Torquay in crisis?

[Gulliball]

…and there goes the youth academy. Sad, but not unexpected.

I think it was the only choice, sadly. If we have to make savings of circa £500k per year, then the youth academy at between £240k and £300k had to go. For all the good it brings, we simply don't have the money for it now that any losses aren't being covered. I think the authorities should take a good chunk of the blame too - the first team getting relegated out the league means we lose funding for the youth department, so what do they think is going to happen? We might have been able to maintain the previous level of funding, but having lost the central funding there was no chance.

 

[HertsWolf]

…and there goes the youth academy. Sad, but not unexpected.

Always sad when a youth setup goes. How much does it cost? Surely these can be run at virtually no cost at all.

Some of what Dean Edwards says would seem a bit scary if I was a TU fan. He seems to be alienating people...calling them soft, telling local FA to 'step up', etc.

 

[yellow]

Nah, see Gulliball's post above.

I don't know what to make of Edwards' comments so far to be honest, but some of the early signs from this new board are refreshing. Hopefully we'll have a manager in soon (preferably not someone previously employed at the club) and we can start grabbing some players to bolster the first team.

I don't care how it's done, but I just want to be back in the Football League, desperately.

 

[Tarzan]

Frankly, I think Edwards comes across as a bit of a tit in that article. I also find it odd the way that anyone can distance themselves from failure whilst also claiming to be part of the solution. I guess that's what solitary confinement in the cloakroom does to you.

The way I read it, and once you strip away all of the jumpers for goalposts bluster, what he's essentially saying is that it's back to basics. There's probably going to be a whole lot more pain along the way (I heard something about the training ground?) but I genuinely wish them well. Paul Buckle is still unemployed I think

 

[DarkSithLord]

Frankly, I think Edwards comes across as a bit of a tit in that article. I also find it odd the way that anyone can distance themselves from failure whilst also claiming to be part of the solution. I guess that's what solitary confinement in the cloakroom does to you.

The way I read it, and once you strip away all of the jumpers for goalposts bluster, what he's essentially saying is that it's back to basics. There's probably going to be a whole lot more pain along the way (I heard something about the training ground?) but I genuinely wish them well. Paul Buckle is still unemployed I think

Welcome to 1FF!

 

[HertsWolf]

I suppose it depends on what you are calling an 'academy'. Many non-league clubs have junior and youth teams, teaching them skills and bringing them on. How much does that cost? Surely, an academy is the way to further cement a club to a local community, and conversely, without it, people drift away and the next thing you know all the local kids are wearing green and white striped tops.....

 

[DT-the-gull]

I suppose it depends on what you are calling an 'academy'. Many non-league clubs have junior and youth teams, teaching them skills and bringing them on. How much does that cost? Surely, an academy is the way to further cement a club to a local community, and conversely, without it, people drift away and the next thing you know all the local kids are wearing green and white striped tops.....

We had an EPPP CAT 3 academy, with 5 full time staff, a youth team and academy teams from U8-U16, as said with the loss of funding the club couldn't run it anymore. TUFC are going down the route you're talking about, our club does have a " football in the community " scheme, that is going to be extended, and club is going forge greater links with the local youth football leagues.

 

[HertsWolf]

We had an EPPP CAT 3 academy, with 5 full time staff, a youth team and academy teams from U8-U16, as said with the loss of funding the club couldn't run it anymore. TUFC are going down the route you're talking about, our club does have a " football in the community " scheme, that is going to be extended, and club is going forge greater links with the local youth football leagues.

Ah, fair enough. That was what I was wondering. Can understand that you can't afford that kind of academy at the moment.

 

[DT-the-gull]

As for the comments of Dean Edwards, he wasn't referring to the local people as being soft, he was referring to the new, young and upcoming generation of footballers, he is referring to TUFC as being a soft touch over the years, and I make him right.

When he said I want people at this club who'd kick their granny, he really didn't mean bringing thugs to the club who would actually do such a thing, he is obviously talking about bringing people in, players and staff who are mentally strong, physical, and have that will to win, no matter what, lets hope he can deliver that.

 

[Luke Imp]

Surely Torquay have got rid of it too quickly i.e. they'd still get part of an FL/FA grant this season?

Closing it completely won't be a 100% saving this season.

 

[DT-the-gull]

No, in a clubs second season out of the football league, the academy funding drops from 2/3rd's to 1/3rd, in which case TUFC would have to find approx. £250,000 from it's own money to fund the youth set-up. I agree with the sentiment, the club's priority should have been to keep the youth set-up, but it's necessity.

Our club has been losing £500,000 a year, new C.E.O Steve Breed, has said the club was hours from having the chains locked around the front door, this is the problem, had the new owners pumped £250k into the youth set-up our club more than likely would have found itself in a position where by, it would have been spending more of it's annual income on the youth set-up than on it's first team.

No club should ever be in a position where by, it's spending more on it's youth set-up, a Cat 1 set up is believed to cost around £2 million a year, most premier league clubs earn that in a day.

Our clubs new owners are faced with a fine balancing act. One, they have to get the club back into a sustainable position, living with in it's means, at the same time as trying to provide our new manager with as much money as they can, so at least we can try and have something like a team that can compete in the NL premier.

 

[Luke Imp]

Why not water it down to an extent that it would be covered by the grant and a bit of fundraising by parents etc? The latter is easily said than done, admittedly, but there was scope there to keep it going for another season at least. A year to try and sort bits and pieces out.

 

[DT-the-gull]

Agreed. But, as said in a previous post, the club are going to be extending it's F-I-T-C scheme, and going to be forging greater links with the Torbay pioneer youth league, that's the starting point. The most burning issue for our club right now is stability, and survival, once these issues have been taken care, I think some form of community based youth scheme will emerge and grow around our club, going to take a bit of time to fix everything.

 

[silvergull]

No point in running academies in the world of EPP. We lost a young keeper last season who would have started for us, for a miserable £40k up front. You have to sell 10prospects a season to break even. EPP is garbage. Utterly garbage

 

[Shotsfan1993]

Whilst spunking away a playing budget Torquay can only dream of.

Bloody hell I'm glad he didn't get the Wrexham job.

Plenty of managers have been bankrolled or had promotion budgets and failed miserably though.

 

[Flaxman's Alibi]

Cox would be an odd one that even us Stags fans would struggle to be able to help you Torquay ones out with, as it is true, we've only really seen him succeed with a very healthy budget. When he was challenged with a much smaller one - last season the club slashed its spending in half - his recruitment stank the place out, and we were lucky to survive a horribly dismal season because of it.

However, Gulls fans shouldn't despair because of that because if Cox can get it right his teams become very resolute, disciplined and difficult to beat.
Ultimately it all boils down to his recruitment and getting in players to follow his philosophy.

Could he do that on a tight budget?
That really does remain to be seen, but he is a winner and deserves a chance somewhere.
Yes, his football is industrial and often unpleasant on the eye, but in the Conference, you could argue that, winning games under any circumstances has to take presidency and worry about cultural changes at a later date.

Id certainly be watching Torquay games with a great deal of interest, if he was appointed.

 

[Luke Imp]

No point in running academies in the world of EPP. We lost a young keeper last season who would have started for us, for a miserable £40k up front. You have to sell 10prospects a season to break even. EPP is garbage. Utterly garbage

Unfortunately, those at the top fail to understand that!

When it was first discussed years ago, our example was Jack Hobbs about 9 or 10 years ago now. We sold him as a 16 year old to Liverpool for around £750k plus a friendly and sell-on, yet under EPPP it would have netted us something silly like £60k.

No bargaining power with it.

 

[BeesKnees]

I don't fully agree, the money you receive to run the academy is far higher than it used to be but in return you get less for players sold on to top clubs. We have benefited from several players developing from the academy to first team and now being regulars with their develpment paid for by premiership clubs.
Saying that, because we did not have a development squad this year we have been receiving some very big offers from clubs for our under 18s. We've already turned down a 250k + £500k add ons offer and rumour is Swansea have put a bigger offer on the table, Man U have also shown interest in another player so the money lost over the last two years due to funding cut of the academy looks like being recovered from players we have still managed to develop.

 

[Star Lane Silk]

I don't fully agree, the money you receive to run the academy is far higher than it used to be but in return you get less for players sold on to top clubs. We have benefited from several players developing from the academy to first team and now being regulars with their develpment paid for by premiership clubs.
Saying that, because we did not have a development squad this year we have been receiving some very big offers from clubs for our under 18s. We've already turned down a 250k + £500k add ons offer and rumour is Swansea have put a bigger offer on the table, Man U have also shown interest in another player so the money lost over the last two years due to funding cut of the academy looks like being recovered from players we have still managed to develop.

 

[Star Lane Silk]

Great little club who I sincerely hope have their troubles resolved very quickly .

 

[yellow]

Paul Cox confirmed.

http://www.torquayunited.com/news/article/paul-cox-is-the-man-2496171.aspx

 

[WH_Stag]

Whilst spunking away a playing budget Torquay can only dream of.

Bloody hell I'm glad he didn't get the Wrexham job.

The budget was relatively small. No idea where this "mansfield spent loads" to get out the conference rubbish comes from, although it was probably bigger than all those tiny teams like barrow, Every player on a free transfer and on wages of 500 pw.... A solid defence, experienced keeper and top striker got us promoted. We signed the players to get us out the conference, in the league they were useless and have now all gone back to where they came from. Cox is your manager now and should do well again if he really was that great, just not sure who he would sign, He's got very limited resources.

 

[DT-the-gull]

So the worst kept secret is out, and Paul Cox finally named as our manager, looking forward now to see what he can do.

 

[Richard Cranium]

Hope he's got money to spend!

 

[Master D]

I don't completely buy the "he only did it because of money" argument, there's been loads of club chucking money at it down here over the past decade or so and failed to get promotion. It still takes a good manager to get a team to win this league, even with money. Got to get the players bang at it every match 3 times a week and motivated to play away to Braintree on a Tuesday night etc. Style of play left a bit to be desired but he knows everything about the league and he's a solid appointment to steady the ship.

 

[yellow]

http://www.torquayunited.com/news/article/the-new-youth-plan-2497195.aspx

Update on the youth approach. I imagine this is what Edwards was referring to with his "back to the 80's" comment.

 

[HertsWolf]

I don't completely buy the "he only did it because of money" argument, there's been loads of club chucking money at it down here over the past decade or so and failed to get promotion. It still takes a good manager to get a team to win this league, even with money. Got to get the players bang at it every match 3 times a week and motivated to play away to Braintree on a Tuesday night etc. Style of play left a bit to be desired but he knows everything about the league and he's a solid appointment to steady the ship.

It also takes some imagination from the club to get the support to turn up, especially long-distance. As an example, Braintree...... why don't clubs market it as a trip to (the excellent) Braintree Freeport, an excellent outlet village. Like Bicester, people travel long distances to visit it. Allow an extra hour or two on the coach on the way out or back, market it as such and you've probably got another coach-load who will come. If the club are making a bit on every coach seat (as they ought to be) it'll all help, as well as more supporters in the packed Amlin Stadium. Make it a day out that appeals to those who are not already die-hard supporters.

 

[DT-the-gull]

Paul Cox first interview as Gulls manger.

 

[yellow]

Hugely impressed with the communication of this new board already. Massive difference.

 

[yellow]

http://www.torquayheraldexpress.co....arliamentary/story-26722715-detail/story.html

Not that anything will really come of it, I imagine, but fair.