Torquay United Fans Forum

We've hear a rumour, but it's mainly been from your end with our fans picking up on stories in your local press etc.

Would be interested in your assessment of him if he does sign, as I like what I've seen with him, but that's only been about 4 games in the last 2 years.

rumurchap wrote:Hes signed on the dotted line to be confirmed tomorrow. He left Birmingham at a young age as he wants to be a number one goalkeeper, Derby offered him a deal to be number two, choose Torquay to be a number one. Very good goalkeeper at the right age, will do Torquay very well. You will see soon and sure enough....

And where do we get the six figure transfer fee from?

Even if we believe the player himself would be willing to come here, Burton wouldn't let him walk away for nowt more than a twix and a can of coke.

Leon McKenzie? Northampton might be pushing the boundaries of Northern, though....

Yellow4life wrote:Jj melligan anyone!!?


Has Played for leyton orient!

Pretty sure he was a defender.

Ian Thomas-Moore has been released by Rotherham, was in League 1 before that. Fits the short hair and short in height bits, but wouldn't describe him as nippy these days (although he's always been quality, and would love him to sign)! The search continues...

knh316 wrote:los lobos-la bamba

Stop saying that, we have never run out to la bamba, the mexican song that got pop-murdered by los lobos, we used to run out to A BANDA, by HERP ALBERT AND HIS TIJUANA BRASS.

We did so for about 30 years (albeit with a gap in the middle), until Paul Buckle came in and said we weren't allowed to anymore, we had to play crap pop-dance chart crap to run out to instead to entice more people in. More people who wouldnt know were playing pop-dance chart crap because theyre not in the stadium to hear it.

I hope we can have it back now he's gone.

"It's not a top 8 budget, but it's certainly not a bottom 8 budget either..."

Hmm. If the reports on this website are to be believed, we will have less money this year than last, or at least we wont have any more, in the playing budget.

If our budget is pretty much mid-tableas Mr Ling supposes, I find it incredibly annoying, frustrating and nauseating that I was led to believe by our previous manager that we had practically no money and a budget that would be more akin to fighting relegation than pushing for promotion.

If we did indeed have a mid-table budget, I fail to see how scraping into the play-offs on the last day is a "massive over-achievement". It's certainly doing well, but its not exactly wining the league either!

I completely agree with SG, seems to be more cards on the table with Ling than there ever was with Buckle.

Fonda wrote: No, i can't 'point you in the direction' of anyhting. I trusted that if they were prepared to name them so confidenetly, the Herald had been notified of who was on the list. It's not my fault if they lied.

They didn't lie, they used journo-speak.... the shortlist is "beleived to contain" etc etc. The club are not responsible for the stuff that the Herald peddles. Bear in mind also that it wasn't Dave Thomas writing these articles. If it was, i would believe that the shortlist named was the actual shortlist, but if it isn't Dave then the Torquay news is always rushed and not well researched. Probably got half of the names on the shortlist from this board!

Lets not forget they thought Trollope had applied until the O/S said otherwise!

Fonda wrote:I'll humour you. The vacancy was advertised last Monday? Those seriously interested would have had their applications in by Friday surely? Is it too much to ask that with the critical nature of the situation the board worked over the weekend to formulate a short-list? How long does it take to say 'he'll be too expensive' or 'never heard of him' or 'what has he ever acheived'? Notify those in the frame today, with the intention of interviews - Tomorrow if possible, if not Wednesday/Thursday. Decision made, offer sent and accepted by Friday. If the eventual result is one completely unexpected, and doesn't come from the obvious list of applicants i'll hold my hands up - not something i've ever had a problem with. If it turns out to be Trollope, Forster or Hargreaves the argument will just be strengthened it was a decision that could have been made much sooner.

Pretty sure that what you've said is what's actually happened (and been publicly stated). In the HE they said that they were finalising the shortlist on Monday (yesterday) after going through all received applications, and interviewing this week, which by the looks of it is the same as your timetable.

The only difference may be in the date of the announcement. Personally I would imagine that the board and successful candidate will probably know who has the job by the weekend, but we won't see anything official until all the Ts and Is have been crossed and dotted and everything finalised, which will probably be Monday.

Hopefully the shortlisted managers would, by the end of yesterday, know who they are. If I was going for an interview with a club I would have immediately gone out and contacted people about issues like player availability etc., which is usually a topic for discussion at interview these days (see buckle's "extensive database of players"....eurgh). This should mean that as soon as the new man gets a tentative nod he can start trying to make his tentative enquiries come to fruition.

I think it's slightly naive for any of us to think that we'll have a new man on Monday who hasn't even thought about what was first on the agenda.

Although I agree we should cast a critical eye over the timetable and the boards actions, and even feel slightly anxious, I also don't think its time quite yet for heading to the panic stations like some members have been. Let's see who we employ before we do that!

Think you'll find we played them in the last-day-at-barnet season. At home park Chalqi got sent off and John gayle hit habib sissoko with a right hook in the changing rooms...allegedly. weren't we winning then drew?

O'neil Donaldson also scored in a 1-0 ldv-auto windscreen-paint-cup-trophy match the season before. Lost to Exeter the game after.

Stoke_Gull wrote:
Macclesfield I am sure won't be going down, they seem destined to hover above the drop zone for all eternity. They are the Wigan Athletic of League 2, a team no one really cares about, has rubbish support and would be easily forgotten if they ever did get relegated.

Harsh!

I'm sure they could say the same about us. People in glass houses etc.

MarineGull707 wrote:In tonight's HE it's says Beven, Branston and Stevens all to be offered new deals! Hope this is true not to fussed about Stevens but think we need to keep the spine of the team in place.

This is the problem with dishing out contracts before a new managers in Place: players like Stevens get to take up a squad space when it's entirely possible that the next guy wouldn't want him, and can't bring in anyone to replace him 'cause we can't afford to pay anyone off.

Can't see the point myself. Stevens has had about an hour in total of decent football this season. I would much rather his 10-minute cameo performances were given to halpin as an aid to his development.

Southampton Gull wrote:
As others have stated, that's exactly the situation Bournemouth faced.

Hargreaves with Milton being used as his right hand man.

Eh? Thought Buckle had nicked Milton away from us and whisked him up the M5?

Scratch that, just seen the other thread. Apologies!

With Milton leaving as well, i think the call for experience becomes even greater. If it's Hargreaves or Trollope, then I would take Trollope. However, if we could somehow convince Rioch to come on board my first choice would be Bruce with a player-coach learning from him (seeing as we can't afford a non-playing number 2), be that Alex Russell or any other player.

I quite rate Marvin Morgan, could be the answer to our big-man options. Might end up back at Dagenham though, i suppose?

Fonda wrote:
Seriously, if your board reacted 'hastily' in getting rid of him, it was a reaction to something. And from what i've seen elsewhere, that something was that many of the fans didn't rate him. I've yet to see a comment from any Rovers fan regretting that he got the boot.

A fair point, but lets look at the whole picture and see where he got sacked from: L1 at a club who's board expect them to be challenging for the play-offs, i imagine.

What we're looking at is whether he can do a good job here, and I'm not sure that Trollope being sacked by Rovers negated the positives he has in his favour (the previously mentioned promotion and 11th placed L1 finish).