League 2: Northampton Town vs Torquay United

[usagullmichigan]

All the top teams in the world get the decisions go their way Man Utd at Old Trafford, Chelski at the bridge and AC Cobblers at San Sixfields. what do we expect when we play team like AC and with the 100,000 home fans behind them. Gario Johnsino time keeping Fergie like until its in their favor

[SkyBlueGull]

Just back from the game - and in all honesty we were lucky to get a point - it would have been daylight robbery if we had won.

Some observations rather than a match report.

I hate the expression that "the players were leggy, 3 games in 7 days, too many games in recent week" as an excuse - they are professional athletes for gods sake and its only 9 hours work in a week (sometimes I do that in a day) but it certainly looked like it tonight - or was it the long journey up!!!

Then there were the substitutions or rather lack of them - and when PB did it was the WRONG TIME. If the players were tired then the substitutions should have been made earlier - Zebroski even with tired legs had skinned their full backs late in the game - I would have thought that a fresh pair of legs on the flanks ie Danny Stevens could have done some serious damage.

However PB waited until the 93rd minute to twice delay THE free kick to put Ellis and Oastler on . This was wrong - it was a key time in the game - the current players although tired were "in the zone" in focus. However bringing on players who need a few minutes to get acclimatised to the pace and set up of the game - it is not the right time when there is a free kick on the edge of the box. In my opinion we lost concentration because of this and the gap made for the scorer I am sure will be attributed to a player (subbed) who was not ther and his successor not in the right place.

The pitch - after the mudbath of Cheltenham - this looked really decent and well suited for our passing game. However appearnces can be deceptive and I could not have been more wrong. Nearly every pass along the ground bobbled and players on both sides were slipping and falling over although whenever it was a northampton player the w#nker in the middle gave them a free kick.

As to the ref the least said the better as I woul not wish to be banned from these boards. However I will comment on the linos - their goalie at every goal kick placed the ball 6 inches outside the 6 yard line and the lino did nothing - when that is the only job he has to do at the goalkick. Reminded me of the lino at Cheltenham who stood 2 feet away from the corner taker who kept placing the ball outside the corner circle.

Northampton - they did a job - they got in our faces - pressed us and didnt let us play our normal composed game. We also seemed to go missing in midfield and they won most 50:50 balls. However why PB didnt get someone to put their foot on the ball and spray it around the backline ubtil a space develops or why we didnt use the flanks more I will never know.

The goal scored - both absolute peaches. O Kane showed some serious intelligence as he started to shoot , realised it would be blocked - jinked and sidestepped to create an opening and then placed it inside the post. Billy Kees just amazed me - similar to Stockport although the goal mouth was more crowded - he jinked inside from outside the area - looked up and slotted it in the corner - it really is becoming his signature goal.

Goals conceded - poor concentration from our defenders

Mom - Had to be Bevan for me - he made a couple of crucial saves when they were ono on one with him - closely followed by mansell for several last minute tackles.


Not disappointed with a point considering the below par performance (although was ecstatic at the thought of 3 points when Billys went in). Its not over until the fat lady sings and there will be many twists and turns before the end of the season and we will be there or thereabouts .It wouldnt be Torquay if we didnt have to wait for a nail biting final game of the season to determine promotion,play off or relegation issues as it has been some 8 years since mid table mediocrity.Its all part of the Gulls Rollercoaster

The season is really in our hands with key games against rivals up there with us- anyway the lads have 8 days rest and then face Lincoln - who had 6 put past them tonight.

Onwards and Upwards

[shaunicus]

However PB waited until the 93rd minute to twice delay THE free kick to put Ellis and Oastler on . This was wrong - it was a key time in the game - the current players although tired were "in the zone" in focus. However bringing on players who need a few minutes to get acclimatised to the pace and set up of the game - it is not the right time when there is a free kick on the edge of the box. In my opinion we lost concentration because of this and the gap made for the scorer I am sure will be attributed to a player (subbed) who was not ther and his successor not in the right place.

Agree with this. Though I can see the logic in it (Ellis and Oastler offer height and aerial prowess) to do it before a free-kick in a dangerous area is ludicrous. Stupid time to make a substitution.

Free-kick or no free-kick, if we defend it properly it's not an issue. Can understand the players frustration though.

[Southampton Gull]

Paul Buckle has every reason to call the abysmal travel arrangements pathetic. It's a friday, we all know how roads can be so busy. Add to that the disappointment at another "clerical error" costing us a signing before the deadline and you can see his frame of mind. The referee was appalling, he gave in to the crowd baying for Branston's blood, you just knew he'd get his yellow card out despite him being the victim of some foul play on countless occasions.

I said all game I would settle for a point and seeing us conceed that late goal came as no surprise (except to the thousand or so home fans who left after Kee scored ). It's far from doom and gloom and we still have everything to play for, automatic promotion is still on however the results go tomorrow.

Great support from the Yellow Army tonight and a spirited, even if tired performance from the side.

Northampton FC banned Paul from taking his drum citing health and safety issues so imagine our surprise when their stupid mascot was allowed to wander up and down the touchline playing a crap drum to stir up the home support, I'd like to know how they arrived at that decision. £19 a ticket, usual rip-off prices for shit food and coffee, I don't understand how anyone can moan about the value for money at Plainmoor when shit clubs like Northampton can rip fans off the way they do.

Take the point and prepare (properly) for the next game.

[Southampton Gull]

Very nice of Cheltenham Town for the lift to the game!!

anybody know what they meant by the comment?

They sent their coach to pick the team up.

Sorry if someone else has already answered.

[Regiment]

i'm starting to wonder if we're the only fans who feel robbed/cheated/hard done by week in week out ??? is it something WE are doing wrong ???

whilst i'd never want to see a torquay player constantly throwing himself to the floor, cheating at every opportunity, i wonder if we are too honest for our own good at times. how many times did that little spanish tosspot (Man of the Match ??? WTF ????) hit the deck tonight ?? and he wasn't alone in that. once these players work out that a referee isn't going to book them for diving, the law of averages suggests, the referee is going to eventually give one, pressure from the players, the crowd appealing for everything, he IS going to give them sooner or later. And not only did he cheat at every opportunity, but the little shite went and had the last word, and totally ruined my week.

the ref was appalling tonight, but i seem to say this on so many occasions, i wonder if i'm looking at it through yellow eyes. i think tonight he got a large majority of things wrong AGAINST us, but he gave plenty of bad decisions our way too (i'd say it was about 70-30 in their favour). he was just a very bad ref, but THE decision at the end seemed to come from the linesman - i feared he was gonna take off he was waving his damn flag so much. i guess we'll need to watch it on tv tomorrow night to see what happened, but if it was a bit of a scuffle or something along those lines, surely ANY ref would just sort it out, tell them to behave, and carry on, not award a free kick on the edge of the box to the attacking team. ludicrous.

three out of the four goals tonight could've been contested to a degree, i was half expecting a whistle for a late challenge by Zeb in the build up to our first goal, their first goal was a dubious free kick, which was retaken after they effed the first attempt up, and then that one at the end. so at least the ref can claim to be consistent ?!?!?

and i'm sorry to mention it (or repeat what has already been said), but those subs at the end, what the hell was he thinking ?? last knockings, they'd have been in a hurry to take that free kick, and all bucks did was give them an extra minute to compose themselves, think about what they were doing to do, and the inevitable happened.

i was starting to think we could go up this year, and have a good go at it in league one, but we have got to start learning to win ugly. i thought we'd turned a corner, but a 94th minute goal away to cheltenham and now the same at AC Northampton, we've thrown away 4 points, and the higher you go, those moments are the difference between success and failure (and this, as we all know, has happened more than just these two occasions i've mentioned).

one final note, i know there is no planning for what happened on the motorway today, that resulted in our players clearly not being prepared/ready for the game, but could it be a case that the team didn't leave devon early enough ?? surely they'd be better off getting to their destination WAY TOO early, and have time to chill, relax, get prepared etc. like i say, i don't know what happened today, but it feels like one of those things that can only happen to TUFC !!

one plus point tho, i thought o'kane looked back on his game tonight.

[Jeff]

Apologies for not posting the usual immediate post match match report - a car park that was apparantly going to be locked at half 10, and a urgent appointment with a bar back down in Bishops Stortford put paid to that.

As Sky Blue Gull has said, we were pretty lucky to get away with a point so don't feel too bad about the late equaliser. Prior to the game in conversation with a friend (before the team arrived) I said the best we could hope for was to just play the game and get beat. Hearing that the team were on the M42 less than an hour before kick off led me to think that they wouldn't make it at any reasonable hour, and the game would be cancelled with substantial penalty to follow . With the minimal preparation, a point was a pretty good return.

I was expecting a slow start, but that didnt really transpire. What did was that we were pretty poor throughout. I'd love to see some sort of stat of winning second balls, as it must be frighteningly low. Northampton seemed to want it more, played the ball around a lot better but lacked something in the final third. Besides a key save from Bevan, we probably got in the more threatening positions but generally the play was at the other end.

Billy Kee's goal was a great finish, but on first view so was the equaliser - a difficult volley dropping from a great height, although I'll have to see it again to see exactly how far out Bauza was when he hit it. The fact we gave away the free-kick in the first place was stupidity on our part. We'd just scored, Northampton kicked off and were casually building down the right when out of the corner of my eye I saw a Northampton player tumble, and then the lino flagged. Quite what happened I don't know, but any offence was miles away from the ball and their was ample opportunity to contain the threat. I have a feeling it was Robbo who committed the offence (although I'll await to see a replay of some kind), and it seemed pretty unneccessary. But before Kee's goal, I would have been happy to hang on to the point.

The referee and main stand-side Lino were both poor, but for both sides. Seemingly pot-luck decision making process. The ref was a real "centre of attention" type - highlighted no more so than when Mansell and the home full back came together as the ball ran out of player. There was no "afters", no malice or anything as each player just got up and ran back to their positions, but the ref came steaming over with his hands out in a "calm down" gesture when there was nothing there!

In terms of our players, I thought Mansell and Lathrope stood out as good performers. Mansell worked tirelessly, linked up and tried to get forward. Lathrope made some crucial interventions and was solid. Robinson, Tomlin and Stanley all had their worst performances I've seen. Kee certainly pepped things up when he came on, and his finish was pretty good even if it was the first shot we had on target of the whole second half.

Given our propensity to lose the "easy" games, I had a feeling we would lose here. Coupled with the dire preparation for the game, to come away with a point is definately a point gained even though we were so close to more. Oh, and if you want an example of how "massive" a club Northampton are, witness the pitch invasion when Bauza equalises (those home fans who were still in the ground anyway). Pitch-invading at the prospect of equalising against such a small club eh? How the mighty have fallen.............

[ferrarilover]

Couldn't agree more about the pitch invasion, Jeff, it goes to show what a crappy little outfit NTFC really are. They didn't sing, save for one single chorus of 'you're not singing anymore' which was cut short by 400 Gulls singing Yellow Army. Regardless of deserved or not, in the end, they got a point against an unprepared, exhausted, poor Torquay side, and they needed the help of all three officials and a big slice of luck (that deflection off the wall could have gone anywhere, it just happened to drop to a centre forward, 6 yards out) to do it.
They can't shoot, they can't pass more then three times without it going out of play and they can't stay on their feet if an opponent is within 10 yards. Hopeless, hopeless referee allowed them to fall over time and time again, pressurised by a crowd which only made noise when whinging about Pickles. Their whole game is physical and long ball, they're a team of much less talented Billy Kees, in so much as it's a case of get it up front as quick as possible, then hold off your man or go down for a free kick. As soon as they tried to play actual football, they were caught miles short and usually ended up hacking the ball out of play.
If we had turned up on time today and perhaps not been playing our third match in 6 days, we would probably have dealt with this lot as they should be dealt with and dispatched a hiding to them. It's no surprise that they are where they are and haven't won a match since 1972, because, for all their possession, I bet we had more shots than they did. There is absolutely no end product to their play at all. Two set pieces and chunks of luck have got them their goals, not any real quality at all. Bevs has made two real saves all game, both fairly smart, but not so good as to make the highlight reel and NTFC must have had 70% of the ball. Jeez, no wonder their supporters are so angry at all the other clubs in our division, nowhere else are you asked to pay £19 to watch Conference style (and standard) football every week.

Thinking back over the Robinson chance from a narrow angle and an open goal header which Branno mishit (hardly his fault), Northants were just as lucky to get the point as we were.

One day, we will turn up somewhere and play like that and get the three points, as a fair number of sides have done to us over the course of this season.

That said, in terms of the big picture, 7 from the nine available against Bradford, Cobblers and Lincoln will be a par return and will see us probably maintain 4th place, happy days.

Matt.

[ferrarilover]

Oooh goodie, I've been quoted, two posts in a row, by a Cobbler, I guess it must be a man crush.

Well, Bananarama (or whatever) quote this:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/footbal ... efault.stm

"Bitter, clueless ****" apparently. Yep, that's us, crying all the way to the playoffs.

Matt.

[Boom Boom]

Oh how the mighty have fallen indeed. Despite an absolute nightmare of an arrival which put us so unprepared to play a game of football, they needed a large slice of luck & a 96th minute strike just to snatch a POINT. Some would argue they had the better of the game too.

Putting Torquay's chances of promotion aside for a second, I think Northampton Madrid have a real chance of being RELEGATED. Even Zinedine M. Jacobs needs to show his class to get this once massive club out of the muck they're in.

Despite the 80,000 weekly crowds it's worrying times ahead.

[gullsrus]

agree that it was a strange time to make those substitution, however the free kick shouldnt have been conceded in the first place especially at a crucial time of the game . apparentlly robbo elbowed one of their players . how stupid !!

[highweekgull]

Two comments to make about the free kick.

All of us who watch the Gulls regularly cringe every time we see Robbo raise his hands, pull a shirt or clamber all over someone - the coaches need to teach it out of him because he does it all the time and it is asking for trouble. This one might have been different and if so, I apologise but half of us weren't too surprised.

Secondly the substitutions. People have already said that they were stupid for three reasons. 1 the oncoming players couldn't get up to match awareness quickly enough, 2 - it gave Northampton time to compose themselves and 3 - they should have been made earlier to freshen up the team. There is a 4th reason as anyone who has ever played in defence knows, you get into a routine of knowing who does what and a last minute change like this means that no-one knows what everyone else was doing.

Schoolboy error Bucks - stop blaming others and take some responsibility.

Saying all that, if we keep playing like we have (apart from when we go a goal or two up and settle too deep), we should still make the play offs and who knows even better

[Enzo]

Even by Torquay's standards that was a bizzare night. You guys probably know more about the reasons for our lateness than I do. I know the M5 was closed, but to leave Torquay at 13:00 hrs for this journey on a Friday night is wrong - no excuses, just plain wrong.

Anyway, on to the game. Frustrating in so many ways. Bucks must have fed the players fizzy pop and E numbers during those hours stuck on the coach. We came out very hyped up - but not in a good way. Little discipline, no composure and little football played. All night we conceded stupid fouls. It was more like a wrestling match at times as the ball spent much of the time in the air with players pushing, shoving and grabbing each other whenever they could get away with it. Our ball retention was awful for much of the first hour or so. Trying to play pretty football at the wrong times and hoofing it when there was no need. We couldn't string four meaningful passes together. All very similar to Aldershot a couple of weeks ago.

That said, O'Kane took his goal very well, taking advantage of sloppy Northampton play. He was probably the only member of the Torquay squad with the ability to finish from where he picked the ball up. After this, Northampton stepped up a gear and had far too much space as we lost the midfield battles and failed to keep the ball when we had it. We gave away so many free kicks and it was only a matter of time before Northamton used one of them. I dare say some of the challenges were fair and that the Northampton players made the most of them, I'm no purist and there is a time and a place when the best course of action is to take the man out of the game - but we did this so often we just invited pressure on ourselves. I imagine many Gulls fans will say that the ref was a homer - maybe he was..........but we kept on giving him the opportunity to penalise us with silly, niggling fouls when much of the time there was no need. Both of thei goals came from a needless free kick concession. The first goal came form a free kick which was rightly re-taken as the first one was taken whilst the ref was trying sort out some pushing and shoving in the box. Typical of the night really. I thought they had over hit it, but it was headed back across goal and nodded in. A stupid goal to concede.

We were slightly better in the second half - a tiny bit more composed and started to create one or two chances as Northampton seemed to get tired. Robinson flashed one across goal - I have seen him put more difficult chances away. Kee came on for the very oirdinary Tomlin. We still struggled to retain the ball and Bevs made two very decent saves and his handling was pretty good under pressure.

Into the closing 4 minutes added time and most gulls fans present would have settled for the draw. Then up pops Billy with a terrific strike from the angle of the edge of the area. A peach of a strike. Had we held on it would have been unjust on Northampton, but who cares. We had the points in the bag if we could just remain composed and keep our discipline for two minutes. No such chance. People will look at the fact that there were seven or so minutes injury time, but in truth there was very little football played between the two goals - a couple of pointless substitutions and then there seemed to be an age before they took the free kick form which they eventually scored.

I don't exactly know what happened. I know Northampton had the ball on the wing not far from the half way line and there was no danger whatsover. Then one of their players went down on the edge of our box - completely off the ball. I don't know if he dived and I don't know which Torquay played fouled him, but suddenly Northampton had a life line. To be honest we had been far too keen on grabbing their players all night and it would not suprise me if free kick was genuine. Anyway. the initial free kick was blocked only to be smashed in on the volley - Bevs no chance. Que a bizzare pitch invasion as if they had just secured promotion.

In the cirumstances a decent point, but don't be fooled by any people blaming the officials or coach journey for this one. We caused our own downfall tonight and have no one to blame but ourselves. No discipline and no composure.

I think the team and PB have done very well this season - exceeded my expectations by miles. Whatever happens the season has been a success in my eyes. However, as well as this debacle I have now seen us against Crawley and at Aldershot, Accrington and Cheltenam in the last 6 weeks or so. In it's current state I don't think the club is good enough on and off the pitch to be anywhere near promotion. Tonight underlines that.

[Mav]

On a good day, leaving Torquay at 1300 should give you an arrival at about 1800. To encounter friday traffic, and tip towards rush hour near the end of the trip - this was poor planning. they should have left a lot earlier in my estimation

[gullsflyinghigh]

Bl**dy hell, some of the comments on here at the end of the game makes it seem like we've conceded one goal and our seasons over.

The truth is, its an away point and everything's still to play for! There's some crucial games coming up and the lads need to pick themselves up from this.

All to play for, would have been absolutely delighted with play offs if asked at start of season, nothing to lose now going into the last 7 games so lets have it!