The Serious Torquay Thread

[Radio Free Skaro]

Most people in Dawlish interested in local football follow City, not Torquay.

I sort of gathered that ! What I am saying is if by some miracle Torquay did well in the future and progressed up the leagues in theory any TUFC football empire could spread from Dawlish to Totnes.

 

[Nigel E]

Oh and I do seem to recall that, in our very darkest hour, it was the Turkeys who not only gave us a pre season friendly down there due also donated all of the proceeds to the "Save the City" fund?

This was when Mike Bateson still owned Torquay. Bateson was unpopular down there because he ran such a "tight ship" financially, but he kept them afloat. And he would have been the one to sanction this generosity, I think.

The lottery winner and his mates who came after him were more antagonistic towards us and sought to undermine us by appointing Paul Buckle (Tisdale's assistant) as their manager, and stealing away a number of our players (Lee Phillips etc). It was pretty sweet when we stuffed them in the play-offs that season. In my 50-odd years of supporting City that is in my top 5 of favourite matches.

While they briefly got back in the League they've not been run sustainably since Bateson sold up. I don't see them getting back in the League without a huge injection of cash from somewhere, and even then, how long would it last?

I wish them no ill and want them to survive as a club, but I, 4-1, hope that we are never that rubbish that we have to play them in a competitive non-league match again.

 

[Paignton red]

To be honest Pete, I know a few Gulls fans who now consider themselves regulars at ECFC. They have just had enough at TUFC. Partly due to the ownership and partly because they are generally not very good.

Yes and I am one of them. Living in Exeter for the last 26 years I no longer go to Torquay. Traveling down to see them lose together with a woeful performance just wasn’t appealing. I am really enjoying watching City and maybe some of you City supporters that knock the team should perhaps realise how lucky you are!!!

 

[Grecian Max]

Torquay actually first entered the league in 1927 and retained their place there until 2007...four years AFTER our own "fall from league heaven". Indeed, in that first season of our own non-league hell they got promoted to L1 - albeit a promotion that possibly precipitate their own swift descent to financial difficulty and non-league embarrassment a couple of years later. And, unlike us, their first spell down there only lasted two years before they re-joined the "proper league" before their last, longest, decline.

Indeed I'm also old enough to sadly recall those days back in the late 1960s when, while we were annually just scraping along in the bottom half of the old Division 4 they were sailing high in Division 3 - even briefly flirting with promotion to the second tier when between 1967 and 1969 they finished 4th and 6th - higher than WE'VE ever managed in our own history.

Don't get me wrong - I'm decidedly NOT a "closet Turkey" by any means. and have always considered them our annoying LITTLE cousins. But let's be fair. In the overall scheme of thing there isn't a lot to choose in the achievement table and comments like yours are as patronising as those frequently postured by those Cornish "slumbering giants" towards us.

And, as for tin-pot - aren't the current bottom two league tiers littered with even more "tinpot" outfits with equally tiny gates?

A bit of historical perspective needed perhaps - hubris is a very dangerous game to start playing.

PS: Shouldn't this be on Banter Board btw?

PPS: Pete M beat me to it!

I appreciate and know that Torquay were in the League for that long - until 2003 only one went down and I truly do think the second relegation spot has filtered them out fully (twice now). We were a basket case but are large enough to sustain FL football.

 

[Grecian Max]

To be honest Pete, I know a few Gulls fans who now consider themselves regulars at ECFC. They have just had enough at TUFC. Partly due to the ownership and partly because they are generally not very good.

And this is embarrassing

Classic Torquay

 

[DB9]

Yes and I am one of them. Living in Exeter for the last 26 years I no longer go to Torquay. Traveling down to see them lose together with a woeful performance just wasn’t appealing. I am really enjoying watching City and maybe some of you City supporters that knock the team should perhaps realise how lucky you are!!!

I'm sorry but with the greatest of respect you stick with a club through thick and thin, If ECFC were still a non-league club in the same league as Torquay would you had "Changed sides"? I'm not so sure, Yep Torquay are going through the depths of despair atm and look like they are way off getting back into the league and may Yo-Yo between the Conf and Conf South but that's no excuse to say sod it and follow another team, Especially a team that most TUFC fans see as their rival.

Stick with your team even through the worst of times thats what you do, In my humble opinion anyway.

 

[Nigel E]

I appreciate and know that Torquay were in the League for that long - until 2003 only one went down and I truly do think the second relegation spot has filtered them out fully (twice now). We were a basket case but are large enough to sustain FL football.

They lived a charmed life, for sure. I was at Plainmoor for the infamous day in the mid-80s when they escaped relegation with a goal in injury time against Crewe created by the stoppage time caused by a police dog biting Jim McNichol (ex-Grecian).

There was something slightly fishy about that result. Crewe absolutely outclassed them and were 2-0 up and coasting. (Crewe were then on the cusp of a climb up the divisions). The Gulls got one back, and then right at the end of the game a Crewe player started dribbling the ball back to his own goalmouth, got dispossessed, and then someone hit one from the edge of the box and it somehow eluded the keeper.

A young David Platt was playing for Crewe that day. And a few years later just after Italia '90, I saw David Platt in the centre of Torquay. Weird coincidence.

 

[Colesman Ballz]

This was when Mike Bateson still owned Torquay. Bateson was unpopular down there because he ran such a "tight ship" financially, but he kept them afloat. And he would have been the one to sanction this generosity, I think.

The lottery winner and his mates who came after him were more antagonistic towards us and sought to undermine us by appointing Paul Buckle (Tisdale's assistant) as their manager, and stealing away a number of our players (Lee Phillips etc). It was pretty sweet when we stuffed them in the play-offs that season. In my 50-odd years of supporting City that is in my top 5 of favourite matches.

Buckle really was a "turncoat" of the highest order. Not only did he sign Phillips and Todd but made other unsuccessful underhand attempts with regard to more players as well. But worse still he knew the players that we had lined up and had agreed to sign that summer and what terms that they had been offered. So he gazumped us by offering better deals or three year contracts rather than two etc.
There is a convention that managers wishing to scout teams /players contact home clubs and get admission and are accorded suitable hospitality. Buckle duly exercised this and there were some gritted teeth and bitten lips amongst our footballing hierarchy when he "swanned up". As you rightly say it was a jubilant day indeed when he received his comeuppance in his own back yard !

 

[Nigel E]

There was something slightly fishy about that result. Crewe absolutely outclassed them and were 2-0 up and coasting. (Crewe were then on the cusp of a climb up the divisions). The Gulls got one back, and then right at the end of the game a Crewe player started dribbling the ball back to his own goalmouth, got dispossessed, and then someone hit one from the edge of the box and it somehow eluded the keeper.

YouTube is a great thing

My recollection of the equaliser (on 1:10) is not too bad.

 

[citytillidie72]

I hope they disappear down the non league ladder. Never to return.