FL2: Torquay United v Port Vale 13th Feb 2010

But it can't be..................he promised us he Terry/Brucie/Open Top Bus would never post on here again.

I don't know, you can't trust anyone's word these days and they'll be telling us Santa's not for real next!

"They'll be gurning in the streets of North Devon tonight" ;D

Same old same old. Another bitterly disappointing afternoon, a fairly mediocre performance but another dreadful result against a fairly ordinairy but organised Port Vale with the two reasonable strikers.

At times we looked OK - but our confidence is fragile and the sloppy goals that we are conceding are clearly taking us back to the BSP.
It's a shame, because Barnes showed some great touches, Thomson ghosted past players (before reverting to a player that tried to take-on far too many defenders and became no use), O'Kane showed great vision and ability to pick a pass, Smith showed excellent maturity and physical presence than you could expect for a player of his age and size.
There is clearly no leadership other than from Branston. We played without direction as soon as PV got their winner - there was no "throwing the kitchen sink" as we have to face on the odd occaision that we are holding the lead late-on in a match. At 2-1 we were chasing shadows and pumping hopeful balls forward into space. Not good enough.

Camara didn't offer the same options that Nicho does - although has a bit of pace his positioning was very poor, his passing was dreadful for the most part and his debut was nicely capped by that dreadful freekick. To be fair he has only been at the club for two days and his ball to Barnes that created our best chance of the first half was excellent.

Mansell's distribution was as bad as I recalled. I would hope that when Carlisle becomes available again the Mansell can revert to right-back with Carlisle in front of him. Smith coped well enough at left-back and I'd be happy to see him back there.

A word on the ref. We have had some crap this season at Plainmoor (and beyond) but not really many of them have directly cost us points from their poor decisions. That was never a free-kick - and the amount of fouls committed by PV players that went unpunished was shocking. That goal had a huge effect on the match and I think that we might just have sene a different outcome if we had held-on til half time.

I've no idea where the next point is going to come from. We have 16 games left to extract ourselves from this position, judging by the performance today I think that there is too much to do.
The departure of the natural leader who can drag the younger players through has seen the team's structure disappear - I can only see one outcome and it is the likes of Altrincham, Histon, FGR and Salisbury returning to Plainmoor to "park the bus".

jeanette - no offence my dear but come on Hargreaves never had the energy to get his hair cut. More interested in this new fangled dogging or blogging or whatever its called. Never really rated him - always winking to the camera when we on the tele last year or flexing his man boobs for the camera's in the changing rooms. tell you what if I didn't know better I think he had his eye on that presenter. Gawd - no wonder we never won a game when we were on the tele. All that posing - got on my wick. if I was Paul Buckle I would have had him training the kids, and on half wages as well. That might have got him concentrating on the matter in hand..
And that Lee Mansell ain't alot better I can tell you today. Look at him today - given a chance in midfield. All that running around and trying to gee the team up today when we went one down. he was putting it all along the lazy shit. didn't really care, the blokes got no pride. The manager will have him on his bike. He knows his onions. See how he likes a spell at Forest Green Rovers with a freezing Force eight up his ring piece - that will focus his mind.
we need a bit more character like that Brunston - now he' s an ugly bag of spanners. Would not like to meet him on a dark night I can tell you.

I agree, a cracking post.

I have said elsewhere that I would expect the Board to be looking at the points haul from the next three matches. If we lose to Cheltenham after a loss to Rotherham, my expectation is that we will be in the hunt for a new Manager. If we get a point, but lose the match after that at home to Accrington, then I expect the same will occur.

I do think it is a dangerous game for Buckle to point at the budget at this stage and after Alex Rowe has gone on public record in the way that he has, and he is now a Manager whose team must accrue a decent points haul in the next three matches to avoid him losing his job. Pure speculation on my part, but the words about the budget are badly timed, particularly when we are all aware that the Board had been committed to the Ademeno purchase on February 1st before Evans started talking about Crawley's first £1m player and such like.

Do I believe it would be right to lose the Manager at the beginning of March? I really don't know is the honest answer, but I do believe we have a decent squad at this stage of proceedings - and, yes, Rendell and Carlisle are sorely missed - but they are not producing performances. They were before Hereford, but to no avail. Now, from reports, it all seems a bit disjointed and sounds like the stuff of Management is needed to restore and resurrect it. Firefighting qualities are required. Buckle should be given a turnaround timescale along the lines of those I mentioned above to show such qualities. If the result is no points in the next two matches, further public bemoaning of the budget or not, there is only one way. If he gets only one point and we lose at home to Accrington, the same thing. Other unimpressive points scenarios - again the same.

There seems to me absolutely no point in going down the road of Colin Lee to support his efforts as with Wes. That only goes one way and the friction in the interim is not what this squad needs to produce results.

I'm not calling for anyone's head, but I do think fresh perspective is now required by the Board. Some would say, it is overdue. Either way, it is essential.

... and things are that bad I did my last post on the wrong thread!!

It's really difficult to assess quite where we are now, isn't it ?

Our team containing Todd, Nicholson, Hargreaves and Sills was good enough to beat Chesterfield in the first game of the season, who, it now turns out, could achieve automatic promotion this season.

We all thought that the corner had been turned in December, when we thrashed two poor teams in the league and also Stockport 4-0 away in the FA Cup. At that time we all thought that we would go steaming up the League 2 table. Time has told us that it was nothing more exciting than a false dawn.

The manager has decided, with the arrival of the January transfer window, that the experienced players who excelled in the BSP years are no longer good enough, and has replaced them with a mixture of youth, experience of days gone by and players who are actually committed to other clubs.

So, we have been handed a short-term future which has been determined by a choice between the devil (you know) and the deep blue sea, to coin a hackneyed phrase.

Only time will tell if the current crop of players will get us out of our current predicament, although it is strangely similar to our situation in 2006/07.

Is the manager right or wrong to have taken what all of us realise is a gamble fraught with danger ? Perhaps the game at Cheltenham the week after next will provide the answer.