Torquay United V Cambridge 6th December 2008

Whilst I would agree with much of your report swangull I thought Cambridge were distinctly ordinary. We coped pretty well at the back apart from the odd self imposed mistake. Whilst they will be difficult to breakdown they are pretty pedestrian in attack and that may well be their downfall.



It was perhaps a gamble to give Carlisle the start. Not surprisingly he struggled at first, but in my view became stronger as the match wore on. Perhaps a sign of PB making a decision for the medium term and enhancing Carlisles return to match sharpness. Some difficult decisions have to be made when you have no reserve team and you need to bring back a player you consider to be key. Worth remembering that PB clearly does not fancy playing Stevens and Carayol together and currently sees neither player as a 46 games per season option.

a match report from forevertufc
« Thread Started Today at 20:20 »

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todays match would see two of the bsp's big hitters clash at plainmoor.

the game has a slow start and for 15 mins not much to report niether keeper seeing any meaningfull action,thats is untill 15 minutes torquay had not looked troubled ,a collective gasp from the gulls faithfull a mistake has let crow in for a 1 on 1 with bevan ,the gasp is soon follwed by laughter ,crow meets the ball with the touch of an elephant and beavan collect's.

torquay are seeing a lot of the ball and their first chance would soon follow,nicholson free kick is allowed to run ,sills on the back post ,ooh thats was close just out of his reach.

from the 15 - 30 minute mark this game has gone a bit dull two very good sides canceling each other out bevan and potter largely untroubled.

it would be the 38th minute before this game would spring to life sills booked for an elbow hmmm this one's got me puzzled,i allways try not have a go at referee's ,as a qualifyed football coach i have ref'd many grassroots games and i know how hard it can be ,but sorry these officals are sunday pub league and thats for both teams.

just before half time a great chance for the u's convery with a free header just over.

second half , torquay have come out the blocks like a mad sprinter intent on a record breaking run,and it would not be long before the best moment of the match so far ,stevens corner sills header ooh heads in hands its hit the bar,rebound benyon drive potter saves no how ,rebound part2 wroe header off the line no,no,no how did they keep that out.

two minutes later ,a cadburys passing move from torquay ,oh so sweet and smooth ,finished with a weak shot from carlisle,but it would not be long before the moment of the match maybe the season, wroe just inside the cambridge half looks up see's potter of his line ,he takes a shot ,the ball rises travels ,hang on we say its going in ,potter back pedals franticly ,oh what a save a massive round of applause rings out around plainmoor not just for wroes quick thinking a shot but for potter aswell ,best save ive seen in a long,long time.

dispite dominating large periods of the second half this would be a nerve jangerling end for torquay ,cambridge have fought their way back into the match and its end to end now ,both teams are like lions fighting for the kill one attack followed by another ,torquay have defended well but a second mistake lets in rendell ,no he has an open goal we cant have thrown it away ,phew its cleared off the line and so it would end 0.0.

quite often fans look at 0.0 results and think glad i missed that one , in this case you missed a thriller real end to end stuff however i will say i think torquay edged it overall with more and better chances,this match was played by two teams who will in no doubt be a threat to any one gunning for promotion.



Just put this on the match thread as well Dave R

Interesting that with Paul Buckle having said that he would have loved to have been able to have Poke on the bench in last week's cup tie, when he had the chance today in what effectively was as good as a cup tie (not one to lose) he didn't opt to use him in that role.

Only if it becomes possible to keep Bevan all season, will he be available for the Blackpool cup tie. As Poke's loan position continues to be irrevocably that........................a loan position unavailing him to us during cup ties; and Bevan IS made available to stay until the season's end, I would think that Bucks will opt for signing him ASAP and ending Poke's loan early........................what do you think?

Yes I was forgetting all the games we have to play Andy, so we should be able to get most fringe players some action, just hope those that will only feature in games like the St Luke's, do not get a bit fed up, but then it maybe the chance they need to put them in contention for a place on the first team bench at least.

Thanks otobe another class report from you, I'm sure we will see Carlisle fully back to the form he showed before he got injured, very soon. He is a class player and most seem to think he got stronger as the game went on to day.

He will in my view always be picked to start when he is fit and he along with some others are the very best signings that Bucks has made for the team.

Not much to add to the match reports from today’s game.

Swangul pretty much nailed it, then Paulr & Andygulls comments tied up any loose ends.

A couple of things i would like to add;

Cambridge played a very aggressive ‘game’, especially in the first half. Was i the only one who saw their defenders lead with their elbows more often that not?? Yet Sillsy jumps with his arms down and gets a booking, didn’t understand that. The referee didn’t get to grips with that until midway through second half.

I thought the first half was pretty even, neither side creating an awful lot. Second half we battered them for 40 minutes, yet they nearly snatched an undeserved winner when Rendall went round Bevan, looked for one horrible second he was going to go down, but his shot was superbly blocked on the line by Hodges.

Wroe was deservedly given our Man of the Match, however my overall MoM was Potter in their goal. Bearing in mind he is only the size of a Hobbit, how he got back to tip Wroe’s audacious shot from the half way line was exceptional. He also pulled off a cracking save in that 10 second frenzy where we could/should have scored with any one of those 3 attempts and another from Stevens just before he was subbed. He was good at collecting crosses, although Nico was a bit guilty of putting them on a plate for him. Its no wonder than so many people think he is the best keeper in this division.

As for our players, Woods and Hodges were outstanding. I have been a bit sceptical about Woods over the last 2 seasons, but you have to give it to him this season he is playing as good as he ever has. He seems to have overcome his habit of climbing all over opponents before dragging them to the ground (Exeter on boxing day epitomised that). However he is still prone to the odd error like today when he gifted their guy a one-on-one, only for him to lose control of the ball.

Mansell once again covered every single blade of grass, TWICE. He was awesome. At one point he chased down the ball 4 times in a row. A couple of times he found himself chasing down their defenders and ended up as our furthest man forward. He would be hard to replace if, god forbid, he got injured.

Wroe was also outstanding and fully deserved his Man of the match award. He was behind most of the creative things we did today. Carlisle overcame an understandably sluggish start and had a very good second half. I was glad to see him start, a bit concerned at half time when i thought he might have been taken off, then pleased when he really got back into in the second half. He should be back to being in the starting line up again now.

Overall i thought we played some fantastic football today, we also broke extremely quickly and with a better final ball, and slightly better finishing, we could have been out of sight before their only real pressure at the end.

I don`t know how these officials can get away with either being that bad that it appears there cheating or they actually are cheating, I don`t think it`s just me not seeing the game right because the whole of the Pop side plus the Family stand were chanting at him in unison! Reading the non-league today there are reports of match fixing on bets going on, I wonder if we looked in to the moneys place on a Cambridge win at Plainmoor do you think there might be some irregularities going on. Look at the linesman in the first half we couldn`t pass a ball forward in their half with out the flag going up, twice we were blatantly on side I was in line with the linesman and the disgust from people around me who saw what i saw says it all. Check officials bank accounts and monitor the moneys placed at bookies and you just never know, it happens.
Also I love Elliot Benyons play, his finishing and his effort but by Christ is he shit in the air, come on boys pass it to the lads feet for a f**king change. How Sills doesn`t lose it on the field I don`t know, if I had the attention he gets I`d be flooring people, so well done Silly for not losing it!