2 weeks Ago By [email protected] (Richard Hughes)
Torquay United are sitting in fourth and ready to pounce should the teams above them drop the ball. That’s how it feels as the Gulls kick off the final month of the National League South season, with five games to go, and Chesham United at home today. There will be another big crowd at Plainmoor and it is at home that Torquay need to do the business, pick up nine points from three home games to make sure they are in the right place if that ball is indeed dropped.
It’s Chesham, Slough Town at home next weekend, and then Truro City away on Good Friday. Easter Monday is Weymouth at home - and the final game of the season, on Saturday, April 26, is at Hemel Hempstead Town. Thirteen points out of 15 might be enough - but you never know, because this division is a crazy one.
Chesham come to Plainmoor in 15th, but Torquay manager Paul Wotton won’t tell you any team can be taken lightly. “It’s a game at a time, a day at a time,” said Wotton. “There are five big games left for lots of teams in the league.
“I don’t perceive there being a great deal of pressure on us. There are three teams above us, it’s nowhere near in our own hands, so we have just got to go and make it as difficult as possible for the teams above us, and a couple of teams below us as well.” Three points separate the top four teams, with Worthing ahead on 80 - and Dorking Wanderers, Eastborough Borough and Torquay on 77.
Below that it’s Truro on 75, Maidstone United on 73 and Boreham Wood on 71. Even Weston-super-Mare in the eighth, one place outside of the play-off zone, have caught up a little bit and they now have 69 points. Wotton said: “We said probably it’s the tightest in Europe last week and there has been nothing to have happened in the last seven days to change that.
Anyone in the league can beat anyone, as you have seen all season. I also think, the biggest thing is there hasn’t been a runaway team. There have been some outstanding team efforts but there hasn’t been one team that has blown the league away like Yeovil Town did last year.
“So it is a crazy time. With five games to go, for it to be as tight as it is, points wise and goal difference wise as well, it’s crazy really.” Torquay are on a run of five wins in six games, while Chesham have lost three of their last six.
But they are comfortably above the relegation zone and can perhaps relax a little at Plainmoor and enjoy the occasion, the big crowd, possibly another 4,000-plus. Wotton has a decision to make about who will play up front. Ozzy Zanzala has been his pick since Cody Cooke’s thigh strain, but in the last two games, Cooke has come on and scored the winner.
Perhaps he will get the nod this time. And Wotton has loan signing Manny Ilesamni back from Derby County, while Matt Jay, who has been playing as a wide midfielder, is also technically a forward. He is unlikely to tinker with a defence that has overseen clean sheets in three successive 1-0 wins, but he may change some personnel elsewhere.
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