Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2009 8:49:26 GMT
Reading Dave R and Merse’s observations about Kevin Hodges on another thread has encouraged me to start a series of occasional threads about our former managers (or, if you prefer in some cases, head coaches).
The basics about Kevin Hodges are that he signed for Torquay United as a player in December 1992 (after an earlier loan spell). This came after he’d made a record 530 league appearances for Argyle. He became head coach in time for the 1996/97 season and was in post for two seasons during which time we finished 21st and 5th. In the grand order of things Kevin Hodges succeeded Eddie May and preceded Wes Saunders.
I'll stick to three main points because I’m hoping others will add memories, comments and observations. However, as Merse has already intimated in several extremely-telling postings, two features of Kevin’s period at the club were the “triumvirate” (of Hodges, McCall and Nelson) and the increasingly harsh and miserly nature of Mike Bateson’s management of the club.
Of my points, firstly Dave R asks if I – or others – have a recall of any financial agreement with Argyle governing Kevin Hodges’ departure from Plainmoor. Well, I haven’t and, from what I can remember, Hodges was out of contract anyway so compensation wouldn’t have been an issue. Is this correct on my behalf? Indeed, my abiding memory was the apparent inevitability of it all. I’m not sure if this was resigned pessimism on my behalf – putting together 2+2 and making four for once – or something more-widely felt. Either way, I began to think Kevin Hodges would go to Argyle from around February 1998. Not rocket science, of course, remembering Argyle were in the process of getting relegated under Mick Jones. It always struck me – from a totally uninformed viewpoint – that the Benney/Bateson puppet-and-master twosome couldn’t be arsed to prevent the inevitable once Desperate Dan had started sniffing.
Secondly, what if Kevin Hodges – and possibly Garry Nelson and Steve McCall – had stayed longer? Some years later – was it around the time Colin Lee was in the frame after Barnet in 2001? – there was talk of how Torquay United’s aim should be to become another Crewe Alexandra. Well, if you were to apply that objective backwards a few years, might it be argued that Kevin Hodges could have been our Dario Gradi? Maybe not always as first team coach, but certainly in a genuine director of football role?
Thirdly, there’s the sorry memory of how 1997/98’s promotion bid petered out before our eyes. Not just the nightmare of Brisbane Road – nor the emptiness of that Wembley game against Colchester – but the horror of those last eight or nine games which had all the signs of an accident waiting to happen. What was that all about? What went wrong? Please enlighten us if you can.
Of course, there’s another theory which says we only found ourselves in such a strong position because of that remarkable eight-game winning sequence (during which we played some admittedly poor teams such as Brighton, Doncaster and Hull). Anyway, make your mind up from the details of that three-part act:
Table after game 28 (a 4-1 defeat at Scarborough):
1 Notts. County 28 59
2 Peterborough United 27 49
3 Scarborough 28 47
4 Barnet 28 46
5 Rotherham United 27 45
6 Exeter City 28 45
7 Chester City 27 43
8 Lincoln City 27 43
9 Macclesfield Town 27 42
10 Hartlepool United 28 41
11 Torquay United 28 41
Then those eight wins on the trot:
Sat 24 Jan Shrewsbury Town (H) W 3-0
Sat 31 Jan Hartlepool United (H) W 1-0
Sat 07 Feb Brighton & Hove Albion (A) W 4-1
Sat 14 Feb Hull City (H) W 5-1
Sat 21 Feb Doncaster Rovers (A) W 1-0
Tue 24 Feb Chester City (A) W 3-1
Sat 28 Feb Lincoln City (H) W 3-2
Tue 03 Mar Cardiff City (H) W 1-0
This resulted in this league table after 36 games:
1 Notts. County 36 78
2 Torquay United 36 65
3 Macclesfield Town 36 62
4 Barnet 36 61
5 Scarborough 36 57
6 Peterborough United 36 56
7 Rotherham United 36 55
8 Lincoln City 35 55
Next, the last ten games of the season:
Sat 07 Mar Cambridge United (H) L 0-3
Sat 14 Mar Darlington (A) W 2-1
Sat 21 Mar Barnet (H) D 0-0
Sat 28 Mar Scunthorpe United (A) L 0-2
Sat 04 Apr Rochdale (H) D 0-0
Sat 11 Apr Mansfield Town (A) D 2-2
Mon 13 Apr Rotherham United (H) L 1-2
Sat 18 Apr Notts. County (A) L 0-3
Sat 25 Apr Peterborough United (H) W 3-1
Sat 02 May Leyton Orient (A) L 1-2
Looking at the final table below, you’ll see – in hindsight of course - that eleven points from the last ten games (possibly just ten) would have ensured promotion. Alternatively, counting after that Darlington win, eight points (maybe seven) from the last eight.
1 Notts. County 46 99
2 Macclesfield Town 46 82
3 Lincoln City 46 75
4 Colchester United 46 74
5 Torquay United 46 74
6 Scarborough 46 72
7 Barnet 46 70
Apologies for labouring this final bit. Your thoughts please on this spell in our history...
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Dave
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Post by Dave on Aug 23, 2009 11:16:56 GMT
Great thread and post Barton and I think your planned threads on former managers will be very enjoyable. I hope merse can post the guts of his post on Kevin Hodges on this thread as well, as it would suit this thread very well.
I have been trying to remember the situation about wages that I said Hodges or Plymouth tried to claim from our club.
The best I can remember is that our club was asked to pay wages to Hodges up until the day he signed for Plymouth, was he still under contract to that day? that I do not know, but I'm 100% sure this is what happened and the story was covered by the Herald Express at the time.
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Post by jond on Aug 23, 2009 16:53:06 GMT
I think this was the season we had Jason Roberts on loan for much of this period and for me it was his his partnership with Rodney Jack that made a huge difference. It would be interesting to see our record with and without Roberts in the side.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2009 17:44:27 GMT
I have been trying to remember the situation about wages that I said Hodges or Plymouth tried to claim from our club. The best I can remember is that our club was asked to pay wages to Hodges up until the day he signed for Plymouth, was he still under contract to that day? that I do not know, but I'm 100% sure this is what happened and the story was covered by the Herald Express at the time. Right, putting together things from Wiki, other sources and my memory I now believe there was a gap between the announcement and Hodges officially taking over at Argyle. I cetainly remember discussing Hodges' departure at the Devon v Yorks Nat West cricket match at Exmouth on 24 June with other Torquay supporters. But, according to various sources, he didn't start at Home Park until 1 August, just over five weeks later. Desperate Dan possibly asked us to pay him for those weeks? |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2009 17:54:34 GMT
I think this was the season we had Jason Roberts on loan for much of this period and for me it was his his partnership with Rodney Jack that made a huge difference. It would be interesting to see our record with and without Roberts in the side. And Roberts was recalled by Wolves - to be lent to Bristol City - immediately after that eighth consecutive win. I'm pretty sure Colin Lee was number two to Mark McGhee in those days so may have helped us secure Roberts in the first place. |
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Post by Yellow on Aug 23, 2009 18:14:50 GMT
I think this was the season we had Jason Roberts on loan for much of this period and for me it was his his partnership with Rodney Jack that made a huge difference. It would be interesting to see our record with and without Roberts in the side. And Roberts was recalled by Wolves - to be lent to Bristol City - immediately after that eighth consecutive win. I'm pretty sure Colin Lee was number two to Mark McGhee in those days so may have helped us secure Roberts in the first place. I remember with great fondness seeing the dynamic duo rip Brighton to shreds at Gillingham's stadium. What a pairing.... |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2009 19:04:28 GMT
Great thread and post Barton and I think your planned threads on former managers will be very enjoyable. The first few will concentrate on the 1990s because that should interest nearly all of our members - and it was an eventful decade, after all! |
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merse
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Post by merse on Aug 23, 2009 19:37:07 GMT
I think this was the season we had Jason Roberts on loan for much of this period and for me it was his his partnership with Rodney Jack that made a huge difference. It would be interesting to see our record with and without Roberts in the side.  It was Jason Roberts who was the icing on a very good cake and his departure before the end of the season saw an end to a pretty unique pairing of pace and power between him and Rodney Jack. Make no mistake about it, teams were terrified of the duo; it was something they were totally unused to facing in League 2. The sad thing was Jason didn't really want to go back to Wolves and he only went with great reluctance, and Wolves only wanted him back to get him out to Bristol City. I'll let you into a little secret too........................Jason's nephew occasionally posts on here, he's a real Torquay United fan; as is his dad! |
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Post by Yellow on Aug 23, 2009 19:46:36 GMT
Can someone stop this thread please.
It is too much to bear to be reminded of the pace and power of those two.
For a brief and glorious spell we had a Championship attack operating in Div2.
It was s*x on a stick.
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merse
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Post by merse on Aug 23, 2009 20:18:43 GMT
Can someone stop this thread please. It is too much to bear to be reminded of the pace and power of those two. For a brief and glorious spell we had a Championship attack operating in Div2. It was s*x on a stick. Better to have loved and lost than never loved at all Yellow.....................always be thankful when someone special comes along, but always be aware we are going to lose them some day............................Robin Stubbs, Lee Sharpe, Mark Loram, David Graham, Gregory Goodridge, Rodney Jack and Jason Roberts isn't bad going for so little a club in my lifetime and I'm waiting for the next "Special One" who will set Plainmoor alight and fire our imagination. ~ Merse awaits the Messiah!  |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2009 21:03:27 GMT
I'll let you into a little secret too........................Jason's nephew occasionally posts on here, he's a real Torquay United fan; as is his dad! What about his Uncle Cyrille? |
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Post by ohtobeatplainmoor on Aug 23, 2009 21:24:58 GMT
I think that there was a feeling that the departure of Kevin Hodges that summer was a virtual certainty, just as it felt that our promotion train was fallling off the rails from the moment that we were hammered by Cambridge United. Look back at the team that faced Cardiff for the final win on of our record breaking winning run: Torquay: Veysey ,Gurney ,Gibbs ,Robinson ,Gittens ,Watson ,Clayton ,Hill ,Jack ,Roberts & Leadbitter That was a very solid line-up - a real mix of vastly experienced players at the back in the midfield, all players that were either full of know-how and players like Hilly, Gibbs and Gurney earning very little money but were desperate to advance their football careers and they proved to be excellent finds. I can't see that the departure of Roberts was the sole reason for such a stutter, but it was certainly compounded by the loss of Jack for a couple of matches with a gashed knee. Scott Partridge wasn't fully fit when he signed (he didn't feature in the play-offs at all, did he?) and the Bedeau / Wayne Thomas (two young hopefulls whose careers certainly took very different paths) and Andy MacFarlane wasn't a patch on Jack and Roberts. I think that there was just a feeling of gloom hanging over the ground for a few of those final home matches and we were just destroyed at Leyton Orient by a team that was playing as if their lives depended on it, although just the width of the crossbar stopped Alex Watson from notching the goal that would have taken us up. How very different it would have been for a lot of those players and our club as a whole had that effort had gone-in and it is just another illustration between how fine a line there is between success and failure in football! The coach back to Devon was horrible, nearly as horrible as the trip back from Wembley a couple of weeks later! The summer was just a case of trying to limit the damage. A vacancy at Plymouth was always going to result in Hodges' departure, I was only surprised that he didn't take more players than Gibbs and McCall (although they were hugely significant departures). On your question about "what if Hodges, McCall and Nelson stayed", I think that it was very much a case that Rodders was going to leave for sure - he had earned move to the second tier and I was hugely thankful for the entertainment he provided and the money he brought the club when he went. He was a huge element of the success of that team (just as Hodges was a key element of the success of Jack - clearly a talent but took a while to be harnessed and used to such great effect) and perhaps Gittens and Gibbs (who I was told had an unsurprisingly massive pay-rise and signing-on fee when he signed for Plymouth) were likely to leave regardless of the ultimate outcome of the season. Could Hodges have handled such a rebuilding of a fantastic little squad of players? Possibly, but it always seemed to be a case of the "law of diminishing returns" at Plainmoor on that front........ Looking back over the Bateson years, I always felt that a Manager would come-in and achieve some initial success to a greater or lesser extent, once it seemed that there was some success being acheived we seemed to start to get crapper players to replace the key players that would depart for good money. I could always accept that we would lose the likes of Paul Trollope, Wayne Thomas, Andy Gurney, Rodney Jack, Greg Goodridge, David Graham etc, but when we would get trialists and total rough diamonds (who both have their place in putting a squad together) to repace such departures then it will always see a reign of a manager end in "failure". It just didn't have to be that way. What frustrated me even more that he would then let the new incumbant into the seat have a seemingly free-hand to bring-in new players with a budget that the departing manager had not been offered. To have created a dynasty that would see young player come through the system and bring the club success needs a stable bedrock and a robust infrastructure - whether it is at the Premier League or local Saturday League level. You wouldn't ever get that with Bateson at the helm. I watch the developments (that I'm surprised haven't been discussed on these fine boards before) that the Bateson clan make towards becoming a "centre of excellence" for Plymouth Argyle at Milber with interest: www.newton-abbot-today.co.uk/tn/news.cfm?id=33041&searchword=bateson |
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Post by Yellow on Aug 23, 2009 21:58:13 GMT
Can someone stop this thread please. It is too much to bear to be reminded of the pace and power of those two. For a brief and glorious spell we had a Championship attack operating in Div2. It was s*x on a stick. Better to have loved and lost than never loved at all Yellow.....................always be thankful when someone special comes along, but always be aware we are going to lose them some day............................Robin Stubbs, Lee Sharpe, Mark Loram, David Graham, Gregory Goodridge, Rodney Jack and Jason Roberts isn't bad going for so little a club in my lifetime and I'm waiting for the next "Special One" who will set Plainmoor alight and fire our imagination. ~ Merse awaits the Messiah! Well you missed him merse. It was Aggy Russell - football genius. Stay awake old boy. |
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Jon
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Post by Jon on Aug 23, 2009 23:40:01 GMT
Kevin Hodges was under contract at TUFC until June 30 1998.
Technically, that meant that no club could approach him without TUFC’s permission until July 1.
Argyle sacked Mick Jones over the weekend of June 20/21. They asked for permission to approach Hodges but permission was refused. Argyle went ahead and made an illegal approach anyway and Hodges was paraded at Home Park on June 24.
Kevin Hodges had verbally agreed a contract with TUFC over the weekend of 20/21 June, but then refused to sign it. A new contract had not been tied up before Wembley and both Hodges and Bateson had gone off on holiday after Wembley. According to Mervyn, the only sticking point before the holidays had been a car allowance and that had been resolved by Mervyn while Hodges was on holiday.
TUFC lodged an official complaint with the FA over the illegal approach. McCauley apologised for acting improperly and acknowledged that he had tarnished what had always been a very good relationship with TUFC, but said that football was a “bloodthirsty game” and you have to look out for yourself. Mervyn B appeared on TV and said he didn’t want an apology, he wanted £20k compensation. I’m not sure how it was resolved in the end.
Many will say, with some justification, that Hodges should have been tied up on an extended contract well before Wembley. In fairness to Mervyn, I think you should have a good look at the club’s circumstances at the time and then you would probably conclude that Mervyn wasn’t quite as brainless as the commonly accepted spin says. Mervyn has his faults but has always done his best for TUFC and the mocking derision he receives is utterly unfair in my opinion.
In the summer of 1997, Mike Bateson did step away from TUFC in quite a marked way. Mervyn became Chairman and Heather Kindeleit became Managing Director. Bateson wanted to remove his loans, which had until then been interest-free, but as there was no way of raising them elsewhere he left then in the club but started charging interest. The remaining board were left to balance the books and Mike Beer, Bill Rogers and Tom Lilley didn’t fancy the task so they all resigned. This left just Mervyn, Ian Hayman and Brian Palk to run the club alongside Heather Kindeleit with Mike and Suzanne Bateson retaining a place on the Board. Benney, Hayman and Palk would not have had the financial clout to be able to afford to take risks and the Bateson cheque book had been locked away.
Of course, Hayman and Palk are part of the marvellously progressive Board we have at Plainmoor now. They haven’t had brain transplants or personality transplants, they are merely able to act more “ambitiously” because there is financial backing.
Just about everyone agrees that the current Board is doing a great job, but last season they (I think one of them in particular) had to pump in an extra £370k in loans. If Benney, Hayman and Palk had got that far into the red in 1997/98 they would have had nowhere to run to.
Although Kevin Hodges was doing a sterling job, crowds in November / December sank as low as 1,400. There was no way that it looked as if there would be enough money to increase anyone’s wages.
Ironically, the financial tide was turning just as Hodges walked out. Wembley produced a decent profit. Rodney Jack was sold for a big fee, followed by Gregg, Gurney and Partridge.
As a result, Wes Saunders was given budgets that Hodges could only have dreamed of. I remember when we played Spurs in the League Cup in 2001, Garry Nelson was the summariser. The commentator pointed out that Spurs had paid £11m for Rebrov whilst TUFC’s most expensive player was Eifion Williams at a paltry £70k. You could hear Nelson spluttering like one of those four Yorkshiremen - £70k, we were lucky to have the price of a cup of tea.
A recurring theme is that TUFC spends the money it has – some managers have been fortunate to be in place at times of relative feast and some at times of utter famine. Maybe it has been the wrong managers that had the funding.
I don’t think Wes made the most of the money he had available to him. What would Hodges have done with the budget Wes had? What would Cyril Knowles (or Mike Green or Bruce Rioch for that matter) have done with the budget Dave Smith had? What would Don O have done with the money Eddie May spent? What might Leroy have done with the budget Roy McFarland had? We’ll never know.
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merse
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Post by merse on Aug 24, 2009 2:52:58 GMT
~ Merse awaits the Messiah! Well you missed him merse. It was Aggy Russell - football genius. Stay awake old boy. You missed the point that the players I listed are all exciting finishers, match winners and therefore the obvious focus of idolitory whilst their star is burning. Fine player that he was, Aggy couldn't lace the boots of people like Don Mills, Tommy Mitchinson and Bruce Rioch.That's not to deride him for he was and remains a very fine player, but Alex Russell was no exciting finisher who got pulses racing; he was a craftsman and creator of chances for such players. |
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