Peterborough United suffered a nightmare afternoon at London Road...and not just because of the result

‘The Pilgrims’ won 1-0 thanks to a Bim Pepple tap-in on 25 minutes, while Posh barely managed a shot in anger in a game that saw 12 yellow cards and a red one for full-back Peter Kioso.

Kioso will now serve a second suspension of the season for a Posh side who also suffered the sight of star striker Harry Leonard leaving on a stretcher 15 minutes from time after a lengthy assessment of neck and head.

Remarkably Posh remain just four points from the play-offs, even if they did drop two places to 12th, but they now face a couple of tough away games that will challenge a squad that now looks threadbare.

Referee Ben Atkinson will doubtless be used as a Posh scapegoat for a horrible performance of cautions for re-start delays, yet nothing for some rather blatant time-wasting, but to be fair he laid down a marker for his inconsistent awfulness by a mystifying failure to send off Posh central defender Tom O’Connor in the opening five minutes.

Posh predictably named an unchanged side after last week’s impressive 3-1 win over Bolton. There was a change on the substitutes’ bench though as unexposed goalkeeper Bastain Smith replaced transfer listed Nick Bilokapic. The Aussie was understood to be unwell.

Plymouth, who have also been making stealthy progress after a terrible start to the season, handed recent signing Ronan Curtis a start on the wing.

And the visitors also brought plenty of aggression with them. They muscled Posh off so many balls in the early stages while also running amok down the Posh left with O’Connor enduring a nightmare 25 minutes which ended up with him limping off, straight after being caught in possession for the the opening goal.

O’Connor was lucky to stay on the pitch for more than five minutes as he was cautioned for stopping Plymouth taking a throw-in quickly before hacking Lorent Tolaj down a couple of minutes later. A more blatant yellow card it was hard to imagine.

Punishment for the player arrived when Tolaj nicked the ball off him before feeding Bim Pepple for his goal. Pepple also spurned two decent chances from set-pieces, while Tolaj almost netted with a classy volley.

Posh did eventually settle down and started to push Plymouth back. There were moments of promise, but little in the way of chances with Jimmy-Jay Morgan missing the best of them after Harry Leonard had teed him up.

A fine run and cross from Archie Collins in the final minute of the half did led to a mini-goalmouth scramble, but the ball was eventually hacked clear.

The second-half was a dismal stop-start spectacle as Atkinson rushed to his pocket for every Posh misdemeanour, encouraged by the visiting players. Kioso collected two of them and walked off in the 89th minute.

When the football did break out Plymouth dominated, helped by that stream of free-kicks. Posh ‘keeper Alex Bass saved well from Pepple and Tolaj fired miserably wide when clean through.

Archie Collins made a brilliant last-ditch tackle to thwart Pepple. Posh did well to dig in. They even responded with some determined attacks when down to 10 men, but they created nothing with a rather hopeful blast over the crossbar from Cian Hayes from distance the only shot of note they delivered.

Posh won some set-pieces, but a cross into a crowded penalty area was too often ignored which rather summed up a muddled approach against combative opponents.

Posh: Alex Bass, Carl Johnston, Tom Lees, Tom O’Connor (sub George Nevett, 25 mins), Peter Kioso, Brandon Khela (sub Declan Frith, 76 mins), Archie Collins, Kyrell Lisbie (sub Cian Hayes, 76 mins), Matt Garbett, Jimmy-Jay Morgan (sub Pemi Aderoju, 60 mins), Harry Leonard (sub Donay O’Brien-Brady, 76 mins).

Unused substitutes: Bastien Smith, James Dornelly.

Plymouth: Conor Hazard, Mathias Ross, Joe Edwards, Brendan Galloway, Alex Mitchell, Malachi Boateng, Ronan Curtis, Joe Ralls, Matthew Sorinola (sub Brendan Wiradu (0 + 3 mins), Bim Pepple (sub Caleb Watts, 85 mins), Lorent Tolaj (sub Kornel Szucs, 90 + 8 mins)..

Substitutes: Luca Ashby-Hammond, Brendan Wiredu, Jamie Paterson, Xavier Amaechi, Ayman Benarous,

GOAL: Plymouth – Pepple (23 mins).

Sending off: Posh – Kioso (second yellow, foul).

CAUTIONS: Posh – O’Connor (delaying the re-start), Lisbie (delaying the re-start), Leonard (dissent), Garbett (foul), KIoso (foul), Collins (foul), Khela (dissent).

Plymouth – Boateng (dissent), Tolaj (persistent fouling), Ross (foul), Mitchell (foul).

REFEREE: Ben Atkinson 4.

ATTENDANCE: 8,864 (1,234 Plymouth).