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Saints At Plymouth The Verdict

It all went to script for Saints

For some reason I felt confident going into the game at Home Park, and being someone who prefers to be cautiously optimistic this was a strange feeling, however i felt that since the win at brighton the squad had stepped up a gear, against Hartlepool and brentford they had a confidence about them that wasnt there before, they had finally found that discipline that had seen them give away stupid goals and in many cases cost us points that meant that promotion wasnt in the bag weeks ago.

I therefore felt that given our squad compared to Plymouth's, one that had been decimated due to their financial problems there could only be one result.

That proved to be the case, Argyle were busy first half, but apart from one cross that Kelvin came and missed (thank God for Jaidi) they barely raissed a whimper going forward, we seemed to have a game plan, that was to make sure we didnt give them a ray of hope, keep it tight and then start to impose ourselves.

This we did and did well, it meant that peerhaps we didnt charge forward as much and with only four shots on target this was perhaps our lowest total in any game this season, but we took them clinically and once Dickson got the second you knew there was no way back for Plymouth, Lambert's penalty with half an hour left finished the home side and from then on Saints just played out the final third content to look for a goal when it came but more determined to make sure this was game set and match.

Of course there were chances, David Connolly seemed determined to get his name on the score sheet aand almost scored a wonder goal from distance, but in the main the final 20 minutes seemed to be subdued, you sensed that both sets of players and fans just wanted to hear the final whistle, theirs to go and lick their wounds and ours to celebrate wildly.

The late goal for them was too late to worry the travelling support and the final whistle sparked rioutious joy both in the stands and on the pitch, a couple of things i have noticed of late, the first that the most delighted person in the ground looked to be Bart Bialkowski, the moment that the final whistle went he was haring on to the pitch to celebrate, the second how David Connolly after applauding the Saints fans took time out to applaud the Plymouth fans and show some respect for them as his teammates celebrated wildly in the back ground.

As i said though at the start Im always cautious rather than wildly excited and i think that with the job 99.9% done wwe now need to finish the job next Saturday, when wwe are mathematically up is the time for the celebrations to begin and that will be next weekend.

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