MATCH VERDICT
Luke Hunter – @gullsgullsluke
Luke summarises a disastrous weekend in Gloucestershire.
BISHOPS CLEEVE 3-0 TORQUAY UNITED – 14.09.24
SUMMARY
This weekend has reminded me of a scene in Mike Bassett England manager, where following a 3-0 defeat to Mexico, Mike hopes to find some positives amongst his coaching staff and players; “on the positive side, those Mexicans were bloody brilliant” and “three cheers for Ramriez!” are the responses offered. It would have been similar for Paul Wotton yesterday trying to dissect that – Bishops Cleeve were bloody brilliant, and Ross Langworthy was deserving of all those hurrahs.
I live in Cheltenham, and I know Bishops Cleeve well – they’re a well run outfit and a non-league club doing all the right non-league things; they have monetised Kayte Lane seven days a week, they have an extensive network of youth teams and it is not unusual to see Cleeve tracksuits around town. They have been steadily improving since the late 2010’s and are well established in the Southern League with a good blend of youth and experience; many within their ranks have dropped down from academies further up the pyramid. They deserve respect.
So imagine the sense of impending doom as the team sauntered in at 14:15, unable to name a full bench, cobble together a half-arsed warm-up and – give or take a few tiny glimpses – offer up one of the most unprofessional Torquay United performances I have ever seen. We ducked headers, pulled out of challenges, couldn’t pass, couldn’t shoot, didn’t talk and completely lost our heads – it should have been more than three.
This season, more than any, it is important not to ride the highs too high, or the lows too low – BCFC are not as ‘village’ as some may have you believe, everything about that result was FA Cuppy and the relative gap between the clubs (a damning indictment of where we are now, more than anything else) is no bigger than say, Torquay and Derby two years ago. This is not season defining, depending on our reaction but nevertheless, we had better hope that is the lowest it gets – Paul Wotton immediately has to contend with a few clicks on the pressure dial now; he made only one promise this season – 100% effort and commitment – the club fell short on this occasion.
Things started bad and got worse. United were pinging the ball around without much purpose, with most long balls drowned out by a ferocious south westerly wind. One half chance materialised, with Brad Ash misjudging his header from a Fin Tonks’ cross. Within ten minutes, the hosts had the lead, some hapless defending presented the tenacious Langworthy with an opportunity that he couldn’t miss – the striker had apparently been struggling for form before today, but you wouldn’t have thought it.
Cleeve were absolutely relentless in the first half and between the 20th minute and half time, the game could have been dead and buried. Time and again they found space behind the United backline, with Will Turner plundering the United right with some pinpoint passes that left Palmer, Dreyer and Moxey lost at sea. We were extremely lucky to head in with the deficit at just one; it would have taken an almighty change to reverse the momentum.
And that change was not delivered, within five minutes of the restart we had fallen further behind, a delicious cross from left winger Jay Malshanskyj found the head of Langworthy, who did what the United strikers could not, and headed the ball towards goal for 2-0. United pushed forward and the game stretched; a few half chances fell to Mussa and Ash, but in truth, Clayton in the Cleeve goal will have been astounded at just how untroubled he was.
With twenty minutes to go, Langworthy turned provider, standing strong to set-up Dunbar one-on-one with United’s Hamon – Dunbar did the business and cup progress was secured. The Gulls capitulated at that point, touches went askew, passes went AWOL and the tensions of the Yellow Army heated up. It was not pretty at full time, but at least Paul Wotton faced the fans to apologise.
This was not a day to write off and forget about, equally, it does not need to be season defining – but Paul Wotton and his newly assembled squad need to learn quickly that our standards are astronomically higher than that. Kudos to Bishops Cleeve, who were absolutely faultless on and off the pitch; parking, catering, boozing, pricing were spot on and I wish them well. The magic of the cup, ehy?
PLAYER RATINGS
1 – James Hamon – 3 – Involved in the first, distribution frustratingly off but did keep a (very narrow) degree of respectability to the score…
17 – Finn Tonks – 3 – Struggled against the Cleeve left – did find space moving forward and offered a couple of half-decent crosses.
16 – Ed Palmer – 2 – I don’t have anything good to say about the backline today.
5 – Sam Dreyer – 2 – As above.
21 – Dean Moxey – 2 – As above.
14 – Matt Carson – 3 – He’s so much better than that performance, disappointing and looked uncomfortable.
18 – Oscar Threlkeld – 2 – second to everything in midfield.
10 – Omar Mussa – 2.5 – Very capable with the ball at his feet, can we squeeze out some accurate passing and shooting? Defensively; see Threlkeld.
7 – Lirak Hasani – 2 – Outclassed and overrun, no time on the ball to do anything.
11 – Brad Ash – 2.5 – Perhaps looked the most likely, if anybody was going to score, but Ash/Seymour just doesn’t look right as a partnership to me.
9 – Ben Seymour – 2 – really struggled to get involved. Felt like he was marking Ash at times – not the first time I’ve said that.
Subs
15. Jadyn Crosbie – 2 – Picked up where Seymour left off.
2. Finley Craske – 2 – Picked up where Moxey left off.
8. Roddy Collins – 2 – Picked up where Threlkeld left off.
23. Ollie Tomlinson – NA – not on long enough to make any difference.
MAN OF THE MATCH – ROSS LANGWORTHY
I’m genuinely not prepared to waste brain bandwidth trying to wrongly justify any of the men in pink getting it – an assist and two goals – he ran rings around us.
HONOURABLE MENTIONS
Paul Wotton. His post-match presser was as honest, passionate and heartfelt as any as I have seen from a Torquay manager; I appreciated it. I had a good view of PW through the match and his body language told you everything you needed to know – I’m not wanting to paraphrase Gary Johnson, but there are occasions where players need to take responsibility, he didn’t send them out to play like that.
TACTICS
It still seems to be 3-5-2 or bust… one of two things needs to happen – we either need more pace, or we need to change formation. I’d also like to see another edge to the frontline – it is all very samey.
OFFICIALS
A moot point really, but an all round 6/10 – some equally strange decisions in each direction but had no bearing on the result.
OPPOSITION
Bishops Cleeve absolutely nailed it. Off the pitch, some great catering options (loaded fries at one end, Jamaican cuisine at the other) – extra bars (Cruzcampo, Old Mout, Brixton and Heineken on the outside bar, I didn’t make it to the inside one) extra toilets, extra staff – hopefully it was a big money maker for them with the potential of more to come. They treated that fixture exactly as I hope we would if we’re in the position with a bigger team coming down. On the pitch, they were as good as we were bad – paid us no respect, worked hard, pushed forward quickly and defended from the front. Hopefully they can get a couple of winnable draws and creep into the first round – I’ll be rooting for them.
KEY MOMENT
Turning up to a competitive match less than an hour before kick-off.
CONCLUSION
It was a perfect storm and a perfect cup tie; we have done it to others and others will do it to us. I think the result itself is forgivable, especially in the broader context of the club right now, but the manner of it not so much; Paul Wotton will need to make a few big decisions this week and I only hope it is a catalyst to kick us forward this season.
I’m sorry for the owners who likely would have hoped there was an income stream to be exploited there, and I suspect that will cost the playing operation some serious goodwill in the terraces – it will be a test of the Yellow Army’s patience and resolve; there was already cracks showing at full time which I don’t think will do anybody any good at this stage. Ultimately, as disappointing as it is, the league is the aim this season and come what May, I would hope this is not a result that we consider as being hugely influential across the 24/25 campaign.
With bottom of the table St Albans visiting TQ1 on Saturday, what could possibly go wrong?
SOCIAL MEDIA
COYY – Luke
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