Argyle 1 Yeovil Town 0: Match report

RYAN Brunt has not made loads of appearances nor scored stacks of goals this season, but he has featured in every Argyle game and popped up with some vital strikes, not least of which was his Boxing Day winner that maintained the Pilgrims’ lead of Sky Bet League 2.

He deserved to be the one to break stubborn Yeovil’s resistance as the gap between top and bottom was reduced to his single goal just before the hour-mark: it capped his best ever performance in the Green and gave Argyle the victory their dominance of the game merited.

It was a fine way to mark the midpoint of what is turning into a potentially memorable season. Argyle have accumulated 46 points, exactly two points a game, which is – whisper it – consistent title-winning form.

Argyle’s starting line-up was unchanged from the one that had paved the way for a 2-1 win at Hartlepool the previous week and significant as much for two players who were not in it, as for the 11 that were.

Reuben Reid has not played an active part in Argyle’s promotion push since firing them to a 1-0 home win over Accrington Stanley in mid-October: after his stunning early match-winner, he hobbled off with a hip injury that – with a recurrence on the training-ground – had absented him for the Pilgrims’ next 11 matches.

The former Glover, who had a largely unhappy 25 games at Huish Park before returning to his Home Park alma mater in 2014, started on an attack-heavy substitutes’ bench alongside Josh Simpson, who missed the previous two games because of a knee injury.

Yeovil were attempting to extend their unbeaten run under caretaker manager Darren Way – a Plymothian former Argyle season-ticket holder – to four. Consequently, Way stayed true to the 11 that had eked out an impressive 1-1 draw at Leyton Orient before Christmas.

The Glovers’ line-up included ex-Pilgrim Ryan Dickson, a Saltash leftie who played seven times for Argyle in the last decade’s Championship years, while another Home Park youth product, Ben Tozer, was a substitute on his return to his home town.

It was not, initially, the composition of the teams that was the talking-point among those in the traditionally bumper Christmas holiday crowd (why is it that only crowds are described as ‘bumper’?) but the composition of the pitch. Despite extensive and expensive work on the surface since the previous home game a fortnight earlier, the infamous algae is clearly still having an effect and the surface is currently more greasy, than grassy.

Gregg Wylde was at the forefront of the Pilgrims’ opening salvos. His first contribution was to skin Connor Roberts on the left flank and send in a cross to the far post which was returned by Jake Jervis back into the centre, from where Oscar Threlkeld could not quite get the ball on target.

From provider to prober. The next significant Argyle attack saw the ball arrive at Wylde’s fleet feet for a shot that, although on target, was easy pickings for Yeovil goalkeeper Chris Weale. The same could be said for Brunt’s edge-of-the-box curler that followed.

Argyle were clearly in the mood. Notwithstanding the surface, they produced a slick end-to-end move in which Brunt was twice prominent as the ball was worked from one side of the pitch to the other before Weale gathered Craig Tanner’s downward header

Yeovil needed to respond to the onslaught and almost snaffled the lead with their first shot, an ambitious 30-yard drive from Matt Dolan which seemed to surprise Argyle ’keeper Luke McCormick with a late dip that saw the ball clatter the crossbar.

McCormick’s excuse might have been a relative lack of activity, the reverse of the problem that Weale was experiencing. A brave punch by the Glovers’ gloveman to take Tanner’s free-kick delivery away from Wylde’s head was followed by a block to thwart Jervis, before another routine collect from another goalbound Brunt shot.

The pressure on the visitors was nigh on relentless and Weale came to Town’s rescue again , just winning the race against Brunt to clear on the edge of his area as the Argyle forward ran down Wylde’s little prodded pass through the centre.

Despite the possession and shot data overwhelmingly favouring Argyle, the two teams turned round level on the only stat that matters.