First-half goals from Charlie Kirk and Owen Dale saw Crewe Alexandra defeat Plymouth Argyle at the Alexandra Stadium last night despite substitute Luke Jephcott’s late goal for the visitors.
Manager David Artell named an unchanged team from Saturday’s 2-1 home win against Northampton Town with Sam Booth named as the substitute goalkeeper with Dave Richards playing in the Under-23s game earlier in the day.
The opening chance and goal of the game came in the 9th minute with Oli Finney testing Mike Cooper in the visitors’ goal before Kirk opened the scoring midway through the first half, getting on the end of Tom Lowery’s cross and lobbing it over Cooper as he came off his goalline. Finney would have another effort that would go wide before the Alex would double the lead 2 minutes before the half-time interval, getting on the end of Kirk’s cross.
The second-half saw the Alex on top again with Ryan Wintle testing Cooper following a decent move midway through the half before Will Jaaskelainen was tested for the first time with 20 minutes to play by Jephcott. Finney had another effort that went over the bar before Jephcott scored with 5 minutes to play following a scramble in the penalty area.
The next games for the Alex see us travel to AFC Wimbledon on Saturday before a home game against Rochdale.
What can we take out of this game?
Another win and another decent victory. Dale and the two centre-backs, Lancashire and Beckles, were impeccable (so much so that Watts was substituted at half-time) with Lowery and Mandron also playing well.
Finney could have scored on his birthday with a little bit more end product but he kept getting into decent positions between the defence and midfield, especially in the opening 45.
Alexandra Stadium
League 1
15/12/2020 8:00 pm
Attendance: 2000
Referee: Scott Oldham
| Crewe Alexandra | Plymouth Argyle | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kirk, Dale | Jephcott | ||||||
| Jaaskelainen | M. Cooper | ||||||
| Offord | Wootton | ||||||
| Lancashire | Aimson | ||||||
| Beckles | Canavan | ||||||
| Pickering | Watts | 46 | |||||
| Lowery | Moore | 73 | |||||
| Wintle | Pereira Camara | ||||||
| Finney | Fornah | 46 | |||||
| Dale | 81 | Mayor | 73 | ||||
| Mandron | 88 | G. Cooper | |||||
| Kirk | Nouble | 64 | |||||
Substitutes |
|||||||
| Booth | McCormick | ||||||
| Nolan | Edwards | 73 | |||||
| Powell | 81 | Hardie | 64 | ||||
| Porter | 88 | C. Grant | 73 | ||||
| Adebisi | MacLeod | 46 | |||||
| Sass-Davies | Opoku | ||||||
| Johnson | Jephcott | 46 | |||||
Game Statistics |
||
| 12 | Goal attempts | 5 |
| 4 | On Target | 3 |
| 5 | Corners | 3 |
| 7 | Fouls | 10 |
| 0 | Yellow Cards | 1 |
| 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 50 | % | 50 |