TALKING POINTS

Rob Dand

Rob discusses the opening day victory

ATMOSPHERE

A young, ambitious manager with a squad rebuilt from scratch, almost 4,000 fans in the stadium and a massive yellow flag being dragged along the Popside – Plainmoor was ready to party like 2007 this weekend, and what a joy it was to be behind a club at least vaguely facing in the right direction. All the scrutiny over the summer must have brought added pressure, but a beautiful summer’s day ensured a comfortable, reflective mood, and the buoyant atmosphere even withstood the disappointment of an early goal against. It’s been quite some time since we’ve been able to enjoy a game of football like this at Plainmoor.

CREATIVITY

In recent seasons, we’ve not had many players with the vision or ability to deliver that key pass into the final third. Omar Mussa looks like the kind of intelligent player who thinks of the second most-obvious pass first, and on more than one occasion he surprised opponents and teammates alike with his clever, incisive distribution and close control. Looks like the kind of player who might start to drift if he isn’t kept involved, but his replacement in the second half Hasani also posed a threat, operating with a more direct mindset. There are others too across the team – Hayfield, Carson – who are clearly going to be looking to contribute in an attacking sense.

TT MATCH VERDICT – TUFC 2-1 ENFIELD TOWN by Tom Diamond

FITNESS

If there was a Torquay United ‘new season’ bingo card, you’d expect to check off the box marked ‘Manager promises to have the fittest team in the league’ pretty early on. This dates right back to the days of Nicho and his infamous tyre-flipping challenges, although you at least got the sense in those days that he meant well, as the man leading the training exercises. Of course, Gary Johnson’s borderline gaslighting had no obvious visible benefit on the pitch. Ever the wily character, perhaps his defence would be that he didn’t say which league… Wotton’s methods seem to be working, though, as the tempo for large parts of Saturday’s game was good, with some direct passages of play interspersed with more patient cross-field build-up, a necessary and sensible pattern in the August heat.

SQUAD DEPTH

This links to the previous point, but something else we learned this weekend was that unlike previous managers, Wotton is not afraid to make use of his bench, which will both protect the players who start and give those coming on valuable minutes with which to contribute. We made four substitutes against Enfield, including not one but two strikers, and not one of them felt like a significant downgrade in that situation. The squad as a whole feels a lot more balanced this year, and you get the sense that everyone will get an opportunity to stake a claim for a starting place.

COMPLACENCY

Wotton said after the game that he felt there were a million things to work on. I think he was being slightly harsh there, as I only counted 999,000, but it is pleasing that he feels that there is a lot more to come from these players. One thing that may trip us up is complacency – you could argue that we weren’t alert to the danger for the Enfield goal, and although they finished the move off really well in very direct fashion, every Torquay player was a yard too far off his man after losing the ball in the midfield, and we didn’t look comfortable playing catch-up.

BEARDS!

Presumably another of the million things Paul Wotton hopes to cover in training between now and next Saturday (that’s 200,000 things a day Paul) is the disappointing lack of beards at the club, following Aaron Jarvis’ departure in the summer. There are some tantalising hints at growth from the likes of Omar Mussa, but frankly someone is going to have to step up. I’m not yet sure who. Oscar Threlkeld already looks dangerously close to brewing his own IPA and making artisan bread in his spare time, so a beard might be a step too far. Maybe Ben Seymour will channel his inner Jarvis with the weight of that number 9 on his back. It’s hard to say, but I have no doubt that the coaching staff will be dealing with this as a matter of urgency.