Buckle up folks, this one could be quite a bumpy ride. With a squad that’s thinner than Woking FC’s Guide To Winning Trophies and a back line that seems to have more holes in it than Swiss cheese, it’s not the ideal time to call in on league leaders Plymouth Argyle. Yep, the Pilgrims are flying high, while we can’t keep any opposition out… so what could *possibly* go wrong this week?
Plymouth Argyle v Stevenage? Lead On…
If we’re not giving the Daggers a leg up to get over the wall between us and them at the wrong end of the League Two table, we’re doling out points to a Mansfield side that hadn’t won since November. Even we’ve won since November! So, how do you rate our chances of getting out from Home Park without the need to go into hiding on Saturday evening? Slim-to-none? Yeah, us too.
For what it’s worth, our record in our three meetings with Argyle would have been flawless had it not been for the referee playing on for as long as it took ’em to equalise at their gaff last season. And that record also means that Plymouth are one of the only six sides to have been conquered by Teddy’s Boys this term. If you were after something to cling onto in blind hope, that might do it.
While we remember, Keith Keane. On loan. Not fit. Either Cambridge are telling porkies about his fitness or we’ve just got a man in on a month’s loan who, well, might not be back to full fitness for a month. We guess we’ll find out soon enough if he makes the team sheet this weekend. Or next. Or the one after that…
Anyway, Plymouth come into this game off the back of a home defeat to Northampton Town; the Cobblers joining them level on points up at the summit. They’ve actually lost nearly as many on their own patch as we have this term (four), though their defence has been a mean one across the board; handy for us, with our lack of recognised strikers and general inability to the chances we do create.
With 61 goals either for and against in their 26 games before this weekend, Plymouth are the second worst team in the league for that sort of thing – not that we should really be pinning our hopes on that stat too much. Use this Bonus code for Ladbrokes 2016 and you can jump on a home win at 17/20, while Coral will give you evens on the hosts to bag at least two against our defence.
For us, though, the current state of affairs makes it tough to read too much into things if we do – as many probably expect – lose at Plymouth. After all, we’re hardly able to put our best foot forward right now with the players we have at our disposal. Instead, it’ll games against Barnet and York that paint a clearer picture of our predicament as we wrap up January over the next two weeks.
Not that it’ll make it any easier when we’re standing still in the league table this weekend.
BoroGuide’s Plymouth Argyle club profile – reassuringly free