All Points Bulletin

Argyle lie second in Sky Bet League Two, with 11 games remaining, and the importance of each fixture will continue to rise. Attaining enough points to remain above the crucial dotted line is all the boss is concerned with right now. 

“Performance is not important to me,” said Derek. “Points are; wins are. Between now and the end of the season if we’re able to grind out wins, then that is the main focus. A good performance comes with winning games. That creates confidence and that is the same throughout the league.

“We’ve seen already this season that shock results happen. They’re not shock results as such but they are in terms of where teams are in the table. Nothing does shock you because anybody can beat anybody on their given day.”

In order to reverse a run of form that has seen Argyle win just one of the last six games, Derek is not averse to making changes. Those changes will likely not, though, be to the formation he is comfortable with. 

There have been calls from some quarters that Derek should send out a team with two recognised strikers – indeed, this tactic has been utilised during games on occasions – but the manager is reluctant to go with a plan that has never truly clicked for his side. 

“We’ve played two up front a number of times this season and it’s not worked,” said Derek. That’s the problem. It hasn’t worked. 

“We’ve played in a style many times this season that has worked. We’ve won over 50% of our league games and it’s proven to be the right way because when we have gone with two up front – We haven’t scored.

“We didn’t create enough opportunities in the second half (against Blackpool). We went two up front and became direct and it didn’t help us.

“We have to change our style of play when we go away from home and we have to change our style at home from an away performance. We’ve been too open in some games that our supporters feel we should win and we need to change that from now until the end of the season.”