Why do you support Torquay?

[andygull]

Just thought i'd post my first ever new thread and ask fellow Gulls out there why they support Torquay and what made them worship the yellow army. My allegiance to the Gulls is probably one of the oddest of all fans. I am a yorkshireman, born and bred in doncaster who used to play for and support Hull City ( when they were s**t i may add back in the early 90's when Boothferry Park was a hovel and Malcolm Shotton, Andy Payton and Leigh Palin were Hull stars !) I lost interest in football for a bit having become disillusioned with Hull , reasons including not getting a full time playing contract and missing out on cup tickets v Villa even though i had been to most home games in that particular season. Bitter! You bet!! Anyway, after a good few years i missed football dearly and decided to dip my toe in again. I had burned my bridges with Hull and so i had to do what i'd always believed was wrong......choose another club to support. I was only a teenager at the time after all and they always make stupid decisions!!! I basically stuck a pin in a map and whichever football league club it was closest to i would support. Premiership clubs were ruled out as they are basically just footballing mercenaries and i wanted to be part of a footballing community, not a worldwide footballing community!! Anyway my pin landed in Bovey Tracey and the rest is history. I love the Gulls and i do feel part of a special club with special fans even though i live in Derbyshire, was born in Yorkshire and have no real connection with Devon whatsoever (apart from many holidays there each year). I just wish i had not had that Hull City tattoo on my forearm which means me either wearing long sleeved clothing at Gulls matches or, in the summer a bandage over it. Best safe than sorry! I wanted to hear stories from other Gulls fans to hear their reasons for supporting the Gulls. Hope i'm not the only weird one!! Cheers!

[Colorado Gull]

Because i'm mad!

[Southampton Gull]

Born and bred in Dartmouth I was taken to my first game at Plainmoor aged about 6 or 7 and as someone else mentioned recently, one glance at a packed Plainmoor under lights, with the noise and smelll of a football ground and I was hooked. It was during what was the glamour part of our history, Robin Stubbs seemed like a God to me, Tony Scott created a buzz for me every time he got the ball and a cup of bovril, a real treat in those days, just added to the experience of going to see professional football.

My father played for Dartmouth YMRC and as a small child I always used to go and watch him play, that is unless he was playing somewhere in Torquay when I was allowed to go to my beloved Plainmoor.

After leaving Devon with my family to move to Southampton, I could only follow my team through the tiny coverage afforded them in the national papers. With the roads network far removed from what it is today, it was almost a 4 hour drive to get back to Torquay so I rarely got to see them play.

My own football career began in earnest after moving to Hampshire culminating in a Hampshire Senior Cup win at The Dell, where I had Matthew Le Tissiers peg in the dressing room and that's when I took the decision to retire leaving me free to follow The Gulls again on a much more regular basis. Both my sons were dragged along and are now die-hard Gulls fans, much to the initial amusement of all their friends. Through them though, there are now dozens of Saints fans with a real affinity for Torquay United, some of you will have met them at various games across the south over the past few seasons.

Nothing glamouroua about supporting Torquay, but as Andy alludes to in his OP, we're a special community in my eyes, some of whom are really "special"

[yellow]

Because they are my team. Through thick and thin.

They often disappoint, but when they do deliver the joy is multiplied many times over.

They are like an errant child that you keep forgiving through a bond of loyalty that you know is irrational but somehow you just can t help yourself.

I wouldn t swap them though. I pity those plastic supporters of the big boys with their over priced and over exposed Premiership fantasy football.

For exiles they are a constant point of reference and an awayday is a chance to be in the brotherhood of your fellow pleasant nutters. A home game is a pilgrimage back to your roots.

I m getting emotional now. Must go and lie down....

[Southampton Gull]

You soft old codger

Going today?

[westbaygull]

Oooh, what a great topic for a first ever thread, andygull, gives me a great opportunity to make my fellow posters glaze over as I recite my story...
I was born and bred in West London, and went to my first ever Brentford game at the age of 6, with my Dad and brother. From then to the age of 17 I rarely missed a home game for the Bees and often went to see Hayes (and they were only Hayes in those days) when Bees were away. When I was 17 and passed my driving test, I was able to see Brentford home and away, so until I had my boys, I watched pretty much every Brentford game and thought that there was no team in the world, nay universe, that could ever replace them in my devotion.....<<sucks on pipe and squints into the distance fondly>>
Anyway, fast forward on to '97 and I moved to Guernsey. Initial visits back over included a trip to Griffin Park but as time went on, more and more visits were made to Plainmoor as my (then) husband had Devon connections and had always followed Torquay. I had a bit of 'fondness' for the Club through the many Bees/Gulls connections - Pat Kruse, Jim McNichol, Len Bond, Danis Salman - many of my previous faves had played for Gulls at some point. When I moved back to the mainland, I often went to watch Bournemouth but never felt any real connection with that team and wasn't overly fond of their support either..
It was a very gradual process, but I finally realised that Torquay were indeed my number 1 football love, and I have chosen to see Gulls over Bees on a couple of occasions now. Whilst I hate to see them play each other (THAT Boxing Day match confirmed my allegiance) I deep down want Gulls to win, although feel guilty about that fact. It's like watching your 2 kids beating each other up, you want them both to be ok and move on and pummel someone else instead. Oh. Maybe not the best analogy, but you know what I mean...So, there we are. Anyone who says you can't ever support another team is wrong. It is possible, although obviously I could never support another team other than Torquay, Brentford and Hayes.

[Northumbergull]

Born and bred in the town, though have lived away since 1979. Been in Northumberland since 1987, hence my monicker!

Enrolled as a Junior Supporters Club member at birth, my dad took me along in the Stubbs era. He was a steward for a while in the grandstand. I have the only surviving metal link chain from the supporters club -it has a cast metal badge at the top, about an inch and a half across, showing an old leather football with the supporters' club motto underneath. Below that are individual links dated for each year from 1960-70. As I said, I know of nobody else who possesses one. It confirms my link to the club but, more importantly, it's about as rare a piece of TUFC memorabilia as you'll ever get. Mind, if you, or the club, would like to make a large donation, I'm talking in the hundreds, towards my charity trek, I'll part with it as nobody in my family wants it when I'm gone. Displaying this in a frame on your, or the club's, wall would be the talking point of any gathering of fans.

Drifted a bit when I first left home, but ran across Mervo's original site while studying for my nursing degree. As money's tight, I hardly get to any matches other than my "local" ones in the north east, though Wembley trips are ten-a-penny, of course ;o) Even then, Darlo's an hour's drive south from here!

I've brought along any number of locals to games, who all now shout out TUFC conversation when I see them!

So, all in all, I do what I can for the cause. Each of us has more, or less, resources than each other. But, even if I only look on from afar (and that's not as far as some!), my heart still stands on the Plainmoor terraces every other Saturday.

Cheers, and PM me to get bidding!

Bruce

[RussianGull]

I wasn't born in Devon, nor have i ever lived in the Bay, my Parents were Teign Valley born and bred.

My dad would always take me to away matches in the east midlands, Lincoln City (a) being my favourite fixture of every season, and when we were in Devon for family events/christmas/easter my Dad and Grandfather would take me to Mecca (as we call it in our house) and as others have alluded to, the noise, the goals, the ups, the downs, it gets to you.

My friends back home may support Chelsea, Man Utd, Liverpool but how many of them can say they've sung on the terrace and felt every football emotion possible?

Now i'm down in Exeter studying for my degree, it's just a train down to the Bay and then I can escape the Grammar and the Vocabulary of Spanish, Portuguese and Russian languages and I can stand next to my Grandad, watch my football club and feel part of something.

The only thing is to watch my beloved Torquay in the future, i'm going to have to find a job in Devon which uses languages!

[Ludlow Gulled]

Like Russiangull, I wasn't born, nor have I ever lived in, Devon but my family roots (at least one half of them) are in the Bay. My grandad owned a butchers in Walnut Road and he and my Gran were lifelong supporters. My dad followed suit and has some great stories of 22,000 at Plainmoor for Huddersfield and the day when we missed out on promotion to Alf Ramsay's Ipswich on goal difference. He maintains that Crystal Palace (i think it was?) put out a second-string side and rolled over against the Tractor boys while we faced a really tough Southampton team (or was it the other way round?). He also remembers knocking around with some of the players during summer holidays when he was hiring deckchairs on the beach and the younger members of the squad were renting boats out to holiday makers to make a bit of money during the off season - how football has changed, eh!

Despite growing up in Essex, regular trips were made to visit the grandparents and ,of course, Plainmoor and this is where my love for TUFC began. My gran was a great letter writer and she would send me clippings every week from the Herald Express which I would then diligently stick into a scrap book thereby securing my interest and devotion. There have been periods of wavering interest - when it was just easier to jump on an 86 to Green Street with my mates on a Saturday and watch West Ham for a fiver. But I know now that it was only ever a distraction. So many ups and downs: promotions and relegations, conference away games in the arse end of nowhere and visits to Wembley. Why would I want to support anyone else? Where else would you get the opportunity to run the full gamut of emotions season after season? Besides which, the tattoo on my backside pretty much seals the deal - unless I get laser surgery I'm in for the long-haul!

Without wishing to sound too sentimental, Torquay United is more than just the football. Others have referred to it being like a family and certainly, as far as my family is concerned, it is a key ingredient of the glue that binds us together. I sank a couple of pretty mournful pints with my Portsmouth-supporting mate last night as his i-phone constantly reminded him that his club may well cease to exist. I can't imagine how I'd feel in the situation - even though we've been to the brink and had a cheeky look over the edge. I don't even want to think about it. I've kind of learned to be unambitious for my club, even though I've loved the triumphs and yearn for more. I don't think we'll ever do a Wigan and I'm not sure I'd want to. Football is littered with the husks of teams with vaulting ambitions that have traded homespun integrity for cynicism and avarice. If I ever meet the devil at a crossroads, I'm afraid it's a no deal! I like who we are, I like where we are, I like what we represent. And now so do many of my friends too. Although it sometimes pains me to think it, I'm afraid I'm Torquay till I die!

[wivelgull]

You don't choose to support a club - it chooses you!
If you don't know what that means then you're not a proper supporter (you may as well catch a bus each fortnight to Manchester).
Whitby Town chose me when I was 13.
Torquay United chose me when I was 20.
No other clubs have since.

[HardofHerringGull]

I was ten or eleven, and a couple of friends of mine would come down to my place in Edginswell every other Saturday during the season trying to drag me up to Plainmoor.It must have taken about six months for them to finally drag me up there...the rest of course is history.



Sadly, though both of them have lived in Torquay all their lives, they no longer go to matches...and haven't done for a long time!

[HRG]

I'm Hereford born and bred but never felt a connection with the place, up until my children were born I was the only member of my family from Hereford.
Anyhoo, my grandparents are from Torquay, however my dad was born in Southampton but went to school in Devon and spent summer holidays with his gran in Torquay. During that time he'd go to watch the Gulls play and eventually passed that love on to me by taking me to watch them play at Hereford after much nagging from me.I loved it and that was it. My aunt and uncle live in Newton Abbott so they send the HE to my dad and one of his cousins works for the club. I couldn't imagine supporting my local team, it'll always be Torquay for me

[SuperNickyWroe]

i like bruce (northumbergull) lived in Torquay from birth until 1979, when i moved to sunny barnsley....

always looked for the score, but didnt start going till 1975. i remember have to wait till match of the day to come on and tell me the score when the gulls played on a saturday night!!

then that was it. and why not?

why not the support your home town team???

of course there have been ups and down, disasters, idiots in charge, idiots playing for TUFC, promotion, relegation, mediocrity.

its hard to say why. i just do. and im proud too, and i dont care (much!) if they lose, although i am delighted when we win.

its bizarre living in barnsley and supporting Torquay, although there have been a few players who have played for both clubs, i do get stick from my stepkids and my (alledged) mates, buts that doesnt bother me either.

and its great when we have done well and im strolling round barnsley with my Torquay shirt on, which usually results in a free pint for me.

so its hard to say why.

i know im proud to be a fan -i have the club crest tattooed on my shoulder on the strength of it!

but I know Torquay United will ALWAYS be my team!

COYY!

[Northumbergull]

SNW - good post, mate!

I, too, love to wear my Torquay top locally when we've done well up here in black & white land!

Cheers

Bruce

[Plymouthgull]

Born and bred in Barton. Went to my first game with my dad when I was six. The club finally choose me when I was 13.
I have no choice but to support TUFC - could never support anyone else including the premiershite!!!