Brief Synopsis (Sponsored by Bromleigh House)

[Herts Green]

Agree about the commentator. He didn't waffle, was incisive and really added to my 'enjoyment' of the game

He certainly didnt rate Wigan though! Which is an indictment of our performance.

It is. Argyle were absolutely dreadful second half and ordinary first half. Wigan looked like what they are, a team of cast offs and we still didn’t beat them. If only we could have displayed the same urgency for the whole of the second half as we did in injury time where we could and should have scored. 2 points dropped but all will be forgotten with a win in Tuesday.

 

[vibratingspider]

Have to say, Cooper’s decision making again let us down today. He always seems to get caught between two minds. Experience will do him good, I just hope it’s not at our expense for much longer. Agree with the earlier comment that Palmer in goal would have meant three points for us today. Cooper just doesn’t command his area enough for me. Fingers crossed he sorts it.

 

[demportdave]

Have to say, Cooper’s decision making again let us down today. He always seems to get caught between two minds. Experience will do him good, I just hope it’s not at our expense for much longer. Agree with the earlier comment that Palmer in goal would have meant three points for us today. Cooper just doesn’t command his area enough for me. Fingers crossed he sorts it.

Yes, definitely Cooper's fault that despite dominating the first half we only score following a defensive mistake or that only 4 of 19 shots were actually on target or that Fornah allowed the ball to go under his foot in the lead up to the Wigan goal or that once again, our midfield went awol in the second half.

Cooper has got a lot to answer for tonight.

 

[Nobby]

Have to say, Cooper’s decision making again let us down today. He always seems to get caught between two minds. Experience will do him good, I just hope it’s not at our expense for much longer. Agree with the earlier comment that Palmer in goal would have meant three points for us today. Cooper just doesn’t command his area enough for me. Fingers crossed he sorts it.

Yes, definitely Cooper's fault that despite dominating the first half we only score following a defensive mistake or that only 4 of 19 shots were actually on target or that Fornah allowed the ball to go under his foot in the lead up to the Wigan goal or that once again, our midfield went awol in the second half.

Cooper has got a lot to answer for tonight.

It’s natural that Cooper is being criticised, mistakes are more glaring for a keeper as they usually result in a goal for the opposition. He could have done better, but frankly I’d be asking questions of the centre backs as to why the striker was unmarked in the centre of the goal six yards out.

A few hours on and I’m unsure what my overriding feeling is about today’s performance. I certainly think we should have won, however the spell between 45 and 70 is as bad as we’ll play all season. There was nothing good to say about it.

Overall, I thought Kell Watts, Ryan Hardie and Joe Edwards has decent games. Mayor I found very frustrating. Jephcott looked off the pace. I can’t understand why Camara didn’t start, and I think Lowe should have brought him on earlier. It was clear we were losing control of the game early in the second half. I think we very clearly missed Canavan’s experience.

In defence of the management, we started today without Cooper, MacLeod, Grant, Canavan, Sawyer and Wootton. Who in terms of FL appearances are experienced players. Hardie, Jephcott, Fornah, Mike Cooper, Watts, Opoku all started today and are u23 with limited first team experience. I think that goes part way to explaining our in-game management being poor. Hard to know how to fix our problem of being crap in the second half. It’s bizarre and isn’t something we had a problem with last year.

Anyway, two points dropped for sure. Need a win on Tuesday.

Cooper - 5
Edwards - 7
Watts - 8
Opoku - 6
Aimson - 5
Moore - 6
Fornah - 6
Mayor - 6
Reeves - 5
Jephcott - 5
Hardie - 7

Camara - 6
Nouble - 6
Telford - 5

 

[gaspargomez]

Crap goalkeeping for both the goal and the disallowed goal.

He should have been sent out on loan for a season to gain experience.

 

[jimsing]

Crap goalkeeping for both the goal and the disallowed goal.

He should have been sent out on loan for a season to gain experience.

He won't get better experience than playing in the first team. He is one for the future, if you let him.

He will make mistakes, just be patient and try to see further than the here and now.

 

[Biggs]

Crap goalkeeping for both the goal and the disallowed goal.

He should have been sent out on loan for a season to gain experience.

Let’s play Cooper, they said.

Accept he’ll make mistakes, they said.

Crap goalkeeping, send him on loan, they said.

I think he’s been very good and we’re just outside the play-offs while getting to grips with a new division and defence :thumbup:

 

[demportdave]

Cooper is not the issue here.

It's not his fault that we didn't go in at HT with a 3-goal lead or only 4 of 19 shots were on target or our Midfield went absent for the third quarter of the match.

We have scored 1 goal in our last 3 away games and that came from a defensive mistake. Where is the creativity from Mayor and Co or what about the header from 6 yards that Jephcott put over the bar.

The lack goals is the issue, especially when we are playing well.

 

[davie nine]

Crap goalkeeping for both the goal and the disallowed goal.

He should have been sent out on loan for a season to gain experience.

I think he made a mistake by not coming out decisively for their goal but that, in my opinion, is the first mistake he has made in a league match and, no, I don’t blame him for any of Wimbledon’s goals.
He must have done well at Lincoln because I’m sure that the vultures were waiting to pounce and compare him with Palmer.

 

[Gary Wills]

Keeper Coops has not looked out of his depth at all, imho.
Long may the lad keep it up.
You can’t bring players through and have zero dips and blips can you.
Reading just this week how Kellett, who’d been surprisingly snapped up by Manchester U, is playing non league football by his mid twenties. Not so special K seemed to have more ‘attitude’ than Coops though.

 

[bringonthemilkman]

What is worrying is that Fornah has put in man of the match performances in the first halves of the games against Lincoln and Wigan and then been totally anonymous in both second halves. Why is this?
Is it down to inexperience? Complacency? Tactics?
The midfield link is so important to the way we play as if that role functions it allows Mayor, Reeves - who also disappeared in the second half yesterday-and the wingbacks to spread play and pressure the opposition defence.
I accept we have made a decent start and the team is still gelling ; especially given the enforced changes we’ve had to make, but yesterday’s result was disappointing as we were by far the better team. I hope that the two points we lost yesterday aren’t significant should the season be ended early.

 

[phil thefluter24]

just going off topic for a moment. I see the guy who " won " the penalty for Lincoln against us got another soft one for them again yesterday. Apparently it was the fourth one he has been awarded this season, guess he could teach Tom Daley a thing or too

 

[moles40]

Once we start taking our chances in games then this league better watch out.


Great chance of auto- promotion this season, despite everything like no crowd to help the team to victory.

 

[plymade]

Well said Moles! Agree. It also shows how COVID messes with the stability of the team and how much it messes with heads too! Its no coincidence that our recent form in the second half of matches is to a large extent, caused by matters we can't control.

 

[Nobby]

Once we start taking our chances in games then this league better watch out.


Great chance of auto- promotion this season, despite everything like no crowd to help the team to victory.

Thought i'd nibble at this, and expand slightly. Personally, I think you are too optimistic. I don't think we are good enough defensively to be promotion contenders. Although unlike some, I do not fear we'll be down the bottom. I think a top half finish is achievable.

Anyway, for some context i thought i'd have a quick look at your statement of "Once we start taking our chances in games then this league better watch out." Mainly for my own curiosity more than anything. Statements like this are the exact reason "Expected Goals" exists. I'm a believer in stats and think xG gives you a good indication of how a team may fare over a period of time. xG calculates the probability of scoring based on the chance created. So the more clear cut/central/closer the chance is, the higher the XG is. Pretty simple. So far this season our results based on xG should be:

Wigan 0.9 - 2.1 Argyle
Lincoln 2.7 - 0.5 Argyle
Argyle 1.6 - 1.2 Northampton
Argyle 1.6 - 0.7 Burton
Hull 1.1 - 1.1 Argyle
Argyle 1.4 - 0.4 Shrewsbury
Wimbledon 2.2 - 2.7 Argyle
Argyle 1.1 - 1.4 Blackpool

To explain how this works, if the xG is within 0.3 of one another, the match is consider a draw. If more than that it suggests one the team with the higher should have won (basically, round to nearest whole). Whilst I can see the limitations of XG, it shows that barring the Lincoln game, we've been very competitive in every game we've played in and created enough to win most.

Outperforming your XG would be a sign that you are very clinical, but don't create many chances. Underperfoming would suggest we create good chances but don't take them. If these patterns continue over a season, the former will eventually stop, the latter will generally catchup. A good example would be Solksjaer's first few months at Man Utd or Emery's first few months at Arsenal. In both circumstances, the teams were outperforming there xG either through outrageous finishing from them, or bad finishing from the opposition. The following season United were atrocious for the first six months and Emery was sacked before Christmas following a poor end and start to the new season. The results started to match the performances.

Here's how the L1 table would look so far if teams took there chances:

Paints a frustrating picture, but shows that we are doing well from box-to-box. We had the issue last year and Hardie and Jephcott came in in January and starting scoring which made the difference. Our current circumstances are similar.

Anyway, I know some don't believe in stats, some think xG is nonsense... "you win games on goals not expected goals" bla bla bla... but just a little bit of data behind the performances giving food for thought (data the club probably looks at).