LEAGUE TWO. SATURDAY, 3rd MAY 2025.

Horror Show Against Harrogate

In what has been a pretty meaningless fixture for quite some time now, bottom-of-the- table Morecambe welcomed Harrogate Town to the Mazuma Mobile stadium for the last ever game in the Football League for the foreseeable future. The Shrimps’ unenviable statistic as the worst team in the entire EFL was already guaranteed before a ball was kicked this afternoon. So all Derek Adams’ men had to play for today was pride: even a win would still see them marooned at the bottom of League Two before their descent into the Underworld of National League football next season.

This has been a disastrous season for Morecambe FC both on and off the field. For Harrogate – a club much like our own with a small but loyal fanbase – things have also been a struggle. They arrived in twentieth position in the table on the back of two defeats and two victories in their last six League Two outings. But how we – on the back of five straight defeats in a row and a points total fourteen short of the fifty which Harrogate have accrued – envy them… King Derek predicted several months ago that fifty points would be sufficient to guarantee League Two football next season. And whilst we have fallen well short, the Sulphurites have kept plugging away and gradually accumulated them, despite several glitches and runs of defeats on the way. Well done to them – this is a club whose stability off the field is one we must attempt to emulate, following years of uncertainty and two years of almost total unreliability from the current Morecambe owner, Jason Whittingham. If the Shrimps are to stand any chance at all of survival in the Dog-eat-Dog jungle of the National League – let alone a swift return to the EFL – a change in ownership is absolutely vital. But that’s for the future.

From the past, the historical record shows six previous meeting between the two clubs. Harrogate have won two of these, Morecambe three, including a last-minute 1-2 win last November in Yorkshire.

Derek Adams made it very clear last Saturday after the latest defeat by Chesterfield that he is both exasperated and stymied by the fact that neither the owner nor the Board at Morecambe FC have any sort of plan for coping with non-league life next season. Supposedly, a meeting with the Board of Directors (BoD) on Tuesday was supposed to clear the air but the lack of any clarity about this by the hierarchy at Morecambe football club keeps at least the fans – as almost ever – completely in the dark about this potential major development as the current on-going crisis lurches towards yet another low. The laconic response to a question about this subject posed by the Shrimps Trust hardly helps to clarify this matter as far as supporters at least are concerned. The BoD were asked:

Can the BOD comment on Derek’s post-match comments after the Chesterfield game? He indicates there is ‘no plan’ for next season, and he can’t plan on the playing side until he has some direction. Do the club have a strategy in place for the future? If so, what is it, and when can it be shared with the fan base?

This was the reply:

Derek’s comments were borne out of the same frustration that we feel, which is that we all plough countless hours into planning for the future across every aspect of the Club, but all plans that require investment and the Club’s overall strategy require sign-off from a committed owner with the necessary funds, which we don’t have. As a Board we want nothing more than to be able to share a clear and transparent strategy with everyone who cares about the Club, but to do so without a responsible owner that can back it up would be meaningless.

Well – what a ridiculous situation to be in. However much we all – and this includes the BoD to some extent – remain clueless about what is happening as far as the ownership and potential financing of our club is concerned, King Derek has manfully soldiered on. He said the following about a meeting he had with the co-Chairmen of the club earlier this week:

“I’ve had a very productive meeting with the co-Chairman, Rod Taylor and Graham Howse. I think that was important because Graham and Rod, over the years, have committed many years of time and effort running this football club through difficult circumstances. For me, my interview on Saturday was frustrated but it was also very passionate about this football club because it means a lot to me and I shared the reasons for it with the co-Chairmen on Tuesday. Firstly, I was unaware that they both spoke at a radio programme on (the previous) Friday and discussed the club’s plans. I would like to say all of us are telling the truth in this matter. As the co-Chairmen alluded to during the radio interview, the club has a plan for next season but they haven’t shared that with me yet. We are still waiting for a football budget to be signed-off by the owner, Jason Whittingham. So that’s where we are at this moment in time.”

Curiously, although he admitted that the lack of knowledge of what was happening behind the scenes and particularly the lack of a football budget made his situation `difficult’; he insisted that he would continue negotiations with the players he wants to keep next season during the coming few days as if this is not a problem. In fact, he explained that a number of players had already left the club by mutual consent and suggested that the eighteen who remain will most likely form the nucleus of next season’s National League squad.

On a personal level, when asked if he ever regretted telling things as he sees them throughout his career, Derek replied:

“It’s from the heart. It’s the way I am as a person. It affects my job; it affects my career; it affects other people’s careers; it affects this football club. I’ve got to deal with that. For me, there is a lot of football managers who don’t want to say much; to toe the Party Line so to speak. I think that – from my point of view – you’ve got to have desire; you’ve got to have a work ethic to go somewhere – and that’s why, over the years, this football club has been successful.”

He went on to say what he thought the point of the final match of the season would be today:

“It’s for the players to go out – as they have done all season  – and try and get that victory in front of the home supporters and leave the season in a better way than it’s finished over the last couple of weeks. (It’s) to give us some idea that we’ve got the nucleus of a squad that can go into next season on the front foot.”

It was quite bright and sunny although with a deceptively chilly wind by the side of Morecambe Bay as the match kicked off.

Most of the spectators’ eyes would be on King Derek’s line-up today. In truth, that was probably more interesting for the majority of Shrimps fans than the actual game itself.

Personally, bearing in mind what Mr Adams had said earlier, my heart sank when I saw both Paul Lewis and Ben Tollitt not only in the magic Eighteen which the boss had referred to before the game, but actually starting. I believe that Ben is about to take his finals in his chosen vocation. Do you think it could be – as a cost-saving exercise – that Derek hopes that Ben might become the club’s physiotherapist next season? I cannot think of any other reason why this player should still be on the books. Although I don’t doubt for one moment that they both absolutely splendid chaps, I can think of even fewer reasons why Paul should not be seeking pastures new because he has offered even less to the team, in my admittedly subjective view, than Mr Tollitt has. Today, Lewis was lucky only to receive a yellow card after an hour for a really nasty foul using his elbow on Bryn Morris which drew blood from the Harrogate player’s nose and I simply cannot see what the Manager – who has admittedly forgotten more about football than I shall ever know – sees in him. 

Whatever, in a very scrappy opening period, Morecambe went ahead after lucky thirteen minutes. Harrogate conceded a corner, Adam Lewis took it from the home team’s  right and central defender Max Taylor did really well to outsmart his marker to meet it with his head to beat visiting custodian, the veteran Mark Oxley, at his near post.  

But the lead didn’t last long. By the twenty-second minute, the Sulphurites had turned the game on its head. Firstly, Bryant Bilongo scored far too easily after twenty minutes as the home defence was at sixes and sevens and unable to clear the ball following what I think is called a `dead ball situation’. Ellis Taylor took a corner which produced a great save from Ryan Schofield via the post from a tremendous back-flick by ex-Morecambe Skipper Anthony O’Connor. And – as the ball was just about shepherded off the line and away, it was returned into the home penalty area, headed on by Tom Cursons to Bilongo, who basically couldn’t miss. His completely over-the-top and very provocative reaction towards the home spectators on finding the net was completely unwarranted though – they hadn’t been baiting him or anything of the sort. So what on earth was that all about? It’s probably too late for Harrogate Manager Simon Weaver to have an urgent word in this gentleman’s ear – more pertinently, parent club Bristol Rovers really need to tell this lad to give his head a shake – and grow up… 

However, just two minutes later, the visitors had gone from one down to leading the game as – yet again this season – the Shrimps defence was found Absent Without Leave. This time, the ball found its way to Taylor on the Town right. He made good progress without challenge before unleashing a shot which bounced back off Schofield’s right-hand post only for Josh March to blast it into the net as the home rearguard was again far too static.

And – very sadly – that was basically that. In a meaningless match for both sides, the second half was also a very poor advert for League Two football but the Sulphurites had enough about them to ensure they were able to hang on to all three points. Harrogate Skipper – the iconic and long-serving Josh Falkingham, who has appeared more than 300 times for the club – played his final game today and came off to clearly heart-felt applause from the away contingent. Shortly after this, substitute Andy Dallas was simply shoved off the field by a man in a sky blue strip when he had played the ball around him in the penalty area. Anywhere else on the field, this was a foul all day long: Andy wasn’t looking for it. But – but Referee Ollie Yates waved Play-On. Would it have made any difference at the end of the day? Not really.

So, in their last EFL game for the foreseeable future, Morecambe bowed out in a fashion totally appropriate for the entire season: they lost yet again. This was their sixth straight defeat in a row and underlined the fact – as if any more proof was needed – how utterly catastrophic this season has been for the Shrimps and their supporters. They end their eighteen-year stay in the Football League right at the bottom of the table; a massive thirteen points from safety and six below almost equally hopeless Carlisle. It was a poor end to a disastrous campaign. For what it’s worth, today’s win saw Harrogate finish in eighteenth position in League Two.

This is what a clearly very dejected Derek Adams had to say about the latest failure in his last interview as a Football League Manager for possibly quite some time:

“We’ve had some really, really big chances in the game. We just haven’t been good enough to get it into the back of the net. I’m extremely disappointed for the supporter base (and) the community because collectively, as a football club we have tried our best but we’ve let the supporter base down. That’s the hard facts: that we haven’t been good enough over the season. We haven’t scored enough goals. We haven’t stopped the ball going in the back of the net and collectively – from top to bottom – we’ve got to take responsibility. We have tried our best (but) we haven’t won enough games.”

Morecambe: 12 Ryan Schofield; 3 Adam Lewis (29 Adam Fairclough 84’); 4 Tom White; 5 Max Taylor (24 Yann Songo’o 58’); 6 Jamie Stott (C); 9 Hallam Hope (16 Andy Dallas 73’); 10 Lee Angol; 17 Paul Lewis (Y); 18 Ben Tollitt (11 Jordan Slew 58’); 20 Callum Cooke (23 David Tutonda 68’); 28 Callum Jones.

Subs not used: 1 Harry Burgoyne; 19 Marcus Dackers.

Harrogate: 31 Mark Oxley; 2 Zico Asare; 3 Matthew Foulds; 4 Josh Falkingham (C) (37 Ella Barnes 78’); 15 Anthony O’Connor; 20 Bryant Bilongo; 21 Ellis Taylor; 24 Josh March; 25 Tom Cursons; 28 Bryn Morris.

Subs not used: 31 James Belshaw; 10 Matty Daly; 16 Olly Sanderson; 35 Marcus Etherington.

Ref: Ollie Yates.

Att: 3,725 (357 from Harrogate.)