Plymouth Argyle v Torquay United - 26/12/12

[Neal]

Just got back. We never ever deserved to win that! I thought we were very poor! Conditions in first half were difficult though but I can tell you it was dire stuff.

Their pitch looked amazingly good, probably due to it being championship std although they don't deserve it given their financial history.

I thought Craig Easton did well today, worked hard. Yes Downed did well also. Pokey did OK, but the rest, mmmmm..... nope did not do well at all. Bodin was poor, needs a longer rest although that isn't going to happen with our injury list etc.Thinking about it I would exclude Yeoman as well who I would give a start, he doesnt look out of place and deserves a few games OK n my opinion.

Draw was a fairish result, but when you concede at the end it always feels like a defeat whereas they will feel like a win, just the way it is.

[Gullscorer]

So two draws against Argyle this season!! But not to worry, I have a feeling we'll dump Excreta home and away..!!

[portugull]

My first visit to Home Park in over 30 years.
With the wind behind them it was all Argyle in the first half. We were poor.
Second half different game.Lingy has got to move Craig into central midfield. He is not, and never will be, a winger. Completely wasted out wide.
We have a great defence. Harveys goal was 2 inches inside Pokes left post. No keeper would have saved it.
We are still a very hard team to beat BUT only 2 wins in 8 because we invite our opponents to attack us as we do not possess enough power in wide positions and Rene, who has real class, gets poor support.We simply do not play the right type of passes to the big man.

If Martin can bring in 2 quality players in January we can still make the playoffs in a very tight league.Downes MOM by a distance. What a great signing.
For me a draw was a fair result but still hugely disappointing to concede again in the 90th minute.

[Plymouthgull]

Really fed up that we cannot defend a lead successfully. Saying that, we did not deserve to win. Overall, I thought we were poor and I am still not convinced by Ling's tactics. In all honesty, they were the better team overall. However it was interesting to see their fans celebrate the equaliser as if they had won the game. The biggest club in Devon delighted with a draw against 'Little Torquay' - who would have thought it?!!!
As for the players they cannot be faulted for effort, but Bodin, Stevens and Craig were poor. Craig is NOT a wide player and if not in the middle does not deserve a place in the team. Yeoman showed a lot of promise and although he made one wrong decision, his ball to Stevens was great and Danny should have buried it. I also thought the two centre backs were excellent.
Lastly, well done to the Yellow army - once again, an impressive turnout!!

[ROADRUNNER]

come on everyone, lets start with the crowd, over 10,000 in this league, with over 1500 gulls, great turnout, not so noisy as last year but as argyle fans have already said we were loud when we sang, weather was shit so all in all a good turnout from both sets of fans,
the game, well they dominated the first half and had many chances but the donkey chadwick was is usual self thank goodness, they used the wind but most of there shots were well high, pokey kept us in it with one superb save in the 1st half
2nd half , we came out of the blocks well and were far better, danny did well as was unlucky , rene worked hard again and put a good ball into the box but nobody there to finsh off, then downes scores so we are on course for 3 points, chadwick missus another sitter and again pokey comes up with a top draw save. but the pressure tells and they score, 1-1, backs to the wall for the last few minutes , angus never put a foot wrong along side downes, and pokey was on top form, all in all they had more chances but i think a draw was a fair result, and i would like to say the support today was superb, and as for mr bell ringer bartlett, you again made yourself look a right ass, spouting off again when we were all leaving the ground the stewards were more than accomadating but you nearly spoilt the day, several torquay fans put you back in your place. perhaps you should crawl back under your stone.

[ROADRUNNER]

just been reading pasoti, funny how people see thing differently, the ref had a yellow shirt on apparently, sorry i thought it was green, houlihane didnt dive in the penalty area apparently, i think he did!, purse shouldnt have been penalised for giving away a free kick which evantually lead to us scoring, sorry but he did,next they are going to tell me someone is going to sign chadwick and griffiths for a combined fee of 10,000,000, what utter tosh! :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D :~D

[ferrarilover]

We had 1 free kick in the first half, that bloody Purse did nothing but block Rene all day (although his foul was on Yeoman) and the referee would have to be very, VERY sure to have given a booking rather than a penalty to the home side. Given the excellent view he had, I'm not convinced he got it wrong.

Matt.

[ROADRUNNER]

maybe, but he got a lot wrong today, he was shocking . but he did get the houlahane dive spot on, the player should have got an oscar!how fletcher can say it was a penalty all day is beyond me, must have had his beer goggles on.

[goodluckgull]

It was a great day out. Positives are Ashley Yeoman ( he should start next game) Gus and Downey were superb and Pokey literally saved the day. Negatives another late goal...ouch and injury to Manse who was really brave making that block.

Errrrr Andy, please can you put me out of my misery and tell me what the other 5 fish are ?

[AustrianAndyGull]

Just for you GLG, the 15 fish ( excluding Chub and Wroe ) were Coley, Plaice, Rudd, Ray, Shark, Flounder, Dab, Poacher, Perch, Cobbler, Ling, Dace, Bleak, Sardines and Minnow. May i take this opportunity for bestowing upon you the title of 'winner of the inaugral andy's matchday thread quiz and the first and last as there won't be another because i'm not going to waste my time when blatantly nobody gives a sh#te'. I thank you for taking part GLG and, true to my word i shall buy you a pie of your choice should we ever be introduced at a game my good man.

Right, onto today's game and much of what i am about to post is pure personal opinion as i wasn't there today thank Christ. First of all massive credit to the fans who were there today off the back of an expensive Christmas and on a rotten and foul day weather wise. Especially for our friends in the north Scottish Gull who made the 4 billion mile trip from Edinburgh ( like he did last week v Exeter when the game was postponed ) and his fellow travellers Jaxx and Gaz. Either Scottish Dom is a multi millionaire with cash to go round at the tightest time of the year cash wise or he is fact, clinically insane. As he is Scottish i'd go for the latter.

Today is an epiphany for me as a Gulls fan in that i have finally come to terms with the fact that our manager is restricting our players, stunting their growth and development and limiting the teams potency due to his Goldie Lookin' Chain mentality. Each player has ingrained in their psyche, 'safe as f*ck' and many players of great potential are being flogged, hung drawn and quartered on a weekly basis in front of our very eyes and they themselves are questioning their abilities and they are forced to repress their positive actions and mindsets and are brain drained by Ling's ultimately clueless football.

I am not having a rant here, i am calm and accepting that whenever i go to watch Torquay i will always get the same performance. Stale and bereft of any 'zip'. It's dead football and has been for a while now. For all we could argue that we should have scored when we were on top or we should have defended better, it is tactics that generally dictate the ebb and flow of a football match and Ling's tactics are costing us points. There are 2 key issues here, firstly Ling is NOT utilising properly or maximising the potential of a number of key players because his attitude towards each game is so conservative and this often leads to turgid lethargical kick offs to games where the opposition is eventually always allowed a route back in to the game as we give them more and more possession and more and confidence that there could be something in it for them. We never turn the screw when we are on top, Paolo Di Canio ( for all his eccentricities ) would ensure that when Swindon attack, they do it at pace, with conviction and if it doesn't work they'd go again. We have a few minutes pressure, don't score and then give up.

Rene has been not scoring of late but we've been nicking the odd goal here and there, not good enough i'm afraid. The word Ling needs to drill into his players is ruthlessness but he can't do this and we just don't have it. If we don't find it then we're mid table at best. We are a play off side, i have no doubts about that, it's the manner and mentality Ling sets us out with that is costing us points.

Take Plymouth today, this is a side so poor and low on confidence that they are struggling at the foot of the table and have not kept a clean sheet for 3 months, since they played us at Plainmoor actually. I am 100% certain that if Ling had his players pumped up in the dressing room beforehand, set us out to bully them from the off, maybe play a 4-3-3 and get at them then we would be looking at a 2 or 3 goals return. They were there for the taking today and we let them off the hook because Ling has no motivational skills. It's really sad. We could have destroyed them today given the office, hell we were probably going to let one in some stage but if we had got 2 or 3 by being dominant and positive then it wouldn't have mattered. The frustrating thing is that i'm finding the old broken record coming back again but it's just not changed. I thought we had turned a corner at York but we've got worse. The quality of football being served up is sickening as i know we have the players to offer us more. They aren't being led or told they can do anything if they put their minds to it. They aren't being exposed to positive reinforcement, they are simply being told that what they are doing is good enough and acceptable. It may be for Ling but for me it certainly isn't and i'm sure that for some of our players who just want to be let loose it isn't either.

Ling manages but he doesn't take risks, even the most minimal of risks. It is impossible to be successful if risks aren't taken and it impossible to win things if we go out there not to lose.

[Dutchgull]

Oh dear...

[Sexy_Gulls]

Andy, I agree that Ling is too cautious and some of his decisions are puzzling (Craig on the wing anyone?) but to say he is "restricting our players, stunting their growth and development" isn't fair. Name me one player that has gone backwards under Ling's management? Howe, Stevens, Oastler, Eunan, Lathrope, Mansell have all played their best football under Ling, some weren't even in the team before. I'll give you Bodin, but he is either a dud or totally dependent on form. We simply don't have the personnel to be a ruthless attacking side, we have 1 excellent striker and only 1 winger with any experience. Bodin, Macklin, Thompson, Yeoman are all 20 or under. We don't have a good creative midfielder, and the only one capable is played on the wing. Clearly that is ling's fault, but even in the middle I wouldn't expect Craig to run every game.

I keep hearing fans crying out for a more 'attacking mentality', but no-one has yet explained what that means. Ling can tweak it a little, but I can't see a magic button marked 'swashbuckling adventure'. I would like to see 4-4-2 with Bodin upfront with Howe, Stevens and Macklin/Thompson on the wings. But we have injuries that prevent that, unless we play another youngster with no experience.

The thing that impresses me the most about the manager is that he always seems to recognise problems and do something about it. He fixed our flimsy midfield at the beginning of last season, he went 4-4-2 when Jarvis was fit. He clearly sees the problems just as we do, so asking him to take a risk overlooks the fact that he tends to be working on a longer solution. If we don't sign another striker in January then I will begin to worry about him, but up to now I think he his doing an excellent job.

[AustrianAndyGull]

Oh dear...

very well thought out and reasoned reply, thanks.

[Dutchgull]

Anytime !

[Dutchgull]

I will comment further when the beer has gone through me !!