TALKING POINTS

Dom Roman – @DomRoman

Dom looks ahead to the NLS game

BACK ON THE ROAD AND TAKING CHANCES

St Albans away ended up being a frustrating result for United on Saturday. After a slow start the Gulls found their groove in the second half and after Jordan Young’s penalty there looked to be only one winner. Unfortunately a mixture of bad luck (it’s not often you see a ball bounce 3 times on the crossbar!) and wasteful finishing meant the Saints held on, and we were left thinking of what might have been. The pluses? Well in the majority of games Torquay haven’t created very much away from home this season, and this certainly wasn’t the case. There’s no guaranteeing anything in football, but find something similar against Slough and I’d fancy us to come away as comfortable winners. Of course, the main thing is just to win, force our will and make sure we have taken 4 points from these two fixtures.

STARTING LIKE YOU MEAN TO GO ON

On a number of our away fixtures this season it feels like the Gulls players are a little lethargic to begin with, almost like they want to take some time to get used to the surroundings and work their way into games, whilst the home teams spy a chance to get at us (as St Albans did on Saturday). This isn’t the comforts of Plainmoor and each away ground has its own challenges, but if United want to prove their title credentials then we just have to do better. I’d like to see us start on the front foot if possible and be more proactive, we have the players to do this and scoring the first goal would set us up nicely. Otherwise, allowing Slough Town too much room to manoeuvre could put us in another small hole, and leave us scrapping hard to salvage a result.

THE LINE-UP

Jay Foulston returned from injury on Saturday before being subbed off for Matt Carson in the 2nd half. Assuming he’s okay, the line-up could well remain the same. Dylan Morgan and Will Jenkins Davies have both struggled to make an impact in recent games, so perhaps one of those will be rested in favour of Omar Mussa or Lirak Hasani. Hasani has become the forgotten man since his red card before Christmas, but can give us something different if given the chance. Meanwhile Omar is looking fit and is causing opposition defences problems, the question is can he add to his meagre tally of one goal in 2024/25? He’s more than capable, so maybe he can grab an important goal in this one.

THE OPPOSITION

Scott Davies’ Slough Town team are on a poor run of form, and haven’t won a game since 7th December in the FA Trophy against Maidenhead. Their defence has been leaky during this period with 5 conceded at Boreham, and 4 at Hemel & Kidderminster. To help rectify this, centre back Guy Hollis has been re-signed from Farnborough, and on Saturday they did battle out a 0-0 draw at home to 4th placed Eastbourne. Former Oxford United youngster Leon Chambers-Parillon is earmarked as a key man in our Opposition Q&A this week, whilst another former Oxford lad Slavi Spasov is their top scorer with 9 in all comps. The Rebels started the season well, and Arbour Park is a place not many teams have won at, but if we can get to grips with the occasion and make some of our chances count, then hopefully a lovely 3 points will be all ours!