Adams joy as he sees Pilgrims’ progress

DEREK Adams hopes his Plymouth side have turned a corner after a thumping win at Scunthorpe completed a great week for the club.

Having lost seven of their first 10 games, Argyle are now toasting back-toback victories, with Freddie Ladapo, Niall Canavan, Joel Grant and Antoni Sarcevic all finding the back of the net days after a 3-1 success over Gillingham.

“We’re hopeful now we can start to climb the table,” said Adams.

“I think we’ve shown in our performances this season that we are better than our league position.”

This latest success was built on a dominant first-half performance.

Ladapo fired them in front with his fifth goal in three matches in the 13th minute – finishing from inside the penalty area – before former Scunthorpe defender Canavan flicked home a header from a corner in stoppage time.

The Iron made a bright start to the second half with substitute Lee Novak clinically firing into the bottom corner after Ike Ugbo had been crowded out while trying to shoot.

Sixty seconds later, after keeper Matt Macey pulled off one of several fine stops to deny Novak, the hosts had the ball in the back of the net again, only for Ugbo’s header to be ruled out for offside.

Things then went from bad to worse for Scunthorpe, with Pilgrims winger Joel Grant finishing off a great run and cross by Sarcevic in the 57th minute to restore his side’s twogoal lead.

And in stoppage time, Sarcevic went from provider to scorer, making the most of being afforded time on the ball to fire home.

“It was great to make it 2-0 just before half-time, but conceding so early in the second half set us back,” said Adams.

“We had to regain the confidence we had in the first half and we did do with the third goal.”

Not for the first time this season, Stuart McCall bemoaned his Scunthorpe side’s defending.

“We’d talked about coming out and having a fast start because we’d lost four on the bounce, but I thought we looked edgy and didn’t really get on the front foot.

“Plymouth scored with their first attack of the second half, which is criminal from our point of view. We can’t concede goals like we are doing.”