LEAGUE TWO. SATURDAY, 5th OCTOBER 2024

Morecambe Old Boys Too Good for the Latest Crop.

Today’s Lancashire Derby saw both Morecambe and Accrington Stanley in the positions that the so-called betting experts have predicted for each of them ever since they entered the EFL: right at the bottom of League Two. The Shrimps have always been favourites for relegation ever since they left what was then the Conference as long ago as 2007 – almost twenty years ago. However, in the time that both clubs have been members of the Football League, Stanley and Morecambe have repeatedly confounded the doomsters in the betting industry by actually going in the opposite direction from that predicted by the self-styled `experts’ and playing in League One. Since those heady days, though, crises off the field have had a severe downward influence on the fortunes of each club. Morecambe’s ownership crisis seems to be an ongoing reality for the club with no prospect of a change in the foreseeable future at least. At Accrington, long-term backer and sometimes veritable Messiah – Andy Holt – has lost his enthusiasm for Stanley in recent times. In finally sacking Manager and ex-Shrimps striking sensation John Coleman last season, Mr Holt said he was no longer prepared to indefinitely bankroll the club. This season, it has shown…

Stanley started today’s game right at the bottom of the EFL. Their record in recent times is two games drawn, four lost. They have failed to win any of their eight games so far in League Two and sit a point lower than today’s visitors, albeit having played one game fewer. Morecambe, on the other hand, have lost just two of their last six games and drawn four of them in a row. In common with Stanley, they are the only club in the division still not to have won a league football match this season.

So today’s clash was even more significant than usual.

Accrington remain Morecambe’s all time Bogey Team. Since 2007, they have met in various competitions no less than 34 times. Stanley have won fifteen of these, Morecambe a paltry five: a third as many. But last season (and just over six short months ago) – ironically with current Accrington Assistant Manager Ged Brannan at the helm – the Shrimps won at this venue for a very welcome change. In their last six league meetings, Morecambe have won two to Accrington’s one. So are things belatedly looking up for the Shrimps?

Shrimps’ boss Derek Adams would have been looking up the table and hoping for his team’s first win of the season prior to today’s clash. As he has claimed since Day One of this latest campaign, his latest collection of non-league players, youngsters and loanees is very much a work in progress. There’s no doubt that his men are beginning to gel and experimentation plus injury to key players has unearthed potential gems in the shape of Adam Lewis and Jamie Stott at least among others who have caught the eye in recent games. It would be interesting to contrast them against former Morecambe Skipper Donald Love; perennially injured Ash Hunter; fans’ favourite Faz – Farrend Rawson – and Bolton loanee Nelson Khumbeni (scorer of Morecambe’s winning goal here last season), all of whom left the seaside further north during the closed season to re-materialise at the Crown Ground.

The quartet’s new Manager – John Doolan – said this to the Accrington Observer before his team lost again: 2-1 this time at Cheltenham on Tuesday, having initially taken the lead:

“We are looking forward to the challenge. It’s a big week. We have to win games of football, it’s what the club demands. We have got to keep in touch. Where we’re sitting, it’s important. We do need to get away from the bottom end of the table. It’s a massive week because come Sunday, you (could be) sitting more healthier in the table. To win, you have to have a bit of luck. You need to stay focused 80-90 minutes, and need fighting spirit and togetherness.”

All Shrimps’ fans would be hoping that Accrington would take their Manager’s advice and stay focused for just `80 minutes’ this afternoon.

He added the following about today’s match on the day before it happened:

“We just need to win a game, it’s as simple as that. At the end of the day, we need to win a game of football and that’s what we are going to do tomorrow. Me and Ged are passionate about what we do. We have sleepless nights, we love this club, we care about this club. We want to do it for the owner, the Board, the fans, and the people who work at the club. We put the trust in the players we have brought to the club and we give them a plan, put them on the pitch and we want to see the results. Hopefully them results will start coming, beginning tomorrow. I am the right man for the job. If I didn’t believe that I wouldn’t be here. That’s out of my hands where it goes next but I am fighting big time and the players are fighting big time – and it’s just things happening on the pitch. We just need to get the win and it will snowball: and hopefully that comes tomorrow. It’s massive. It’s a big derby. It means everything to our fans. Players know it’s a massive game and they have been told in no uncertain terms. Players have to produce on the pitch. We have got to nullify (the Shrimps’) strengths, but we have to make sure we jump all over them tomorrow. I love playing Morecambe. It’s a good day out for both sets of fans. It’s a challenge for our players. We will turn up tomorrow and perform.”

His Opposite Number – Derek Adams – was far more succinct in his thoughts about the game:

“We need to go there obviously and try and get that win. We know what Accrington are about. They play with high energy; they’ve got a lot of enthusiasm. That’s what the derby game will be come Saturday. This week, we need to start really well; continue that focus that we have done in recent games.“

It was really sunny and quite hot at times almost all the way through the match today. For a welcome change, no rain was attracted by this fixture. But there’s a lot more than the weather that can affect any football league match. There are at least three other key ingredients. These are the Referee; the hosts and the visitors.

So let’s look at them all in turn.

Adam Herczec was today’s Referee. I’ve never heard of him before and I hope I never have to come across him again. He was absolutely appalling – even by the very low general standard of League Two officials, this man was way below par. First of all, he was clearly influenced by the continual whingeing of the Accrington Stanley players. He shouldn’t have allowed this to happen in the first place – only the Captain is supposed to be able to even approach the Man in the Middle these days.  He made a rod for his own back by allowing the Stanley defence to hold onto Morecambe forwards right from the start. If he wasn’t going to do anything to stop it after five minutes (which he didn’t), how could he possibly start brandishing yellow cards later in the match for the same offences? So – right throughout the game – he didn’t. In doing so, he repeatedly ignored the evidence of this sometimes literally right before his eyes. In fact, he didn’t penalise the home team even once for the continual holding, pulling of shirts and crafty pushes which Marcus Dackers in particular was subjected to all afternoon. In doing so, the Referee gave Accrington the Green Light to stretch the laws of the game to the limit – and beyond – and thus continually win an unfair advantage time and again all the way through the match. The penalty he gave Stanley was more down to the constant haranguing he allowed Shaun Whalley to indulge in than it was any actual offence that occurred on the field. Whalley’s dive was so exaggerated and so obvious that it would have won at the Olympics earlier this year. He should have been booked for making it but the utter incompetent with the whistle instead gave him what he wanted. To be intimidated and show such obvious partiality as a result should not be acceptable. Once they got ahead, Stanley players regularly went down – often off the ball – with clearly imaginary injuries. They must have wasted at least four or five minutes alone from the time Morecambe reduced the arrears until the end of the game, with Dara Costelloe and Kelsey Mooney clearly feigning injury and goalkeeper Billy Crellin regularly falling over as if pole-axed at regular periods of the proceedings. But Adam Herczec allowed them to get away with this blatant cheating all afternoon.

So we move on to the hosts.

Everyone who knows the first thing about Accrington Stanley understands the way they have always played. They are physical; they get in your face; they push the limits; they moan to the referee; they niggle, they fall over and pretend to be stricken when it suits them simply to waste time. The result is all that matters – how they get it is almost irrelevant.

Farrend Rawson showed his fondness for his former club this afternoon by continually trying to bond with its new players. He was virtually stuck to Marcus Dackers right from the start of the game until the finish. If he didn’t have hold of his shirt, he was either pushing or pulling him more often than not. But the old stager has enough experience to make sure his hands and what he was doing with them were more often than not on the blind side of the referee. Marcus is only nineteen and – despite his own battling and committed performance – is still learning the game. One of the things he would have learned today is that it’s no good relying on either the Referee or his alleged assistants to penalise foul play. It’s too glib to say he was outsmarted by an older player. The truth is that – without any protection offered him by the man with the whistle – he was simply bullied and pushed out of the game today.

Stanley’s first goal today was a farce. If Morecambe Skipper Yann Songo’o made any contact at all with Shaun Whalley when he threw himself to the ground in the away penalty area after 35 minutes, it was marginal in comparison to the pushing and shoving that Faz and Zak  Awe indulged in all afternoon. But the Referee fell for it and Dara Costelloe scored easily from the spot. Sadly, nobody can blame the Ref; Stanley taking advantage of weak officiating; the weather or anything else for their second. Morecambe handed it to them on a plate. An inability to clear the ball led to Costelloe getting ahead of David Tutonda before netting a second simple strike during injury time at the end of the first half.

So now we come to the visitors.

This was a local derby today. The result would decide which of two old rivals will prop-up the entire Football League tonight. That’s surely motivation enough for any team to actually turn-up and put on a committed performance.

But if either of these realities had dawned on the team Derek Adams put out today, you could see very little evidence of it. Stanley were up for the fight this afternoon – Morecambe weren’t. They were slower to the ball, sloppier in their passing and second best virtually every time there was a 50/50 challenge. Too many players just didn’t show up this afternoon. Paul Lewis was anonymous for most of the game and contrived to miss a tap-in when namesake Adam put the ball on a plate for him in front of goal with a sublime low pass from the Shrimps’ left with nine minutes played. Instead of striking it into the net, Paul seemed to inexplicably actually step over the ball and let it get away from him. Adam himself then provoked an excellent save from Crellin with seventeen minutes on the clock. But other than that, Morecambe offered little offensively until Ben Tollitt scored with a sublime shot from a free-kick on the Shrimps’ left in the eighty-sixth minute. By this time, it was too late: the game was already lost. They then threw the kitchen sink at the men in the red strip. But – interrupted by mystery injuries to Accrington players – there wasn’t enough time left to turn the game around and they deservedly lost it.

Earlier, I picked-up Stanley Manager John Doolan’s somewhat curious observation that his team should be fully-committed for at least 80 minutes – today, ironically, too many Morecambe players were not properly committed for 80 minutes and only really threatened Stanley for the last ten minutes or so.

This pathetic display saw the Shrimps fall to the very bottom of the entire EFL tonight. They remain the only club in the division not to have won a game so far this season. And if they continue to play like they did today, they aren’t going to win any either. They looked and played like a team at the bottom of the table and against a poor team – because Stanley weren’t much better – all supporters must be seriously concerned about their fate at the end of the season if this utterly anaemic display is anything to go by.

This is what King Derek said about it all once the match had finished:

“We put in our worst performance of the season in that first half. I thought that we were terrible. It was exceptionally poor. That was a huge disappointment. Coming into a game like this and putting on your worst performance, it wasn’t good. We didn’t play to the levels that we have done this season. I’ve said that to the players. We’re in tomorrow morning now because we can’t accept it – we can’t accept the level of today’s performance. We need to be better than we were today in the game. We can’t accept the level of today’s performance – it was way below the standards that we have set. We can’t leave it to the dying stage of the game to mount an effort. They need to understand that. They need to understand what it is to be a professional football player. The players have to take responsibility. Today, we weren’t at it. I can’t accept that. Today, I can’t back them with a performance like that.”

Accrington Stanley: 13 Billy Crellin; 2 Donald Love; 4 Zach Awe;  5 Farrend Rawson (Y); 7 Shaun Whalley; 9 Kelsey Mooney; 14 Nelson Khumbeni; 17 Dara Costelloe (Y) (23 Tyler Walton 90’); 24 Sonny Aljofree; 8 Seamus Conneely (Y) (C); 38 Connor O’Brien (Y).

Subs not used: 1 Michael Kelly; 8 Benjamin Woods; 10 Alex Henderson; 11 Jimmy Knowles; 39 Josh Woods; 45 Ash Hunter.

Morecambe: 25 Stuart Moore; 2 Luke Hendrie (20 Charlie Brown 82’); 3 Adam Lewis; 6 Jamie Stott; 14 Rhys Williams; 17 Paul Lewis; 18 Ben Tollitt; 19 Marcus Dackers; 23 David Tutonda (8 Harvey Macadam 57’); 24 Yann Songo’o (C) (9 Hallam Hope 57’); 28 Callum Jones (11 Jordan Slew 75’).

Subs not used: 1 Harry Burgoyne; 26 Lennon Dobson; 40 Adam Fairclough.

Ref: Adam Herczec.

Att: 2,462 (almost 800 from Morecambe.)