Dale drew a blank for the fifth consecutive home match against a team with a very poor away record until today, and to be perfectly honest, we never really looked like scoring, with the Argyle keeper untested throughout the entire ninety minutes. This report reads very much like so many of recent home matches with Dale having lots of possession but unable to take advantage of their dominance. Talk of a crisis is very, very premature, but we seem to have hit a brick wall in terms of home form, with no improvements showing from past home games.

Dale started brightly enough and forced a succession of corners in the first few minutes as they attacked the Sandy Lane end of the ground. It looked like Dale were continuing straight on from their impressive performance at Barnet the previous Saturday. Again the corners seemed limited in their approach and lacking any real penetration. Platt came close to scoring when he turned, but his shot ended up in the back of the Sandy without worrying the Argyle keeper Jon Sheffield. Peake had a similar effort with the same result, and he also saw a free kick creep past the right hand post.

Argyle managed to survive this early onslaught, and they started to get into the game and had quite a bit of possession themselves. They are a very hard working team, who never stop running. They attack on the break, and defend in numbers. They played a good mixture of long ball football and the passing game. They flooded the midfield and made things difficult for our pairing of Flitcroft and Peake.

Dale were denied a penalty when Searle was fouled on the edge of the box, but the referee waved play on.

The rest of the half saw end to end football but neither side really looked capable of scoring. Defences were well on top, and the away side seemed very content with this. Dale came closest to scoring in the injury time added on at the end of the first half. A passing move led to a scramble in the box, and Holt poked the ball only to see CLIVE PLATT clear the ball off the line as he attempted to thwart the attentions of an Argyle defender.

The second half always looked like being similar to the first, and it was to nobody's surprise that the game finished in a stalemate. Clear chances were few and far between, and neither goal keeper was required to pull off a save. Any breaks by the visitors were dealt with superbly by Richard Green who was the best player on the park by miles.

Michael Holt wasted a couple of chances as he attempted to finish first time, but they weren't easy chances. He was substituted late in the game for Julian Dowe. Dowe had an attempt within seconds of coming on, but he fired well, well wide.

The referee blew the final whistle to announce the inevitable nil-nil draw which had threatened all afternoon.

Despite the note of depression above, there was
still lots to be enthusiastic with. Loan signing Damon Searle played well and put in some fantastic crosses. It was somewhat unfortunate that nobody could get close to getting on the end of them. With these crosses, perhaps Searle should be taking corners as he did for Carlisle. Corners are certainly lacking a bit of invention at the moment, so maybe this is the answer.
As noted by Parkin in midweek, the front two are both lacking experience. Platt is not playing like the 6'3" striker that he is. He has suffered from a spate of shirt pulling and getting pushed off the ball.

The biggest problem I think we are facing is that our midfielders are not getting forward quick enough to support the attack. We can get down the wings and when balls are crossed in, there is a battle between 2 Dale strikers and upwards of 4 to 5 defenders for the ball.

There was another big crowd of 3000+ today with the away following only a couple of hundred of this. We need to turn this around if we are to sustain this renewed interest in the club, and build on our successful start. We cannot rely entirely on our away form

Dale: Edwards, Evans, Searle, Hill, Green, Carden (Jones), Flitcroft, Peake, Atkinson, Holt (Dowe), Platt
my man of the match: Richard Green

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