Lincoln City took the long trip down to Plymouth Argyle this afternoon, with the latter looking to cement their place at the top of League One as they look for promotion. However, the Imps are not an easy team to beat and proved once again today that we shouldn’t be seen as an easy challenge.
Mark Kennedy made a few changes to the side that beat Cheltenham Town on Easter Friday to keep things fresh as we looked to go three unbeaten. The defence remained unchanged with Regan Poole leading the team out. There was a change in midfield, with Matty Virtue coming into the side for Max Sanders after being rested on Friday. Ted Bishop dropped out the side completely due to injury and was replaced by Mide Shodipo, who impressed from the bench against Cheltenham.
I don’t even know where to start. We were incredible, we controlled the game and we probably should have won it by more than two. Everyone was brilliant, Mide and Lasse, especially so. Right now, it’s raw emotion and I’m so proud and pleased for everyone involved. That is why we support the club because we have staff and players that give it their all and get results like this. It’s a massive credit to Mark, in his first season of management to go and school Steven Schumacher’s top of the league Argyle side is something special.
I thought from the first minute we looked the better side, Shodipo looked bright early on and forced a shot. What I thought we did really well was getting on them early. The shot I was talking about from Shodipo was from us pressing inside the first thirty seconds and although it wasn’t that close, I think it rocked Plymouth. Virtue and Ethan Erhahon also played their part, they chased every ball in the opening few minutes and battled immensely in that period and marked their authority in the centre of the park.
I think Plymouth must have had about five or ten minutes of dominance in the opening twenty minutes, but as we’ve seen for much of the season, I don’t remember Carl Rushworth having much to do except a save from Ryan Hardie, which should have been offside anyway. It’s a credit to our defence, the back-three that played today are three of the best defenders in the league in my opinion. Adam Jackson is criminally underrated by our fanbase and I’ve said a number of times that he is a great defender and while he looks rash, he is also a very good technical player. Some of his decision making today was excellent, it’s the little things. When to go in for a header, when to make a tactical foul, it’s the things we take for granted that he does that other defenders get wrong. If his contract is up at the end of the season, get that man a new deal because he is key for us going into next season.
I feel like this wouldn’t be an AllLincoln article without me praising Paudie O’Connor and whilst I feel like a broken record, he deserves every piece of praise I’ve given him. To come in to such a talented group of defenders and play this many games over the course of a season is exceptional. He will (unless he gets injured or suspended) have played over forty league games for us and bar Regan Poole, no one has done that for us in defence since Neal Eardley and Harry Toffolo if I remember and in terms of centre-halfs we’ve had in recent times, not many manage it. He is captain material and he will go and be a very successful player for this football club.
Regan Poole also deserves a mention, he is once again a major contender for player of the season, and I think he has improved on last season too. He will be playing higher next season without a doubt. As much as I would like him to stay, I think he is just too good for us. He loves defending but his technical side of the game is incredible. The way he reads the game, if we didn’t have Regan we would have conceded quite a few more goals, not because of last minute headers off the line or last ditch tackles, but the work he does to prevent the ball even getting into the box for example. I would go as far as saying, you wouldn’t find much better than Regan in this division.
After defending well and settling down into the game, we found ourselves an opening goal and what a piece of football it was. It started with some strong goalkeeping from Rushworth to claim in his area from a corner. He rolled the ball out to Lasse Sorensen, who took a touch and played a defence splitting switch of play to Danny Mandroiu. The Irishman took it down, and played a lovely ball across the box to Shodipo, who tapped in a deserved goal to give the Imps a one goal lead.
That lead should have been doubled before half-time too. We really had Plymouth rocked and we were winning everything. If we didn’t win the first ball, we won the second and we looked like we were the side fighting for promotion and the league title. I think everyone, Plymouth fans included, had thought we got our second goal through Poole. A corner in from Mandroiu was headed in by Poole, who wheeled off in celebration all before the linesman (on the side Poole celebrated on) but his flag up for offside. I don’t understand what it was for, if Mide is blocking the goalkeeper, which I don’t think he is, why is the linesman taking so long to flag and surely the referee would get the final decision on that considering he is the box and watching the action closer than what the linesman is. It can’t be offside, and even if Mide is blocking the goalkeeper, he was never getting anywhere near that header anyway. It’s simply bizzare and I know it has no effect because we won, but if Plymouth had equalised, a poor decision from an official could have handed a team promotion. Not just today, it’s been poor for seasons, I understand It is a hard job but we need to be looking at the standard of officiating in this country.
I don’t want that to overshadow the win, but I think it is something that needs looking at. We have the best standard of football in the world but our officials aren’t in the same league as other countries in Europe. One thing that was certain though, was that City held the lead at half-time and even without that second goal, we were still by far the better side and if we kept up our first half performance into the second, then I had some degree of confidence that we might get something.
One thing you can expect from a team fighting for promotion and one that has only lost one home game all season is that they are going to come at you, especially at the start of the second half when they are losing by a goal. The only way we could combat that was by getting a goal of our own to make it two and give them a mountain to climb, we did just that and added a second just two minutes into the second half.
The right-wing back got the praise all afternoon and I’ll get onto him later but I thought Harry Boyes had another excellent game, and is giving Mark something to think about now Sean Roughan is back fit again. He had a role to play in the second goal too with some patient play on the edge of the area, which saw him find Ben House, who turned onto his right foot far too easily to fire low into the net right in front of over three hundred travelling Imps’ fans. I also want to give Erhahon some praise in this goal, he played a great ball wide to Boyes. Ethan’s choice of pass is excellent and while other players may have chosen the easier pass wide or back to the goalkeeper, he took the risk and it paid off.
That is House’s twelfth goal of the season, a really impressive feat for the striker. We’ve spoke about needing a ‘twenty goal a season striker’ so many times but Ben has done the job for us this season. Twelve non-penalty goals at this level is impressive, especially for a player that was playing National League football eighteen months ago. If Ben can carry on to play at this level, he will make it as a top footballer.
I’ve waited nearly one and a half thousand words to talk about Lasse Sorensen and I don’t think anyone expected him to play a game like this for City at right-wing back when TJ Eyoma limped off against MK Dons nearly a month ago. Lasse is such a likeable guy, he does so much off the pitch for the community and on the pitch he always put 110% effort in and even if things aren’t going his way, you see that level of effort from him. He’s selfless and today we saw the best version of Lasse we’ve seen in an Imps shirt. He was excellent all game, he just kept running and was an outlet for us every time on the right hand side. He was man of the match in probably the best performance of the season, which is so impressive considering he was out of his usual position and up against a top winger in Mickel Miller. To put his defensive performance in perspective, the Plymouth man was pulled off in the fifty-third minute. Pretty impressive stuff from Lasse and if he carries on like this, he might have found a new position.
Against Sheffield Wednesday, we dug deep and really defended for our lives but we didn’t have to do that today. We were impressive defensively but never for a moment I felt like we were under threat from Plymouth, if anything I felt we were more dangerous when Plymouth were attacking due to the fluidity of our counter attacks. Shodipo, in particular, was great again and was close behind Lasse for MOTM, I just really hope that Jez George is sorting out his permanent contract as I type this. I also want to give Luke Plange some credit for his performance today, he looked really good off the bench and although he didn’t get his goal that he probably deserved, he showed why he signed him. I do feel a bit sorry for him because we’ve signed a number nine and put him on for the last twenty minutes most games in a team that is normally defending a lead or a draw once he is brought on. He will probably go on and be a bit like Liam Cullen, leave in the summer and go and score goals for someone else. If he does, I will be more than happy for the kid, the service he gets is not his fault.
The win rounds off a great Easter Weekend for us, we have all but secured League One status for next season and I believe (if my maths is correct), we could mathematically confirm it on Saturday with a win against Port Vale and if Accrington lose at home to Fleetwood. I hope everyone has a great week and hopefully we can make it three wins on the bounce next Saturday. Up the Imps.