Plymouth Argyle have picked up their second victory on the road in five days beating a very under par Crystal Palace 2 – 1 at Selhurst Park. Both Argyle goals were scored by loan signing Paul Gallagher (let’s hope that Blackburn don’t want him back on this form) against a rather lacklustre Palace side. The first of Gallagher’s goals was a superb curling shot from the edge of the penalty area which decieved the home keeper to fly into the top left of the net. His second goal was even more spectacular, controlling Rory Fallon’s floated ball to unleash a low drive from 25 yards out. Sadly Plymouth didn’t keep a clean sheet at Selhurst Park with Patrick McCarthy’s headed goal with seven minutes left on the clock. Like Tuesday’s game the goal was conceded from a set piece move. More work is definitely needed on defending set pieces as Argyle were comfortably on top in both of the recent away games when they conceded. Better teams will punish Argyle if they are weak in defending set pieces and take points away from us. But things are certainly a lot more encouraging for those wearing green shirts. We are not up to 18th in the league, still not ideal but better than bottom of the league as we were at the beginning of the week. Plymouth’s next game should be winnable as Argyle host second bottom club Nottingham Forest at Home Park on Saturday afternoon. Then the following Tuesday Argyle face a trip up to Ashton Gate to face local rivals Bristol City, let’s hope for a repeat of last years result.
Liverpool weren’t so fortunate being held to a scoreless draw at Anfield against former Argyle boss Tony Pulis’ Stoke City. Liverpool fans will feel aggrieved by the result as Stevie Gerrard had a perfectly legitimate goal disallowed in the second minute of the game. It was a frustrating game for Liverpool as (so called) premiership whipping boys Stoke City played a nine man defence stifling any attempted Liverpool attack. The home team had chances but just couldn’t get their finishing right. I know that newly promoted Stoke are fighting for their lives in the Premiership but this makes for boring football. Liverpool should have done better in breaking down Stoke but the Reds should have had all three points as there is no reason why Gerrard’s goal should have been disallowed. Rafa Benitez wrote in the match programme “if we don’t beat Stoke City, our win over Manchester United will mean nothing” – I personally don’t like to think of it in that way, but I can understand the sentiment! United and Chelsea drew their match 1 – 1 so Liverpool remain level on points with Chelsea. But it was the other London team, Arsenal that seized the initiative to go top of the Premiership this weekend. Manchester United are languishing in 15th position with only five points on the board but do have a game in hand over their title rivals, Chelsea, Liverpool and Arsenal!
Now it’s time for one of those “only in America” news stories. There is a road in the Californian desert town of Lancaster that when driven on plays the Lone Ranger theme. This initiative was dreamt up by Honda who say when driven over with a Honda Civic at 55mph plays a note perfect rendition of the Rossini overture. But local residents aren’t happy with the road saying it’s a high-pitch drone which keeps some local residents awake at night. Honda say that it’s only supposed to be audible in car but it seems that isn’t the case. Anyway, local authorities have decided to “pave over” the offending piece of road. There are a number of videos on You Tube of cars driving over the so called “musical highway”.
