Plymouth kick off home double header

10/01/2024 10:10 AM

Having drawn at Oxford last Saturday, it's back home for a double header this week with Preston here on Saturday and ahead of that comes tonight's home game against Plymouth.

It's a while since we last played Plymouth. Apart from a League Cup tie in 2012, it is back to the 2008/09 promotion season under Owen Coyle with our last league game against them coming at Home Park towards the end of the season.

We go into the game on an unbeaten run of four games which have seen us draw against Blackburn and Oxford with wins at Leeds and at home against Portsmouth sandwiched between them. At times it's not been pretty to watch with only four goals scored, but we've only conceded two.

Had we been able to get a winner at Oxford, we would now sit proudly at the top of the Championship so the start has been good enough, more so given the disruption during the early games. We are also playing without a number of players. Last Saturday both Joe Worrall and Zian Flemming were added to the casualty list to add to the long term injury victims. It's pretty obvious that we can't cope with too many more injuries.

Head coach Scott Parker outlined it will be a very different game to the previous home games this season with Plymouth, unlike the other three, wanting more possession of the ball. "It's a tough a game for sure," he said. "I watched the game on Friday night (against Luton) and they look a good side that are progressing well.

"We've got two home games now though back-to-back so we're looking forward to them. We understand the challenges we face on Tuesday night. They're a passing team that want to stretch you with the ball. They're a possession team with a lot of movement, so they're going to come and try and dominate the game in terms of how they play and we need to be fully prepared for that."

Parker said after the Oxford game that Worrall had suffered an impact injury which he hoped wouldn't keep him out long but he said Flemming could be fit this week after struggling with a knock.

With no update on Connor Roberts, it's likely that we will go without both again tonight so the team is likely to be very similar to the one that took on Oxford which was: James Trafford,  Bashir Humphreys, CJ Egan-Riley, Maxime Estève, Lucas Pires, Josh Cullen, Josh Brownhill, Luca Koleosho, Hannibal, Jeremy Sarmiento, Lyle Foster. Subs: Václav Hladký, John Egan, Owen Dodgson, Han-Noah Massengo, Josh Laurent, Jaidon Anthony, Enock Agyei, Andréas Hountondji, Jay Rodriguez.

While we've flitted between the Premier League and the Championship since our last league meeting, Plymouth dropped into League One in 2010 and a year later into League Two. They weren't too far from three relegations in three seasons but survived in League Two in 2012, ending the season just two points ahead of relegated Hereford. One year on and they were even closer to non-league football, ending the season just one point above the drop zone.

They finally won automatic promotion in 2016/17 having reached the play-offs in the previous two seasons and then returned to the Championship in 2023. The second of those promotions was with manager Steven Schumacher but he left for Stoke part way through last season which ended with them surviving on the final day of the season with a win against Hull.

In came Wayne Rooney, who two years earlier had been on our short list to replace Sean Dyche. It started with two points from the first four games having kicked off the season with a 4-0 defeat at Sheffield Wednesday, but they've won their last two home games against Sunderland, who at the time hadn't dropped our point or even conceded a goal, and then Luton who they beat 3-1 in front of the Sky cameras last Friday.

Those wins have lifted them to fifteenth in the table and brought a lot of positivity given they had become everyone's tip for relegation. Seven of their eight goals have come at Home Park, one of them an own goal. Morgan Whittaker, a player linked with a Burnley move close to the transfer deadline, has scored their one away goal in a 1-1 draw at QPR. Whittaker is one of four players to have scored one goal while Ibrahim Cissoko, who scored two in the win against Luton, leads the way with three.

There is no information on any Plymouth injuries but it is expected that Michael Obafemi will have to sit this one out. He played last Friday when the Plymouth team against Luton was: Daniel Grimshaw, Joe Edwards, Kornél Szücz, Lewis Gibson, Bali Mumba, Darko Gyabi, Adam Randell, Morgan Whittaker, Rami Al Hajj, Michael Obafemi, Ryan Hardie. Subs: Marko Maroši, Ibrahim Cissoko, Adam Forshaw, Brendon Galloway, Jordan Houghton, Mustapha Bundu, Victor Pálsson, Muhamed Tijani, Callum Wright.

LAST TIME THEY WERE HERE

The last time Plymouth played a league game at Turf Moor was for the fourth game of the 2008/09 season when things hadn't started too well for us.

We'd lost 4-1 at Sheffield Wednesday and 3-0 at home to Ipswich. We then drew 0-0 at Selhurst Park against a Crystal Palace side who played with nine men for almost half of the game. Then Plymouth came and there was no real improvement as we had to settle for another 0-0 draw.

This one even ended with us having just ten men on the pitch with Chris Eagles sent off by referee Michael Oliver. It proved to be a dull, tedious game with only new loan signing Russell Anderson offering much positive.

The teams were;

Burnley: Brian Jensen, Russell Anderson, Clarke Carlisle, Steven Caldwell, Christian Kalvenes (Joey Guðjonsson 74), Graham Alexander, Wade Elliott (Ade Akinbiyi 72), Kevin McDonald (Robbie Blake ht), Chris McCann, Chris Eagles, Martin Paterson. Subs not used: Diego Penny, Alan Mahon.

Plymouth: Graham Stack, Karl Duguid, Krisztian Timar, Marcel Seip, Chris Barker, Simon Walton, Luke Summerfield (Jim Paterson 85), Chris Clark, Jason Puncheon, Steven MacLean (Rory Fallon 71), Paul Gallagher (Craig Noone 68). Sub not used: Craig Cathcart, Jamie Mackie.

LAST TWENTY SEASONS

2004/05
Away: L 0-1
Home: W 2-0, Valois, O’Connor
2005/06
Away: L 0-1
Home: W 1-0, Ricketts
2006/07
Away: D 0-0
Home: W 4-0, Duff, McVeigh, Jones, Elliott
2007/08
Home: W 1-0, Blake
Away: L 1-3, J O’Connor
2008/09
Home: D 0-0
Away: W 2-1, Caldwell, Blake
2012/13
Home: D 1-1, Austin (League Cup, won 3-2 on pens)