Torquay United Fans Forum

Ling had a different mind set - he won matches by not conceding - but, now, with a more attacking mindset and even with a specialist defence coach, we cannot defend, cannot keep composure to clear danger, do not win enough loose balls, and it seems impossible to keep a clean sheet against any opposition (except against Aldershot and Wrexham, who just couldn't shoot straight).
At least we do not see boring 0-0 draws..
Luckily, the league is still wide open, but we really cannot afford to lose many more matches..and, at the very least, have to turn losing matches into draws.

The last two home games have been entertaining as the visitors have tried to play an open style of football - Eastleigh, in particular, played a quick tempo passing game, often one-touch passing because they played as a supportive team. We can play also but seem to run out of steam and confidence, and so revert to hacking the ball forwards in the air - indeed I lost count of the times we hoofed the ball to the Eastleigh keeper.
Our set plays need honing tactically - we scored a super goal from a short corner, but the majority of our corners went long and over heads, whereas all but one of Eastleigh's deliveries went into the six-yard area with obvious danger given our inherent failure this season to clear our lines.
We have to learn from such matches and to stick with playing on the deck - there is no point lobbing the ball into the opposition penalty area as we have no-one who is likely to score very often with a header. Our forwards are too static in the box, and we rarely exploit or attack the near-post with low balls in even though such play is as likely to produce an own-goal as a tap-in.
We badly need a target man for Jamie to play off - opposition teams are learning to mark our top-scorer out of the game, or he has to come away so wide of goal as to be of no threat.
Ultimately, we are a young side and you just cannot buy experience, but you can stick to a game plan...

Agree that Hartlepool were more streetwise than us, and that we get bullied too easily. We badly lack a genuine target man, an asset that most other teams have, who can both win in the air and hold the ball to bring others into play. However, we can play good football - just not, apparently, for two halves - and need to get our distribution and decision-making more consistent.
Too often our attempts on goal are high or high and wide - trying too hard, instead of testing the goalkeeper on the ground and picking up any rebounds. We can't expect Jamie to score all the goals for us!
Too often we loft the ball hopefully into the penalty area, often beyond the far post, and it is not as though we are likely to bullet headers into the net very often. So we have to play more on the deck, and, especially, look to exploit crosses into the near post area to create more realistic goalscoring opportunities. We seem reluctant to make runs to the near post even with two up front to look for space in the box.
Yes, playing neat football can make us more predictable, but hitting high balls just plays to the strength of tall or robust opponents. Perhaps we could even keep the ball from a kick-off rather than hoofing into touch; after all, we do give ourselves enough practice with kicks-off!

Amongst all the welcome euphoria and congratulations to playing, coaching, backroom staff, should we not also offer thanks to our owner for keeping us full-time, for reversing the disastrous decision to appoint the lacklustre GO last season, and for providing the funding behind our push for promotion which has hopefully galvanised both club and fans with some extra pride and passion for the future?

Our young players need to remember their practice/warm-up drills/skills - controlled passing, triangles, shoot low/actually hit the target, but all went completely out the window in the first half. And we are left to wonder why/how our more experienced personnel could let this happen for so long.
We must also wonder why we concede so easily when we have a specialist defence coach; it seems like any team can score twice against us on our own pitch! But at least we have normally scored enough goals to win; also inexplicable how the WSM keeper had so few saves to make when under siege in the second half. More composure needed.
COYY, learn from this abject team performance, stick to playing controlled football and make sure of promotion.

Ignoring all the personal stuff, the poor referring, and lambasting Billericay for successfully seeing out the game, the fact is that we greatly assisted the time wasting by just lumping the ball forward instead of using the extra man to advantage and actually keeping the ball in order to create chances.
Why is it so difficult to play against 10 men for a team of full-time professionals? We were clearly tactically woeful then, and we have to learn to be smarter. But we did have a relatively young and less experienced team for this match.
On the other hand the opposing keeper did make two fairly point-blank and crucial saves to deny us a third goal and almost certain win in the second half.

Should there not be an advantage in having a manager who has played and been coached at a much higher level.....?
Alas not in our case!

One minute Owers states he is happy with his squad, the next he spends all his time swearing at them. How difficult should it be for a professional manager with full-time pros to play to the strengths of the squad members? How can less well-known teams consistently come and show us how to be organised and to play as a team?
How can a professional manager send his players out to produce Sunday League hit and hope air ball. Shame on you GO.
Can we please find a manager/coach who will try to play some vestige of football basics. In this league we should be controlling matches and easily making sufficient realistic goal-scoring opportunities from open play and sensible crosses/balls into danger areas where the opposing keeper actually has to do something!

Quite frankly, apart from the joy of wondering who would want to stay and who would be wanted, it really doesn't matter whom GO signs or re-signs given that he has had most of a season to make us into a professional outfit on the pitch - he has failed.
Most visiting teams have shown organisation, teamwork, and composure, whereas we have resembled a bunch of uncoordinated individuals.
GO's 5-3-2 formation has failed - the 5 at the back have conceded goals far too easily, the midfield has not dominated or controlled games, the strikers have not linked together and have not found the back of the net. We have not played ourselves into positions to make easy chances. We have even failed to convert 3 penalties.
So if GO remains, and plays the same system lacking in cohesion next season, how are we going to win games in whichever league or cup competition we find ourselves.?

As Portugull wrote, Fylde won because they were better, they won most aerial contests at the back and the front, and especially PLAYED AS A TEAM. In fact for most of the season we have had the frustrating spectacle of other teams showing themselves to be better organised than us.
So if Owers stays will he continue to set up with 5 at the back (and yet we concede two goals to unchallenged headers), with our two midfielders who are most likely to hit the back of the net from the edge of the penalty area playing deep in front of the back 5, with no wingers, with two forwards running in different areas and not linking together, with overlapping full-backs hitting hopeful high balls beyond the far post (who have we had all season who was going to score with a bullet header?), with a midfielder apparently behind the front two who cannot head a ball or tackle??????
If only we had appointed Mark Yates when we had the chance...

Before we get carried away with the best Easter results in memory, tactically we should still be better in order to take the late pressure off and to exert our own pressure during the game. And especially in a must-win situation.
We began and ended the game with hoofs upfield, thus giving away possession, and we still think that the best way to take a throw-in is to lob it towards the odd head surrounded by opponents. We did take one throw to feet, and it resulted directly in Luke Young nearly scoring from the edge of the penalty box. And we still give opponents ample space in which to take their own throws-in and to keep possession.
We created two great one-on-one chances from slotted through balls on the deck as opposed to the more normal hopeful aerial route.
You can't win a game without the ball or with our main strikers chasing long balls to and beyond the corner flag. It isn't rocket science, so why does our management let us waste possession so regularly?
COYY, but do it with the ball please.

Oh, I forgot the other gripe, shall we practice throwing the ball to ourselves - which does entail some support and movement - instead of lobbing it to the opposition outnumbering our two hopefuls standing up the line?

Maybe it all depends on what we do on the training pitch this week - shall we practice hoofball to make the ever-willing centre forward chase hopelessly and get nowhere near the goal or his strike partner, shall we tell the midfield never to pass to one another or move forwards together, shall we work on having just one attacker in the penalty area and expect someone to make another lung-busting run between penalty areas to try and support, shall we agree to give the opposition the freedom of the park to impose themselves, shall we practice corners and crosses going over everyone's head????
Or just maybe we could practice playing as a team and thinking about how to make goal-scoring chances from open play and from passes and crosses on the deck... And even be professional in our approach...

Same old same old, either can't do or won't do the absolute basics - ball control, passing, playing to feet, movement, teamwork. Full-time pros producing hopeful Sunday League stuff.
And yet most opposition teams we have seen show how easy it is to control a game by doing those basics; when on earth will we learn????
As for formation, once we had a wide player - a sub of course - we actually looked dangerous, and even had as many as 6 players in one attack instead of the usual one max two in the opposition penalty area.
How does our coach possibly expect us to score without support? In a must-win scenario..... pathetic.

How much more depressing and pathetic can it get? And Owers claims at post-match interview that he knows what he is doing...
He plays a right-footed forward with little ball control on the left - ineffective. He plays a totally left-footed midfielder on the right - very ineffective. Try switching wings?- no, not part of the knowleadgeable master plan.
We play high hopeful balls to our new loan striker who spends all his time unsupported and having to jump or chase for punts he will never get. We put on a tiny winger who runs round in circles and hardly sees the ball but a midfielder who can't tackle is out on the wing instead - very ineffective.
We lose all shape and purpose in midfield and get carved apart.
Were Bromley that special?- no, they didn't have to be, all any team needs to do is stick to the basics against us, ball to feet, triangles, beat a man, provide passes to team-mates queuing up to score from close range. How many opportunities did we make inside the penalty area from open play?- I counted one. And yet in another must-win home game our keeper is arguably man-of-the-match.
Do we resemble a full-time professional outfit or a Sunday league bunch. If mere fans can see problems on the pitch how can professional management stand by silently and cluelessly?