Torquay United Fans Forum

AlexGulls wrote:The world would be a better place if there were more Paul Buckles in the world.

So true, monogamy is the route of all evil and the world would be better without it.

Rather it be 100k for Macklin

You really have to admire Buckle - constantly battling in the face of adversity but would never complain about it......

His continued bravery and modesty bring a tear to my eye, a true inspiration to us all.

0 in 15 for Histon in the BSP wouldn't fill me with much confidence either.

Not his biggest fan, but there is a lot to be said for stability and familiarity in times of big change and upheavel on squad morale etc.

Seems like he's setting the groundwork to build himself up nicely, already alluding to budget constraints at supermassiff Rovers.

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How long before he says they are overachieving on a shoestring budget

Kuffour better than Zebroski?

hmmmmm.....interesting opinion

If your using goals to games ratios as a means of comparing Zebroski to other players, then you clearly have very very little knowledge of Zebroski, contary to what you seem to believe.

Rather his word be ethos, than "overachievement" or "shoestring budget"

I agree it's not a move without risks, but then, if Ling did get off to a bad start and Russell was part of the team:

1) Would everyone see him as 100% blameless - he would, after all, be part of the losing management team - many may believe complete change is needed

2) He would go from completely inexperienced, to inexperience with his only small experience being of losing and bad management - can't see many who weren't backing him now backing him to step up in this scenario.

I thought the comment "Not a top 8 budget, but certainly not a bottom 8 budget" was quite interesting.

Regardless of how factual the statement is, it's refreshing to see him lay those cards on the table and not instantly looking for an excuse for potential failure, or a tool for self promotion if things go better than expected, a la Buckle.

I've made my feelings clear elsewhere on whether we overachieved.

However, it's not a word our chairman should be using publicly and another "foot in it" with regards our approach to PR.

People of Torbay, come buy a season ticket - we won't be as good as last year and you shouldn't have high expectations of the coming season, but come and buy a season ticket anyway.

It's incredably pedantic, finishing a couple of places above the predicted position is not overachievement - it falls into the margin of error.

If you finished 17th, but you predicted that you'd finish 18th - you wouldn't call that overachievement.

Plus, if we really want to be pedantic - 68 points would almost always give you a top half finish, not play-offs - so from a points gained perspective we did not "overachieve".

Maybe people are trying to play up the shock of our achievements last year but I strongly recall many people predicting a top half finish before the start of the season, and a fair number suggesting that a play off push was a realistic aim, although automatic would be a stretch due to the small squad.

I certainly don't remember anyone predicting a relegation battle (maybe 1 or 2 but no more) and considering we don't do mid table, by not expecting a relegation battle, you are implicitly expecting a promotion push.

IIRC the beginning of last season was one of the most optimistic times I can recall for a long time among supporters.

I'm not sure - maybe I was always destined to be underwhelmed. Personally, effectively promoting someone who failed in the league below makes me quite apprehensive. I'll support him, but that can't change the fact I was underwhelmed.

To be overwhelmed would have required a positive shock - not exactly sure I can comment on what that would be given it would have been a shock.

I'm underwelmed, but let's not put Forster up on a pedestal.

Sure he had a good record at Brentford, but he inherited the entire squad at Brentford (there was zero transfer market dealings) and it had a decent amount of momentum before he was in charge, so he's never really been under pressure to change anything or had experience of the transfer market.

Those are two pretty big aspects of management that he doesn't have experience of and we have no idea how good he would have been at these.