In Position

Argyle head into the season’s home stretch – and an Easter double-header at Morecambe, on Good Friday, and home to York, on Bank Holiday Monday – trailing third-placed Bristol Rovers only on goal-difference.

“We are in a fantastic position,” said the Pilgrims’ boss. “At the start of the season, any Plymouth Argyle fan would have taken the position we are in with nine games to go. 

“We are still in touching distance of second place, which is great at this stage of the season. We just need to keep on going.”

“The reason that people get disappointed is because of how well we have done. We have over achieved; the standard in this league is very tough. We will continue to work hard and it’s about achieving our goals – our goal is trying to get through into the next league.”

Derek also takes great heart that, although Argyle go into Friday’s match on the Fylde coast having tasted back-to-back defeats for the first time this season, there is nothing amiss that a couple of goals would not instantly fix.

“Performance-wise, we have done really well,” he said. “We have deserved to win: last week, against Luton, we had nearly 60% possession and more opportunities and more attacks then them. We just needed to get that goal, then we are going to get the win.

“It’s just the nature of the business in this moment of time. There is not too much wrong with our performances. We just need to put the ball in the back of net and then we will go into another good run.

“We haven’t taken our opportunities when they have come along in the game. We have been in very good positions and maybe chosen the wrong ball or the wrong pass. We have had opportunities to score; we just haven’t taken them.”