Maidstone Utd v Torquay Utd Sat 27 Aug 3pm

[Nick Potkins]

Very poor again today, something is clearly not right.

Time for change, but you can't say that!

[thebigp1]

What a nightmare start and we thought last season was bad.
This is nothing like a Gary Johnson side
What is going on ?
ONE goal in 5 games !! and look how Maidstone have been shipping goals and where Halifax are who battered us all game.
This is becoming a relegation fight already
Can anyone see a win or even a goal
on Monday ? Of course not

Thoroughly depressed.

Completely agree, we are in a relegation battle. Our only win was at Halifax and we got battered by them. They got spanked 1-4 at home today.

[brucie]

Shocking isnt it.

Maidstone are terrible. Radio Devon commentator calling us a disgrace and embarassing.

Lapslie came on as sub and went off injured 5 minutes later. What a farce. It seems like half our team were hobbling at the end of the game.

[Leonharper2004]

What an absolute shambles! So called marquee signings that are supposed to be pushing for playoffs can’t score more than 1 in 5 games. Something has to change!

[grockle]

All we are saying, is "Give us a goal"! Never thought I would be saying that about a GJ team!

[Minneapolisgull]

The hope we had at the beginning of the season has evaporated in the first 3 weeks of the season!
This season I was led to believe great pre season (as opposed to last season with the late finish and th heartache of the playoff)
Sadly it seems worse cannot score a goal for live nor money
Poor performances
Once again injury list growing! Where do we recruit the hospital?
Along with poor recruitment
My question how can a team like barrow who were our rivals( we were trying to chase them down) when we went down flourish in league 2 low attendance not well backed financially. I am sure Barrow is not the most desirable place to live.
How are they seeming to get it right?
I fear mid table is already our goal for this season. Another long disappointing depressing winter ahead for the yellow army

[The deluder]

I think you will find that Barrow are backed by an American owner who underwrites their loses. A bit like Torquay and Uncle Clarke.

[standupsitdown]

A game of two halves.

We were well on top for much of the first half and could have been three up in ten minutes. Loads of long throws but they weren’t working and perhaps we should h as ve tried another tactic.

Maidstone we’re awful first half but after half time they looked a different team, we hardly had an attack and a late winner seemed inevitable.

Overall we deserved to lose but if we’d scored early as we should have done may well have won easily.

Very worrying that we can’t score and can’t blame ref, opponents tactics, or them being one of the potential top sides. We were beaten by Maidstone who lost 5.0 at Wrexham last week and for the first 20 minutes or so looked as if they expected to lose by another five today.

I’m not sure the answer is but when the team are being outplayed by Maidstone and seem happy for a draw, I question the ambition and team spirit as much as the quality of the players.

[MellowYellow]

What I witnessed today was a truly magnificent display of two teams playing hoof-ball. Maidstone were absolutely dire and Torquay ... best I say nothing as there is nothing to say.

[standupsitdown]

What I witnessed today was a truly magnificent display of two teams playing hoof-ball. Maidstone were absolutely dire and Torquay ... best I say nothing as there is nothing to say.

Yet we started the game with some good passes and flicks that led to good chances.

Not an excuse, but the pitch must be an advantage to Maidstone as it doesn't play like grass. The ball actually holds up, unlike the old plastic pitches where it rolled and bounced high.

[MellowYellow]

Yet we started the game with some good passes and flicks that led to good chances.

Not an excuse, but the pitch must be an advantage to Maidstone as it doesn't play like grass. The ball actually holds up, unlike the old plastic pitches where it rolled and bounced high.

Good strikers bury good chances, so let just say a couple of half chances; I don't want to write off half of the squad five games in, although having watched four of those games I am beginning to think we ought to consider it. No excuses it was a dismal performance by both teams.

[Bristol_Gull]

I have enormous respect for Gary Johnson and what he’s helped us achieve with minimal resources, however I do grow tired of his responses after games where he lambasts players for not being good enough or having the experience for this league.

Whilst I can appreciate that part of this may be reverse psychology in giving players the oomph to prove him wrong, the reality is that this is the national league and we don’t have club owners determining who we sign…these are almost ALL GJs signings and therefore if they don’t have the attitude, character, desire, skill or quality then it’s on the manager and the back room team for poor recruitment. Have you ever hear Gary take responsibility for a defeat in the post match commentary? Come on.

Don’t get me started on injuries. What is going on? Every season under Gary’s tenure we have had the same problem. There has to be something causing the perpetual injury list other than simply bad luck? How does our injury list compare to other clubs in the division?

To hear GJ say that Lapsie “said he was good to go” and to then go off 10 mins later is not good enough! We are supposed to be a professional football team, and with all due respect, if our new 22 year old physio doesn’t yet have the experience to make such a call on our players fitness then we need to look ourselves in the mirror and ask what is going on?

The pressure is on and we can’t wait until the last part of the season to go on a run if we want to get anywhere. There is stronger competition than ever before in this league so we will need to see a major uplift in commitment from the squad to stand a chance of promotion this season - Gary needs to get the players motoring like we know he can

[thebigp1]

I have enormous respect for Gary Johnson and what he’s helped us achieve with minimal resources, however I do grow tired of his responses after games where he lambasts players for not being good enough or having the experience for this league.

Whilst I can appreciate that part of this may be reverse psychology in giving players the oomph to prove him wrong, the reality is this is the national league and we don’t have club owners determining who we sign…these are almost all GJs signings and therefore if they don’t have the attitude, character, desire, skill or quality then it’s on the manager and the back room team for poor recruitment.

Don’t get me started on injuries. What is going on? Every season under Gary’s tenure we have had the same problem. There has to be something causing the perpetual injury list other than simply bad luck? How does our injury list compare to other clubs in the division?

To hear GJ say that Lapsie “said he was good to go” and to then go off 10 mins later is not good enough! We are supposed to be a professional football team, perhaps like our squad our new 22 year old physio doesn’t yet have the experience to make such a call on our players then we need to look ourselves in the mirror and ask what is going on?

The pressure is on and we can’t wait until the last part of the season to go on a run if we want to get anywhere. We need to see some commitment from everyone on and off the pitch before it’s too late.

This is spot on. I appreciate we are by far the biggest club in this division but we are a far bigger club than the likes of Maidstone, Boreham Wood and Bromley all of whom have beaten us without us even scoring. Their budgets cannot be bigger than us and we have been a football league club for much of our history. It’s time we started acting like it.

[Taelee73]

Relegation battle, in August.
Unfortunately every other season we lose the spine of our team, Gary has to rebuild constantly, the injuries we continually suffer mean we rarely put out our first choice eleven for consecutive games.
Certainly the injury situation needs addressing, in my opinion its what's been stopping us returning to the football league.
Does Gary try to get players back playing too soon? Are they pushed too hard in training?
With no reserve team, there is no alternative but to be hard on them and then put them straight back in. We certainly need an experienced and strong physio who can say 'no' to the second part.
Do we gamble on experienced and/or classy but fragile players? Yes we do, some come off but most haven't. Do we gamble on marquee signings? Yes, because we can't seem to bring on our own younger players.

Is Johnson still the best person to drive us forward? I'd say yes, even with the the issues we have. What's the alternative? Pay him off, put Downey in charge with limited funds. Pay them both off, and new guy has no money to spend?
Last seasons start was very similar, leave it to him to get it sorted.

[culmstockgull]

Bristol_gull, a shockingly accurate assessment, last season we recruited late and poorly and Johnson wanted 10 games for them to settle, decided they were not going to and got in a few more and achieved nothing more than to stabilise the team and the mid table finish was an accurate reflection , in fact undoubetdly flattering, this season with a full pre season and lots of early acquisitions , as perfect a pre season as you can get and yet we are still having a conversation about giving them ten games, the most telling comment I took from Johnsons post match today was that we do not know enough about some of these youngsters ,that comment is an embarassment for a pro manager who signed them at the behest of his brother.
We have two of our best players than cannot be trusted to play on 4G without copping an injury, we have a strapping centre forward that had two dead legs in pre season and still cannot manage to put on a shirt a month later, perhaps that is the one Johnson mentioned in midweek as being precious.
There will be those that rightly say its only 5 games in we can only get better, but so can every other team in this league. We need experienced players that turn up for both halves, know how to pass to one of their own and for goodness sake sack this stupid 3-5-2 system, we do not have the quality in the squad to make it work.