Portsmouth’s Bishop’s Mate…
Over a thousand Portsmouth fans made the long journey to Morecambe from Hampshire to watch today’s League One fixture at the Mazuma Stadium. It’s about three hundred miles one-way from the south coast to the north west so well done to everyone concerned. The team travelled the same distance yesterday to prepare for the game and Manager Danny Cowley told the local media before he left:
“Great game for us. One that we’re really looking forward to. We had the pleasure of watching Morecambe on Tuesday night at MK Dons – (brother and Assistant Coach) Nicky and I – so that’s nice when you can watch an opponent before you play them. I think there’s a lot to like in that Morecambe team. It’s a really determined, resilient group; really gritty. Their home form has been good in recent games so we anticipate a tough game but we’re in a good place ourselves. We’re looking forward to the game.”
The Shrimps have played Pompey on ten previous occasions. They have lost half of them and won only three so far. In League One last season, the Blues beat Stephen Robinson’s team 2-0 at Fratton Park before drawing 1-1 at the Maz last April as Derek Adams took on the daunting task of saving his old club from the humiliation of an immediate return to League Two from which he had led them only a year or so earlier. What short memories some amongst our number have. We have to remember that Derek has been lumbered for all of this season by 75% of the squad which was bequeathed to him by Robbo prior to his defection North of the Border. Performances in the last week – when Morecambe have been tamely dumped out of the two major English Cup competitions by Sheffield Wednesday and the Wimbledon impersonators away from home – have been very disappointing. But their collective effort against a brilliant Derby County in their last home match still gives us hope that Derek can perform the same miracle once more this season even with players he doesn’t want and with no resources to improve the squad. If he can’t do it – who else does anyone with even one toe still in contact with reality – would be able to? (I don’t think the Prophet Mohammed; J Christ Esq. or Mr Buddha are available currently…)
King Derek’s men started the game third from the bottom of the League One table on the back of just one defeat in their last five league games. It’s not anything like as bad as the Soothsayers of Doom would like us to believe in their regular hysterical social media outbursts. The Shrimps have won one and drawn three of the remaining matches.
High-flying Pompey have exactly the same record in their last five league games, even though they arrived in fifth place in the table given a far better win ratio earlier in this season’s campaign. But Portsmouth is another big club with a huge actual and potential support which has fallen on (relatively) hard times. We aren’t…
Last Saturday, the Blues had to come from behind at Edgar Street to overcome Hereford FC of National League North 1-3 in the FA Cup. The fact that they were losing to what is now, very sadly, a genuinely small club shows in itself that they are far from invincible these days.
These were King Derek’s thoughts before the game:
“It’s another challenge, just like all the games in this league. We want to try and stay here. We understand the difficulties, but as a staff and players we know how we are going to get ourselves staying in the league next season. We’ve played against two very good sides in Sheffield Wednesday and MK Dons. We did our best to get through but we unfortunately weren’t good enough and we just have to get on with that. I know what people are spending elsewhere and it’s extremely difficult. But we’re working hard, and we’ll get there. Our aim is to remain in League One, and that hasn’t changed. Home form is key. The more wins we can get at home will give us an opportunity to stay in this league. Draws will help us too through the season, but it will be the wins against the teams around us that will be vital, and we haven’t done that well enough so far.”
As far as recent league matches are concerned, he added:
“We’ve drawn three and won one of our last five. The games we’ve had to play in that time have been very difficult, really hard games with small margins in the games. We’ve competed with the superpowers of the league. Every game we go out and try and win. We’ve lost 14 points from winning positions so far this season. With those points, we’d be in the play-offs at this moment in time.’’ After a wet and blustery week in north Lancashire, it was sunny and quite mild in Morecambe today. The Last Post was impeccably played by a female bugler and wreaths placed on the pitch by the club captains prior to the usual silence to respect the dead of two world and other wars over the years.
The hosts had the first half-chance once the game started as Ryan Cooney headed wide after four minutes. They looked lively and well-drilled against a team dressed in turquoise (Teal? Portsmouth Bay Blue? – who knows?) shirts and socks and black shorts. Portsmouth looked well organised and had a couple of nippy players in their ranks in the shape of Josh Koroma and Dane Scarlett. Both sides won several corners and the match was fairly evenly balanced throughout the first half. Referee Adam Herczeg and his Assistant on the main stand side of the ground hardly covered themselves in glory when they both missed a very obvious and pretty crude challenge on Caleb Watts off the ball as Morecambe hit on the break during the early play. Connor Ripley made his first significant save of the game after 23 minutes, when he was forced to push a curling shot from Own Dale over his bar. But the breakthrough came in the thirty-sixth minute when Adam Mayor’s good run and cross from the Shrimps’ right was struck home low by official and deserved Man of the Match Liam Shaw. Although there were few clear-cut chances, this was always a good game to watch. In injury time, though, Kieran Phillips had a decent opportunity to score but couldn’t quite sort his feet out to strike on target. Even further into stoppage time, Morecambe should have increased their lead and would have but for an outstanding save from Josh Griffiths. With an unmarked Jensen Weir bearing down on him at speed, he somehow or other managed to turn the striker’s effort over the bar.
So Morecambe returned to the Dressing Rooms in the Winning Position King Derek had highlighted before the game. The question was – could they hold onto it this time?
The initial signs were good. As the visitors tried to compress the play into the home half, the Shrimps kept breaking the press by constantly hunting down the man in possession and hitting on the break at every opportunity.
Visiting Skipper Clark Robertson was hurt just before half time and didn’t return after the break. In his absence, Watts missed with a shot after only two minutes of the re-start. He than came even nearer when – following an excellent counter-attack by the Shrimps; he headed a cross from the Morecambe right agonisingly wide of Griffiths’ right-hand post with fifty-four minutes played. But the away team were beginning to build up a head of steam at this point. They had a lot of the ball and Morecambe found it difficult to get it off them for a period before they actually equalised with 67 minutes played. It was a scruffy goal but after the Morecambe rearguard failed to clear the ball in their own penalty area, Pack’s header was cleared off the line only for Pompey’s leading scorer Colby Bishop to then sweep the ball home from close range.
As the famous Chimes constantly underscored the action, there was a brief period where the visitors looked as though they were going to steamroller their way to a win at this point in the game. But – to give them their due – Morecambe responded very positively. Substitute Dylan Connolly outstripped the entire Pompey defence on their left after 76 minutes and unleashed a shot-come-cross which Griffiths couldn’t hold but got away with. A minute later, he was off again. His cross this time found Cole Stockton in a position where he would have scored for certain last season on the Morecambe left in the box and with a clear sight of goal. But Cole missed today. Connolly then had a golden opportunity of his own after 81 minutes. One-on-one with the goalkeeper and the goal gaping, he also contrived to allow Griffiths to save a chance he should have buried with a poor effort. A minute later, the third of the trio of late substitutes – Arthur Gnahoua – also came close with a strike which went just wide. At the other end, Ripley did well to save a thunderbolt from Pack after 86 minutes. But the `goal’ wouldn’t have stood as the Ref had already blown for off-side.
All the time, Pompey looked vulnerable to the counter-attack and the antics of some of their players – shamelessly time-wasting after falling over on the pitch often a long way from the action and feigning injury- showed how grateful they would be for a point long before the end of the game. Their Manager – constantly dancing down the touch-line miles away from his technical area to coach his players as the weak Referee did nothing to stop him – didn’t help. Pompey were quite physical at times this afternoon and a general free-for-all between the two teams right at the end of the game threatened to spoil things as a spectacle.
Cole missed again with a hopeless shot from a long way out in injury time. But that was as close as anybody got to winning it.
Morecambe could – and should – have won today. They were the better team most of the time and created far better chances then did their opponents. But it wasn’t to be. At the end of proceedings, neither club was any better off as far as the League One table is concerned. But both rival MK Devils and Forest Green Vegans lost at home and Burton Albion could also only draw at the Pirelli. Encouragingly, Accrington Stanley also lost again, this time in East Lancs to Sheffield Wednesday. So thing could be a lot worse.
This is what Derek Adams had to say after the game:
“How we haven’t won by five or six is a travesty. I’ve played against Portsmouth many times in my career as a manager, and never had as many glaring opportunities as we had today. We out-defended them, we outplayed them, we outran them and the chances we created were glaring. Their goalkeeper’s made a couple of good saves, we’ve maybe not done well enough. We should’ve won by a landslide, there’s no doubt about it. We should have had them dead and buried, and if anybody says differently, they’ve not got a clue about football. I’m very proud of the players today. The players gave their all and I thought they were fantastic over the afternoon. The fans were fantastic, they kept our players going. They saw the chances we created; the way they worked; the way they ran forward. I’m proud of the supporters because they were outstanding. But over the afternoon, the disappointing thing is not being able to win the game against Portsmouth, and that is hugely frustrating.”
Morecambe: 1 Connor Ripley; 2 Donald Love (C) (Y); 6 Ryan Delaney; 15 Jensen Weir; 16 Jacob Bedeau; 17 Caleb Watts (11 Dylan Connolly (Y) 74’ ) 20 Liam Shaw (Y); 21 Ryan Cooney; 22 Anthony O’Connor; 23 Kieran Phillips (9 Cole Stockton 74’); 25 Adam Mayor (14 Arthur Gnahoua 74’).
Subs not used: 12 Adam Smith; 3 Max Melbourne; 5 Farrend Rawson; 8 Ousmane Fané.
Portsmouth: 1 Joshua Griffiths; 2 Zak Swanson (25 Jade Jay Mingi (Y) 83’); 4 Clark Robertson (C) (3 Denver Hume 45’); 6 Connor Ogilvie; 7 Marlon Pack (Y) (28 Michael Morrison 90’); 8 Ryan Tunnicliffe; 9 Colby Bishop (10 Joe Piggott 83’); 15 Owen Dale (18 Reeko Hackett-Fairchild 67’); 19 Dane Scarlett; 20 Sean Raggett (C 45-90’); 27 Josh Koroma.
Subs not used: 13 Kieron Freeman; 11 Ronan Curtiss; 16 Joe Morrell; 21 Josh Oluwayemi;.
Ref: Adam Herczeg.
Att: 4,726 (A magnificent 1,057 from Portsmouth.)
