Dave
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Post by Dave on Apr 20, 2010 18:55:45 GMT
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Post by lambethgull on Apr 20, 2010 20:08:00 GMT
Thanks for that, Dave - much appreciated as someone who can't get hold of a paper version of the HE.
My observation is how young the crowd looks compared to nowadays (see top pic). Will we have any fans left by 2030?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 21, 2010 16:29:45 GMT
From an entirely personal perspective in looking back to the Crewe game in 1987, the most surprising thing was that I was even at the match. At that time, I was living in Preston, working in Blackburn and watching most of my football at places such as Goodison and Ewood. In those days I normally only visited Torquay at Christmas and Easter and never once contemplated a trip home solely for the purpose of watching football (not even for the Sheffield Wednesday FA Cup tie in 1983). I kept in touch but – for reasons relating to distance and the sheer bloody awfulness of it all – I’d describe myself as “semi-detached” and “semi-lapsed” at the time. Indeed, checking the programme box, I’m surprised I made it to as many as eight away games during that 1986/87 season.
In fact you’ll probably be relatively hard-pressed to find too many people on this forum who watched a large number of Torquay games that season. Some of us are too young; others were geographically dispersed or distracted by other duties. And, as for the rest, the attendance figures were so low that watching TUFC must have been even more of a minority pursuit than usual.
Consequently it would be revealing to learn more about the mood during that season. It can’t have been good due to the Webb effect and – quite possibly - the generally sombre atmosphere surrounding the game after Heysel and Bradford. And, remembering this was the first year when a club was due to be automatically relegated to the Conference, I suspect we were resigned to our fate once the League announced this change (which I imagine was during the summer of 1986? Or was it earlier?).
One game I attended was the 3-3 draw at Rochdale at the end of November. Looking at the table after that match, it must have been an important affair and we were probably already getting jumpy:
20 Hartlepool United 18/19
21 Halifax Town 18/18
22 Rochdale 16/14
23 Torquay United 18/14
24 Stockport County 17/9
I guess it was “thank God for Stockport” at the time who – as it happened - finished 19th. No sign yet of Burnley, Tranmere or Lincoln who were all to be involved in the scrap at the end of the season. A lot has been made of the fall of Lincoln who – as of 3 January – were in 7th place; 17 points ahead of Torquay United at the bottom. But, look at that New Year table, and you’ll see Tranmere in 15th place (eleven points ahead of us) and Burnley in 19th (nine ahead). Now cast ahead to when we played at Turf Moor in mid-April, an easy trip over from Blackburn for myself. Mark Loram scored twice only for Burnley to recover to force a draw. My colleague Richard was sure we’d be okay as long as had Lors in the side:
20 Hereford United 39/43
21 Stockport County 38/43
22 Torquay United 39/40
23 Burnley 39/39
24 Rochdale 38/37
But, for myself, still no real feeling that I wanted to be there for the final outcome: interested but still a bit detached with other football to watch and other things to enjoy (which suggests I was a rather better-balanced individual in those days). In fact the urgency and importance of the whole business didn’t occur to me until the May Monday bank holiday on 4 May. I was in Norwich visiting Dave Street – who’d been in and around TGBS and Plainmoor in the 1970s – and had seen Everton win the League in the afternoon. Then, in the evening, I suddenly became absolutely desperate to learn how we’d done at Leyton Orient. It was only then the idea of actually getting to Plainmoor on the Saturday – should it be vital – crossed my mind. From that point it was a case of firstly waiting for Rochdale's game in hand to be played on the Wednesday before the season finished on the Saturday. By 10pm Wednesday, Teletext was showing:
20 Rochdale 45/50 (-17)
21 Lincoln City 45/48 (-18)
22 Torquay United 45/47 (-16)
23 Tranmere Rovers 45/47 (-19)
24 Burnley 45/46 (-22)
At this stage the key point was that – and it’s hard to credit it now – Tranmere’s last game was to be played on the Friday evening against Exeter City. Should they lose, I was unlikely to make the trip from Preston to Plainmoor as I would have considered us safe.
As you can imagine Friday night was spent in front of Teletext in my 12th floor downtown Preston apartment and – once Tranmere’s 1-0 victory was confirmed – I immediately headed to the railway station to buy a ticket for the 0330 to Newton Abbot. My logic was that, with the ticket already purchased, I wasn’t going to do anything silly like changing my mind. And, given I hardly ever used to go home outside of holiday times, my mother was shocked when I gave her the ten-minute warning from the phone box at Hele Corner. Quite correctly, she knew something must be wrong.
The rest –as they say – is history: the old popular side; a scrappy affair; complete and utter resignation at half-time; a strange incident down by the popular side touchline which caused play to be held up; Dobbo’s equaliser; Crewe’s missed opportunity; delirium when the other results came through. The media scrutiny had been on Burnley (cue: late kick-off) – how can such as great club be in this position when the likes of Torquay deserve to be there? – until, ultimately, the arithmetic caught up with Lincoln who had not once been at the foot of the table until the music finally stopped:
20 Tranmere Rovers 46/50 (-18)
21 Rochdale 46/50 (-19)
22 Burnley 46/ 49 (-21)
23 Torquay United 46/48 (-16)
24 Lincoln City 46/48 (-20)
I’d watched the game on my own because all the people I knew who were interested in Torquay United were living in different parts of the country. None made the effort to be there so there was nobody with whom to compare notes. I realised the stoppage had been something to do with Jim McNichol but I’m pretty sure I knew nothing of the police dog until the next day’s Sunday Independent at the earliest. The angle from my spot on the Marnham Road terrace meant I saw nothing of the incident.
My memory from that point is of hanging around Sammy Collins’ old newsagency on Forest Road for the Buff which I’m convinced had THE GREAT ESCAPE as its' headline (has anybody a copy?). Thereafter I can only recall changing trains at Crewe – of all places – the following afternoon. But, from then on, something had changed and supporting Torquay United meant more than it had ever done.
Oh, and my apologies if I've said some of this before. We've revisited that day before and I'm sure we'll do so again...
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merse
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Post by merse on Apr 21, 2010 17:16:15 GMT
In fact you’ll probably be relatively hard-pressed to find too many people on this forum who watched a large number of Torquay games that season. Some of us are too young; others of us were geographically dispersed or distracted by other duties.  You can certainly count me amongst that category Barty. I was so distarught with the state of the club that I can even recall making one visit to Plainmoor and surveying the decaying, run down dereliction of the ground, tiny crowd and bloody awful football; leaving before half time and going to Torre Abbey Sands and meeting Jes Payne ~ a former player during my time working at Plainmoor ~ who had decided on exactly the same course of action and we spent the rest of the afternoon wondering what was becoming of our old club whilst we drunk coffee on the harbourside. I had not long settled in London after being a somewhat transient figure coming to terms with my recent divorce and the separation from my two young daughters that it all entailed. Although I had caught a couple of away games including that one at the Orient, my "end of season" plans had taken me to Rhodes for the actual time of the Crewe game and in those pre-internet days and also the fact that Sunday's papers didn't arrive in town until Monday lunchtime; it was only then that I even got to read the result let alone learn of the enormity of the late drama and the exact detail of it. So there was I in blissful ignorance of it all and more than likely at the very time of "Bryn's Bite" I would have been contemplating ending the afternoon siesta (2 hours ahead in time remember)and having an early evening snorkel dive into the clear blue waters and watching myriads of fish with their attendant colour and drama of shoal swimming before heading back to my appartment and a nice cool evening dinner at a roof top restuarant in the town of Lindos (if you've never been there, do try before you die!) certainly a whole world away from what would have been a dreadfully fraught situation back home! |
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chelstongull
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Post by chelstongull on Apr 21, 2010 18:44:46 GMT
Thanks for that, Dave - much appreciated as someone who can't get hold of a paper version of the HE. My observation is how young the crowd looks compared to nowadays (see top pic). Will we have any fans left by 2030? I hope to be around then ;D |
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Post by stuartB on Apr 21, 2010 20:49:42 GMT
Thanks for that, Dave - much appreciated as someone who can't get hold of a paper version of the HE. My observation is how young the crowd looks compared to nowadays (see top pic). Will we have any fans left by 2030? I hope to be around then ;D are you sure? you'll be 104  |
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Jon
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Post by Jon on Apr 21, 2010 23:41:23 GMT
In fact you’ll probably be relatively hard-pressed to find too many people on this forum who watched a large number of Torquay games that season. Some of us are too young; others were geographically dispersed or distracted by other duties. And, as for the rest, the attendance figures were so low that watching TUFC must have been even more of a minority pursuit than usual. Consequently it would be revealing to learn more about the mood during that season. It can’t have been good due to the Webb effect.... I spent that season living in Portugal and following (verging on supporting even) Vitoria Guimaraes led by the mighty Paulinho Cascavel. I spent the Crewe match listening to the World Service prattling on about how nobody wanted Burnley to go down - I bloody did! I can remember it like it was yesterday. They updated every time an important goal went in, but not when we equalised. When they said "Final score from Plainmoor...", I prepared myself to jump off the balcony only to hear the unbelievable deliverance in the words " Torquay TWO...." Utter despair to total elation in a split second. I was in Torquay for the first month of that season and I seem to recall the mood being quite upbeat in the summer of 86. Webby had been chased away - "Ding Dong the Wicked Witch is Dead". We made some pretty impressive close-season signings - McNichol, King, Impey, Musker, Dobson, Nardiello. We even beat Chelsea in a pre-season friendly! As I left the country, I did not fear for our survival one bit. In fact, we only lost two of our first ten league games. It was a season that started with hope and optimism, descended into a mixture of fear, despair and panic and ended with a sigh of relief. We've seen quite a few of them over the years, haven't we? |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 26, 2010 21:28:47 GMT
I was in Torquay for the first month of that season and I seem to recall the mood being quite upbeat in the summer of 86. Webby had been chased away - "Ding Dong the Wicked Witch is Dead". We made some pretty impressive close-season signings - McNichol, King, Impey, Musker, Dobson, Nardiello. We even beat Chelsea in a pre-season friendly! As I left the country, I did not fear for our survival one bit. In fact, we only lost two of our first ten league games. That’s a fascinating insight into the summer of 1986. As I’ve said, I was relatively disconnected from the whole thing and can now only remember a deathly blackness surrounding the whole 1984-87 period. In fact, catch me unawares, and I’m likely to recall two-and-half years of Webb followed by Stuart Morgan heroically digging us out-of-the-hole. But, as Jon’s post would serve to indicate, that would be quite a rewriting of history on my behalf. Webb was only actually manager from February 1984 to August 1985 and was gone from the club by June 1986. Stuart Morgan, for his part, was on the scene from September 1985. From my Lancashire eyrie – with me having something of a “downer” on things Torquay – it still resembled an unhappy mess and I’m sure I didn’t have much faith in the return of Mr Pope and friends. But, as ever, Jon makes a good point about the quality of our signings that summer. So what went wrong after those first ten games? Was it Jon’s departure for Portugal or something more structural? Six defeats on the trot in October and November culminating in the infamous game against Wolves. But not too much disruption to the team as the key signings played in the majority of those games. We do have in some off the old programmes on here just how much it cost to watch games back then along with the cost of season tickets, it would be great if one of our more brainier members could work out if watching football back when we did have evening kick-offs was much cheaper and by how much. I’m afraid I can’t offer anything conclusive but I suspect “football price inflation” wasn’t too much of an issue then. Indeed, I’d contend it was post-Hillsborough (stadium modernisation) and post-Premier League that the cost of admission - much to the disappointment of Lord Taylor - started to shoot up. In other words, 5-6 years after the end of evening kick-offs at Plainmoor. Instead, we have to remember that attendances at Torquay United – and elsewhere – steadily decreased during the greater part of our mid-1960s to mid-1980s floodlit era. The common explanations for this were, initially, television and, more latterly, hooliganism. As someone who never stopped going to football matches during that era, I’ll always argue the perception painted a far bleaker picture than the reality. Nonetheless, football’s reputation was at an all-time low and “polite company” never ceased to express amazement at my willingness to attend matches. I had to be a thug to even contemplate it. The moot historical point might be to argue that our gates would have further fallen if we’d be playing in the afternoons. But, overall, it was the case that – for numerous reasons - our crowds started to decline around five years after we started playing on Saturday evenings. We do now have living in Torbay and Newton Abbot and all the other towns and villages, far more people who have moved down here from outside Devon, there are not so many locals as there once was for sure, but there was a time we had gates of over 10.000 and I really believe its more than possible to build our gates up over time to at least 5.000 and it can happen, but it never will if the club does nothing and just hopes people will come to home games. I’ve taken this interesting statement from another thread. I take the point about Newton Abbot and many villages being different but, regarding Torquay and Paignton, it was ever thus with inward migration being central to the story of the two resorts. At the time Torquay United turned professional, around 60,000 people lived in Torbay. Later, there were nearly 80,000 Torbay residents when Eric Webber arrived in 1951 and just under 110,000 when the O’Farrell/Brown years came to an end. Now we’re told there are 135,000 living in the bay. You may not have seen this figure before, but that means Torbay’s current population is 2.20 times what it was at the start of Torquay United’s professional era (compared to a 1.39 times growth for the UK as a whole during the same period). Back in that 1921/22 Western League season, 0.14% of the UK population lived in Torbay. Now it’s 0.22%. And, should you wish to draw a mythical line between “locals” and “non locals”, I imagine there are now more of both categories than ever before. But has Torquay United ever benefitted from the area’s population growth? Probably not too much as our attendance history generally matches national peaks and troughs with the exception of our exceptional times in the late 1960s. However you can imagine that some of the post-WW2 newcomers – my father included – were attracted to Plainmoor when football was much more of a national habit. Likewise, the club probably won over plenty of new converts from those moving to the area in the 1960s. But from the 1970s onwards I guess it’s been far harder for all the usual reasons: changes in lifestyle; televised football; the lack of appeal of lower division football to all but the commited. And, of course, that applies to so-called “locals” and "non locals” alike. And, to return to the original theme of this thread, I doubt there were too many "converts" to the cause in the mid 1980s. A number of young people, of course, but probably rather fewer than at other times. Good luck to you if you were one of the "newbies" who cut their teeth on Webby's Wonders... |
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merse
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Post by merse on Apr 26, 2010 21:43:21 GMT
One of the most laughable excuses put around when I was at Plainmoor for the poor interest levels was that "Torquay was a rugby town" ~ what bollocks that was when any fool who ventured to the Rec would be pushed to find more than a handful of bellicose die hards in their barbour coats and deer stalkers augmented by a handful of Welsh teachers dotted around the place in numbers that defied the use of the word "crowd". On the subject of rugby......................has anyone any idea of just what level of crowd interest the resurgence of Newton All Whites has resulted in this season?
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Post by stuartB on Apr 26, 2010 21:49:07 GMT
Is it possible that Bryn had more bite than aussie?  |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 26, 2010 21:52:46 GMT
One of the most laughable excuses put around when I was at Plainmoor for the poor interest levels was that "Torquay was a rugby town" Ah yes, Torquay Athletic one of the successes of the professional era! A reminder of this season's table: 1. Hartpury College 2. Newton Abbot 3. Brixham 4. Paignton 5. Clevedon 6. Avonmouth Old Boys 7. Cullompton 8. St Ives 9. Chosen Hill Former Pupils 10. Ivybridge 11. Sidmouth 12. Torquay Athletic 13. Yatton 14. St Mary's Old Boys |
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Post by stefano on Apr 26, 2010 22:27:35 GMT
On the subject of rugby......................has anyone any idea of just what level of crowd interest the resurgence of Newton All Whites has resulted in this season? About 200 which has been quite consistent over several years now. I've been up there a few seasons now with Ivybridge RFC (a very young club only formed about 1980) and perhaps like our own football team you have the loyal diehards, although I think in local rugby they don't actually drift away depending on results (mind you it did used to be 500 plus at Rackerhayes in the 1960's but the lower crowds now probably just reflects declining spectator interest in all sports) |
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Post by westyorkshiregull on Apr 30, 2010 21:02:42 GMT
checkout my tufc tribute of the crewe match here
i was 8 at the time of this match and it was the 2nd season my dad taking me too plainmoor. i remember like yesterday being on the old wooden benches in the family enclosure aythey called it then. ( tolchards family stand i seem to remember ) .
i remember the cloom of dust from dobsons boot and everyone screaming and shouting........ great day , great memories. dobson was a awesome player really for us , 2 great seasons. he now plays a bit of bowls up in the north east.... wonder what the others players do.... anyone know ? ade manns and the like ?
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Dave
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Post by Dave on May 1, 2010 10:26:28 GMT
Hi westyorkshiregull and welcome to the TFF, many thanks for putting up the link I really enjoyed watching the video and reliving again that great day.
Its clear to see just how much smaller the popside is now and what a reminder to see that horrible away cage that was put up after Web had removed the terraced steps that were once there so he could use the space behind the goal as a secondhand car lot.
While the new away stand is smaller than it really should have been built, its a vast improvement on what Web left there.
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Post by westyorkshiregull on May 1, 2010 13:28:41 GMT
no worries dave. thanks great forum this did not know it exsisted. its also good to talk about the old times. the 1980's to me were the old times. check out my other videos , im going to add more soon.
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