Stats tell me that away from home we have scored 9 (3rd lowest) and conceded 11 (3rd best)
At home we have scored 21 (joint 7th highest) and conceded 16 (middling bad, cant be bothered)
So we are defensive away from home and get the stats you would expect. It's a pretty accurate reflection on our tactics and results away from home W2D5L5
At home our decent scoring record and not that great defense shows suggests that we are trying to be more attacking but not getting the rewards. Tellingly we concede more goals due to our attacking play at home. Our 6 wins isn't too far behind the highest and our goals scored is only 5 less than the most prolific team.
So really its the defense who are letting us down at home, perhaps due to us being too attacking...
Not sure about the last bit sexygulls!
But overall that is a quality post. As someone who watches mainly away games i can see how the stats are formed. My complaint is that in a lot of the away games i have seen we would definately have won more games just by turning up the heat just a notch. We have been far too conservative away than we have needed to be and, like you say, as we generally concede, it either results in a draw or a loss.
Strangely enough it was Pope Gregory the 9th inviting me for drinks aboard his steam yacht, the saucy sue currently wintering in montego bay with the England cricket team and the Balanese Goddess of plenty.
So we sold Ellis for 80k and bought Bodin for 70k - the no money excuse just doesn't stand up. That was bad business in anyone's book. As I said before a player like Zebroski would have cost a fraction of what we paid for Bodin and is probably better than twice as good.
Its ok trotting the same old "we are broke" line out. Therefore its all the more important to spend what you have got wisely. Bodin is looking like the biggest Turkey this side of next Xmas.
austrianandygull wrote:An example of a typical attack which we should be doing. Give the ball to Thommo / Stevens who run with the ball at defenders and whip balls into the area. That is all they have to do, they don't even need to look up at where they are hitting the ball just as long as they attack at pace and whip balls in. If we have Howe, Jarvis and a couple of others in there then we can get on the end of it. I was at the Northampton home game and was not surprised to find that Northampton had loads of men over in and around our penalty area in dangerous attacking situations and when it was our turn to attack we only had a few up top. It was only a crisp precision pass by Craig to Stevens who picked out Jarvis to score that created our only opportunity of note. It was only a matter of time that Northampton scored from one of their plethora of goalmaouth scrambles in the box because they had the manpower in there in the first place! We don't have to play like Barcelona, just give the ball to our quick players to run and cross and so long as we have men over we can score goals. If a fast player like Thommo can't do something as simple as run fast with the ball and cross it and a clinical finisher like Howe can't get on the end of some of the crosses then God knows!
So what you are saying is that if we had played in the same way that Northampton had we would have scored more than the 1 goal we did. An argument clearly born out by the number of goals that Northampton scored in the 1-1 draw. :na:
Jerry wrote: So what you are saying Austrianandygull is that if we had played in the same way that Northampton had we would have scored more than the 1 goal we did. An argument clearly born out by the number of goals that Northampton scored in the 1-1 draw. :na:
Jerry I'm shocked! Are you saying he is not the Messiah? There was me thinking that Martin Ling (you know the football professional with many years experience) had a serious rival for picking the team and deciding on tactics.
Spoilt my Christmas has this revelation Jerry. I was so looking forward to seeing our players haring forward with heads down and then crashing the ball in for the grateful defenders to deal with. I'm sure that that revolutionary approach would never have been sussed out by our League 2 rivals.
Andy, you say youth doesn't make a difference - were you as good at your job then as you are now? I don't think so. Saying it doesn't make a difference is frankly ridiculous.
Another thing then, would you rather finish 18th playing nice football or finish 7th by playing as we are?
One of the problems is that people are constantly looking for justifacation for paying to stand out in the wind and rain each week supporting a team that aren't providing. If we aren't good enough to score goals and win convincingly, then the current senario won't change...Our era of the 1-0 wins has gone (Let it go).
The argument about what is more important, a drab narrow victory or a multi goal entertaining draw will go on for ever but the requirement of constant effort is beyond debate.
I suggest that people reread comments made by AustrianAndy, they are not condeming but reasonable valid points that need to be addressed
Bullshit - whether we were "gifted" money or not makes not a jot of difference. We still paid an over inflated price for a player who really could not command a regular place in any team.
coley wrote:One of the problems is that people are constantly looking for justifacation for paying to stand out in the wind and rain each week supporting a team that aren't providing.
Good point. I only see the team 10 or so times a season so this won't affect me as much as others.
I suggest that people reread comments made by AustrianAndy, they are not condeming but reasonable valid points that need to be addressed
No-ones condemmimg Andy, were responding to his points. It's called a debate.
brucie wrote:sh*t - whether we were "gifted" money or not makes not a jot of difference. We still paid an over inflated price for a player who really could not command a regular place in any team.
True - but goes some way to explaining why we haven't bought anybody else - we have no money.
True - but goes some way to explaining why we haven't bought anybody else - we have no money.[/quote
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This opens up another debate and one which i know there a few of you out there who agree with me. The debate of youth players being given a fair crack of the whip and also the debate of whether or not we should really be throwing our energies into finding local amateurs or semi pro's that could step up and provide us with a steady stream of players.
If we have no money then instead of whining about it ( which i know Ling has done ) then whoever at the club is responsible for youth ad scouting should be scouring the south west for young lads who could do a job at league 2 level. I don't even have to know the area to know for a fact that there are loads of them out there that aren't being unearthed for whatever reason. Finding these players and giving them a trial should be top of priorities for our club. The non leagues are a place where players are there ready to be cherry picked, will cost nothing and could even make the club a few quid if they turned out any good. Why are we bothering wasting £70k ( or £20k whatever your viewpoint ) in bringing in young players like Bodin who 'HAVE POTENTIAL' when we could be spending nothing bringing in young players from non league who 'HAVE POTENTIAL'. It's a no brainer really and for a club who is brassick it's the ONLY SUSTAINABLE WAY FORWARD. We should be having trials every couple of weeks inviting all sorts of players over, and i don't just mean ones from 'higher non league clubs like Truro but lads from pub sides even. I don't know if it's lazy scouting but these players exist, lots of them exist.
And on the subject of youth, i have said this before also. What is the point in having a youth set up when none of them ever get a fair crack of the whip. Why have we still got Halpin? He will never be a part of Torquay, anyone can see that yet we keep him. Why?! Let him go if we don't think he's good enough or play him more. Same with Yeoman, been around a while now but only now getting brief run outs just because we are totally desperate for personnel! If these players aren't going to be given a chance on their own merits and only play when we are screwed for players then the manager clearly thinks they aren't good enough. Get rid of them then and then question the usefulness of the youth set up as for the number of ultimate first teamers we get coming through it doesn't work.
Strangely enough it was Pope Gregory the 9th inviting me for drinks aboard his steam yacht, the saucy sue currently wintering in montego bay with the England cricket team and the Balanese Goddess of plenty.
Your not going to see the benefit of the new youth department right now, our youth department was disbanded and now re established,so because there was a break a lot of the good local youngsters went to our rivals. Players like yeoman and halpin are the last of the old batch as such. As a club we are now recruiting nationwide and I guarantee we will soon see players being sold on to other clubs and also some youngsters who will establish themselves in the first team. Even if you look now you have had Mackenzie and Thompson this season and I think you will see players like Sullivan and Hutchings coming through in the future. The youth set up will start to reap rewards. But it's about being patient as you cannot expect immediate results, but the youth set up is a much more professional unit under Geoff harrop compared to the past.
Lots and lots of things wrong here, Andy. The two that stick out from a vague skim read seem to be that we are not a team who goes all out attack from the first whistle because that's not how we play. If we went in all boom boom boom and found ourselves 4-0 down after 230 minutes, guess which Austrian among us would be the first to complain.
We didn't sign Bodin who had potential, we signed Bodin who walked through the door and slotted in as a player very nearly as good as Eunan while on loan last year. The fact that that was a complete fluke (Brucie, you old wind up merchant you, this is for you as well) is something that couldn't possibly have been predicted by Martin or anyone else. Even in pre-season, he scored that incredible goal against Stoke. Yes, he now looks like a lemon, but since not a single one of us called it when we signed him initially, I think it's a bit of a liberty now for some to be having a pop at ML for making that decision.
Also, for some balance, I disagree with the OP in so far as we are not overachieving being in the middle of L2, that is where we have spent 99% of our time in existence, it's where he level out. We're better than the real non-league rubbish (Rovers, Barnet etc), but not every quite rich or lucky enough to be up with the big boys (Gillingham, who, lest we forget, are riding the wave of robbing Saints of £3,000,000 for one of the worst goalkeepers the world has ever seen) and Port Vale who, it seems, simply take stuff, promise to pay for it, then go into Administration every 5 minutes and have their debt written off.
I totaly understand why some are being negative, 2 seasons back play-off finalists, last season came within 180 minutes of gaining automatic promotion getting beat in the play-offs again. Expectation levels have risen massively amongst our support, and why not ? This was all achieved on the same limited budget that we have this season.
I really hate the tag "overachieving" In football, over 46 matchs good and bad luck evens itself out, mistakes are rectified etc, etc where you finish in the league is on merit. We did not finish 5th last year through overachieving, we finished 5th because we were the 5th best team in the league, what happened is we achieved some relative and unexpected succsess nobody could be sure if that would happen again, so you dump the tag overachieving on it as a way to try and manage expectation levels.
All in all us Gulls fans have little to complain about really, the club have spent a great deal on rebuilding the infrastructure, we have a staduim, training ground, coaching set and youth set up to be proud of, and that was needed to carry the club forward. Money had to be spent in these areas otherwise we would have just gone backwards we all see it.
When you have low attendances and as a club you are not cash rich then a youth set up is vital, our youth set up is now scouring the whole country and abroad for young talent, that will take time but will deliver. I do not think it is however a case of going around the local semi-pro scene looking for potential the standard is no where near good enough, do agree that we should be looking around the conference premier, North and South, and down into the Southern/Northern premier leagues where there is some real quailty young players hungry for a chance.
This season we have been unlucky with injuries, however at times the football played has been dire. It about getting the best out of what you have in terms of the playing squad, and finding the right balance between attack and defence, if you dont attack you cant score or win. I dont think we have allways found that balance this season though I do accept we cant go out with the attitude we will score more than the other team.
I had a quick chat with Bengull at Plymouth and think we both agreed we are a midtable team this year and thats something all might have to accept, however dont think it would take much tweaking to get us back in the play-offs.
To end this now, think we all agree dont we that our club is very well run we dont spend money we have not got, that is the right way and for that we must be happy surely.
and our goals scored is only 5 less than the most prolific team.
