.

The statistics are almost just as close as far as all their previous meetings are concerned too.

In the past, the two clubs have played each other fourteen times in League Two. Morecambe have lost four of these and won five, some memorably.

Who can forget the photo of Shrimps’ Skipper Jim Bentley trying the put his arms around much larger unit Sol Campbell in a game which the Magpies lost at Christie Park under the short but spectacular reign of former England supremo Sven Goran Erikkson?

This was Sol’s first game for the club – and his last. Sven didn’t stay much longer, leaving shortly afterwards after claiming he had been conned into taking on the job in the first place.

County’s fortunes have been dire ever since. The world’s oldest football league club lost this unique claim to fame when it was relegated to what is now the National League during 2019.

They came back up again – via the Play-Offs – this term. The Bookmakers have made them one of the favourites for an immediate second promotion. But two weeks ago, harsh reality intervened to bring them crashing down to earth: they were hammered by unfashionable Sutton United in their first EFL game in four years by five goals to one,

The football pundits tell us that all football teams need a Rock at the centre of their defence.

Really? 

On second thoughts, they may be right: a mere Stone clearly won’t do.

Notts custodian Aidan Stone was sent-off after just a quarter of an hour at Sutton for bringing-down a United player where goalkeepers really shouldn’t do so: in his own penalty area.

(I had to check this after tonight’s game. Having witnessed it, I imagined that Aidan had been sent off at Sutton for wandering into adjoining Merton or Raynes Park without the Referee’s permission, given his penchant for leaving his own goal line this evening…)

Last Tuesday, League One Lincoln City unceremoniously dumped the Magpies out of the League Cup at Meadow Lane – and another man (defender Aden Baldwin this time) was also shown a Red Card. Against struggling Grimsby Town, they fell behind twice at home last Saturday before our very own Daniel Crowley (almost certainly the smallest player on the field) won the game with a diving header of all things to make the final score 3-2.

Morecambe’s last game at tonight’s venue resulted in a 2-1 win against Walsall in their opening fixture of the season. Since then, they have lost twice. Last Tuesday, there was no disgrace when they took the lead against Championship Rotherham in Yorkshire only to draw the game and then lose on penalties. But against Mansfield at Field Mill last Saturday, they were truly dire and lost 3-0 having not forced even a single save from the opposition goalkeeper at any time throughout the entire proceedings. Morecambe Manager Derek Adams must have been really worried by this hopeless display – but (and as ever) he refused to criticise his players in public afterwards.

Mr Adams himself was kind enough to take time off from his day job

to share these words about tonight’s opponents with the media prior to this evening’s match:

“They are a team who play in different styles and different systems during the season. They’ve already done that (at) the start of this season. They’re obviously trying to get the right blend with the players they’ve taken in. They’ve taken in a good calibre of player over the summer: you only have to look at McGoldrick coming in from Derby to suggest that is true. We look forward to playing against them.”

I don’t know what Opposite Number Luke Williams thought before the match because there doesn’t seem to be anything on the club’s website or Twitter/X feed to tell us.

Anyway – the weather in north Lancashire has been pretty dire recently. Rain followed by More Rain followed by Heavy Rain – more or less. Today has been an exception: sunny right from early morning.

So the game started with the away stand two-thirds full and basking in the early evening sunshine:

This was a really intriguing game to watch. There was little goalmouth action and few major incidents to comment upon. Daniel Crowley was jeered increasing loudly by the home crowd every time he got the ball. Why? He was dumped by Morecambe – not the other way round…

Visiting goalkeeper Aiden Stone added a new meaning to the concept of Stopper/Sweeper tonight. Virtually every time he got the ball, he was allowed the freedom of his own half to approach the half-way line without any pressure at all on him to select a usually pretty good pass deep into opposition territory. The only home player who ever even attempted to stop him doing this was Michael Mellon – who I though played exceptionally well tonight. And when that happened, the large man in the blue kit invariably messed-up his clearances. But he still spent an awful lot of the game miles outside his own penalty area.

(Where is Cole Stockton and his unwavering ability to lob goalkeepers like these when you really need him?) Oh – that’s right: he’s at Burton – like Dan the Man Crowley, King Derek was not given the spondulicks during the summer to keep him in our camp…

To be fair, Adam Mayor actually tried – and failed – to swerve the ball over a goalkeeper way out of his ground with just three minutes of the second half played.  County need to be wary of this – their stopper is simply asking for it to happen, sooner or later…

Other than that, David Tutonda looked like a class act when he came on for the first time in a Shrimps’ shirt – even with hardly any of the match left to play. Right up on the Morecambe left, he turned two opposition players inside out before delivering one on the best crosses of the night right across the visitors’ penalty area. After that, he conspicuously attempted to vocally gee-up his fellow defenders in a manner that has been absent since iconic Captain Sam Lavelle left the club a couple of years ago.

All in all though, attempts on goal tonight were at a premium. The visitors had the first proper chance of the game after eleven minutes when Macaulay Langstaff headed over the bar when he might have done better. Aaron Nemane was caught late after thirty-eight minutes. A clearly rehearsed free-kick routine saw a deep cross by Jodi Jones find Langstaff again – this time at the back post. His header produced a really good save from Stuart Moore, who tipped his effort over the bar. Much later – as the teams had changed ends – Jones hit the bar for the visitors early in the second period with an instant volley as a cross from the Notts’ right by Matthew Palmer was flicked onto him by Nemane.

This was the closest either team came to scoring tonight. For Morecambe, their most impressive chance was when Mellon controlled the ball really well after 70 minutes on the left hand of the away penalty area from his point of view. He went one way and then the other before swivelling brilliantly and unleashing a decent shot which went wide of Stone’s left-hand post – but not that wide.

The once again very impressive Mayor had earlier stung the hands of the visiting goalkeeper with a powerful strike with just three minutes of the second half on the clock.

But both teams tried to play progressive football tonight. In truth, County were probably marginally better at it. They tended to be quicker to the second ball in particular throughout the match. But they clearly lack a cutting edge. They were better at finding their men most of the time as well – Morecambe occasionally combined really effectively but the end product was often disappointing.

A draw was thus probably a fair outcome. But this was a far better effort by the men in the red strip than that they provided last Saturday against Mansfield.

The stalemate didn’t make much impact on the clubs’ overall mutual history. At the end of the game, they also remained in the same relative positions as they had at the beginning: Morecambe lay in fourteenth spot; Notts remained a single position below them.

King Derek’s verdict on the game – and tactical explanation of why Aiden Stone was given the freedom of his own half more often than not – was:

“Tactically, it was very difficult for both sides. There’s got to be credit to the players. They had to play with their heads. Mentally, it’s difficult to play when a team is playing-out from the back. Their goalkeeper takes the ball so far. What you get – if you press the goalkeeper – then the ball gets played to the Centre Half. The Centre Half can dribble into your half. The goalkeeper can’t dribble into your half and what we did was allow their goalkeeper to kick it long.”

Answering the inevitable question if the latest campaign is too much, too early for his very young team, Derek replied with his usual disarming honesty: 

“As a young player, it’s about learning. It’s difficult for me because I have got to win football matches. But I have to coach them at the same time and educate them. They have come from an environment – sometimes – it’s just about playing football. But when you get to this level, it’s a wee bit different: you’ve got to play for three points; you’ve got to win games. A point for us could be massive at the end of the season They are learning all the time. They are learning from each other.”

Morecambe: 1 Stuart Moore; 2 Donald Love (C); 4 Jacob Bedeau; 5 Farrend Rawson; 6 Yann Songo’o (16 Jacob Davenport 68’); 7 Tom Bloxham (17 Cammy Smith 78’); 8 Eli King (3 David Tutonda 88’); 9 Michael Mellon; 10 JJ McKiernan (18 Jake Taylor 78’); 11 Adam Mayor (Y) (14 Jordan Slew 78’); 12 Joel Senior.

Substitutes not used: 21 Adam Smith; 15 Chris Stokes; 20 Charlie Brown; 23 Max Melbourne; 24 Cameron Rooney.

Notts County: 26 Aidan Stone; 4 Kyle Cameron (C); 6 Jim O’Brien (8 Sam Austin 60’); 7 Daniel Crowley; 9 Macaulay Langstaff; 10 Jodi Jones (16 John Bostock 84’); 11 Aaron Nemane (19 Cedwyn Scott 85’); 15 Aden Baldwin (Y); 17 David McGoldrick; 18 Matthew Palmer; 23 Adam Chicksen (21 Tobi Adebayo-Rowling 70’).

Substitutes not used: 1 Sam Slocombe;  5 Connell Rawlinson; 27 Junior Morias.

Ref: Scott Jackson.

Att: 3, 869 (over 600 from Nottingham.)