I want you to cast your mind back to early May 2024. Plymouth Argyle had just beaten Hull City to maintain their Championship status. Sure, things looked shaky for a while, and the decision to hire Ian Foster was a shocker, but that was just a minor blip, and the Pilgrims pulled it off. It’s a night the Barbican won’t forget in a hurry.
There were obvious reasons to be cheerful. Argyle had maintained their place in one of the best football leagues anywhere in the world. They had the most valuable squad they’d ever assembled. The club was possibly more cash-rich than it’d ever been. A huge opportunity to press on through the five-year plan to fight for the Premier League was staring Argyle in the face.
But see, this is where a certain attitude took over and crushed those ambitions. Arrogance. That summer, Argyle proved that the Foster decision was less a rare error, and more the start of a cascade of ruin. They made the shockingly arrogant decision to hire a man totally unbefitting for the position of head coach, with predictable results, and the hubristic decisions haven’t ceased since.
The Home Park hierarchy at least had the opportunity to right one wrong after that debacle. Many feel Argyle’s downturn stemmed from Steven Schumacher’s departure in December 2023. They may be right, but Schumacher was willing to return in January 2025, and was the obvious choice to get the club back to some semblance of normality.
Argyle, however, decided they were better than the obvious choice. Instead, they opted to hire Miron Muslic, a man who despite clearly being an excellent coach had a playing style totally unsuited to the squad he inherited. And what an appointment that turned out to be! Argyle were still relegated, and Muslic swanned off at the first possible opportunity. Who can blame him?
Scorned by two years of self-destructive decision-making, you might have thought Argyle would show some contrition. A board statement promised to do “everything we can to put things right.” Would this, therefore, mark the end of the arrogance that had plagued the club for so long? No chance.
This summer, the club once more decided to throw out the tried and tested, and “do things differently” again. They shunned the loan market (well, until desperation necessitated), built a team of “project” players, and employed total inexperience in the ranks both on and off the field. With a significant degree of snobbery, they assumed being relegated with a top-tier fan base and decent budget would mean they’d be fine whatever they did. Spoiler alert: we’re not fine. We’re anything but fine.
It’s time to tackle the elephant in the room; the man behind this continued display of damaging arrogance. Neil Dewsnip and Andrew Parkinson can no longer be used as human shields. The blame lies right at the top. It lies with owner Simon Hallett.
I already know that daring to speak ill of Hallett will have me blacklisted in certain corners of the internet and beyond. And indeed, a nuanced assessment of Hallett would point towards the many successes he had before 2023. But here’s the reality: the man who hired Wayne Rooney, after his spell at Birmingham City, lost every single penny of credit he had in the bank. And given events since, Hallett is now in severe decision-making debt.
We are now at the stage where Hallett’s own arrogance is killing the club he loves. And I have no doubt he does love the club; his own personal investment is testament to the fact. I am, however, starting to wonder if he doesn’t love Argyle as much as his own sense of grandeur.
And let’s be clear: Hallett is a man who absolutely believes in his own hype. He was more than willing to do the media rounds to defend the appointment of Rooney, painting himself as the face of an act of self-sabotage. And at a fans’ forum at the start of this season, he predicted Argyle would finish second. Second! With this team! I always had Hallett down as a good ukulele player, but I didn’t know he dabbled in comedy too.
Thursday night’s capitulation at Exeter City was arguably the nadir of Hallett’s tenure to date. When you consider club size, level of fanbase and the amount we’re expected to spend to follow our team, Argyle should never find themselves in the same league as the Grecians. That they’re at the same level is galling enough; to be outplayed is totally shameful.
In a perverse way, this was perfect. One of the most bizarre moments of Hallett’s reign came a week before the famous Hull victory. Argyle had just lost to Millwall, and were on the brink of relegation. But in one of the most shocking displays of stewardship he’d show for at least a month, Hallett seemed too busy on social media, retweeting an article praising the way Exeter were run. Many Argyle fans found out about his online activities in disgust on their journey home.
At least he was right about one thing; there is a club in Devon that seems well run at the moment, and it isn’t Argyle. Thursday night showed an Exeter team punching above its weight, with Argyle reaping after a particularly painful two years of sowing.
This is not the time for a serious conversation. The time for a serious conversation was probably well over a year ago. It’s now time for action, and Hallett has two choices. Either put the arrogance to one side, show some genuine contrition, and run things to a reasonable degree of competence, or sell the club to somebody who will.