All or Nothing

ARGYLE manager John Sheridan believes his aggressive substitutions played a part in the Pilgrims’ 4-0 home Sky Bet League 2 defeat by York City.

John found himself in the unenviable position in the second half of choosing whether to cut his team’s losses – 2-0 down and having had centre-back Neal Trotman sent off – and accept defeat, or go all-out and attempt an unlikely comeback.

“At 2-0 down with ten men, we’re still in the game, so what should we do?” he said “Do I put us in a position to chase the game or accept that it’s 2-0 and try and keep it to that?

“I made some substitutions – whether they were the right ones, I don’t know. I thought Nathan [Thomas] and Durrell [Berry] would give us legs and energy, but I don’t think it worked out too well. Maybe I should have gone with players with more game know-how.

“I’ve made substitutions before and they’ve worked out for me, but today I don’t think they did.”

Eventually, Argyle conceded two more after a “ragged” final ten minutes, but you would be hard pressed to find someone willing to criticize John for trying to get something out of the game.

“Whenever I’ve had a man sent off, I’ve always thought we can get something out of the game, and it’s worked for us a few times,” said John, who will now prepare for next Saturday’s visit to Dagenham & Redbridge.

“But I’ll have to hold my hands up – we got well beaten. Sometimes it works, and it didn’t work today.”
 
“We’ll have to work hard to pick the right team to play well against Dagenham. We’ll have to hit the ground running, looking to forget about today and get a good result there.”