Blackburn beaten by Burnley Loanee – Ouch!!!!
Before we go any further, let’s make a bit of a departure from the norm this season and have a quick look back at last Saturday’s game in Sussex first. After the Shrimps’ first-ever match in League One, Ipswich Manager Paul Cook said the following:
“Take your hat off to Morecambe. They were absolutely magnificent from the first minute to the last minute – they couldn’t have left another breath on the pitch. I must pay Morecambe a massive compliment: they come here today and they gave an amazing account of themselves and it’s a great sign for them in the division in the future.”
Amen to that. For those of us who haven’t already seen it, I am also indebted to Ben Kennedy for posting the following photograph on Facebook of `a very classy Sussex Lass’, to quote Shrimpsvoices Maestro and namesake Keith Fitton’s description of her as she celebrated the Shrimps’ first ever goal in League One:
(first picture please)
I wonder what was going through Alfie McCalmont’s head as he looked back at her. (He might have been counting how many fingers she has on each hand and concluded – as someone else suggested somewhat unkindly – that she wasn’t really from Ipswich at all as she only has five digits on both…)
Touché Madam. Finally, here’s a little stat to make everyone realise one of the many realities of the transition from League Two to League One. Saturday’s gate – 21,309, including 356 from Morecambe – was the largest crowd (bar Wembley Finals) that the Shrimps have ever played in front of. Wow...
But that was then. How about tonight?
Morecambe travelled to Ewood Park this evening to face Championship Blackburn Rovers in the League Cup First Round. They arrived on the back of their tremendous display against much-fancied Ipswich Town at Portman Road last Saturday. The Shrimps’ first ever League One match ended in a very creditable 2-2 draw. Meanwhile, Tony Mowbray’s Rovers were beating Swansea City 2-1 here to start their own league campaign on a very positive note. Tonight marked the first occasion on which two Lancashire clubs which are less than 40 miles apart geographically have ever faced each other in a major competition.
There have been developments at the Mazuma stadium since Saturday, mostly concerning Morecambe’s central defenders. Ryan Delaney was hurt during the game against Ipswich and had to leave the field to be replaced by Club Captain Sam Lavelle. Since then, Manager Stephen Robinson has announced both that Ryan’s injury is a long-term one and that he needs to get a left-sided central defender in to cover as a matter of urgency. Enter Scott Wootton, who was signed on a one-year deal today. Recent rumours also suggested that the game at Portman Road would be Skipper Lavelle’s last for the club: he was almost certainly going to be a Wycombe Wanderers player later in the week, if he wasn’t one already.
So much for the Rumour Mill: Sam led the team out at Ewood Park tonight with the Captain’s armband on as usual.
Concerning the prospect facing his players this evening, the Morecambe Manager said:
“Another hard, hard game for us, our start was always going to be difficult but an exciting one again. It’s not too far up the road so we can go and enjoy ourselves, we’re under no pressure, I think we proved on Saturday we can certainly compete but we’re going to have to produce another performance like that. Blackburn are a good side, I watched them against Leeds and Tony Mowbray is a very good manager so we’re going to have to be at the top of our game to try and get a result. They had a very good result [on Saturday], we’ve seen the game and as I said, I’ve seen them live against Leeds and they’re a good side, they’ve got very good young players, some exciting players so we’re under no illusions it’s a tough game for us, but we’ve got absolutely nothing to lose. First and foremost, we just have to be competitive against Blackburn and make sure we try and take the game to them, possibly a little bit more than we did against Ipswich, take all the good points from that game and learn from the things we can do better from.”
Opposite Number Tony Mowbray said prior to the match:
“We won’t be making wholesale changes because Morecambe are a team of strong, professional athletes. They are coached very well (so) we’ll put out a strong team to try and get through to the next round of the competition. For us, we will be trying to beat Morecambe, will make appropriate changes and look to try and continue the momentum from the weekend to move forward. Morecambe are a team with momentum, with promotion on their CV and with a team that went to Ipswich Town, in front of over 20,000 supporters, and earned a 2-2 draw. They’ll come to Ewood in a confident mood. We have no real injuries from the weekend. Joe Rankin-Costello and Bradley Johnson are closest, but they are both not quite ready yet.”
It was a beautiful, bright summer evening in East Lancashire as the game kicked-off. The majority of the bumper crowd of away fans chose to stand for the entire 90 minutes among the seats in the Darwen Road Stand. You wondered how many of the home crowd realise that the Ronnie Clayton Stand which faces it has as much significance to the visitors as it has for themselves. Ronnie was not only Rovers’ and England’s long-term Captain back in the 1960s; he was also Morecambe’s Player-Manager once his league career came to an end. He still made playing the game look easy. Sadly, his managerial skills were not in the same league…
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All the players Took The Knee before kick-off and any jeering was drowned-out by loud applause from all sides of Ewood Park. Rovers immediately went onto the front foot and they should have taken the lead after just four minutes when – with the Morecambe defence at sixes and sevens – Ben Brereton Díaz contrived to put the ball over the bar when he was unmarked in the centre and only a few yards from goal. Not long afterwards – with the visitors looking as if they were in danger of being overrun – he was denied again by a tremendous save from Jökull Andrésson low to his left.
Morecambe looked off the pace, disorganised and weak particularly on their left flank. Nearly all the game was played in their half for at least the first half an hour and it was no surprise when Rovers took the lead after twenty minutes. After good approach play, Harry Pickering slung an inviting cross into the danger area and Tyrhys Dolan emphatically headed it home. Thirty-three minutes had been played when Brereton Díaz weaved his way through the Morecambe defence and passed the ball to John Buckley, whose shot was only just wide of the target. As the match continued to be dominated by the home team, Andrésson was called into action again after 36 minutes to brilliantly keep out another header from a Pickering cross, this time by Ryan Nyambe. There were other chances for the home team as well whilst Morecambe offered little going forward apart from a truly sublime effort by Adam Phillips which we will return to later. Having said that, there were a few positive signs for the visitors on occasions. Cole Stockton kept the home defence fully occupied throughout. Greg Leigh put in a sterling performance at left back. In flashes, Shane McLaughlin looked like he can play a bit. It has to be said, too, that – even as their team looked disjointed and then fell behind – the fans from North Lancashire’s loud vocal support of the men in the red strip never relented for even a single second.
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Robbo responded to what had been a one-sided contest so far by changing his line-up and the formation at the start of the second half. He complained after the Ipswich draw that his team should have actually gone for it when ahead instead of playing within themselves and trying to hang on to what they already had. Tonight, they were losing. But the Manager clearly reminded his troops that they had nothing to lose.” Win or bust” seems to be his mantra. Let’s hope so…
Whatever, the shaky-looking Kelvin Mellor and the ineffectual Wes McDonald were replaced by Liam Gibson and Toumani Diagouraga and the 4-4-3 they had started with was changed to three across the back with two wing backs pushed slightly further forward.
It turned-out to be a master stroke. Right from the off, the visitors dominated the play. For the first time, they started to consistently press further up the field. The Shrimps played at a much faster tempo than they had done in the first period and Blackburn never seemed to me to adapt to either the increased pace of the game or the fact that they were being put under pressure every time they got the ball. Was this complacency on their behalf? Did they underestimate Morecambe and consider the match already won? Or was it the simple fact that they were being outplayed by a totally rejuvenated team?
Nippy and skilful Left Back Leigh – who had defended so stoutly throughout the first half – was given the license to pull the Rovers’ defence this way and that as he continually marauded up the Blackburn right. Jonah Ayunga – who had made a lot of the poor service he had received during the first half – increasingly troubled the hosts as he ran with the ball; held it up; swapped positions and shifted the play into areas where the men in blue and white really didn’t want him to go. As the so far undemonstrative home crowd fell even quieter, there was a feeling of inevitability about the equaliser. Morecambe had already caused a few missed heart beats in the Rovers’ defence before Ayunga burst into the home penalty area at speed on the Morecambe left, looked-up and played a cross to strike partner Stockton to score with an emphatic finish. Wow – two games played; three goals scored by Cole. Thank goodness he didn’t allow Derek Adams to persuade him to follow the best Manager Morecambe have had so far to Bradford…
At this stage – the fifty-second minute – there was only one team going to win. Tony Mowbray tried to freshen things up with a double substitution after an hour or so. Last Saturday’s match winner Sam Gallagher was one of the men thrown into the fray. But the change made absolutely no difference. The game was decided in the eighty-fifth minute when quicksilver Leigh was caught by a clumsy and panic-stricken challenge by Dolan in the Rovers’ penalty area. Phillips almost burst the net from the spot. And that was it –1-2 to Morecambe at the end.
For me, the absolutely outstanding moment of the game arrived in the first half when – with his team losing – Adam Phillips made a phenomenal tackle in the centre circle, pushed the ball forward and – spotting goalkeeper Thomas Kaminski way off his line – belted the ball half of the length of the pitch. It looped way over the goalkeeper and missed the top left corner of the Blackburn goal by only a few inches with the man in the fluorescent yellow strip a mere spectator as he tried to recover his ground. Given the tribal hatred between Blackburn and Adam’s parent club Burnley, this would have been a special moment indeed for the player. If it had gone in – as it so nearly did – it surely must have been a contender for goal of the season so far. (And Burnley FC were not slow to celebrate their player’s achievement tonight on Twitter to rub it in either…)
It’s all too tempting to suggest that a Referee called Steve Martin must be a bit of a joke. But his performance tonight was worse than a joke – he was absolutely dreadful. He made loads of basic mistakes. As Blackburn’s frustrations grew towards the end of the game, there were handbags exchanged between the two sides. The players must take ultimate responsibility for this bit of stupidity but the man in the middle is also culpable for making a string of poor decisions and failing to punish adequately a few really bad tackles which were made during the course of the game: a better official would never have let things deteriorate to that point.
But let’s end on a far more positive note. Morecambe’s win tonight on a Championship ground against a strong team is probably the upset of the season so far.
There was nothing of a fluke about it. Nobody watching this game tonight would have thought that the team in the red strip are favourites for relegation. It was an outstanding and very well deserved victory which had only a little bit of the gloss taken off it by a clearly serious injury to Liam Gibson towards the end of the game. Just two matches played and already two men are out of the frame to add to Jonathan Obika, who was crocked before the campaign even started. Let’s hope the bad luck stops here: at this rate of attrition, Morecambe will have no players left by October….
Blackburn Rovers. 1 Thomas Kaminski; 36 Tyler Magloire (6 Jacob Davenport (Y) 64’); 26 Darragh Lenihan; 24 Hayden Carter; 2 Ryan Nyambe; 27 Lewis Travis; 21 John Buckley (Y) (14 Dan Butterworth 45’); 8 Joe Rothwell (9 Sam Gallagher 65’); 3 Harry Pickering; 22 Ben Brereton Díaz; 10 Tyrhys Dolan.
Subs Not Used: 35 Jake Garrett; 45 Jordan Eastham; 34 Dan Pike; 33 Lenni Rea Cirino.
Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 2 Kelvin Mellor (8 Toumani Diagouraga 45’); 4 Anthony O’Connor (Y); 5 Sam Lavelle (C); 3 Greg Leigh; 18 Adam Phillips (Y); 19 Shane McLaughlin; 6 Callum Jones; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 9 Cole Stockton; 7 Wes McDonald (22 Liam Gibson 45’;16 Jacob Mensa 77’).
Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 11 Josh McPake; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 25 Alfie McCalmont.
Ref: Steve Martin.
Att: 5,283 (908 from Morecambe.)
