Totally Unofficial Preview of the Season, 2026-2027. Morecambe FC.

Part Three: Pre-Season Campaign.

Kendal Town 1:3 Morecambe. Saturday 4th July 1500hrs.

This was a good work-out against a team not a long way from our current level who the Shrimps more or less outplayed for most of the game. If it wasn’t for their very impressive goalkeeper, Chris Cheetham, Kendal would have lost by a far bigger margin.

What was refreshing to see was a Morecambe team with a plan. The latest incarnation of the Shrimps contains a number of quite small but nippy players but the understanding between some of them seems to be already quite well established. Cameron Coxe really caught the eye with his constant movement forward from Right-Back; his control on the ball and his outstanding anticipation and reading of the match. Lewis Baines looked calm and authoritative at the back as the second half Captain and new players such as Teddy Collis; Eliot Newby and Isaac Buckley-Ricketts – among others – put in good performances. All the Academy players – Adam Fairclough; Corey Goodyear; Conan Newall; Harley Illingworth and Elijah Vilchez – put in decent shifts too. The visitors led by the only goal of the game at half time. It was credited to Newby but I suspect it was actually an own goal. Then Kendal equalised with a well-taken goal in a rare foray forward in the second half. Morecambe upped the ante again and scored two more goals, courtesy – first of all – of young Mr Blois after Buckley-Ricketts had played him in following a mistake by the Town defence. The ex-Macclesfield winger was again instrumental with the third Shrimps goal by Newall right at the death.

Morecambe First Half: Myles Boney; Cameron Coxe; Liam Hogan (C); Teddy Collis; Matty Daly;  Elliot Newby; Trialist A; Trialist B; Paul Lewis; Adam Fairclough; Corey Goodyear.

Morecambe Second Half XI: Joe Young; Ben Williams; Conan Newall; Lewis Baines (C); Isaac Buckley-Ricketts; Taelor O’Kane; Ronnie Blois; Trialist C; Harley Illingworth; Elijah Vilchez. 

Clitheroe Town 0:1 Morecambe. Tuesday, 14th July 1930hrs.

Morecambe travelled to Manager Adam Lakeland’s home town tonight to play their second pre-season fixture. Northern Premier League Clitheroe – the Blues – were their hosts.

Morecambe and Clitheroe have faced each other on an equal basis many times in the past in competitions such as the Lancashire Combination and the Northern Premier League. Additionally, the Shrimps certainly beat Clitheroe two-nil in the Lancashire Junior Cup 3rd Round, on Wednesday 26th February 1969: I know because I saw it happen.

The full names of the Morecambe squad then were: Lance Millard; Derek Varcoe; Bob Baldwin; Dave Halstead; Ian Mitchell; Steve Done; Steve Porter; Arnold Timmins; Charlie Wroth; Derek Lancaster; Charlie Lea and Gerry Irving.

Today’s squad was very different for all sorts of reasons. Probably the main one was that the men just named played football part-time: outstanding midfielder Steve Done was a teacher, for example; incomparable Centre Back Gerry Irving was a shop-keeper and goal-machine Arnie Timmins was an engineer who worked for the local gas Board, when such things actually existed.

At Clitheroe, the Shrimps came out of the blocks quickly and dominated the game in its early stages. Paul Lewis scored after just five minutes when he headed home after a cross by Ben Williams was helped onto him by Elliot Newby. Joe Young then made an excellent save after just over a quarter of an hour to keep the visitors’ lead intact. Adam Lakeland changed virtually the entire team after an hour. Morecambe were then not as dominant as they had been earlier on in the game, perhaps because of the tactics of the hosts: crude in the extreme. On a rock-hard pitch, some of the wild tackles put in by Clitheroe players could have caused our men serious injuries.

For the record, the hosts almost pulled level right at the death when Myles Boney was beaten but Lewis Leigh came to the rescue with a goal-line clearance to make it two wins in two for Morecambe so far.

Morecambe: Joe Young (Myles Boney 45’); Cameron Coxe  (Adam Fairclough 60’); Ben Williams (Trialist A 60’);  Liam Hogan (C) (Harley Illingworth 60’); Lewis Baines  (Corey Goodyear 60’); Taelor O’Kane; Matty Daly (Elijah Vilchez 60’);  Elliot Newby (Oscar Wright 60’); Isaac Buckley-Ricketts  (Conan Newall 60’); Paul Lewis (Lewis Leigh 60’); Ronnie Blois (Joe Garner 60’).

Bamber Bridge 0:3 Morecambe. Saturday, 18th July 1500hrs.

The Shrimps made it three wins out of three with a comprehensive win over Northern Premier League club Bamber Bridge at Irongate. Joe Garner opened the scoring after just five minutes when he pounced on a mistake by the home defence and beat the home goalkeeper from a tight angle. Captain Liam Hogan doubled Morecambe’s lead in the twelfth minute when he volleyed home from a corner.

Virtually the same side which had been so comfortable against the Bridge in the first half, though, were given a bit more of a contest in the second.  As the game became scrappier, Joe Young in the away goal earned his corn with some really good saves to preserve his team’s clean sheet. However, half-time substitutes Isaac Buckley-Ricketts and Ronnie Blois combined well after almost an hour for Ronnie to score his second pre-season goal for the Shrimps and Adam Lakeland’s team went back to the Dressing Rooms at the end of the game with another impressive victory.

Morecambe: Joe Young; Cameron Coxe (Triallist 84’); Liam Hogan (C) (Harley Illingworth 84’); Lewis Baines; Ben Williams; Taelor O’Kane (Paul Lewis 55’); Lewis Leigh; Matty Daly (Oscar Wright 84’); Elliot Newby (Conan Newall 84’); Joe Garner (Ronnie Blois 45’); Matty Collis (Isaac Buckley-Ricketts 45’).  

Bury 0:2 Morecambe. Saturday 25th July 1500hrs.

All true Morecambe fans love Bury. Whereas we have had a succession of people who should get as near a football club as an arsonist should get to a petrol forecourt in charge of our club in recent years, the Shakers have had an even worse experience. Football League Bury’s final owner – who paid a whole one pound for the club – admitted once the deal had been done that he didn’t even know where the town could be found. The EFL – as ever – saw no reason to disbar this gentleman as a Fit & Proper person to own a club they were supposed to regulate. And then did precisely nothing positive to intervene as the club was brought to its knees and actually went bust altogether, just as has been the case at Darlington and Macclesfield in recent times. The way the clowns in Preston have traditionally punished football clubs in their grasp with points deductions; embargoes and other sanctions when things go wrong instead of punishing or – god forbid – actually disbarring the rogue owners they have personally vetted and passed as upstanding members of the community – is surely reason enough to scrap these incompetent, reactionary halfwits altogether, isn’t it?

So we can count our lucky stars that, as the gentleman the EFL deemed to be of similar ethical and moral status even after he had personally engineered the demise of Premiership Rugby Union club Worcester Warriors and then saw us fall from the heights of League One out of the EFL altogether, this individual wasn’t allowed to totally scupper our club as well.

Bury supporters stood with us in our Darkest Hour (picture below) and any Shrimps fan who attended Gigg Lane on Morecambe Day last season will forever treasure the moral support the Shakers offered to us all. God Bless Them.

Then, the re-constituted Bury FC were starting their campaign in the Northern Premier League Division One West: a campaign that ended with them Champions of the competition.

They are on the way back Up – and good luck to them.

Against Morecambe this time, the Shakers took the field as a member of the Northern Premier League Premier Division, just one tier lower where their visitors currently find themselves.

The ambitious team had won all but one of its previous eight friendlies, including a 1-2 victory over two of our own rivals this season: Chorley at the Park of that name and at home against Radcliffe by two goals to one. The only fly in the ointment was a 2:2 draw at Clitheroe, where Morecambe won almost two weeks ago.

So the Shakers had High Hopes for another positive result in front of their own fans this afternoon.

These were dashed as quickly as twenty-five seconds into the fixture, when Teddy Collis smartly headed Ben Williams’ cross from the left past a Trialist in the home goal at his far post. With the visitors in control of the game, Teddy scored another after just twenty minutes with an assured finish after beating the Shaker’s off-side trap and finding himself in a good position in front of goal. The Shrimps then continued to dominate the game until half-time. Cameron Coxe had a goal disallowed for off-side after a quarter of an hour but Bury fashioned a couple of half-chances with James Melhado catching the eye as an attacking threat on the right flank and veteran centre forward Anthony Dudley and strike partner Tom Carr always a handful. 

Ronnie Blois fluffed what looked like a simple chance for the visitors right at the start of the second half. Collis then had a golden chance to claim a hat-trick in the sixtieth minute but instead shot tamely straight at the Bury stopper with an hour on the clock. Bury then had a good chance in the 74th minute when Louis White’s strike was denied only by a superb reaction save from Myles Boney in the away net. The closest the Shakers came to making a breakthrough was when Skipper James Neild hit the post with a good shot later in the second half.

For the Shrimps, this was a good run-out against a pretty good looking team. Bury are probably favourites for a second promotion in a row this season. But Morecambe must be quietly confident that they are also putting together a team which can look for promotion this term. This is what Manager Adam Lakeland made of today’s performance:

“I thought it was a really good game for us. It was a good technical challenge for us today. We had to be incredibly disciplined. I thought the players had a good shape. Probably being a little bit critical, I thought that in the first hour of the game, I felt that maybe at times decision-making or execution or that kind of first; second action after we won the ball back maybe wasn’t quite as precise as it needed to be. But, saying that, we scored a really good second goal. We had numerous other opportunities. We had some really good moments while having some really good defensive structure and organisation. I’d like us to be more fluid going forward. But on the whole, it’s been a really good afternoon for us: another step in the right direction.”

Morecambe: Myles Boney (Joe Young 76′); Cameron Coxe; Ben Williams (Harley Illingworth 83′); Liam Hogan (C); Lewis Baines; Lewis Leigh (Trialist A 76′); Taelor O’Kane (Paul Lewis 64′); Teddy Collis (Newall 76′); Matty Daly (Elijah Vilchez 83′); Elliot Newby (Trialist B 76′); Ronnie Blois (Joe Garner 64′).

Morecambe 1:1 AFC Fylde. Tuesday, 28th July 1900hrs.

The Shrimps faced their hardest test of pre-season tonight so far as they lined-up against the team that has replaced us in the National League this season: AFC Fylde. After the win at Bury last Saturday, Morecambe Manager Adam Lakeland said he would welcome the chance to compete on a grass surface for a change tonight as pre-season has been played almost exclusively on artificial pitches.

Fylde are clearly a cut above the other non-league teams the Shrimps have encountered so far and they had the lion’s share of the play after a slow start. But Morecambe started brightly and had the first good chance when Lewis Leigh stole the ball from a Coasters’ defender and unleashed a shot which bounced back off the post with just two minutes played. Visiting goalkeeper Pat Boyes then did well to keep out an effort by Cameron Coxe just a minute later. The team from Wesham also had chances – Danny Ormerod’s shot was well-blocked by Lewis Baines and Dylan Allen-Hadley and Tom Whelan wasted half chances to score. The match ended goalless at half time.

The visitors improved a bit in the second half of a game that was never of particularly good quality. Adam Lewis showed us what we are missing when he forced a reasonable opportunity for himself before Ormerod forced a smart save from Joe Young in the Morecambe goal which was cleared after a goalmouth scramble. With the Shrimps offering little in response, it was no surprise when Allen-Hadley – who had been causing the Morecambe defence problems on their right all game – scored with just seven minutes left, striking from an acute angle after a one-two with Ethan Mitchell.

But the visitors couldn’t hold onto their lead. As Morecambe visibly rallied in the dying minutes, Paul Lewis was in the right place at the right time to equalise with a tap-in from Isaac Buckley-Rickett’s killer low cross in the eighty sixth minute. 

So it ended honours even and the end of Morecambe’s 100% winning streak thanks to the Champions of the National League North. Good luck to them this term.

Morecambe: Joe Young (Myles Boney 78′); Cameron Coxe (Trialist A 78′); Ben Williams (Adam Fairclough 61’); Will Smith (C) (Liam Hogan 45’); Lewis Baines; Teddy Collis (Ronnie Blois 45’); Lewis Leigh; Matty Daly (Harley Illingworth 78′); Elliot Newby; Elijah Buckley-Ricketts; Taelor O’Kane (Paul Lewis 26′).

Morecambe 0:1 Barrow AFC. Saturday 1st August 1500hrs.

Local rivals Barrer crossed Morecambe Bay today with a virtually new squad and a recently-appointed Manager after their relegation from the EFL earlier in the year. Following a ticket cock-up this week, I was given a free one for this game thanks to the wonderful Nikki Lambourne and it was in the posh end; right behind the Shrimps’ dug-out.

The instructions shouted to their players by Manager Adam Lakeland and assistant Sam Walker were – in my opinion at least – far more interesting than what occurred on the pitch.

Barrow are a big, aggressive outfit. I reckon that six of their starting line-up were well over six feet tall and theirs was a pretty brutal way of playing with not a lot of skill.

New Manager – Adam Murray – has been poached from newly-promoted Bluebirds’ rivals Kidderminster Harriers and he was the Mastermind behind our hammering there last season in the FA Trophy.

The Murray Method clearly rates attrition very highly as the key to success in the National League. Mr Murray had clearly identified our small, slim but very nimble Elijah Buckley-Ricketts as our danger man and basically set huge Centre Back Paul Kalambayi (6’2” on a bad day and built proportionally) to Man-Mark him. With no protection from the Ref, Elijah had a pretty torrid time of it although he got the better of the much bigger man by guile alone on several occasions.

Other than that, there’s not a lot to say. The match was scrappy and quite bad-tempered at times: unusually for an alleged `friendly’, three yellow cards were handed-out for really bad challenges (one for us; two for the visitors) and there was an embarrassing display of Handbags right the end as well. What was that all about, for goodness sake?

Goal-mouth chances were few and far between but the Bluebirds did have a shot cleared off the line in the second half with Joe Young in the home goal beaten. The nearest Morecambe came to scoring was when Barrer Old Boy Elliot Newby headed narrowly wide right at the start of the second period.

The visitors were awarded a penalty right at the death when Lewis Baines was adjudged to have committed a foul but it looked soft in the extreme to me at least. Whatever, Olly Cranshaw scored comfortably from the spot.

So that was it. This game won’t live long in the memory: it was frankly really awful. A defeat is obviously a disappointing end to the pre-season campaign but no football fan anywhere really knows the state of his or her club’s squad until the action starts for real.

So Roll On next Saturday and the visit of Spennymoor.

See you there!

Morecambe: Joe Young; Cameron Coxe; Ben Williams (Adam Fairclough 82’); Liam Hogan; Will Smith (C) (Teddy Collis 75’); Lewis Baines; Lewis Leigh (Trialist A 75′); Matty Daly (Trialist B 82′); Elliot Newby; Elijah Buckley-Ricketts (Ronnie Blois 75’); Paul Lewis.

That’s it for this preview of Morecambe’s season. It seems to have touched a nerve and I would like to thank the many people who have taken the trouble to comment on Part One of it.

I was personally alarmed by a comment which suggested – after I had asked what had happened to Jim Bentley and his promised role in the Panjab’s Brave New World this season – that the owners haven’t even spoken to him about what he might be doing. Or not.

If any more clarity emerges about this issue, you will see it on these pages.

We’re all clearly desperately worried about what is really going on behind the scenes at the Halo Aerospace Arena. What the owners are really up to. Why they have appointed the sort of person who is now their Chief Operating Officer given the many skeletons in the cupboard from the past associated with this individual.

Naturally, there is absolutely no actual link between this real person and someone totally fictional who I have invented to play a similar role in my imaginary Shrimpleton Town club in the spoof I have been writing of the goings-on at Morecambe as a potential Soap Opera during the last few months.

But – guess what? Episode 23 of The Sensational Shrimpleton Saga is out tomorrow and it features a story about their very own Chief Operating Officer. James Churchill Proudfoot is a sleazy, professional con-man and a serial liar. He is also very, very stupid. Even if you haven’t been following the serialisation, you might find this particular episode interesting. So please look out for it.

In the meantime – Keep The Faith! Up the Shrimps!

2026/27 Enterprise National League North Fixtures

August 2026.
Saturday 8th August, 15:00hrs  – Spennymoor Town (H)
Sat 15th Aug, 15:00 – Harborough Town (A)
Tue 18th Aug, 19:45 – South Shields (H)
Sat 22nd Aug, 15:00 – Radcliffe (A)
Sat 29th Aug, 15:00 – AFC Telford United (H)
Mon 31st Aug, 15:00 – Chester (A)

September 2026.
Saturday 5th September, 15:00 – Buxton (H)
Tue 8th Sep, 19:45 – Southport (A)
Sat 12th Sep, 15:00 – Brackley Town (H)
Sat 26th Sep, 15:00 – Oxford City (A)

October 2026.
Saturday 10th October, 15:00 – Worksop Town (A)
Sat 17th Oct, 15:00 – Hereford (H)
Sat 24th Oct, 15:00 – Merthyr Town (A)
Tue 27th Oct, 19:45 – Darlington (H)
Sat 31st Oct, 15:00 – Scarborough Athletic (H)

November 2026.
Saturday 7th November, 15:00 – Hednesford Town (A)
Sat 21st Nov, 15:00 – King’s Lynn Town (H)
Tue 24th Nov, 19:45 – Macclesfield (A)
Sat 28th Nov, 15:00 – Spalding United (H)

December 2026.
Saturday 5th December, 15:00 – Bedford Town (A)
Tue 8th Dec, 19:45 – Spennymoor Town (A)
Sat 19th Dec, 15:00 – Harborough Town (H)
Sat 26th Dec, 15:00 – Chorley (A)
Mon 28 Dec, 15:00 – Marine (H)

January 2027.
Saturday 2nd January, 15:00 – Hebburn Town (H)
Sat 9th Jan, 15:00 – Hereford (A)
Sat 16th Jan, 15:00 – Brackley Town (A)
Sat 23rd Jan, 15:00 – Oxford City (H)
Tue 26th Jan, 19:45 – Macclesfield (H)
Sat 30th Jan, 15:00 – King’s Lynn Town (A)

February 2027.
Saturday 6th February, 15:00 – Hednesford Town (H)
Sat 13th Feb, 15:00 – Scarborough Athletic (A)
Tue 16th Feb, 19:45 – Darlington (A)
Sat 20th Feb, 15:00 – Merthyr Town (H)
Tue 23rd Feb, 19:45 – Southport (H)
Sat 27th Feb, 15:00 – AFC Telford United (A)

March 2027.
Saturday 6th March, 15:00 – Radcliffe (H)
Tue 9th Mar, 19:45 – South Shields (A)
Sat 13th Mar, 15:00 – Buxton (A)
Sat 20th Mar, 15:00 – Chester (H)
Fri 26th Mar, 15:00 – Marine (A)
Mon 29th Mar, 15:00 – Chorley (H)

April 2027.
Saturday 3rd April, 15:00 – Hebburn Town (A)
Sat 10th Apr, 15:00 – Worksop Town (H)
Sat 17th Apr, 15:00 – Bedford Town (H)
Sat 24th Apr, 17:30 – Spalding United (A)