MAN-OF-THE-MATCH George Cooper said it was a pleasure to receive his award in the new Mayflower Grandstand after Argyle’s 3-0 victory over Morecambe in Sky Bet League Two.
Cooper scored a superb free-kick, as well as assisting a goal in his champagne-winning performance in front of the Grandstand, which was open to spectators for an EFL game – at 50% capacity – for the first time in the Pilgrims’ victory on Saturday afternoon.
“It was a pleasure,” he said, after experiencing the new hospitality area. “It is unbelievable really. It’s not a League Two ground and everyone knows that – it’s Championship.
“Or more. It’s bigger than Bournemouth, isn’t it? But it’s up to us and the staff to get us to where we belong.”
Morecambe were stubborn throughout the game, even after the Shrimps went down to ten men in the incident that led to Cooper’s opening goal three minutes before half-time, but it was evident that the Greens wanted to put in a good performance in front of the fans that returned to the Mayflower.
Immediately after Coops opened the scoring, Antoni Sarcevic made it 2-0 from the penalty spot.
He said: “It was a tough game but, as everyone saw, we were on top and the goal was coming. The ten men did help us but we would have gone on to win the game anyway.”
As always in a football match, the scoring of the first goal is vital, and this is something that manager Ryan Lowe made aware to the Greens beforehand.
“It was just key for us to get the first goal,” said George. “The gaffer was on about a fast start, which we did have. I think we had about six or seven corners in the first ten minutes.
“When the first goal came, we got the second one and it was done.”
The previous week, the man on a season-long loan from Peterborough missed a free-kick in the dying seconds of the game against Cambridge, but that certainly did not stop him from taking the one he curled in from 20 yards against Morecambe.
He said: “Sarce picked the ball up but I said ‘Come on, give me one more chance after last week’ and I am just glad that it went in.”
The 23-year-old was excellent all game with a lot of the play going through him. He set up Conor Grant late on to make the score 3-0, but admitted that he could have created more.
He said: “I probably should have set up a few more with the number of crosses that I had but we got a 3-0 win, so we’re happy.”
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