A glimmer of midweek hope but can Argyle convert that to league success? Adam Price finds out.
I don’t wish to sound fickle but, after seeing how dominant Plymouth Argyle were against Queens Park Rangers in the cup, I’ve concluded we’re winning every trophy possible this season. Quite how the Pilgrims will balance Europa League football with next season’s Championship campaign remains to be seen, but I for one look forward to finding out.
In all seriousness, Tuesday night’s game did provide some relief after a sticky start to the season. Argyle were completely rampant, and ultimately deserved to win by a far greater margin than the eventual 3-2 scoreline. Still, context is necessary; the win came against a team that wouldn’t look out of place in under-21s competitions, and it’s in the league where reputations will be won and lost this season.
That league run sees Argyle take a trip to Lincoln City this weekend. The Imps are managed by Michael Skubala. He was rumoured to be on the shortlist when Argyle were looking for a head coach of their own in 2024, and he could hardly have done a worse job than the successful candidate. After finishing 11th last season, Skubala and his side are looking to push on, and may well see a home game against the team sitting 23rd early on as a decent opportunity to get points on the board.
Style of play
In general, Skubala wants his teams to play an exciting brand of football. That won’t necessarily involve keeping the ball on the floor – Lincoln posted an average possession figure of 45.2% last season, with only four League One teams having less. However, Lincoln will look to counter quickly when they win back possession, getting the ball upfield rapidly. It’s already hurt Argyle on multiple occasions this term.
Skubala has occasionally shown a willingness to deploy some funky formations to make his style of play effective. Across the 2023/24 season, and during the first half of the last campaign, he showed a preference for various shapes with three at the back. However, that changed to defensive four as the season drew to a close, and this season Skubala seems keen to deploy a 4-2-3-1.
That feels like an understandable change. Following departures over the summer, some of which we’ll discuss a little later, Lincoln don’t appear to have the depth of personnel to make a back three successful. In their opening two league games, Adam Jackson has lined up with a certain Sonny Bradley as a central defensive duo. However, Jackson will miss this one after picking up a straight red card against AFC Wimbledon last weekend.
I imagine that’ll see Tom Hamer come in as a straight swap, though there is the option of switching Ryley Towler from left back, where he’s started the first two games, to a more familiar centre back role. Towler, Bradley and Hamer actually feels like an ideal back three, but that’s unlikely as it would leave Lincoln with little central defensive cover on the bench. The rest of the back line is likely to be made up of captain Tendayi Darikwa at right back, and George Wickens in goal.
Lincoln have named an unchanged eleven for their two league games thus far. Whilst they’ll be forced into a defensive change this weekend, they could opt to deploy the same front six. If so, we’ll see Tom Bayliss and Conor McGrandles in the deeper midfield roles, with Jack Moylan trusted as the number 10. If all three start, Ethan Hamilton can be expected to emerge from the bench at some stage, and can take up either a deeper or more attacking role.
In the wide roles, Reeco Hackett has been lining up on the left. You may recognise him after he scored home and away for Portsmouth against Argyle in the 2022/23 season. He’ll be looking to do the same again…and Argyle wouldn’t mind the season ending in similar circumstances. Meanwhile, Rob Street has been playing on the right, with the experienced James Collins leading the line.
There are other options in the attacking areas. Academy graduate Freddie Draper may be in contention after scoring in the League Cup against Harrogate Town, whilst Swedish winger Erik Ring played on the right in that game. Ben House can also play as a number 10 or central striker, whilst there is plenty of excitement surrounding 18-year-old forward Zane Okoro, who got a hatful of minutes at the back end of last season.
Whoever lines up though, I expect the style to remain the same. 4-2-3-1, happy to soak up pressure, and aiming to break at pace whenever possible.
Strengths
I’m going to come right out with the first one: I’m having nightmares about Lincoln’s prowess from set pieces.
You may recall I had similar thoughts about QPR. They ended up scoring their second goal on Tuesday night from a set piece situation, as Rayan Kolli headed home amid questionable resistance from Argyle goalkeeper Luca Ashby-Hammond. My fear ahead of that game was based on the fact QPR scored 14 goals from set pieces in the league last season. Lincoln, by comparison, scored 29. An absurd figure.
Quite incredibly, two of those goals came directly from corners. First of all, Sam Clucas whipped one into the far corner in a 3-0 win over Mansfield Town…
And just a few weeks later, Tom Bayliss did exactly the same from the other flank against Bristol Rovers, in an eventual 5-0 victory.
To be brutally honest, the thought of Ashby-Hammond dealing with crosses on top of him like this is giving me the wrong kind of shivers. I’d genuinely be more surprised if Lincoln didn’t score from a set piece this weekend.
That aside, I’d also consider it significant that Lincoln are the home team this weekend. Of their 61 points last season, 36 of them were won at home. That they won 25 points away from home means just over 59% of their points were won at Sincil Bank. It’s not unusually high but, proportionally, that’s a practically identical figure to what Argyle posted in their 2022/23 title-winning season, when the Greens were practically unplayable at home. It’s cliched, absolutely, but Sincil Bank is a classic “difficult place to go.”
And in front of their own fans, Lincoln at their best have the ability to blow teams away. Not only can they win, they can win by scoring a hatful of goals. I’ve already mentioned the five-goal winning margin against Bristol Rovers, but some of their other highlights include beating Mansfield 4-1, Peterborough United 5-1, Crawley Town 4-1 and a 4-2 victory over Steven Schumacher’s Bolton Wanderers. If Argyle make a poor start, they’ll need to work hard to ensure they don’t become Lincoln’s latest victims.
In terms of individuals, I think I’d have to look towards Collins up front. He may turn 35 in December, but he still has more than enough talent to flourish at this level. Given how Argyle’s summer has gone, I certainly wouldn’t turn down the opportunity to have him wearing the Pilgrims’ coveted number 9 shirt.
Collins only signed for Lincoln in January, moving to Sincil Bank from Derby County. However, he immediately made an impression, scoring ten league goals and ending up as their top scorer by a comfortable margin, despite only playing 20 games. His average of 0.69 goals per 90 minutes during his Lincoln spell last year was genuinely excellent.
There are other players who could be seen as notable strengths. I was impressed with what I saw from Moylan when he was fit last season, and Bradley will naturally be a threat from those tricky Lincoln set pieces. However, stopping Collins will be objective number one for the Argyle defence.
Weaknesses
When looking at Lincoln’s squad, I think it could be argued they’ve had a similar summer to Argyle. There have been several high-profile departures this summer, and the majority certainly haven’t been replaced by incomings.
One of the summer’s major departures was Jovon Makama. The 21-year-old shone last year, putting in one of the best performances of the entire season in League One as he scored a hat-trick and got an assist in the 5-0 Bristol Rovers win. He took part in pre-season training with Lincoln but, at the start of this month, departed in a £1.2 million transfer to Championship side Norwich City. It was a club record sale for the Imps.
Makama isn’t the only notable departure. Further back, midfielder Ethan Erhahon left for Bolton – he actually emerged from the bench against Argyle just last week. In defence, Paudie O’Connor, a player linked with Argyle in the past, joined Reading on a free transfer. The same fate befell Sean Roughan, an excellent defender who played every possible minute for Lincoln in the league last season. He’s now at Huddersfield Town. Are these the sorts of players Argyle ought to have targeted? No comment.
On the other hand, let’s look at their incomings. They brought in Towler and Bradley in defence, and…that’s it. Only two senior arrivals despite significant departures is obviously inadequate. Sure, Towler and Bradley can act as direct replacements for Roughan and O’Connor, but fixing what they’ve lost in midfield and attack is clearly going to take some time. Argyle should see this as an opportunity to take advantage.
Lincoln face problems similar to Argyle’s when it comes to putting a squad together at the moment. Granted, the lack of new arrivals at Sincil Bank means they don’t need as much time to gel as Tom Cleverley’s side. However, there is a sense that some key business is still to be done at both clubs. Lincoln will, quite reasonably, see this as a good time to play Argyle. But that’s also true in reverse, particularly when you consider that Lincoln should get stronger at home as the season progresses.
I’d also note that, under Skubala, Lincoln have a tendency to be a streaky side. They remind me a lot of Argyle under Ryan Lowe in 2020/21 – when they’re playing well they can easily go on a strong run, but they struggle to turn things around quickly if things are going against them. I believe it was their inability to put results together consistently that stopped them launching a genuine play-off push last year.
There are several runs from the 2024/25 campaign that demonstrate Lincoln’s “up and down” nature. They started well, losing just once in their opening nine league games. However, the festive period was tough, as they picked up just one point in four games without scoring a single goal. They picked up towards the end of the season with a five-game unbeaten run, before losing the final two games of their campaign.
Notwithstanding their cup victory against Harrogate, it could aid Argyle that Lincoln lost their previous league game to Wimbledon.
Prediction
I want to be more optimistic. Despite speaking in jest about it earlier, victory in the cup will surely have helped the mood throughout the Argyle squad. Whenever things get tough this season, and they surely will at stages, they can always aim to summon the spirit that saw them come back from two goals down on Tuesday night.
Alas, I’m finding it tricky to predict a win here. Jackson’s absence will help Argyle, and they may well score. But I can’t overlook Lincoln’s prowess from set pieces, which is a clear weakness of Argyle’s. For me, if either team is going to snatch a victory, it’s the hosts. 2-1 Lincoln.