No Team is Settled

THE value of a talented squad was in evidence at the Energy County Ground, where Argyle used 19 players across two games in four days against Swindon Town to make progress in the Leasing.com Trophy and earn a valuable Sky Bet League Two point.

The 19 ranged in experience from seasoned captain Gary Sawyer to second-year scholar Rubin Wilson, and manager Ryan Lowe said: “That’s what you have a squad for.

“We’d like to have a settled 11 players each week, most weeks, but you can’t nowadays because the games come thick and fast so that doesn’t happen – I don’t think there would be one team in the country that’s got a settled team.

“You only have to look at Liverpool – they are swapping and changing their midfielders every other week. We’re the same; we’ll keep doing it.”

Any hopes that Ryan might have harboured about fielding the same 11 in successive league games for Carlisle United’s upcoming visit to Home Park were dashed when midfielder Danny Mayor was cautioned in the 1-1 draw at Swindon.

Ryan said: “We’ve got a couple of injuries; we don’t want that but, when you do find a settled squad, something always happens in football.

“So, even if we did have a settled 11 for the past three or four weeks, I guarantee someone’s going to get a little niggle or an injury, or loss or form, or a yellow card like Danny’s got and misses the game.

“I’m not too worried about it; that’s what we’ve got a squad for.”

Wilson was on the substitutes’ bench in the Sky Bet League Two game after having made his debut in the previous Tuesday’s Leasing.com Trophy match against the same opposition at the same venue.

The young forward has jumped ahead of some more senior colleagues in the first-team pecking order, including Klaidi Lolos, of whom Ryan said “He needs to do better.

“There have been times when he’s been fantastic and times when he hasn’t. Young Rubin’s in form for the youth team at the moment, so he warrants his place on the bench,

“[Alex] Fletcher is another one. They need to perform and they need to show me that they are good enough. At this moment in time, they are not showing me that.

“The ones that are showing me that are Jude Boyd and Rubin Wilson and Pecky [Mike Peck]. Hence, they travel with us.

“If you don’t show me, you don’t travel.”