Torquay United Association Football Club - Sole Director Clarke Osborne

[Yorkieandy]

MEAT PUPPETS!!!


Now they WERE a great set of puppets.

[hector]

For what it's worth, Chris Rich yesterday confirmed the Five Year plan is alive and well and in draft form. When or whether it'll see the light of day wasn't discussed.
(Target Number One: To get out of the National League!!)

So when the idea of a five year plan was announced in December 2016, they have done so well that it has only taken them 13 months - so more than year 1 of the 5 years - to come up with a bloody draft version of the plan. You couldn’t make it up.

At this rate, it’s going to take them 5 years to actually come up with the 5 year plan. Strikes of incompetence but the reality is they know exactly what they are doing. I’m sure they think the collective of thick Torquay fans will glibly go along with the 5 year plan nonsense.

[Teigngull]

We must be thick hector. All we're doing constructively, is moan & groan on a fans forum.
Osborne & Harrop must be going through the entire stock of marks & sparks gentlemen's undies by the amount of time they must spend pissing themselves at us 'keyboard wa#ker$' as previously described by our former chairman.
We have to get together very very soon & try & disrupt their shenanigans somehow & bring it to the attention of all those who have their heads buried in the sand too.
We've got to make them sit up & notice us & make them know for damn sure we aren't going away anytime soon.

[greb46]

An online site that appeared out of the blue asked the question,Why are Torquay United doing so badly?,out of the majority of replies many idiotic being that they are s--t,hardly any of them realised the reason why the club is in the position it is.Other responses included I live in Paignton but support Exeter because they're better!And there lies the irony many people would support another team from elsewhere due to success though if they'd supported Torquay with increased gates etc maybe over the years it would not have lead to the current situation. It is also sad that as others have mentioned there are many local people who are so disinterested in the club they neither know or care how the club has reached its current position.

[Teigngull]

One of the main problems within the catchment area of the club is there is no LOCAL interest for the club. I was born in Kingsteignton lived in Bishopsteignton, Shaldon & now with my family in Teignmouth some say what a lack of ambition, but I have managed to find everything I need jobs, spouse , children & entertainment (inc TUFC) in south Devon I've never felt the need to look far & wide for anything even a football team to support including one of the top teams which in my childhood's were the likes of Leeds, Derby & Chelsea etc.
Anyhow the point I'm trying to get at is, Torbay is full of people who have retired or moved to the area 'from 'oop north' who have no allegiance to our club at all, I work in the local govt sector & a good percentages of supported teams are the likes of the Burnley's , Preston's , Villa , Birmingham & Wolves etc.
People who arrive to reside in this area from the south east of the country, I have found, are more likely to be part of the 'yellow welly brigade' it's all to do with sailing & water sports. The local kids are nigh on guaranteed to be sporting a Man U , Liverpool , Chelsea , Man City shirt these days as it's rammed down their throats constantly by the written press & on Sky , BT , BBC etc how many Torquay shirts do you see parading the streets other than on match days ?
The club must do better in engaging with the local population it has to get in their faces & generate interest , their is so much more it can offer the wider public but it just doesn't try hard enough ( may be that's part of the 5 yr plan ! ) it never has tried to diversify apart from maybe the bowls club.
So, in a nut shell, if you want the business you have to go out & generate it, speculate to accumulate if the club is destined to die well then fair enough but for Christs sake die fighting not with a whimper as is now .
TUFC THROUGH THICK & THIN COYY

[SuperNickyWroe]

We must be thick hector. All we're doing constructively, is moan & groan on a fans forum.
Osborne & [highlight=yellow]Harrop must be going through the entire stock of XXXXL marks & sparks gentlemen's undies [/highlight]by the amount of time they must spend pissing themselves at us 'keyboard wa#ker$' as previously described by our former chairman.
We have to get together very very soon & try & disrupt their shenanigans somehow & bring it to the attention of all those who have their heads buried in the sand too.
We've got to make them sit up & notice us & make them know for damn sure we aren't going away anytime soon.

edited for accuracy.

[desperado]

Think Teigngull has a point with the local population, an awful lot have moved to the area compared to
other parts of the country and Torquay is simply not their team, I know some do come here and follow
and support the team but there is a lot of apathy and mickey taking towards us. No offence to anyone but you rarely hear a local accent in South Devon
its usually Midlands , South East,, Scottish, Manchester, Liverpool, Yorkshire etc
You go to the north east and everyone talks with a Geordie accent

[nickbrod]

Doesn't somebody at TQ1 talk Geordie?!

[Bomber]

Think Teigngull has a point with the local population, an awful lot have moved to the area compared to
other parts of the country and Torquay is simply not their team, I know some do come here and follow
and support the team but there is a lot of apathy and mickey taking towards us. No offence to anyone but you rarely hear a local accent in South Devon
its usually Midlands , South East,, Scottish, Manchester, Liverpool, Yorkshire etc
You go to the north east and everyone talks with a Geordie accent

Good point, I've long thought that a lack of civic pride in Torbay and South Devon being symptomatic of the apathy that exists towards the club.

[Teigngull]

edited for accuracy.

:slap:

[SenorDingDong]

One of the main problems within the catchment area of the club is there is no LOCAL interest for the club. I was born in Kingsteignton lived in Bishopsteignton, Shaldon & now with my family in Teignmouth some say what a lack of ambition, but I have managed to find everything I need jobs, spouse , children & entertainment (inc TUFC) in south Devon I've never felt the need to look far & wide for anything even a football team to support including one of the top teams which in my childhood's were the likes of Leeds, Derby & Chelsea etc.
Anyhow the point I'm trying to get at is, Torbay is full of people who have retired or moved to the area 'from 'oop north' who have no allegiance to our club at all, I work in the local govt sector & a good percentages of supported teams are the likes of the Burnley's , Preston's , Villa , Birmingham & Wolves etc.
People who arrive to reside in this area from the south east of the country, I have found, are more likely to be part of the 'yellow welly brigade' it's all to do with sailing & water sports. The local kids are nigh on guaranteed to be sporting a Man U , Liverpool , Chelsea , Man City shirt these days as it's rammed down their throats constantly by the written press & on Sky , BT , BBC etc how many Torquay shirts do you see parading the streets other than on match days ?
The club must do better in engaging with the local population it has to get in their faces & generate interest , their is so much more it can offer the wider public but it just doesn't try hard enough ( may be that's part of the 5 yr plan ! ) it never has tried to diversify apart from maybe the bowls club.
So, in a nut shell, if you want the business you have to go out & generate it, speculate to accumulate if the club is destined to die well then fair enough but for Christs sake die fighting not with a whimper as is now .
TUFC THROUGH THICK & THIN COYY

It might sound a bit mad but the club could really learn from Plymouth Raiders basketball club. They get 1k most weeks playing in a tinpot league in a sport that most people in the UK couldn't care less about in a town with a semi-decent football team and a fairly crap Rugby team. Having been to one of their matches recently they also seem to have a strong relationship with local companies and local media and not just from Plymouth but from the surrounding area. To be able to attract fans in such a situation requires a lot of relationship building and a lot of getting out there and changing people's views on the events at hand. They don't have an inbuilt fan base or a core pool of people to recruit from given basketballs' low profile in the UK and yet they draw crowds not much smaller than ours. These are exactly the skills that Torquay United should be looking to develop. Regardless of the differing sports, they could do a lot worse than talking to the commercial people at the Raiders and see how they do it, the skills are totally transferrable.

Good point, I've long thought that a lack of civic pride in Torbay and South Devon being symptomatic of the apathy that exists towards the club.

It's very true, the town has no unifying culture or history to pull people together. It's an artifical construct of the 1800s based upon an industry that has been in decline since the 70s and will never revive to any substantial percent of it's past glory. The only really famous person to come from it is Agatha Christie, it's famous in mainstream culture for Fawlty Towers and only Fawlty Towers and the idiot 1950s throwbacks that run the Council refuse to capitalise on this, refusing to build a statue of Basil Fawlty because it would 'send the wrong message' - what you mean people puking in the harbour is the right message?, in favour of an endless pursuit of a 'class and sophistication' image that the town last had in the 1890s and will never get back.

None of the town's sporting teams ever developed a Pan South Devon identify nor provided the town a sorely needed cultural focal point in the way that random no mark towns like Rotherham and Chesterfield have, they've never drawn many fans from outside the town boundaries - aside from Newton Abboters in the high spots of the 60s. We're a mismash of local Devonians, Scousers/Brums/Scots who moved into the Bay in the 70s/80s and are bringing up families, a load of retirees from elsewhere and a recent influx of Poles. The local economy is so dire that anyone who has grown up in the town with anything about them escapes in their 20s unless they own their own business or work for the NHS. There is a relentless negativity in the town usually eminanting from people who either want it to be like it was in the 70s and try to block any progress or didn't even grow up in the region. There are legitimately people on Facebook groups complaining about the Abbey Sands development when what was there before was a half burned out shell. There is an almost total lack of local civic pride/culture.

This combined with the over commmercialisation of the game, the oversaturisation of the EPL and people's desire to support a winner (even a foreign club like Barca) over a local club that can't tap into local culture because there isn't one is why Torquay United struggle to draw big crowds. It's even worse when compared to Northern post industrial towns of a similar size, with economies just as poor as Torbay's, who's sense of civic self identity is entirely tied up in their football clubs, thus enabling them to punch far above their weight while Torquay punches far below its.

[Southampton Gull]

Brilliant post. I've been thinking much along the same lines although I could never have put it so factually or eloquently as that.

I kind of mentioned this in my post about two of our board members from a few years ago who actively sought the help of those up the road at Exeter and were then dismissed by Simon Baker. I actually knew nothing of Plymouth Raiders despite being a huge fan of the sport and a quick look on the internet shows a lot more about them than you would find about TUFC. The rise of the Exeter Chiefs is another that should be tapped into. We've been mismanaged at Board level for so long it's about time that all changed. For now, TUST could easily set about forging links with these clubs and tap into their knowledge of how to engage the locals and local businesses.

There's a decent core of supporters from my home town of Dartmouth and I'm sure it's the same in towns all around the area so there is definitely potential for growth if the business plan/model can be worked upon. I'm sure with a buzz about the club it would easily attract newcomers to the area up to Plainmoor if it's handled properly. I guess it's about finding the personalities to successfully promote the club, we're definitely not short of those kind of people among our fan base.

Thanks for the insight.

[greb46]

Have received a reply to my email regarding status of Plainmoor from Torbay Council if anyone interested can e-mail to them

[SenorDingDong]

Have received a reply to my email regarding status of Plainmoor from Torbay Council if anyone interested can e-mail to them

Might be worth putting it on this site with any personal info redacted for maximum visibility.

[greb46]

Would do unfortunately I'm not PC savvy enough to know how.