Boss livid after his Alex side fail to run around enough in second half

David Artell said his Crewe Alexandra side committed the ‘biggest crime in football’ last night by not running around in the second half against Plymouth Argyle.

From such a promising opening half an hour of the game, resulting in Chris Long’s opening goal, Crewe quickly found themselves 3-1 down within the first 11 minutes of the second half. Artell was critical of his side’s work ethic and belief in that second half collapse.

Following the 4-1 defeat at Mornflake Stadium, Artell said: “We stopped running about in that second half. I didn’t think there was much between the two sides in the first half and we probably deserved the lead after dominating the first 20, 25 minutes but Plymouth came more into it, the more the half went on. They had a penalty saved and hit the crossbar.

“Then we came out and stopping running about and working hard to stop them and 12 minutes late we are 3-1 down. It isn’t acceptable and I told them afterwards that that cannot happen again. There are two things I won’t tolerate, not passing the ball and not running around.

“For me too many of them committed the most criminal thing in football for me, not running around and that is not reflective of my teams in the five years I have been here. There are some that need to go away and have a good, long hard look in the mirror.”