Brief Synopsis

[Dorset Green]

There have been some very watchable games ,some entertaining football and a couple of good runs. Danny Mayor at his best was a pleasure to watch. In hindsight it may be an achievement to stay up with a side that has relied on a number of loan players, something which hopefully has meant there is more cash in the club piggybank than there would otherwise have been.

The other side of the coin has been players whose form has deteriorated, too many defensive errors by whoever has played, tactical inflexibility, a manager who was reluctant to share the blame when things went wrong. Danny Mayor should have scored at least half-a-dozen goals. Poor runs of form that left us too close to the bottom for comfort.

I was a Ryan Lowe fan until about Christmas, the cockiness I could live with, but by the end of the season I'm wondering whether he really has enough self-awareness to be a good football manager. I really don't know to be honest but its clear that if Argyle are going to make an impression next season there needs to a lot of player recruitment. I rate Cooper, Aimson, Edwards, Mayor, Grant and Ennis plus Randell but have doubts as to whether Camara, Jephcott and Hardy are good enough to be in the starting line-up on recent form.

I think if Lowe was to up sticks in the near future and head north to manage another club that would take the decision out of the Clubs hands and I'm not sure that many tears would be shed by fans, but a poor start next season and he won't have many friends in Home Park and I won't envy Simon Hallett.

 

[rsp4]

The deadest of dead rubbers although it would have been nice to experience a rare win and for Jephcott to reach 20 goals.
As it was - it was another lacklustre defeat, Tomlinson did very well on his full debut, McCormick reached the 350 milestone and Watts suffered a serious injury.

It's finally over, a soulless season spent in front of the unreliable iFollow, apart from three games and even those were strange and abnormal.
The season long aim was to stay in League One and that was achieved with 6 points to spare.

Credit to the club and players for getting through a shortened season playing Saturday-Tuesday-Saturday and having no games postponed due to Covid.
It must have been mentally and physically tough for everyone.

But what a deflating end to the season. Four straight defeats or one point from the last seven games.
It was a rollercoaster with more downs than ups. Inconsistentcy was the buzz word of the season. Winning four games in a row was quickly followed by losing four games in a row. How is that possible?
Coming from behind to win just one league game all season.

We are very watchable in the middle third of the pitch but a shambles in the defensive third and just as bad in the attacking third. The business ends of a football pitch.

We have the third worst away record in the league, only Bristol Rovers and Northampton are worse and only those two teams scored less away goals than Argyle.
Outside of a recovery season after the war in 1945 this season we conceded the most goals at Home Park in our entire history and equalled our worst defeat at home.

How the hell did we stay up? We did and that's all that matters so job done.

I accept I may be in the minority, but with stats like that Lowe must be delighted he’s managed to find a friend in Hallett. Stability is a good thing until it takes you to the conference.

If you add our inability to defend set pieces and corners. Our inability to deliver a decent corner or set piece. Our tactical naivety. Lowe’s very poor success rate in recruitment - I wouldn’t care if any of these left and can’t remember a season feeling like that. Several promising players seem to have even gone backwards. We’ve got no fight or ruthless streak. Our football is a slow motion bore fest.

I’d give those people who say Lowe deserves another chance credit if they could point to how the hell he turns all the negatives to positives next year. Recruitment in itself (where he has no proven record at this level) won’t be enough !

Equal worst home defeat and worst ever league 1 finish - I like record breakers but not this type

Agreed. Tbh I wouldn't be sad to see RL go now but fully understand he won't. Its a shame because the team needs a total rebuild and if it goes minky early next season a lot of pointless signings will have been made already.

 

[slingsbypobble]

Forgettable game. Terrible ground, terrible pitch and then there's Argyle in freefall. The wind didn't help, either.

We had a few chances and a few corners too but we know what happens from corners, usually nothing, or worse we lose possession.

Maybe it was our lacklustre performance making them look good, but I liked the look of every single one of the Gills team. With the possible exceptions of Cooper and Ennis I would happily swap the whole lot if I could. (Take Steve Evans out of the equation when assessing this view).

We end the season with the fifth worst 'games lost' tally and third worst goal difference. Wholesale changes needed.

 

[daront]

We stayed up in a covid year with little in the way of good free agents and little transfer fee's.

Need a solid defence for next season, rather then suddenly being linked to every striker out there.

Defence first!!!

 

[Koala Green]

One of the strangest Argyle seasons in 40 odd years of watching.

On the one hand , we had a lot of quality, exciting attacking football with real quality.

The winning runs where we looked play off contenders were quickly followed by performances where we looked like lower League 2.

When we look back in a year or two, I think we will see it as a year of survival where we made the mistake of having a team of youngsters who naturally were inconsistent and ran out of gas. Or it was the season where Ryan Lowe was found out?

The stats speak for themselves 80 goals conceded, virtually no goals scored from set pieces vs probably at least 10 or 20 conceded via set plays.

Quite simply we need experience, we need height, we need muscle. Then we can mix up pretty ball with more direct League one footy.

To give Lowe credit he identified big Frank as a solution but he was out of his depth. And while I rate Fornah and I thought Watts was solid. Relying on Opoku as the main defender when he was so error prone was a mistake. We need a spine for the team that is on a contract not a loan.

 

[saxman]

Another of those games where we have played quite well in patches but have fallen to a sucker punch of a goal. At least it was only one this time and we had a very young and inexperienced team. Regarding the season summaries above, I agree with most of what is being said. I'm really looking forward to seeing what RL can do to take us forwards next year, new experienced players and a variation on the unsuccessful tactics very much needed.

 

[xmastree]

One of the strangest Argyle seasons in 40 odd years of watching.

On the one hand , we had a lot of quality, exciting attacking football with real quality.

The winning runs where we looked play off contenders were quickly followed by performances where we looked like lower League 2.

When we look back in a year or two, I think we will see it as a year of survival where we made the mistake of having a team of youngsters who naturally were inconsistent and ran out of gas. Or it was the season where Ryan Lowe was found out?

The stats speak for themselves 80 goals conceded, virtually no goals scored from set pieces vs probably at least 10 or 20 conceded via set plays.

Quite simply we need experience, we need height, we need muscle. Then we can mix up pretty ball with more direct League one footy.

To give Lowe credit he identified big Frank as a solution but he was out of his depth. And while I rate Fornah and I thought Watts was solid. Relying on Opoku as the main defender when he was so error prone was a mistake. We need a spine for the team that is on a contract not a loan.

Why give Lowe credit for finding a solution (in Nouble) who was out of his depth (and therefore not a solution)?

 

[Deacster]

One of the strangest Argyle seasons in 40 odd years of watching.

On the one hand , we had a lot of quality, exciting attacking football with real quality.

The winning runs where we looked play off contenders were quickly followed by performances where we looked like lower League 2.

When we look back in a year or two, I think we will see it as a year of survival where we made the mistake of having a team of youngsters who naturally were inconsistent and ran out of gas. Or it was the season where Ryan Lowe was found out?

The stats speak for themselves 80 goals conceded, virtually no goals scored from set pieces vs probably at least 10 or 20 conceded via set plays.

Quite simply we need experience, we need height, we need muscle. Then we can mix up pretty ball with more direct League one footy.

To give Lowe credit he identified big Frank as a solution but he was out of his depth. And while I rate Fornah and I thought Watts was solid. Relying on Opoku as the main defender when he was so error prone was a mistake. We need a spine for the team that is on a contract not a loan.

Why give Lowe credit for finding a solution (in Nouble) who was out of his depth (and therefore not a solution)?

He means the right style of player but he didn't have the required quality.

 

[Penlee]

Their goal looked well offside

 

[Tugboat]

Their goal looked well offside

Straws and clutching spring to mind.

Maybe if we had the confidence and conviction to score a goal ourselves we wouldn’t be naturally searching for these excuses game after game.

Jephcott needs to go back out on loan because he’s an empty man right now.

 

[Andy Maidenhead]

Defeat today was always inevitable.
Lowey post match is full of optimism for next season (why not? he got crazy 4 year security..nobody else gonna offer him a similar paid job).
I give him until end of October to show substantive progress.. last third of this season been mainly utterly pathetic.
He fortunate no fans at HP.

 

[xmastree]

One of the strangest Argyle seasons in 40 odd years of watching.

On the one hand , we had a lot of quality, exciting attacking football with real quality.

The winning runs where we looked play off contenders were quickly followed by performances where we looked like lower League 2.

When we look back in a year or two, I think we will see it as a year of survival where we made the mistake of having a team of youngsters who naturally were inconsistent and ran out of gas. Or it was the season where Ryan Lowe was found out?

The stats speak for themselves 80 goals conceded, virtually no goals scored from set pieces vs probably at least 10 or 20 conceded via set plays.

Quite simply we need experience, we need height, we need muscle. Then we can mix up pretty ball with more direct League one footy.

To give Lowe credit he identified big Frank as a solution but he was out of his depth. And while I rate Fornah and I thought Watts was solid. Relying on Opoku as the main defender when he was so error prone was a mistake. We need a spine for the team that is on a contract not a loan.

Why give Lowe credit for finding a solution (in Nouble) who was out of his depth (and therefore not a solution)?

He means the right style of player but he didn't have the required quality.

Ok, fair enough.

 

[oldage]

Defeat today was always inevitable.
Lowey post match is full of optimism for next season (why not? he got crazy 4 year security..nobody else gonna offer him a similar paid job).
I give him until end of October to show substantive progress.. last third of this season been mainly utterly pathetic.
He fortunate no fans at HP.

If Lowe is optimistic based on what we have just endured and as yet unknown signings it is a big concern. We have just completed a dreadful season and if his transfer deals to date are anything to go by we will struggle to get players who fit into the profiles spewed out by his computer and data analysis.

 

[xmastree]

A few thoughts...

was that an arm to the head, or did it just look that way ?
If Reeves was playing for a contract, I'd say he earned one;
my man of the match;
Tomlinson looked very assured, and is good in the air;
Law acquitted himself well against another difficult opponent;
Cooper was faultless, and is one of our better passers of the ball;
Mayor seemed upset at Watts's injury, and played little further part in the game;
Fornah made a decent fist of things in an unaccustomed position;
Hardie put in a fine shift;
and once again, our build-up was predictable, our set-pieces
totally unthreatening, and our delivery largely poor, and no-one attacked
the occasional decent ball into the box that we did conjure up.
We have a long way to go, but bring on whoever we get in the opener.

Disagree with giving Reeves a contract on the strength of today. It's got to be looked at over the season as a whole he's done nowhere near enough. People will say he hasn't had the opportunity, but that has to be earned. He's generally failed to get a starting berth in a side crying out for experience and creativity. I don't think it's helped him that on the majority of his regular sub appearances he has played as a defensive / holding midfielder which isn't his natural game.

At his peak with Milton Keynes, Reeves was a good L1 attacking midfielder, mobile, creative and capable of scoring his share. Sadly he's lost pace and mobility. He's been neat and tidy, but creates little threat. Although only 29, he has the look of an older, fading player. Being blunt, there's no pace, no physical presence, no killer pass, little goal threat. Thanks for his efforts but we can, and must, find better.

 

[Quintrell Green]

very pleased with the young lads at argyle,also good to see reeves play the full match.man of the match for me ollie tomlinson closely followed by ryan law.

I did not watch the full game as the result was predictable. I have just watched the SKY highlights and at least Argyle had chances but could not put the ball in the net. The positive was that young players gained further first team experience