ON THIS DAY

Steve Harris

@steveharris84

COVENTRY CITY (H) 2009

Throughout their history, Torquay United have reached the fourth round of the FA Cup seven times but have never managed to reach the fifth.

One of the closest times they came to bettering this record came in the 2008-09 season against Coventry City at Plainmoor, when a late goal from Elliot Ward denied the Gulls in a game where they did everything apart from find the back of the net.

Home wins over Chipstead, Evesham and Oxford United set up a third round tie for Paul Buckle’s men with Blackpool, then of the Championship, which was decided by a first half strike from Matt Green. It also saw United avenge their cup exits at the hands of the Tangerines in the 1989-90 and 2002-03 campaigns.

Their reward was a home tie with Coventry City, also of the Championship, who had eliminated the Gulls from the FA Cup in the 1987-88 season under the late Cyril Knowles, winning 2-0 at Highfield Road.

Torquay were first to threaten when Lee Mansell’s cross was caught by City goalkeeper Keiren Westwood.

Coventry soon began to stamp their authority on the game though with Freddy Eastwood missing the target first with a header and then a shot from the edge of the box, before Gunnarsson fired over from distance.

Fox looked certain to open the scoring in the 12th minute but Kevin Nicholson cleared his close-range effort, and keeper Scott Bevan was equally alert to deny Michael Mifsud’s speculative volley from the right of the box.

The hosts responded with a header from top-scorer Tim Sills which flew over the bar and a shot from Wayne Carlisle from the centre of the box which was comfortably saved by Westwood.

Green should have hit the target for United but dragged his shot wide from the left, and the striker was unlucky to be denied by a good block from Ben Turner just before half-time.

Green was in action again early in the second half, heading straight at Westwood and then forcing the goalkeeper to parry his fierce left-footed shot following a swift counterattack.

The Gulls continued to dominate with Roscoe D’Sane shooting over and Carlisle blasting wide from long range, while Coventry could only muster a lacklustre response in Leon McKenzie’s wayward shot.

Sills missed another header in the 72nd minute from Green’s teasing cross and Steve Woods was also wasteful in the air as chances continued to go begging.

Chris Hargreaves was next to try his luck but could only shoot over the bar following DSane’s cross, and Nicky Wroe was also off target with an opportunistic effort.

Three minutes from time, the Gulls were hit with a sucker punch as Fox curled in a corner. Ward was unmarked and buried a six-yard header into the bottom corner.

Torquay boss Buckle said: ‘I’m bitterly disappointed, but proud, too. We believed we could go into the fifth round and it’s hard to take on the back of our performance that we are not there.’

His opposite number Chris Coleman was full of praise for United’s display: “Twenty minutes from time I would have been happy with a replay,” said the future Wales manager.

“In the second half we were outplayed and outfought in many departments and Torquay deserved a lot more than they got out of the game. We had a lot of travelling fans here and they might have thought we were going to breeze it. We were never going to do that.”

The Gulls eventually went on to win promotion at Wembley, with a 2-0 win over Cambridge United in the Blue Square Premier play-off final. They reached the fourth round again in the 2010-11 season, where they were eliminated by Crawley Town.

Torquay: Scott Bevan, Lee Mansell, Steve Woods, Lee Hodges, Kevin Nicholson, Wayne Carlisle (Danny Stevens 90), Nicky Wroe, Chris Hargreaves, Roscoe DSane (Mustapha Carayol 90), Tim Sills, Matt Green (Elliot Benyon 80).

Subs not used: Michael Poke, Chris Robertson, Tyrone Thompson, Steve Adams

Attendance: 6,018