Not Counting Chickens

While the Green Army breathed a collective sigh of relief after goals from Jake Jervis and Nauris Bulvitis secured three points following earlier defeats by Luton and Carlisle, the Argyle manager maintained his usual measured approach.

“It’s always nice to come away from home and win a match, and tonight was no different,” he said. 

“We are obviously delighted to come here, this famous football club, and to win for the second season in a row.

“Our passing was a lot crisper tonight; our runs forward from midfield caused trouble; and, when you come away from home, you have got to defend well in the latter stages of the game, and we did that.

“When you are way from home, the opposition is always going to have a lot of the ball, and they did that. They got the ball wide and put the ball into the box. We dealt well with the high balls. 

“Luke McCormick made one fantastic save towards the end; other than that, he hasn’t had much to do.

“You always want to get going in the league campaign. We had a magnificent time last season and the start of this season is probably not that much different from last season, when we lost our second game; we lost in the League Cup; and we won our first [away] game of the season. So it’s not too dissimilar.”

After three games without a goal, the Pilgrims were on the scoresheet after 14 minutes when Gary Miller got forward to set up Jake.

Derek said: “To start with, I think it was a decent passing movement and then Jake made a very good turn and he hit [the ball] very early into the bottom corner from about 24 yards. It was a fantastic strike and it’s got him off the mark.

“The second goal came from a great corner by [Connor] Smith and a good header from Bulvitis. It was Connor’s first 90 minutes for I don’t know how long. We were trying to get him off, but we just couldn’t get him off and his being able to last that long really helped us.”

Argyle now return to base after travelling 1,800 miles in a week to prepare for the visit of Mansfield to Home Park on Saturday.

 

“Three games in eight days and the distances we have to travel has been very difficult for us,” said Derek. “We have spent a lot of time on the road and the players are rightly tired tonight, mentally tired, as well as physically.”