Sorry Shrews Lose Again…
Today, Shrewsbury Town were the first visitors to the Mazuma Stadium this season. Before we go any further, I would like to take my hat off to their Manager Steve Cotterill, who has described his personal battle against Covid-19 and the complications of it which almost killed him here:
I have to say that his lack of any obvious self-pity and his appreciation of the way other people – particularly the NHS – fought to save him puts things like mere football matches into their true perspective. I wish this man all the luck in the world – except today on the football field.
So let’s continue the thread in my latest posting of looking back at Morecambe’s last game.
Blackburn Rovers Manager Tony Mowbray is a man for whom – for what it’s worth – I also have tremendous respect given the way he has coped with tragedy in his personal life that would have probably floored most of the rest of us. Ashen-faced Tony said this after his Championship side had been well and truly beaten by a change of personnel and tactics in the second half at Ewood Park last Tuesday:
“They matched us up in the end and the substitutions were to revert to a 4-3-3 and play in the spaces between them. I’m not sure it made them the better side but it allowed them to stop us playing and disrupt our fluency. We always deal with the result, I wouldn’t say they were the better side but they got the result so full credit to them.
I actually WOULD say that Morecambe were the better side by a country mile in the second half – but my job doesn’t depend on it.
So let’s get back to matters concerning today’s match…
The Shrews arrived by the sea in North Lancashire today in the relegation positions in League One: 23rd in the nascent table. This was after they lost their opening league fixture at home to Burton last Saturday by the only goal of the game. In mid-week, however, they came from 0-2 down against Lincoln City to draw and then win their League Cup tie on penalties.
The two clubs have met before on fourteen occasions in various competitions. Shrewsbury have won seven of these to Morecambe’s four. This has been a sort-of win/lose sandwich: the Shrimps contrived to lose all of their first five meetings and also the last two.
They went into today’s game, though, in a very positive frame of mind. With a little more ambition – according to Manager Steven Robinson – and certainly better concentration at the end, the Shrimps could (and probably should) have won their opening fixture at highly-fancied Ipswich last Saturday. Instead, they drew 2-2. Against Blackburn last Tuesday, they rode their luck in the first half at Ewood Park only to put on a truly masterful display in the second period to come from behind to deservedly dump their lofty Championship opponents out of the League Cup to set up a home tie against Preston North End in the next round. Before today’s game, Robbo said:
“Our home games are massive, we have to make it a hard place to come to, and we also have to play with a little bit of style and enjoy our football, that’s what the fans want, to be entertained, so hopefully we can do that. A point at Ipswich was brilliant, it should’ve been three. We have to follow that up with a performance and the result usually follows the performance and if we can get anywhere near the second half at Blackburn, then we’ll do okay on Saturday. You see the buzz around the town, we took 1,000 fans to Blackburn and 700 to Ipswich so the momentum is growing in the town, there’s a real feel-good factor about the place and we have to continue that.”
For the Shrews, Assistant Manager Aaron Wilbraham said this:
“Morecambe have already started off with a couple of decent results but this will be their first home game. They will be up for it, the crowd will be up for it so we need to go there and start on the front foot. We need to be ready because they will come at us. Preparing for them is a slight unknown seeing as they’ve just come into the league so we have to be on our guard against them. We need to focus on ourselves more than anything else. They’ve had some positive results in the first couple of games so we know it will be tough.”
It has been sunny in North Lancashire for the last couple of days. But as morning gave way to the afternoon today, the sky started to cloud over and a few spits of rain were beginning to fall by three o’clock. The game kicked-off in front of a bumper crowd, all eager to watch the Shrimps’ first ever home game in League One. And they were not disappointed. The men in the red strip played confidently and assertively right from the start, moving the ball quickly on the deck and always trying to probe their way forward rather than hoof it up the field and pile after it. Arthur Gnahoua set-up Ryan Cooney for a shot which missed after a couple of minutes and the home side were probably marginally on top in the opening stages. Having said that though, Salop weren’t here just to make up the numbers. Seven minutes had been played when Josh Vela tried his luck with a poor shot which went high and wide of the goal. Then, after almost quarter of an hour, Aaron Pierre headed wide from a corner kick when he might have at least hit the target. Shortly after this – in the eighteenth minute – Greg Leigh also tried a hopeful shot from some way out for the home team. He too also missed by quite a margin.
But the first blow which counted was struck when the imperious Toumani Diagouraga played the ball out to Adam Phillips on the Morecambe right with just over half an hour on the clock. I thought the chance had gone begging when Nathaneal Ogbeta had a rush of blood to the head and clearly brought him down with a really crude challenge in the penalty area. Adam picked himself up, dusted himself down and coolly slipped the ball past Marko Marosi in the away goal to put Morecambe one goal to the good. Well done Adam to score a second very assured penalty in just a few days. But Hats Off to Toums as well; I thought that – with the occasional clever feint and constantly excellent use of the ball – he was absolutely outstanding again today. I also thought that the Shrimps continued to shade it until half time. Gnahoua drew a routine save from Marosi after almost forty minutes but the game seemed to be heading towards a narrow deficit for the visitors until just before the break. Then, the Shrews conceded a corner; Phillips took it and Cole Stockton was in the right place at the right time to force the ball over the line. That’s four goal in three games for the much-improved centre forward in eight days. His latest one made it two goals to the good half way through the match – and I thought Morecambe were good value for the lead.
Steve Cotterill tried to shake things up for Town in the second half by introducing big centre forward Sam Cosgrove – signed this week on-loan from Birmingham City from the off. His sole contribution to the game was to square-up to his much smaller Opposite Number Cole Stockton literally right at the end of the game. He’s certainly big enough to be a Rugby player – but he doesn’t have to behave like one. Youngster Tom Bloxham – who scored the winning penalty against the Imps last Tuesday – was also sent on for the last few minutes. He, too failed to have any impact. The second half was quite intriguing to watch although there were few chances for either side and the play was sometimes disrupted by a very erratic performance by Referee Declan Bourne, who got a lot of things wrong today. The Shrews had periods of possession but did little with the ball and looked both short of ideas and – worryingly for them – any real threat. At the end of the game, Jökull Andrésson in the home goal had been limited to just having crosses to deal with until he made a good stop from a close-range header from Matthew Pennington in injury time at the end of the match. The Shrimps always looked like they could find a way through the visitors’ rearguard and Josh McPake was instrumental in a lot of this: his was also a tremendous performance today and the work rate of the young man was phenomenal. Marosi was the busier of the two goalkeepers throughout the game and he did well to keep out efforts from Cole The Goal and impressive substitute Wes McDonald during the second half. But all-in-all, this was quite a comfortable win for the Shrimps which saw them go up to fifth in the table. Winless Shrewsbury, on the other hand, returned to Shropshire rock bottom of the table and – very alarmingly from their point of view – no goals scored either..
Morecambe: 20 Jökull Andrésson; 3 Greg Leigh; 4 Anthony O’Connor; 5 Sam Lavelle (C); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton; 11 Josh McPake (7 Wes McDonald 76’); 18 Adam Phillips (25 Alfie McCalmont 62’); 19 Shane McLaughlin (Y) (31 Scott Wootten 90’); 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 21 Ryan Cooney (Y).
Subs Not Used: 1 Kyle Letheren; 2 Kelvin Mellor; 6 Callum Jones;; 27 Shayon Harrison.
Shrewsbury Town: 1 Marko Marosi; 5 Matthew Pennington; 6 Aaron Pierre (Y); 17 Elliott Bennett (C) (18 Tom Bloxham 81’); 16 David Davis (Y); 10 Josh Vela; 3 Luke Leahy; 23 George Nurse; 11 Daniel Udoh; 15 Rekeil Pyke; 14 Nathaneal Ogbeta (9 Sam Cosgrove 45’).
Substitutes not used: 13 Harry Burgoyne; 19 Charlie Caton; 21 Gregory; 22 Joshua Daniels.
Ref: Declan Bourne.
Att: 3772 (471 from Shrewsbury.)
