Kettering V Torquay United 21st February 2009

It certainly would be a case study for Linguistic students. I used to live up the road in Leicester for 3 years and in Birmingham for 1 year plus our office maintenance guys all come from Derby. Its a weird mix of Brummie and Yorkshire accents. I heard the phrase "alright me duck" so many times. "Poys" was a slightly newer one on me. I wonder if Kettering is the Carlisle of the south when it comes to accents?

....This smoking thing does get my back up too

I actually consider myself a reasonably considerate smoker, i'm quite happy to not smoke in pubs, restaurants or any enclosed places...if people dont want to breathe in my smoke then they shouldnt have to.

...When you are stopped from smoking in the completely open areas at any ground.....thats just persecution.

Dont these people realise how hard it is for us smokers to watch United without a ciggie for the whole game ;D

Kettering - where's that?

Oh you mean Kett Rin' - that's more like it!

I can't go all the way to Kettering and not throw in my two cents. First things first though...





I think you owe Geddington Gull an apology Merse

Your match report was excellent however and I couldn't agree more with what you had to say. I'm glad I wasn't the only one who thought it was a soft penalty. I didn't have a great view, so I didn't want to comment on it, but you've confirmed what I feared. I turned to my brother at one point and asked him why we travel such distances only to be rewarded with a shocking view of the game. I think we might try the grandstand tactic in future.



You're not the only person to have been irritated by these morons. They're an embarrassment to themselves and to Torquay United Football Club. Sadly, it's neanderthal oafs like these that give football supporters a bad name. At the end of the game one of the dribbling buffoons walked past my brother and me and making hand gestures to the home fans. When we mockingly informed him that none of the home fans were actually standing there any more, he flicked us the middle finger. It was laughable. I pity these people, I really do.

The food was awful. Simply awful. I did also enjoy the accent of the "lady" in the burger van. What made me laugh the most however was how the home fans flipped back and forth between "Kett-ring" and "Kett-eerrrr-ing" depending on whichever fit the chant the best!

Anyway, onto the game...

As I said on Page 1 of this thread, Carayol should have started. Having grown up in awe of the likes of Andrei Kanchelskis, Ryan Giggs and, of course, Tony Bedeau, I've always loved a winger who gets his head down, dribbles to the byline and whips a cross in. Whenever I've seen him on the ball this season, I've had the same warm, fuzzy feeling that I used to get when Liam Rosenior was tearing apart opposition full-backs in our promotion year.

Simply put, the kid needs to start more games.

As has been said, Benyon was never going to stand a chance against the thuggish Branston and the man mountain - and not to mention wonderfully monikered - Exodus Geohaghan. Had I known the brutality of the Kettering back four, I would never have chosen him to partner Sills.

I always used to say to one of my friends I played with in the Devon and Exeter League that he should play a higher level. In our division, he would get ten bells kicked out of him and could never get into the game. Once he moved to Torrington, he was on fire. For me, Benyon is one of the players that should be playing a higher level. The physical nature of the BSP doesn't suit him and I'd be happy to see him terrorising the likes of Altrincham and leaving the rest to the "bigger boys". I realise this sounds unbelievably patronising, but sadly it's true.

Not a lot has been said about Christie yet. Naturally he was object of ridicule from the home support when he came on, but he showed a couple of touches of class and won every header he went up for. When he dummied his marker on the edge of the area to switch onto his favoured left foot, I was already preparing to celebrate. Unfortunately for Christie, and the fans in yellow behind the opposite goal, his effort was very well blocked.

I was impressed with our new signing yesterday. Providing he can keep his fitness up and his attitude in tact, I think he could fire us into the playoffs.

I was the one overtaking the "well mannered motorist" as your were performing your bit of bespoke driving. It was probably me overtaking him that prevented him from moving into the outside lane to give you the soace you needed. I apologise!

Excellent pictures, Chris. I can just about see myself - under my blanket naturally - in the main stand.



I suspect these were the same sad characters - and, yes, that's how you come across lads - who were ritually abusing the linesman at the end of the game. I use the term "ritually" deliberately because behaving in this fashion is often seen as one of the essential components of being a true fan. Pride and passion, bleeding for the cause, etc. And, on occasions, they'll tell you it's a "right" which comes with being a paying spectator.

I beg to disagree although I maintain the hope this lot will grow out of it - sorry to sound so patronising - and that they are
essentially pretty harmless and just temporarily misguided. They actually remind me of a similarly mouthy group which has attached itself to Taunton Town in recent years. In rather brusque fashion - I saw it from twenty yards away - they learnt a harsh lesson at Weston-super-Mare this season and have been strangely subdued ever since.


Some good stuff on this site today. Ohtobe reminded us that Exeter looked out of it at times last season. I saw the home draw against Droylsden, close to the end of the season, and the supporters were restless that night as they wrote off the rest of the season together with Paul Tisdale's credentials. You never know!

The same posting also highlighted the contrasting ways in which Exeter and Torquay went about their business last season. For me that was one of the many sub-plots which made last season so compelling (and ultimately so distressing). This may sound terribly parochial but am I alone in feeling that Exeter's absence from proceedings this season has removed some of the edge and intrigue? Not that I'd wish to go through that again.

Thanks also to Merse for these observations which require no additional commentary:


Add tufc01's, DGEP's and Chris H's reports from yesterday's front line - together with Dave's nice reminder of the importance of history and everyone else's contributions - and then all you need is a dose of well-crafted pithiness. And, true to form, here's the icing on the cake:



Great stuff! I'd have used ten times as many words and have said far less in making the same point.

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If you locate Dave Thomas sitting amongst the radio commentators at the top right of the stand, that's me just below him to the left in the dark glasses NOT standing or applauding and WITHOUT my blanket or grey hair! Dunno what happened to Anthony there ( must have beetled off somewhere) and the lady to my left is "somebody else's wife" - Mark Howarth's wife Karen; in fact.