Orient fail – on the Fylde Coast apparently…
Morecambe were looking for their fifth win in a row in all competitions at the Mazuma Stadium when they started a game against Leyton Orient at half-past six tonight. Assuming, of course, that the visitors actually turned-up in the first place. According to their own website, they seemed to be headed for somewhere else entirely: Blackpool or Fleetwood, perhaps. Orient’s official Match Preview had announced earlier: “In their most recent fixture, Morecambe welcomed Harrogate Town to the Fylde coast.”
App Norf – it’s all the same, innit? (And before anyone writes in to complain – I used to live in Leyton – or Bakers Arms to be precise. And if a place was north of Watford, it might as well have been in Australia as far as most Londoners I knew were aware…)
Anyway… The team from East London would arrive on the back of a tremendous 2-1 victory over League Two leaders Newport County at Brisbane Road on Saturday. This win – witnessed by almost two thousand fans live in the stadium – took them to the lowest of the Play-Off positions: seventh place in the Division. In their last five league matches, Leyton have won four games and lost just one. Manager Ross Embleton has thus had a galvanising effect on a club with a troubled recent history, including a spell in the National League until the season before last. In previous meetings with Morecambe, Orient have won three and lost two, the most recent one being last season as club legends Kevin Ellison and Barry Roche took over the Shrimps’ team before the arrival of Derek Adams.
The `O’s’ Manager Embleton summed-up his team’s task like this before tonight’s game:
“They’ve had a good start to the season. It was tough for them last year. From my understanding of what Derek is about – I haven’t met him personally before so I am looking forward to that – he gets his teams well- organised and hard working. We know they played Newport not so long ago and the Newport staff said to me that Morecambe deserved to get something out of that game. We know we’re going up against a team that will make it tough for us. But we don’t fear anybody; we want to make the game about Leyton Orient; we want to make the game about us and what we are good at and then we feel as though when we do that, we have every chance of beating anybody.”
Morecambe, meanwhile, started tonight’s game on the back of two wins and two defeats in their last five league games. Derek Adams chose the same line-up which could and should have won more convincingly against Harrogate last Saturday than by the only goal of the game. Orient would probably not be quite so forgiving tonight and the Shrimps would have to be more clinical if they wanted to hold onto or even improve their pre-match standing in League Two: tenth.
It was windy but dry by the North Lancashire Irish Sea coast following a beautiful albeit Wintry sunlit day in the resort today. Right from the start, the team in the black strip and red socks dictated both the pace and the direction of the game. They seemed to be more fluid in their formation right from the off. The impressive Connor Wilkinson, playing in his short socks with number 9 on his back – was quicksilver. He was on the wing one moment; in the centre a minute or two later; defending next time you saw him. He could carry the ball really well for a big man and you could see that this skilful individual was going to be a handful the entire evening. The whole team tried – and usually succeeded – in playing the game in the right way. They played-out from the back; they kept the ball on the deck; they used the width of the pitch: this was a really good side.
Morecambe looked pedestrian and rigid in comparison at least for the first half an hour. They also indulged in what, for me, is a really bad tactic: constantly standing-off and trying to play on the break. Against a team like Newcastle in the past and a side like tonight’s opponents, this is really tempting fate. After two minutes, Harry Davis did well to block a shot from the competitive Lee Angol. After four, Carlos Mendes-Gomes carelessly gave the ball away, Orient pounced and their resulting effort was diverted for a corner kick. A minute later, a marauding Wilkinson’s wild shot went way to the right of Mark Halstead’ goal from his point of view. Then he got in on goal on the right side of the penalty area only for Ryan Cooney to dispossess him with two fantastic tackles after almost a quarter an hour. Seconds later, a speculative shot from distance by Craig Clay sailed over the home team’s bar. But the break-through which the visitors’ slicker play deserved arrived after seventeen minutes. Hector Kyprianou sprayed a pass from the centre of the field to Wilkinson on the right who in turn picked-out an unmarked Danny Johnson in the centre of the home penalty area. He simply slammed the ball past Mark Halstead who had no chance of stopping it. The game carried on in this vein – Orient pinging the ball around as the Shrimps more or less ran about like headless chickens – until about half an hour of the half.
The hosts hadn’t been entirely on the back foot during this time. When they managed to actually get control of the ball, Cole Stockton could have had a chance after just three minutes but was far too slow to react on the edge of the Leyton penalty area. The visiting defence also had problems clearing their lines with eight minutes on the clock as Kelvin Mellor attacked down the left into the heart of their rearguard. Then John O’Sullivan brilliantly slipped his marker two minutes later and slotted a low ball right across the opposition penalty area: nobody was there to benefit for Morecambe. Half an hour had been played when Referee Sebastian Stockbridge let a decent claim for handball by a black-clad defender in his own penalty area go. Thirty-two minutes saw Cole have another shot blocked: the ball fell to Carlos whose first-time strike from the left went for a throw-in on the right. The same player put the ball over the bar from a corner kick a minute later. By this time, though, the home team were beginning to apply concerted pressure to the visitors and for the first time, they looked neither so assured on the ball or as well organised at the back as they had been earlier on. Further up the field, Angol committed a succession of bad fouls and was lucky to go in at half time with just a Yellow Card to his name. Thirty-eight minutes had been played when a long cross from the Shrimps’ left was brilliantly chested-down by Sully to Stockton, whose instant strike was blocked. A minute later, Carlos found Aaron Wildig with a superb pass into the middle but the latter’s attempted pass to Cole in the centre of goal was just behind him. The big centre forward then just missed with a low shot right at the death only to turn and shoot in his trademark style in injury time. This time, Lawrence Vigouroux (a giant of a man with a big beard and Afro whose huge presence was accentuated by the shocking pink strip he wore from head to foot tonight) made an excellent save. So the half ended with Orient’s easy style a fading memory and the home team very much in the ascendency.
The second period continued in this manner. With no changes to their line-up, the Shrimps continued to dominate the play and ask all the questions. In the very first minute, Sully again excelled on the Morecambe right and sent over a peach of a cross which the huge visiting goalkeeper did well to catch in a threatening position. The next chance fell to the visitors after forty-nine minutes, however. From a central (ish) position, Wilkinson took a tremendous free-kick which crashed against the angle of post and bar to Halstead’s left as he was a helpless onlooker. But the ball was spending most of its time at the other end of the pitch. Adam Phillips struck it into the wall from a free kick in a promising position after 51 minutes. Then Stockton forced a good save from the away goalkeeper with a powerful header from a right-wing cross with fifty-three minutes gone. Almost immediately, a central free-kick to the home team after a foul on Carlos was cleared with a great deal of difficulty by an obviously rattled Orient defence. From the resulting corner, Vigouroux made a tremendous stop high to his right but the ball bounced back into play and as pinball ensued on his goal-line, Skipper Sam Lavelle managed to boot the ball high into the net to deservedly equalise for the Shrimps.
To their credit, Orient tried to pick up the pace again and attempted to regain the initiative. But they had no answer to Morecambe’s constantly gathering momentum. There was another crude foul on Carlos after 69 minutes. From the free kick, Phillips took a pot at goal and only just missed. Three minutes later, though, Adam was on the ball again. He picked-out Mendes-Gomes with one of his special passes; Carlos controlled the ball and slammed it home in one brilliant movement and it was two-one to the Shrimps. From then on, the game was a bit more even with both sides having the occasional half-chance. But, try as they might, the visitors were not able to get back into the match and finally lost by the odd goal in three.
This was the best performance I have seen from the Shrimps so far this season. The way they stuck at it and chipped away at Orient’s initial supremacy was a tribute to them and Derek Adams’ stewardship of the team. Orient are a good side with some outstanding players and you could see why they managed to beat mighty Newport on their showing tonight. But at the end of the day – ok, evening – Morecambe were too good for them. The win meant that the Shrimps leap-frogged their opponents into eighth position. Orient were tenth – but with other League Two matches still not ended, these may not be the final positions at the end of the night.
A final thought. According to HM Government (https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/) six people tested positive for Coronavirus in the seven days leading to 7th December 2020 in the area covered by LA4 4TB: the Mazuma Stadium’s postcode. That equates to an infection rate of 89.3 people per 100,000 residents.
Brisbane Road’s postcode in Leyton is EN10 5NF. According to the same website during the same period, 51 unfortunates tested positive for the viral infection in that area. This is the equivalent to an Official Infection Rate of a staggering 493.8 people per 100,000 residents, which by my calculation is well over five times higher.
Orient’s match against Newport County was watched by 1734 spectators last Saturday. Here in Lancashire, Morecambe’s game against Harrogate at the same time was witnessed by the exact number of people who attended the Mazuma Stadium tonight:
None. Zero. Nada.
So here’s my question to Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his Health Secretary Matt Hancock: where is the logic and the science behind this? For the life of me, I can’t see any. They may say that swingeing new measures are going to be introduced at midnight to reduce places like Leyton to the situation we have endured here for the last few weeks. But the rise in the `R’ rate in the capital has been as steady over the last little while as has its reduction in the area where we live.
I know it’s easy to snipe from the sidelines as the world sees a pandemic sweep across it and all governments struggle to control it. But we in Britain have the highest rate of spread of the virus of any country on the planet according to our government’s own figures. Our fellow-citizens (sorry: subjects: we aren’t actually citizens in this country after all, are we?) are such pariahs in some foreign states (the UAE for instance) that they have to wear identity bracelets in public. The `Test & Trace’ system Mr Johnson promised us would be the best in the world the best part of nine months ago remains a total shambles. Looking just at the government’s policy towards sporting events in isolation (an unfortunate term to use in current circumstances, I admit), I’m afraid that the words `horse’; `stable door’ and `bolted’ immediately spring to mind…
Morecambe: 12 Mark Halstead; 2 Kelvin Mellor; 5 Sam Lavelle (C) (Y); 6 Harry Davis (Y); 24 Yann Songo’o (Y); 10 Aaron Wildig; 11 Carlos Mendes-Gomes; 16 John O’Sullivan (14 Alex Kenyon 90’); 20 Adam Phillips 21 Ryan Cooney; 9 Cole Stockton (17 A-Jay Leitch-Smith (Y) 80’).
Subs not used: 1 Jake Turner; 19 Liam McAlinden; 4 Nathaniel Knight-Percival; 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 3 Stephen Hendrie.
Leyton Orient: 22 Lawrence Vigouroux (Y); 2 Sam Ling; 4 Ousseynou Cissé (11 James Dayton 82’); 6 Josh Coulson (C); 5 Dan Happe; 8 Craig Clay (Y) (17 Louis Dennis 77’); 9 Connor Wilkinson; 39 Danny Johnson; 16 James Brophy; 19 Lee Angol (Y) (20 Ruel Sotiriou (Y) 66’); 26 Hector Kyprianou (7 Jobi McAnuff 66’).
Subs not used: 1 Sam Sargeant; 18 Tunji Akinola; 44 JoshWright.
Ref: Sebastian Stockbridge.
