One Game at a Time: You’re Only Here for the Pasties
Eleven Swans a Swimming (H) October 7th
With all the furore that engulfed the VAR system at Spurs at the weekend, and then the Tory Party conference, it is little surprise that not one, but two muggings went unnoticed at Home Park on Tuesday night. Still, even if crime is on the rise in PL2, Rishi got to announce some good news at least, as Tory stronghold Cheltenham Town look to be on course to achieve net zero by Christmas. Suck on that Dale Vince.
The first offence was that all too predictable smash and grab perpetrated by a team that was organised, physical and, frankly, allowed to get away with it by a compliant referee, who despite issuing seven yellows to the away side, never got to grips with the determined and persistent fouling designed to stop any build-up of attacking momentum and rhythm.
The return, in part down to available personnel, to the back four and a back nine for Millwall made chances hard to create. Even so Argyle could and perhaps should have opened the scoring before one fateful moment of concentration lapsing after an hour allowed a simple through ball to Flemming who confidently steered over and past a helpless Hazard.
As for the second act of larceny, the assault on KKH, which quite frankly would have been better served by the Rugby World Cup process of assessing a challenge and would inevitably have resulted in a multi game ban for the offender, Watmore. After all the Tottenham Stadium shenanigans of VAR most fans have long given up on any consistent application of common sense. On all the commentary seen of the incident the neutral commentators immediate reaction to the challenge was,” Well, that’s a foul” before Saville tucked a good shot into the top corner of Conor’s goal.
Would it have changed the result? Probably not. But if we are going to have to stump up match fees and salaries for officials, it would be helpful to have ones that would marginally better than finding a stray cat, tying a flag to its tail, lacing its pre match milk with brandy and chucking it down a touchline and hoping that the law of averages might prevail.
So, another performance but not a result which leaves us heading into the international break once we have concluded what, for Argyle is the first of only two international opponents we will have during the season (unlike Conor and maybe Hotdog), and the visit of Swansea City.
There is no sense of panic, as we have seen that we are, in footballing terms at least, a match for most of the sides in the Division. If there is an undercurrent of concern it appears to revolve around the fact that we are perhaps a little too naïve that we will be allowed to play our style of game. We foul less than most sides in the division and are fouled more than the average. In the top three for shots on goal but outside the top ten just, of big chances created.
The division, having reached the ten-game mark, by which time most observers believe they can discern the overall make-up of the final table, shows that Argyle are in that central pack from which they can emerge to run at the play-offs, or equally could be hauled back into the fight to stay up.
It is also clearly the time of year for the first itchy fingers to twitch. To the surprise of precisely no-one Cisco Munoz departed rock bottom Wednesday, leaving his successor to mould a collection of players that, other than Munoz, few had heard of, or indeed wanted into a coherent Championship side. How desperate are the Wednesday faithful. Desperate enough to consider lifelong Blade Neil Warnock to do his Red Adair impression. We could be seeing him back for a second visit of the season, and with the chaotic way Chanseri runs his club, with the potential for a third by May.
Further north, the departure of Michael Beale from Rangers had impacts at both ends of the table. Mixed feelings at Loftus Road where schadenfreude at his past treachery mixed with wondering whether he might be a better bet than Greaser Gareth, whose persecution ridden pressers are becoming just the wrong side of manic now.
Rangers (the Scottish one) also had to move swiftly to shut down the rumours, denied before they were even nascent, that Ryan Lowe was a potential candidate to replace Beale, much to the disappointment of a sizeable chunk of the North End commentariat. Despite their early lead, a net seven goal two defeat week has dampened the mood at Deepdale, on the eve of a visit to the rampant Ipswich Town. Lowe says he is definitely staying, although he does have a yen for Wednesday where he is still remembered foldly.
Probably the most surprising managerial move was the extension of Valerian Ishmaels contract at Watford after a run that traditionally would have seen a shuffling of the Udinese groups managerial assets.
The arrival of the Swans, under their new manager Michael Duff, finally feeling a little safer after a three-match winning streak , immediately turn the thoughts of Argyle fans and the fate of one ex Derby County player whose brief stay at Swansea was to end horribly.
Whittaker was his name, of course. In 1912 Walter Whittaker became player manager of the team after a long and distinguished career as a goalkeeper for Newton Heath (Manchester United to the kids), Grimsby, Blackburn, Derby Clapton Orient and Reading, he was Swansea’s first ever manager, taking them to immediate success in the Welsh Cup. He left the club in 1914, joining Llanelly, but tragically he contracted pneumonia and died in 1917.
Swansea Town as they were formed in 1912 started out on a literal vegetable patch for a pitch, the vetch of Vetch field, owned by the Swansea Gaslight company, being a type of legume grown until the club moved in. The Vetch as it was affectionally know was to be the Swans home until 2005.
During World War 1 the stadium was used by the army for anti-aircraft purposes and, following the resumption of the League programme, the Vetch also had tragedy. Having signed a young winger from Barry Town, David “Tich” Evans, after he excelled in a friendly match against them, the club were concerned when he failed to turn up for training. One of the senior players, looking for him, found his body beneath a grandstand, Evans, distraught by the death of his wife in childbirth had slit his own throat and died.
The club joined the nascent Football league alongside Argyle in 1920, and in 1925 pipped Argyle to promotion, in the middle of their six in a row runners up period. This was all the more galling in that Swansea’s and indeed the divisions goalscorer in chief was Jack Fowler, signed the previous season from Argyle.
The season also saw the Swans reach the FA Cup semi-final including a defeat of the mighty Gunners at the Vetch. Defeat by Bolton at White Hart Lane denied them the chance to be the frst Welsh club to win the cup, which honour fell to Cardiff (again defeating Arsenal) a couple of years later.
Swansea had the honour of being the first Welsh club to play outside of the UK, touring first Denmark and then Scandinavia in 1924 and 1925. A subsequent tour of Spain, where Celtic and Motherwell also played a series of matches has led to a commonly held belief that the club boast a three-nil friendly win over Real Madrid. Sadly, despite the club having a rosette of the period in their museum from the tour, there is actually no evidence of the game against the Spanish giants ever having taken place. It seems Madrid reserve their friendlies for the bigger clubs of the world, or as Argyle can testify, at the very least those with better travel agents.
The Swans have historically, following the tradition of their more illustrious and , frankly popular, rugby club, always played in all white, remarkably in the years after the First World War, the only League club to do so at the time. They did for a period spoil that look with black and white hooped socks, and of course in the modern era have joined the trend of maximising revenue from multi coloured away strips.
Post WW2 the club became an established Division 2 club and in 1964 reached another cup semi-final after a Barrie Jones inspired away win at Anfield. Having taken a two-nil lead at half time, the Swans endured a Liverpool fightback to hold on, with Ronnie Moran missing a late penalty, and manager Shankly claiming the final score could have been 14-2. Noel Dwyer, another Swan who joined Argyle at the same time as Jones became our record signing collected coins thrown by the Anfield crowd, not in anger but in apparent admiration, although according to Jones those coins stayed firmly in the Irishman’s pocket and not the team’s beer kitty for the journey home. The victory guaranteed a second division finalist as Preston awaited the winners, but it was North End who progressed to lose the final to West Ham United.
Since then Swansea, shortly to drop the Town in favour of City to befit the status of Copperopolis, as it was known in the earliest days of the industrial revolution, which to be fair is better than most of South Wales, which is simply the Pits, has been a series of peaks and troughs. The greatest peak was their first surge to the highest echelon, under the stewardship of John Toshack. Only 26 when he took charge Swansea went from the basement division to Division one in some four years, and after a five one thrashing of Leeds, led by new signing Bob Latchford, were top of the pile.
Despite a creditable sixth place finish the club suffered rapid relegations to return to the third tier, and Toshack was dismissed. The club also entered a period of turmoil financially, and were saved from oblivion by Doug Sharpe, but eight years after their first promotion Swansea were back where they started.
The clubs fortunes took an upturn with the move to the Liberty Stadium, a council funded venture combined with the Ospreys rugby team, although before they arrived there in 2005 and they did have the bizarre experience of a consortium trying to buy the club, effectively hiring a man with no football league experience as manager. Kevin Cullis, later convicted of fraud and jailed, lasted a mere two games, the second of which, a four nil gubbing at Blackpool was notable for the players ignoring his instructions and staging a revolution in the dressing room at half time where the players determined a second half strategy.
The Swans were more successful managerially with appointments that included Roberto Martinez and eventually (via a couple of caretaker stints by Kevin Nugent) Brendan Rogers, who piloted the Swans back to the Premier League before decamping to Liverpool.
The Swans also reached Europe again, without the crutch of the Welsh Cup, their most notable victory being a three-nil triumph in Valencia. In 2013 they claimed their first major silverware, with a record five-nil defeat of Bradford City in the Rumbelows Worthington Milk League Cup, in whatever guise it had that year.
The loss of Rogers however led to some bizarre appointments, from former defender Gary Monk, to the much parodied Bob Bradley. In recent seasons they have been a solid Championship club, and in 2021 new American owners arrived, to join existing chairman Huw Jenkins (not the former Argyle supporter of the year). Having now lost their parachute payments the club lost a hefty thirteen million pounds in 20/21, and all the money so far “invested” seems to come in loan form. The club does however have a guaranteed fans shareholding from the earlier times of crisis, which whilst having gradually been diluted, cannot fall below five percent and gives a representative on the Board of Directors, which is to be applauded.
The Jack Army showed mixed feelings over recent boss Russell martin, and his possession heavy football which gave mixed results on the pitch but did at least give them a long sought after double over local rivals Cardiff City. The jack Army, whose interesting taunt of the Cardiff fans with breaststroke gestures and the chant of “Swim away, swim away, swim away” refers back to a group of heavily outnumbered Cardiff fans being forced into the sea by their pursuers, also leading to a fanzine entitled “Swimming in Swansea Bay”
Swansea fans are nicknamed the Jacks after a Labrador or Newfoundland retriever, famous for sea rescues (presumably not of Cardiff fans) of 29 people in the 1930’s. Jack was named Dog of the Century by the National Canine Defence League despite a strong challenge by (insert your own candidate here say my lawyers).
Which brings us to Saturday. Serene progress for the on-form Swans or a dogged performance to restore the natural balance of our home dominance from the last twenty odd games? Pilgrim Pete might be wary as Cyril the Swan has form (literally) and once detached Zampa the Millwall Lions head with an uppercut before despatching the said costume piece into the crowd.
It is over twenty years since Argyle recorded a win over Swansea, and on our last meeting, one player scored a hattrick in eleven minutes to seal a thumping four one victory in the Caraboa Cup for the Swans.
For once Argyle fans wouldn’t mind him repeating the feat, as after all the transfer shenanigans of last season are long gone, Morgs is already proving he has what it takes for this level and probably beyond.
To mis quote the famous South Walian of all time, the Green Green Grass of Home Park will be resplendent and waiting for a performance that brings the goals recent ones have deserved and not achieved.
Sorry Walter, but it is Morgans time now.
COYG!!!!
Eleven Swans a Swimming (H) October 7th
With all the furore that engulfed the VAR system at Spurs at the weekend, and then the Tory Party conference, it is little surprise that not one, but two muggings went unnoticed at Home Park on Tuesday night. Still, even if crime is on the rise in PL2, Rishi got to announce some good news at least, as Tory stronghold Cheltenham Town look to be on course to achieve net zero by Christmas. Suck on that Dale Vince.
The first offence was that all too predictable smash and grab perpetrated by a team that was organised, physical and, frankly, allowed to get away with it by a compliant referee, who despite issuing seven yellows to the away side, never got to grips with the determined and persistent fouling designed to stop any build-up of attacking momentum and rhythm.
The return, in part down to available personnel, to the back four and a back nine for Millwall made chances hard to create. Even so Argyle could and perhaps should have opened the scoring before one fateful moment of concentration lapsing after an hour allowed a simple through ball to Flemming who confidently steered over and past a helpless Hazard.
As for the second act of larceny, the assault on KKH, which quite frankly would have been better served by the Rugby World Cup process of assessing a challenge and would inevitably have resulted in a multi game ban for the offender, Watmore. After all the Tottenham Stadium shenanigans of VAR most fans have long given up on any consistent application of common sense. On all the commentary seen of the incident the neutral commentators immediate reaction to the challenge was,” Well, that’s a foul” before Saville tucked a good shot into the top corner of Conor’s goal.
Would it have changed the result? Probably not. But if we are going to have to stump up match fees and salaries for officials, it would be helpful to have ones that would marginally better than finding a stray cat, tying a flag to its tail, lacing its pre match milk with brandy and chucking it down a touchline and hoping that the law of averages might prevail.
So, another performance but not a result which leaves us heading into the international break once we have concluded what, for Argyle is the first of only two international opponents we will have during the season (unlike Conor and maybe Hotdog), and the visit of Swansea City.
There is no sense of panic, as we have seen that we are, in footballing terms at least, a match for most of the sides in the Division. If there is an undercurrent of concern it appears to revolve around the fact that we are perhaps a little too naïve that we will be allowed to play our style of game. We foul less than most sides in the division and are fouled more than the average. In the top three for shots on goal but outside the top ten just, of big chances created.
The division, having reached the ten-game mark, by which time most observers believe they can discern the overall make-up of the final table, shows that Argyle are in that central pack from which they can emerge to run at the play-offs, or equally could be hauled back into the fight to stay up.
It is also clearly the time of year for the first itchy fingers to twitch. To the surprise of precisely no-one Cisco Munoz departed rock bottom Wednesday, leaving his successor to mould a collection of players that, other than Munoz, few had heard of, or indeed wanted into a coherent Championship side. How desperate are the Wednesday faithful. Desperate enough to consider lifelong Blade Neil Warnock to do his Red Adair impression. We could be seeing him back for a second visit of the season, and with the chaotic way Chanseri runs his club, with the potential for a third by May.
Further north, the departure of Michael Beale from Rangers had impacts at both ends of the table. Mixed feelings at Loftus Road where schadenfreude at his past treachery mixed with wondering whether he might be a better bet than Greaser Gareth, whose persecution ridden pressers are becoming just the wrong side of manic now.
Rangers (the Scottish one) also had to move swiftly to shut down the rumours, denied before they were even nascent, that Ryan Lowe was a potential candidate to replace Beale, much to the disappointment of a sizeable chunk of the North End commentariat. Despite their early lead, a net seven goal two defeat week has dampened the mood at Deepdale, on the eve of a visit to the rampant Ipswich Town. Lowe says he is definitely staying, although he does have a yen for Wednesday where he is still remembered foldly.
Probably the most surprising managerial move was the extension of Valerian Ishmaels contract at Watford after a run that traditionally would have seen a shuffling of the Udinese groups managerial assets.
The arrival of the Swans, under their new manager Michael Duff, finally feeling a little safer after a three-match winning streak , immediately turn the thoughts of Argyle fans and the fate of one ex Derby County player whose brief stay at Swansea was to end horribly.
Whittaker was his name, of course. In 1912 Walter Whittaker became player manager of the team after a long and distinguished career as a goalkeeper for Newton Heath (Manchester United to the kids), Grimsby, Blackburn, Derby Clapton Orient and Reading, he was Swansea’s first ever manager, taking them to immediate success in the Welsh Cup. He left the club in 1914, joining Llanelly, but tragically he contracted pneumonia and died in 1917.
Swansea Town as they were formed in 1912 started out on a literal vegetable patch for a pitch, the vetch of Vetch field, owned by the Swansea Gaslight company, being a type of legume grown until the club moved in. The Vetch as it was affectionally know was to be the Swans home until 2005.
During World War 1 the stadium was used by the army for anti-aircraft purposes and, following the resumption of the League programme, the Vetch also had tragedy. Having signed a young winger from Barry Town, David “Tich” Evans, after he excelled in a friendly match against them, the club were concerned when he failed to turn up for training. One of the senior players, looking for him, found his body beneath a grandstand, Evans, distraught by the death of his wife in childbirth had slit his own throat and died.
The club joined the nascent Football league alongside Argyle in 1920, and in 1925 pipped Argyle to promotion, in the middle of their six in a row runners up period. This was all the more galling in that Swansea’s and indeed the divisions goalscorer in chief was Jack Fowler, signed the previous season from Argyle.
The season also saw the Swans reach the FA Cup semi-final including a defeat of the mighty Gunners at the Vetch. Defeat by Bolton at White Hart Lane denied them the chance to be the frst Welsh club to win the cup, which honour fell to Cardiff (again defeating Arsenal) a couple of years later.
Swansea had the honour of being the first Welsh club to play outside of the UK, touring first Denmark and then Scandinavia in 1924 and 1925. A subsequent tour of Spain, where Celtic and Motherwell also played a series of matches has led to a commonly held belief that the club boast a three-nil friendly win over Real Madrid. Sadly, despite the club having a rosette of the period in their museum from the tour, there is actually no evidence of the game against the Spanish giants ever having taken place. It seems Madrid reserve their friendlies for the bigger clubs of the world, or as Argyle can testify, at the very least those with better travel agents.
The Swans have historically, following the tradition of their more illustrious and , frankly popular, rugby club, always played in all white, remarkably in the years after the First World War, the only League club to do so at the time. They did for a period spoil that look with black and white hooped socks, and of course in the modern era have joined the trend of maximising revenue from multi coloured away strips.
Post WW2 the club became an established Division 2 club and in 1964 reached another cup semi-final after a Barrie Jones inspired away win at Anfield. Having taken a two-nil lead at half time, the Swans endured a Liverpool fightback to hold on, with Ronnie Moran missing a late penalty, and manager Shankly claiming the final score could have been 14-2. Noel Dwyer, another Swan who joined Argyle at the same time as Jones became our record signing collected coins thrown by the Anfield crowd, not in anger but in apparent admiration, although according to Jones those coins stayed firmly in the Irishman’s pocket and not the team’s beer kitty for the journey home. The victory guaranteed a second division finalist as Preston awaited the winners, but it was North End who progressed to lose the final to West Ham United.
Since then Swansea, shortly to drop the Town in favour of City to befit the status of Copperopolis, as it was known in the earliest days of the industrial revolution, which to be fair is better than most of South Wales, which is simply the Pits, has been a series of peaks and troughs. The greatest peak was their first surge to the highest echelon, under the stewardship of John Toshack. Only 26 when he took charge Swansea went from the basement division to Division one in some four years, and after a five one thrashing of Leeds, led by new signing Bob Latchford, were top of the pile.
Despite a creditable sixth place finish the club suffered rapid relegations to return to the third tier, and Toshack was dismissed. The club also entered a period of turmoil financially, and were saved from oblivion by Doug Sharpe, but eight years after their first promotion Swansea were back where they started.
The clubs fortunes took an upturn with the move to the Liberty Stadium, a council funded venture combined with the Ospreys rugby team, although before they arrived there in 2005 and they did have the bizarre experience of a consortium trying to buy the club, effectively hiring a man with no football league experience as manager. Kevin Cullis, later convicted of fraud and jailed, lasted a mere two games, the second of which, a four nil gubbing at Blackpool was notable for the players ignoring his instructions and staging a revolution in the dressing room at half time where the players determined a second half strategy.
The Swans were more successful managerially with appointments that included Roberto Martinez and eventually (via a couple of caretaker stints by Kevin Nugent) Brendan Rogers, who piloted the Swans back to the Premier League before decamping to Liverpool.
The Swans also reached Europe again, without the crutch of the Welsh Cup, their most notable victory being a three-nil triumph in Valencia. In 2013 they claimed their first major silverware, with a record five-nil defeat of Bradford City in the Rumbelows Worthington Milk League Cup, in whatever guise it had that year.
The loss of Rogers however led to some bizarre appointments, from former defender Gary Monk, to the much parodied Bob Bradley. In recent seasons they have been a solid Championship club, and in 2021 new American owners arrived, to join existing chairman Huw Jenkins (not the former Argyle supporter of the year). Having now lost their parachute payments the club lost a hefty thirteen million pounds in 20/21, and all the money so far “invested” seems to come in loan form. The club does however have a guaranteed fans shareholding from the earlier times of crisis, which whilst having gradually been diluted, cannot fall below five percent and gives a representative on the Board of Directors, which is to be applauded.
The Jack Army showed mixed feelings over recent boss Russell martin, and his possession heavy football which gave mixed results on the pitch but did at least give them a long sought after double over local rivals Cardiff City. The jack Army, whose interesting taunt of the Cardiff fans with breaststroke gestures and the chant of “Swim away, swim away, swim away” refers back to a group of heavily outnumbered Cardiff fans being forced into the sea by their pursuers, also leading to a fanzine entitled “Swimming in Swansea Bay”
Swansea fans are nicknamed the Jacks after a Labrador or Newfoundland retriever, famous for sea rescues (presumably not of Cardiff fans) of 29 people in the 1930’s. Jack was named Dog of the Century by the National Canine Defence League despite a strong challenge by (insert your own candidate here say my lawyers).
Which brings us to Saturday. Serene progress for the on-form Swans or a dogged performance to restore the natural balance of our home dominance from the last twenty odd games? Pilgrim Pete might be wary as Cyril the Swan has form (literally) and once detached Zampa the Millwall Lions head with an uppercut before despatching the said costume piece into the crowd.
It is over twenty years since Argyle recorded a win over Swansea, and on our last meeting, one player scored a hattrick in eleven minutes to seal a thumping four one victory in the Caraboa Cup for the Swans.
For once Argyle fans wouldn’t mind him repeating the feat, as after all the transfer shenanigans of last season are long gone, Morgs is already proving he has what it takes for this level and probably beyond.
To mis quote the famous South Walian of all time, the Green Green Grass of Home Park will be resplendent and waiting for a performance that brings the goals recent ones have deserved and not achieved.
Sorry Walter, but it is Morgans time now.
COYG!!!!
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