It is set to be a hugely contrasting atmosphere at Home Park for the Championship’s final day fixture between Plymouth Argyle and Leeds United on Saturday lunch time. The visiting Whites arrive in Devon hunting down the league title and having already been promoted after a season of dominance, however the home side’s fortunes haven’t been so kind. Argyle are currently 23rd, three points from safety, but with a goal difference of –36 it would take a stunning set of results to keep them in the second tier and, barring a miracle, they will be relegated to league one by full time this weekend.
It would be overly hopeful, perhaps foolish, to convince oneself that Argyle have any real chance of scraping survival on final day. With Luton being the team to catch, it would require a 14-goal swing, needing Muslic’s side to beat Leeds emphatically, and a severely out of form, managerless West Brom to batter Luton at The Hawthorns. Labelling that scenario as unlikely would be an understatement, and thus the actual football will likely be secondary to the Greens in the stands on Saturday. What many will want to do is show their appreciation to a playing squad who have never downed tools, despite seeming doomed with relegation for months, and a manager who has given them real hope of survival even after the disaster that preceded his appointment.
Before Argyle’s kick-off in Preston last week, Luton scored a late winner against Coventry to all but relegate the Greens. Despite knowing this before the game, Muslic’s side put on a show and won 2-1 at Deepdale, which would’ve been a fantastic result any other week of the season but was ultimately all in vain thanks to events out of their hands.
Following that win, Muslic said:
“It was a tough one to take and we’ll be ready to give it our all one more time.
“We had an obligation as a team and as staff – and to the Green Army who needed to see their team fighting”
In terms of the actual football, Leeds needing a win to secure the title is the last thing Argyle would have wanted ahead of this fixture. Even with the Green’s fate effectively sealed, the league leaders have been ruthless in recent weeks and have already proven they can handle the pressure of a big occasion, thumping Stoke 6-0 at Elland Road to guarantee themselves promotion in April. That doesn’t bode well for Plymouth, as a win here would almost certainly win the league for Daniel Farke’s team, and the party atmosphere from the away end will only boost the team on the pitch. Muslic will just hope his team can put on a good performance to see out the season and provide a bit of entertainment for the fans who have backed them up and down the country throughout such a difficult period for the club.
So, with Saturday’s result being inconsequential in the long run, where did it all go wrong for Argyle this season?
Many will point straight to the appointment of Wayne Rooney in the Summer, and it would be hard to argue against it. A large proportion of onlookers from across the whole Championship were sceptical at the time, and they were proved right very quickly, with Rooney winning just 4 league games from 23, and being finally sacked on New Years Eve. His successor was to be Miron Muslic, a relatively unknown, young Austrian manager, and after some positive business in January, Argyle seemed to be showing signs of life again. They were resurgent under Muslic, but many wondered if it was too little too late, and the turn in form of others down at the bottom of the table meant the Pilgrims struggled to climb up the table. That brings us to today, and had the season been one or two games longer, Argyle could very well have escaped relegation against all the odds. As it is, the boards delay in sacking Rooney has proven to be their downfall, as the gap was simply too big for Muslic to close by the time he was appointed.
Lots of people involved with the club will be happy for this season to be over and will likely be looking towards the summer and next season already, where keeping Muslic at the club must be a priority. Key players will inevitably be linked with Championship moves, with Ryan Hardie in particular impressing in recent months, but with new investment being announced by Simon Hallet in March, the Argyle project could convince such players to stick around in the third division, and may make Plymouth a desirable destination for new recruits in the transfer window. It will be a busy summer, that is for certain, with arrivals and departures aplenty. One shred of hope for fans may be the success of Birmingham City after dropping to League One, and they will hope that, with the right business, the Pilgrims time away from the Championship will be similarly short lived.