FL2: Burton v Torquay Utd 25 April 2011

Greetings from Belgium.

Gutted to hear that we drew again. Didn't hear the match on the wireless but we have certainly thrown away the automatic points haven't we. Touch and go for the play offs but even if we miss out Bucks has done well with the tight budget he's got. Look forward to the match reports.

Right, off for some fine beer and some food. ;D

Totally agree with you there Chelston. Lets look at the bigger picture. However it pans out its been another fantastic rollercoaster of a season at TQ1 !! Well done Bucks and the players.

As I have said before ,that point deducted!!!!

Only my second ever match report, so here goes! Just got back, not much to say really - just one of our classic performances we often seem to put in against lower-in-the-table opposition!

Well, we somehow managed to make Burton look like a class side. They were anything but in reality.

We started off shakily, and their left winger Malone (?), on loan from Wolves, was skinning Manse every time, but couldn't put in a decent enough cross. But then, out of nowhere, we took the lead. I couldn't quite figure out what happened, but from what I saw it seemed like their centre back lost control of the ball in his box and Zebs nipped in and poked it home. The Gulls fans were in raptures. And then a few minutes later a decent move down the right involving Manse, O'Kane, Zebs and Oastler saw the ball laid off to Tomlin who finished impressively. It was against the run of play to be 2-0 up inside 15 minutes but no-one was complaining.

Burton kept piling on the pressure and eventually, after a move where we backed off and backed off their players, the ball came to McGrath on the edge of the area, who curled one into Bevan's right hand corner. The big man did well to get a touch to it but it was pretty unstoppable, even for Bevs. An equaliser seemed pretty inevitable the way we were playing and sure enough, about 5 minutes before half-time, another move down their right ended up in the ball getting squared across our box and, after an agonizing wait watching him chase the ball, Pearson finished from a pretty tight angle.

Half-time was a blessing in all honesty, and it looked like Buckle was going to have to give the players a proverbial rocket at half-time for us to get anything. Sure enough we came back out and looked bright, we made several good chances and looked much more up for it. But then the Burton winger ran down the right, three of our players kept backing off him (not sure which ones), he crossed and Zola had an easy header to make it 3-2. Bucks made the sub pretty soon after that and Kee had an immediate impact. I can't quite remember the move in my mind (I am rubbish at this aren't I!) but I do remember our Billy curling in a very similar effort to McGrath's in the first half. 3-3.

And that's how it remained. We never really looked like winning it. We had a few Branston headers, and a couple of shots from Robinson but that was about it. Burton finished in a pretty similar fashion, with a couple of close efforts but nothing really looking like a winner. In the five minutes added on, Stanley had the ball in the net just as the ref blew for full-time. Everyone was quite angry, but in reality the Burton keeper had heard the whistle and didn't move for it, and we'd wasted 30 seconds before his shot faffing around with the ball on the edge of the area anyway!

So a draw was pretty fair. Annoying, and a poor performance by our standards, but at least we showed enough guts to get a point. We were worryingly one-dimensional at times, didn't use our strengths out wide, and looked very shaky at the back all the way through, so I do worry about how we'd do if we did get promoted, but I'm gonna just put this one down as a blip and move on to Chesterfield!

Few ratings for what its worth:

Bevs: 6 - couldn't do a massive amount about any of the goals but his kicking was all over the place.
Nicho: 6 - didn't do much and was inexplicably subbed for LRT. Hope he's not injured.
Robbo: 7 - Won pretty much everything that came his way.
Branno: 7 - Ditto the above. Dealt with the idiotic Burton crowd well. Had their strikers pretty much in his pocket.
Manse: 5 - Poorest game I've seen from him. Constantly skinned and didn't offer a massive amount going forward either.
Robinson: 6 - Quiet. Had a few nice moments and looked assured on the ball, but never really got any service.
Oastler: 7 - Very good. Put in a great shift, lots of tackles, lots of headers. Passing wasn't always great but not really many options for him to go to. Sign him up Bucks!
Stanley: 6 - Pretty quiet. Put in a few nice passes and was as determined as ever, but nothing ever really came off for him.
Eunan: 5 - Was he even playing? Apart from having a small hand in our second goal I honestly can't remember him doing a single thing.
Zebs: 7 - Great. Fantastic work ethic, didn't stop chasing and linked with Tomlin very well.
Tomlin: 8 - Thought he was our best player. Constant menace for them. Held the ball up well, created chances and scored his own one too.

Subs - Kee: 6 - Scored his goal brilliantly but did little else. Rowe-Turner and Stevens not really worth mentioning.

Up the Gulls,

John

We will all know for sure on Friday whether or not our amazing season will be extended to a few more games.
By far my biggest fear though is that our sucess on a meager budget will not have gone unnoticed and that there may well be a few clubs waiting in the wings to poach our Manger and better players.
Only two defeats in 19 games and a far superior gd than any of our rivals it will be tough phsycologically for players, management and supporters alike if we fail to creep in.

Really not sure what to make of that match. Played in perfect conditions at times in silence, the match basically summed up our weaknesses this season and sums up why, in my opinion, we will not go up........or even get into the Play Offs. For the first 10 minutes Burton were all over us - the omens looked bad as their winger had the beating of Mansell and Zola was causing problems in the centre. I'd have settled for a draw at that point. Then they gifted us a goal - I mean really gifted - think Dobson's equaliser in 1987 against Crewe and thne times it by a hundred for a defensive blunder. That goal is just reward for the amount of similar situations that Zebs had chased down over the season and come away with nothing. Within 5 minutes Tomlin finished well after a slick move - 2 up after one and half shots on goal! For the next few minutes I thought it was a question of how many we'd win by as Burton looked dead.

Then Bevs lets them back in it. I disagree with the previous report - he could and should have pushed this wide. It was a decent strike, but he got both hands to it and should have done better. From then on it was a question of getting to half time still leading. Unfortunately, we couldn't and another poor reaction from Bevan to an angled ball acros our box led to their equaliser. All very frustrating, but oh so predictable. Not a good day for the big fella to have an off day.

Burton were far quicker out of the traps for the second half and went ahead with a decent header - another one which stemmed from us giving the ball away though. At that point I thought we would be on the end of a stuffing, but strangely taking the lead semed to be about the worst thing that Burton have done - they stopped attacking us. Billy came on and scored with a sweet strike and the game was very much in the balance. Burton missed a couple of real sitters and Bevs actually woke up to make a decent save or two. Equally, we looked like we could sneak it late on - their defence was very suspect and this must be Darren Moore's last season in the football league. Both their centre backs were dodgy, but we did not have enough quality to creat the goal.

There is little point in looking at this as another 2-0 lead lost. That situation came about very much against the run of play and we were never, ever going to hold on. They gave us the runaround up front and both our full backs struggled. On the positive side, Tomlin continues to develop as a player and showed very good close control and an ability to turn a player. He is certainly not the lazy player I thought he was. I have been very impressed with him in the two games over easter.

The other results went against us today and to be honest I cant see us getting back into the play offs. In a comparatively poor league we are just falling short. I just don't think we have displayed the quality and consistency to expect anything more. I'd love to be proven wrong mind and it will be no disgrace for us to miss out. We are light years ahrad of where I thought we would be and to keep the season alive going into the last two games has been a real bonus. If we can keep, Branston, sign Stanley, Oastler and maybe Tomlin with one or two others.......sort out Billy's weight and continue the development of Zebs, O'kane and Ellis then there is plenty to look forward to next year whatever league we are in.

Depends on how you look at it really. Chesterfield were 8th last year on 70 points and Bury 9th with 69 points. Northampton were 11th with 67 points. A minimum of a point needed on Friday to guarantee some interest on the last league game.