TT BLOG

Ian East – @Easters86

FARNHAM (A)

As Talking Heads once sang “We’re on the Road to Nowhere” if ever a phrase summed up that 90minutes of “football” from Torquay United and in fact our first 6 games of this season then it’s that one.

I don’t even know where to start with yesterday, I usually always look forward to going to Torquay games (that’s worrying in itself) it’s mainly because I just can’t get to as many as I used to especially since having children, in fact yesterday was going to be my sons first game until he wisely told me in the morning “actually I don’t think I want to go”, so I jumped on my bike and headed to the train station to get to Farnham all the while not having that same enthusiasm or hope that today was the day things got better, no the whole way I kept thinking we’re going to lose and this is going to be rubbish.

Saw a grandmother with her two grandchildren at North Camp station and she explained it was her grandkids first game I simply said “good luck with that one” and wished them well, other fans that we chatted to all had the same dread about the game so it wasn’t just me, we got to the lovely little ground at Farnham they’ve done really well with that as they’ve come up through the divisions and although favoured as a dark horse to do well their home form read played 2 lost 2 including a heavy defeat to Billericay, the team news was in, no Dreyer ahead of his move away so Tyler Hill was in at centre back, new boy Beaumont-Clark was in as was Young so it was back to the 4-2-3-1 or however you dress it up that we played at the back end of last season as we desperately looked for some improvement to what had been a poor start to the season by Torquay.

From the first minute of the game we should have seen what was about to happen Farnham retreated all 11 players into their half and basically said go on then be good enough to play through us and all Torquay did for the next 35 minutes was knock the ball very slowly and very sideways around the middle of the pitch causing Farnham absolutely no trouble at all. It was so dull, so predictable so ponderous. I truly hate lots about modern football especially the stupid phrases made by the PE teachers with FA certificates trying to sound like professors of this game “counter press” “double pivot” referring to players as a “number 6” xG all this crap oh and “final 3rd entries” sound familiar? But one I don’t mind and it was true of yesterday “passing with a purpose” we literally didn’t do that all game, we passed it for passings sake everything was safe no one grabbed the game by the scruff of its neck, no one dropped in got it and tried to move it quickly or get around our wingers to ty and double up against the Farnham defenders, no one ran in behind Deon Moore all game, or when we did get it wide no one busted a gut to get in the box and try and get on the end of something, all the things that you actually need to see in a good football team we lacked.

This is where I’m going to go after Jimmy Ball a bit, because not all of this is his fault. You can look at recruitment, and I’ll do it in a bit but the thing that annoys me most about him on gameday is how reactionary he is, he’s not proactive at all. Example being, on

yesterday it was clear to me with the way the game was shaping up how much ball we had and how happy Farnham were to drop deep and allow us to have it there was absolutely no need for Nash Sundire in this game. I’m not his biggest fan anyway but if you want to sell it to me that he’s a useful squad player for certain games where we may have to defend or break stuff up then I’ll buy it, if you’re telling me he’s starting nearly every for game for us in games where we dominate the ball then I’m not having that. Firstly, he shouldn’t have started in my opinion but if you do start him and you see what we saw for the first half then for me he should have been replaced dropping Lo-Everton into midfield and getting Matt Jay on around Moore up front. Sonny is probably our most gifted technical footballer and he barely saw the ball for 40 minutes of the first half because there was no space for him and the lack of quality in the middle of the park was just so evident. What happened the second Farnham scored? Sundire was replaced. So what’s changed? They’ve scored, so you don’t have any faith in the selection to get the game back so why is their faith in it to win it at 0-0? Then when the game is gone at 2-0 down he brings Cooke on to partner Westendorf (who’d replaced Moore) so we have 2 big men up front and we played one long ball to them in the last 10 minutes. We literally carried on in exactly the same fashion knocking it around slowly and squarely as if we were 2-0 up with no urgency, no belief, no let’s go down kicking and screaming just an overall acceptance of defeat against a seriously limited opposition.

Yesterday was a cast iron 0-0 game, nothing happened for either side of note in it and yet we’ve managed to find a way to lose 2-0, the first goal is an abomination of a goal. I don’t know whose fault it is but between Savin and Hill it’s a shocker. Either Savin has called for it and Hill’s put him off but I doubt that because Savin didn’t seem ready to go to the ball, I think what’s more likely is there’s been no shout at all and Hill has gambled that it’s going to the keeper and ducked out of it, knowing full well if you hear nothing you just head it and have the debrief after it’s out for a throw. The 2nd goal has come from one of their midfielders pinching the ball from us and making the sort of run we never make opening up space and then their sub has finished well to his credit, after that we showed no desire no fight and no quality to remotely look like getting back in the game. This is the biggest worry for me how poor a side we look no matter the opposition and no matter the venue.

You look to the bigger picture now, it is only 6 games there are still 40 to go, nothing is finished nothing is over there is still lots of time to recover from this horrific start. The recruitment however so far doesn’t look good at all, I worried about the left backs replacing a steady Eddie in Foulston, I don’t think Jenkins is good enough to be starting for us right now, and it’s interesting to me he’s favoured over Hill generally. I know Dan Hayfield is suspended but he’s not a difference maker in midfield and for some reason Jimmy is reluctant to play Sonny in central midfield so we have Worthington who is the best of the 3 but the other 2 aren’t good enough to play 46 games for a team supposedly trying to win this league, the lack of pace and direct running ability in this squad is

frightening and we are top heavy with strikers all of a similar type when we only really play 1 so this recruitment in the forward areas doesn’t make sense to me, we don’t have replacement wingers, the only positives have been the more experienced defenders. Bernard was probably our best player yesterday, Wannell has done well as has Savin I think in the main and I feel good about them but everyone else who has been signed hasn’t done well yet that needs to change asap.

The next month is probably make or break for Jimmy Ball, it almost sounds ridiculous saying that but he’s been backed by the Bryn consortium, the noise was title challenge all pre-season, the expectation is promotion and it is to win every game we play at this level that will never change as long as we are in it and the players need to understand that.

We’ve had a wretched start and this block of games looked easier on paper and we aren’t improving if anything we are getting worse, Folkestone at home next and then Maidenhead and then Dorking. It’s starting to get real that if we fail in these next 3 games there will be immense pressure on the management and players so they need to step up big time.

The fans have backed this club and supported this club more than most fanbases of similar clubs in terms of size/history etc would have done. When the club was on its knees the fans rallied and raised money, since Bryn took over the fans have raised serious money for the club, they’ve packed Plainmoor in the 6th tier to record numbers, this season it’s even higher, fans travel home and away regularly to support the club they deserve more than what they’ve got. The scenes at the end where some fans decided to let the players and management have it are just pure frustration boiling over at watching the same old crap week after week season after season, it’s not good enough it needs to change and it needs change starting Saturday.