Torquay Athletic

WP Wilkinson ought to get ready to answer some more tough questions. That really is a shocking result. Tics are an embarrassment.

Great pictures of the ground Barton Downs. I wonder just how far short of football league standard the Rec was in 1950 when Torquay United announced they would apply for the lease when the Tics lease ran out in 1952. I realise that the pitch has always suffered from major drainage problems and i wonder just what increase in attendances would have been envisaged to make the move worthwhile.

That's a fascinating excerpt posted by Gullone. Not only does the Ladmore Plan sound intriguing in itself, but it's revealing the way Torquay United is portrayed as a "threat". Specific to this episode or on a longer-term basis? A huge giant ready to gobble up the poor unsuspecting Tics?

It would be interesting to learn of the relations between the two clubs over the years. Maybe, in the days of Narracott and Brockman, there was a friendly rivalry of almost equals. At other times there may have been hostility or distant cordiality. Now it's hard to imagine that Athletic and United need to have anything much to do with each other. I suspect that Herald Express picture of Chris Roberts and a group of TARFC officials represented a rare "official" meeting between the two clubs. Any other contact is probably less formal and a result of an overlap of personal and business interests between respective officials and directors. There may have been more of that in recent years than during the times of Mike Bateson.

The relative strength - and degree of influence - of the two clubs over time is another discussion point. One I'm sure we've touched on before. My understanding would be that professionalism made Torquay United the bigger entity from the 1920s onwards, even though the Tics continued to flourish. Gullone's article suggests that Torquay Athletic were frequently the best team in Devon before WW2. Then, it points to 1948/49 as the final flicker of greatness with excellent performances against Exeter, Plymouth, Aberavon, Swansea, Gloucester and Moseley. There was no such thing as league rugby in the 1940s but, let's be imaginative for a moment, and suggest that back then Torquay Athletic could have competed at what now equates to the Championship (ie the second tier).

One major difference between the two sports is that, compared to football, rugby union has far more of a "secret history" when it comes to results, players and information that compares the status and performances of clubs. It's easy for us to learn much about Torquay United's 1948/49 season; we'd probably have to approach the club direct - or to consult the Herald Express - to discover much about the Tics that season. What, for example, was the strength of the sides fielded by Swansea and Gloucester?

Another missing component is that of attendances. I'd love to know how many people watched or continue to watch Torquay Athletic. That would be a useful comparative tool when looking at the historical fortunes of the two clubs. But, whereas football kept such records from the Year Dot, rugby never did so (presumably because attendances and revenue where more fitting to a "commercial" sport rather than an amateur one). It's a complete and utter shot-in-the-dark but I'm imagining crowds of 4-5,000 for big games at The Rec in the 1940s; 2-3,000 in the 1960s. Not that we may ever know for sure.

As to the relative status and influence of the two clubs, I suspect another gap opened post-1950 as Athletic dropped a notch and United became an established Football League club. This gap has never narrowed and must have appeared a chasm when Torquay United were doing so well in the 1960s. And, indeed, it's enormous now. Not necessarily because of any great strength at Plainmoor; more a case of considerable decline at The Rec.

Hector has interestingly developed some of the earlier remarks about rugby union's relative strength in the South West set alongside other regions. It's not an exact point - because, in many towns, there are several football clubs and only one rugby club - but there are plenty of examples in Cornwall, Devon and Somerset where the rugby club is the largest single sporting institution in the town. Hector names a few of these places; there are dozens more. This will also be true of Gloucestershire but less so once you get into Dorset and Wiltshire. In the "rugby club" towns rugby, I assume, is relatively classless with more of a crossover in interest between the two codes. And, to illustrate this point, I encountered an East Devon rugby club on the train home from Dartford in August. They'd been to the Rugby League Challenge Cup final at Wembley and virtually needed to be poured off the train at Honiton in liquid form. I'd contend that, in socio-economic terms, they may not have been too different to most of the crowd at Wembley that day.

Yet Hector makes the point that Torquay has no rugby culture. I suspect it does but that it's comparatively diminished for a Westcountry town. There may be an interest in the Six Nations and the Chiefs but not necessarily in Torquay Athletic. Again, plenty of junior players but not so many seniors. And, imagining the Tics' perspective, I sense a delicious irony. It's possible Torquay Athletic bemoan their lot because "Torquay is a soccer town". Who'd have ever thought it?

That's a good point. In our hurriedness to label rugby union as a "posh" or "middle class" sport we often ignore the evidence in front of us. It's a tough sport that appeals because of its toughness.

It's a funny one. Yesterday, after nipping in to The Rec, I had a cuppa at Beacon Quay. I immediately earwigged a conversation (as is my wont) about rugby union between two members of the sailing fraternity. One had been a member of a championship-winning university team whilst a medical student; the other was a keen follower of the game. The "player" mentioned several of his contemporaries - several significant names from the 1970s amongst them - and, to my mind, it was so rugby union of a particular era. It confirmed my prejudices of forty years ago; a narrowly class-based game played by the elite and those set to be our masters.

Oh deary me. Those old prejudices come back and haunt and embarrass us from time-to-time. The dashing doctor - and his chums - was definitely an element of rugby union in the 1970s. But it never told the whole story then; far less so now.

The sport appeals to doctors, accountants, teachers and surveyors. It also appeals to builders, farmers and fishermen. And people who wear uniforms at work. All sorts really. Rugby players are the same people who play football. It's the proportions that are different. That's the oddity. In Devon I often think the typical rugby player is a builder. When I go around the SW Peninsula League, I conclude that the typical football club sponsor is a builder. It's small world.

If I was honest I'd say I prefer rugby league. There are certain well-rehearsed arguments which promote the league game as solidly working-class and proudly northern. This invites the need for a bogey man; enter rugby union as the polar opposite.

Lots of truth in this, of course. Rugby union's former attitude to rugby league was appalling; its snobbery - in the highest places - quite distasteful. There is a socio-economic distinction. I tend to like rugby league because it's more akin to lower division and non-league football. I happen to think it's a shame - rather than a badge of honour - that it's largely confined to the M62 corridor.

But the two games are bedfellows. If there was no rugby league, some of its followers and players would be football people; others would opt for rugby union. And, in your travels, you meet some curious people. I know a bloke from East Hull. He's a teacher, typical of many who work in the state sector. He's a Hull City season ticket holder. He used to play rugby union; he loathes rugby league. What can you make of that?

A genuine question - has Rowe or anybody else actually given much financial backing to Exeter RFC?

I know that £11.4m fell in to their lap when they sold the County Ground at the peak of the property boom.

The sale was dependent upon two highly controversial planning decisions - to allow housing at St Thomas and the new ground at Sandy Park.

I am pretty sure it was suggested at the time that the rugby contingent had the right kind of friends in the right kind of places to get these through and that a similar plan based on soccer rather than rugby would never have been approved.

The feeling that Torquay United should have the Rec was far from a new idea.

Of course TUFC rented the Rec from 1900 to 1904. There was a huge debate in the council before the decision was taken in the summer of 1903 that Tics could move in a year later.

The questioning of TARFC's right to the ground has re-occurred regularly ever since.

Here is a cutting from the WMN 06/12/22

It is funny really that we are sort of coming to the conclusion that Torquay has been slow to adapt to the brave new world of professional and semi-professional rugby union.

Going back in history, Torquay was very keen to embrace professionalism in rugby - long before it was legal to do so.

Here is a letter written from Torquay to the editor of The Times in September 1897.




Quite a compelling case for paying players on compassionate and egalitarian grounds - allowing those working class Torquinians to play without their poor wives and children starving as a result.

You might question such purity in TARFC's willingness to pay players though as it extended to clandestine meetings with Welsh stars offering cash to play for Torquay - which led to TARFC being banned by the RFU in 1899. They were banned again for professionalism in 1912.

Back in 1894, Athletic's big rivals Torquay Town committed an extraordinary act of self-destruction. It is alleged that Athletic tapped up Town's star player Bond in an attempt to get him to transfer his affections from The Rec to Plainmoor.

Town admitted that they paid Bond and said that Athletic had offered him more. Athletic denied it and got off. Town were suspended and as result collapsed half way through the 1894/95 - their results having to be expunged from the league table.