Torquay United Fans Forum

How can a non- playing coach be a luxury? A poor one, yes. But oh boy, didn’t half this season’s team need a good coach!

Yes I wrote this in an earlier post. He most likely was offered a 3 year deal on the eve of the Play Off final, with a relegation clause written in.

Although relegation from the Football league and not National league is what they must of had in mind. As such, who knows if he may have had a pay rise with the thought we may be in league 2 shortly.

It didn't happen, and now we have a manager potentially with a very very good salary, it just makes sense he was offered good money 2 years ago though.

I do feel it was a mistake of GJ to let on his salary is unaffected, ego? As such, any of last seasons players thinking of staying on, will know they'll have to most likely accept less money, while GJs stays unaffected

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This just highlights how poor the recruitment has been

Cheddargull wrote: 05 May 2023, 18:55 This might actually still be the case. In his recent interview Johnson said the players would be getting less money but this wouldn't be the case with him. Is this because he is still under an existing contract? A lot of people seem to think he was given a 2 year contract in 2021 but this was never stated publicly. If he was actually given a longer contract, say 3 years, he would still be on the same money next season. Therefore maybe the club has decided to stick and hope and save the compensation money.
Agree with everything else in your post.

If he is on a 3 year deal I understand his staying, if he wasn’t then it’s a bizarre decision to reward someone for failure..

Cheddargull wrote: 05 May 2023, 18:55 This might actually still be the case. In his recent interview Johnson said the players would be getting less money but this wouldn't be the case with him. Is this because he is still under an existing contract? A lot of people seem to think he was given a 2 year contract in 2021 but this was never stated publicly. If he was actually given a longer contract, say 3 years, he would still be on the same money next season. Therefore maybe the club has decided to stick and hope and save the compensation money.
Agree with everything else in your post.

I hadn’t considered that, you may be correct.

That said, I think that comment may have been taken out of context. I can’t find it so don’t know for sure, but I don’t think that is what he meant to say. Might be wrong.

Enzo wrote: 05 May 2023, 16:03 I had mistakenly presumed that we couldn’t afford to sack GJ and were just seeing his contract out and hoping for the best. The ties between GJ and the owners are obviously stronger than I thought.

This might actually still be the case. In his recent interview Johnson said the players would be getting less money but this wouldn't be the case with him. Is this because he is still under an existing contract? A lot of people seem to think he was given a 2 year contract in 2021 but this was never stated publicly. If he was actually given a longer contract, say 3 years, he would still be on the same money next season. Therefore maybe the club has decided to stick and hope and save the compensation money.
Agree with everything else in your post.

There is one word to describe the recruitment over the past two years and that is 'dire'.

Who, apparently, is responsible for this acute failing? Why it's Gary Johnson and his brother who have both been rewarded for their evident ineptitude by keeping their jobs.

I'm aware that for reasons that involve nepotism the following will never happen. However, my proposal would be to dispense with the services of Aaron Downes who, according to informed contributors on this site, is ineffectual and Peter Johnson, who is to scouting what Mae West was to chastity. Use their inflated salaries to employ, probably on a part-time basis, a network of scouts with proven track records.

I accept that this might not be the answer to all recruitment problems due to the club's geographical position and the fact that other sides might be able to offer better terms. I do feel that it would, however, be a step in the right direction.

Interesting and sobering analysis CP. Thanks. I am sure that there are a fair few former TUFC managers over the years who will have a similar patchy record, but the recruitment over the last two years has been a major factor in our failure. Compounded by the fact that we are easy pickings for bigger clubs to cherry pick anyone who comes good who we have not tied down to a contract.

I’d hope that similar analysis has been carried out by the club as part of a frank assessment of what went wrong last year. I was surprised that we kept GJ - probably slightly disappointed on balance. Not foaming at the mouth, making myself ill disappointed like some of our fans, but things had gone stale and I saw it as an opportunity for a fresh start and a change of approach. I had mistakenly presumed that we couldn’t afford to sack GJ and were just seeing his contract out and hoping for the best. The ties between GJ and the owners are obviously stronger than I thought.

I’d feel a lot more confident in sticking with Johnson if the announcement was accompanied by a recognition and acknowledgement that last season was a complete balls up along with an assessment of what needs to change and how we plan to do that. The noises thus far are far too ‘business as usual’ and acceptance of the failure. Recruitment was central to that failure and by the time we got a squad fit for purpose we had ran out of games. Why was that? Was it GJ spaffing the budget, was the budget not available sooner, were the players simply not available at what we were previously willing to offer? I have no idea what the budget was - some people’s trusted sources, who shall never be named, seem to suggest it was OK?

Are the club backing GJ in a way that we didn’t last year? Has GJ accepted he got things wrong last year and changed his methods? If not, is this another step of managed decline? If that is the case, then why keep GJ and not go for a cheaper option? Why not use it to go part time? Those trusted sources, who are so untrustworthy to keep their mouths shut seem to suggest that GJ was on a fair wedge. Why persist with that unless you genuinely see him as the best prospect of getting back up and are going to back him? All seems odd to me.

A couple of other random things. I might be being ridiculously optimistic here, but I suspect one or two of the disappointments may come good at the lower level - or at least be adequate. I am looking at you MCGavin and Hanson. I think there is a player in Donnellan too. Reid was a target for the boo boys until GJ played him properly in the NLS. Different player from then on. I may be asking too much, but they have half decent pedigree for NLS level.

Finally, and reluctantly as I don’t want to pick on individuals - is having a non-playing assistant/ coach a luxury at our level?

If only we had won at Ashton gate….still leaves a very bitter taste. We have to stop signing under 21 player’s from academy teams, they just don’t fit into National league standards. My only matter on your post is the number of great loans GJ has brought in but likewise it shouldn’t have to come down to that. We simply have to recruit 100% this season and go guns blazing and enjoy a promotion season

Just spent some time looking at our recruitment since that dreadful day at Ashton Gate. We can all bemoan the players we have lost in those last two years but the quality of their replacements have, I think we can all agree, has not not been at anywhere near the previous level.

Leaving aside loanees, and youth players who earned a pro contract ( for what it’s worth ) - here is a list of players we have signed on a permanent contract and where they are now ….

Kieran O’Connell - Released 2022 (Weymouth)
Alex Addai - Released 2022 (Leatherhead)
Ali Omar - Released 2023
Dan Holman - Released 2022 (ON Chechnecks FC)
Klaidi Lolos - Released 2022 (Oxford City)
Mark Halstead - Offered new deal 2023
Dan Martin - Unsure
Tom Lapslie - Offered new deal 2023
Gabby Rogers - Bude Town
Byron Moore - AFC Telford
Joe Felix - Dulwich Hamlet
Opi Edwards - Bath City
Shaun Donnellan - under contract
Ross Marshall - under contract but
Brett McGavin - under contract but
Ryan Hanson - under contract but
Aaron Jarvis - under contract
Dylan Crowe - under contract but
Rhys Lovett - offered new contract 2023
Corrie Andrews - Transfer > Wealdstone
Louis Tomlinson- unsure
Ben Wyatt - released 2023
Jacob Mensah - released 2023
Frank Nouble - offered new contract 2023

So there we have it. Overall, I would argue a lot more misses than hits! The concern would be that there are perhaps four players in that list that, as it stands, will be with us next season who, I think it’s fair to say haven’t proved themselves at NL level. In a perverse sort of way, it may be a blessing that we aren’t “lumbered” with these players taking up a fair chunk of the wage bill at NL level - as there is surely at least a chance that they may be effective at NLS level? We live in hope!!!

Another observation, is that it’s quite frightening how “low” some of the intake of the summer of 2021 have fallen - which makes you wonder where some of the summer of 2022 might also end up!

Overall though, the impression is that, ultimately it has been poor recruitment over the last two summers has cost us big time and leads us to where we are now.

Interestingly though, when you look at the squad that GJ took over in September 2018, from Gary Owers who in most fans eyes was a disaster as Manager, it should be clear that Johnson inherited a squad that included Shaun MacDonald; Ben Wynter, Kyle Cameron, Liam Davis; Opi Edwards, Asa Hall, Jake Andrews; Jamie Reid and Ruari Keating. In all honesty, I would struggle to argue that, as it stands, we are going into this season with a stronger squad than that!

As is always the case …. recruitment is vitally important - perhaps never more so than this summer after what has to all intents and purposes been a disastrous couple of summers!