Biggs":3qs23qmw said:
Can we just relax a bit? Under Lowe we've been promoted then consolidated ourselves in League One.
We'd all have very gladly taken that, now let's see what the management team have got up their sleeves to push us on.
I'll agree with the fact that Lowe got us promoted, that the current team has won enough games to keep us there for next season, and that most of us would have accepted at the start of the season.
There's a word in there, however, that is so ridiculously out of place that I can only conclude that you don't know the meaning. Consolidated. There's a five letter clue in the middle of it, the word "solid". Consolidated, in case you don't know, means to make more solid, to strengthen, to unite as a strong single entity.
When Paul Sturrock got Argyle promoted to the third tier he took a season to genuinely consolidate. He added a few players, let one or two go, but above all strengthened the team as a unit. Like most decent managers, Sturrock built from the back, putting in place a defensive unit that was hard to break down, and consequently hard to beat. In other words, he made us more solid. Having created those foundations, he then worked on the more offensive part of the team. The result was that if Argyle lost, then they lost narrowly, but losses became rarer and Argyle were promoted again the following year.
Contrast this with Lowe's "consolidation". Nearing the end of this season of "consolidation", Argyle actually own only 2 defenders with any experience, one of whom is old, injury-prone and currently moonlighting (badly) in the commentary box. Both Sawyer and Aimson are out of contract at the end of the season, so we have no defenders whatsoever signed up for next season. The rest of the defence is made up by a gang of loanees, boys expected to do men's jobs who IMHO have taken some unfair stick. Lowe had a chance to perhaps consolidate and start to rebuild the defence in January, but he declined to replace the departing experience of Canavan and Wootton, opting instead for more callow loanees, including a LB bereft of defensive nous.
Lowe's salvation has been that his team can, on their day win games, and have actually done so quite often. At its best this team can be very easy on the eye, can be exciting to watch, and in Ennis and Camara Lowe has recruited two players with a lot of potential. However, this is not a solid team. It's is perhaps the flakiest Argyle team I've seen. We're far too easy to beat, and when we concede there's always the likelihood of conceding another 2 or 3 soon after.
I'm sorry Biggs, but this is not consolidation. There's no defensive structure in place for next season, no foundations whatsoever. Yet all you can do is naively whoop about "what the management team have got up their sleeves to push us on".