Plymouth Argyle begin a new era with defeat at home to Barnsley

Defensive lapses ultimately ruined the opening Home Park fixture for new Plymouth Argyle manager Tom Cleverley, as the Pilgrims slipped to a 3-1 defeat against visiting Barnsley.

The Greens conceded the first to a Brendan Wiredu own goal and were on the ropes when more loose defending gave Adam Phillips the time to convert a neat finish for the jubilant visitors.

Caleb Watts, who was one of the stand-out performers on his debut for Argyle, reduced the arrears before half-time and there was an extra boost when Barnsley were reduced to ten men, but the equaliser refused to arrive and the Tykes capitalised on more slack work at the back to seal all three points with a goal from Davis Keillor-Dunn.

Argyle boss Cleverley told the club website: “There’s a lot of regrets after that one, if I'm being honest,” said Cleverley. “We prepared so hard for this occasion, six weeks of real graft from everyone involved. The things we've seen in pre-season, and worked on in pre-season, unfortunately didn't come out today. 

“I’m talking more without the ball than with the ball. We have to defend with a bit more conviction than we did. 

“It could have been a different occasion had the goal not been chalked off, which I thought was harsh, but today was all about us not showing enough conviction in our defensive work. We shouldn't be conceding the quality of chance we did.

“At half-time, I felt there was a genuine belief that we could go on and win the game. We showed that, we scored straight away. The tempo was high. We kept recycling attacks and there was a little bit of a stage that they would manage the time well, and we made some forced errors and that just all breaks momentum.

“We need to be cleaner at that position, and what you certainly can't do is concede any big chances against, especially when they're down to 10 men. That, we didn't do well enough. 

“We had enough openings, opportunities, and not enough good play around their box. We maybe didn't test the goalkeeper as much as we'd like, and then we just shot ourselves in the foot again with a really cheap third goal to concede. 

“The message to the players is, it’s three points out of 138. That's all it is.”