Playing to Strengths

ARGYLE have picked two vital Sky Bet League One points doing what they do best.

A Saturday-Tuesday double header of leaders Shrewsbury Town and third-tier big shots Blackburn Rovers threatened to be a real struggle for rock-bottom Argyle, but two hard-working performances – and a couple of striking goals by Graham Carey – have earned two credible 1-1 draws.

Carey’s wonderstrikes at home to Salop and at Ewood Park were each equalised, but both performances saw Argyle soak up pressure they knew would come, then show promise at the other end.

Points are valuable to Argyle, for sure, but in context this haul of two from six is actually very good.

“I think it is two very good points against two very good sides,” said manager Derek Adams.

“We defended well tonight; we had to because Blackburn are under pressure to get out of this league. We are trying to gain more points to move up the league. We did that against Shrewsbury and Blackburn; Shrewsbury have beaten Bristol Rovers 4-0 tonight, and we have come to Ewood Park and taken a point.

“With the amount of crosses that they put in the box and diagonal balls you think something might fall to them. But we have a disciplined team; their performance defensively is always very good.

“I thought that in the last couple of minutes of the game we could have scored. If we had just passed the ball in the right moment it could have been 2-1.

“That’s the nature of football .You can defend, soak up pressure and play on the counter attack; that’s something we are very good at.

“Our travelling support has been outstanding this season. We’ve come away from home and they’ve backed us, as they have at home. After the final whistle on Saturday we got a standing ovation from the supporters because they can see the hard effort the players are putting in. Exactly the same again tonight.

“We’ve got a group of players that are working hard, we’ve got two points in two games, and we’ll start to move ourselves up the league.

“That’s what we are very good at. We are good at stopping teams playing, allowing them to have the ball and picking them off. We could have done that a number of times tonight.

“There’s no right way of playing football. There’s just maybe the right way for your team.”