‘The Atmosphere Will Be Fantastic’ – A Word On The Pilgrims
- A view on Plymouth Argyle from Plymouth Live journalist Chris Errington
- The Pilgrims host Leicester City in the Sky Bet Championship on Friday
- It’s an 8pm kick-off at Home Park as Argyle bid to move away from the bottom three
- Errington is expecting another capacity-crowd to create a raucous atmosphere
A second season in the division for the south west outfit looked all-but confirmed under previous manager Steven Schumacher, until a poor run of results during Ian Foster’s time at the helm led to Plymouth plummeting down from mid-table towards the bottom three.
Now firmly in the relegation shake-up and fighting to avoid the drop, their recent form has led to some cause for optimism among the Argyle faithful, arresting a worrying slide. Now at the business end of the campaign, Errington provided an insight into the current situation at Home Park.
He explained: “There’s four games left for Argyle: two at home, two away and it’s really getting down to the nitty gritty. They’ve had a desperately bad run at home, five successive defeats in front of their own fans without scoring a goal.
“That was one of the reasons they made the change of head coach, with Ian Foster being replaced on Easter Monday after a 1-0 defeat to Bristol City. Neil Dewsnip, the director of football, and Kevin Nancekivell, a long-time first team coach, have been appointed in temporary charge until the end of the season.
“It’s the second time they’ve done it this season and they’ve got four points from the first two games. That’s a good start. One was away to bottom of the table Rotherham United. They needed to go there and get a win and they did, a 1-0 victory.
“They followed that up with a very tight and tense 1-1 draw with Queens Park Rangers on Tuesday night. Both teams are fighting to stay in the division and there wasn’t a lot to choose between them.
“QPR scored first and most inside the stadium thought they were going to go on and win it because Argyle weren’t threatening an equaliser, but an own goal came from an 85th-minute corner and that stopped the rot. They will be hoping to use that little boost to try and give them an extra bit of momentum going into the rest of the season.”
Winger Morgan Whittaker has supplied a fair share of Plymouth’s goals this term, reportedly attracting interest from across Europe in January. Now, more than ever, Argyle require the 21-year-old to perform, alongside contributions from other attacking talents.
“They’ve probably relied a little bit too much on him in the second half of the season,” Errington admitted. “You look at someone who has got 20 goals this season and 19 in the Championship and you think you wouldn’t have too many problems about staying up, but it’s been down to him.
“Teams know he’s Argyle’s best player and are doing everything they can to stop him being the goalscoring threat we saw for a lot of this season. Although he’s been playing pretty well, the opposition are understandably taking measures to make sure he doesn’t get in the same sort of positions.
“That’s where other players in the team need to step up and start chipping in with goals. But it hasn’t really happened for them and if he doesn’t get it, you wonder where the goal will come from in crucial moments.
“That has been one of the big issues. Ryan Hardie has been a great servant for Argyle over the last few years and has scored 13 goals this season, but they have dried up recently. He’s hit a bit of a slump in terms of goals.”
Facing the league leaders may be a daunting task for the hosts come Friday’s 8pm kick-off, with Errington expecting a resolute rear-guard to be required in order to keep the Foxes at bay. With the crowd in full voice, though, anything is possible.
“They need points,” the reporter continued. “This is the toughest game that they have got left this season and I think anything that they get out of a game against the league leaders is a bonus. They’ve found it hard against all of the top teams this season. Their record isn’t great against any of those.
“If they were offered a point, I’m sure they’d take it. You’ve got to be very careful when you play against quality opposition. We’ve seen that during Argyle’s first season back in the Championship.
“Top teams will pick you off if you give them space or show a lack of concentration. You get punished for not picking someone up at the right moment. Leicester will certainly have more of the possession so they will have to be tight, disciplined and defend well.
“I can’t see them going all-out attack, but they will have chances. One of the big problems is that when they’ve had good chances in games, they haven’t been able to convert them. They’ve not been clinical enough. The atmosphere at Home Park will be fantastic though. They’ve had sell outs in every game and will need the fans behind them.”
All times BST.