The Ultimate Torquay United team: Right-Wingers

Plainmoor’s chief reporter for over 50 years, Dave Thomas, continues his countdown to the ultimate Torquay United team:

No one who saw Stanley Matthews, Jimmy Johnstone, Garrincha or George Best in their pomp, or even film of them in action, can doubt how thrilling or devastating a great right-winger can be.

It may seem as if too many coaches have tried to take the position out of the game – Alf Ramsey even won the World Cup with his ‘Wingless Wonders’ in 1966 – but a well-delivered cross from anywhere near the bye-line is still as good a way to create chances as any.

And harder to defend against.

My days of covering Torquay United were still a couple of years away when Doug Clarke, Ronnie Barnes and Eric Welsh filled the right-wing spot, but I watched them from the Pop Side and knew how exciting they could be.

Frank O’Farrell’s 1965 signing of Clarke from Hull City, where he’d been a big favourite for ten years in what’s now League One and the Championship, proved a masterstroke.

Not only did the sturdy Clarke supply crosses, he could score goals, especially when he swapped sides with the two-footed but slightly less consistent Barnes.

Clarke scored 22 in 131 games over the next three heady years.

Irishman Welsh, signed by Allan Brown in 1969, was quicker than Clarke or Barnes, but injuries hampered his time at Plainmoor.

Talking of pace, the 1970s saw a winger who, to this day, was one of the fastest players ever to represent the club.

Torquay-born Steve Morrall had been a sprint champion at school, before earning a university degree, and he was blisteringly quick.

If he’d been as productive as Clarke, he’d have been worth a fortune, but although he never did get a big move, he still played 175 games (1972-76) for United.

Also a local boy to his bootstraps was Bruce Stuckey, but he actually started his career at Exeter City, and he’d had a couple of good years with Sunderland before returning to his hometown club in 1970.

I was on the Pop Side in a 20,000 crowd when Stuckey hit a rousing goal past Pat Jennings in a League Cup-tie (1-4) against Spurs in 1971.

During a cost-cutting era, it didn’t take a big fee to see him leave for Reading.

Andy Provan had struck up a promotion-winning partnership with former Gulls centre-forward Jim Fryatt at Southport before he came to Plainmoor under Malcolm Musgrove in 1974.

He was a winger at heart, but there were moments, during mid-table years, when he threatened to combine well with fellow Scot Willie Brown up front, while Morrall dashed up and down the right.

When Mike Green was appointed as player-manager in March 1977, it ushered in a new era of specialist wingers.

Dave Tomlin, Peter Coffill and Donal Murphy all entertained Plainmoor crowds in their different ways.

Many fans of that era still recall Tomlin and Coffill with great affection – ex-Watford youngster Coffill played 133 games (1977-81), many of them on the left – but the most talented of the lot was Murphy.

The sale of Tomlin to Aldershot helped to pay for Murphy’s arrival from Coventry.

The quiet but mischievous Dubliner could have his frustrating off-days, but when the wind was in his sails, especially at Plainmoor, he could rip any defence to pieces.

Murphy could also turn 4-4-2 to 4-3-3, and in the two seasons 1978-80 he and strikers Steve Cooper and Les Lawrence scored 93 goals between them, Murphy contributing 22.

Plymouth paid £60,000 for him in the summer of 1980.

In came the lanky Gerry Fell from Brighton with 17 goals in his first season (1980-81), but despite brief spells with ex-Cardiff duo Steve Grapes and Ray Bishop under Bruce Rioch’s regime in the mid-1980s, it would be several years before Plainmoor fans would cheer on another out-and-out right winger.

Welshman Bishop was rapid, he could also play up front and proved it by scoring with a show- stopping long-range volley off the bench to tie up a Fourth Round FA Cup tie at 2-2 against Sheffield Wednesday at Plainmoor in 1983.

United lost a belting match 2-3 late on.

Short but very sweet could sum up Keith Curle’s 18 games and six goals in 1983-84.

Rioch, with help from O’Farrell, signed him from Bristol Rovers for £5,000 as a tall but explosive right winger.

Curle was clearly above Fourth Division level, and it wasn’t long before United doubled their money when Bristol City came in for him.

He went on to play for Reading, Wimbledon, Manchester City, Wolves, Sheffield United and England – not as a winger but as the fastest centre-half in the country!

Cyril Knowles mostly played a 3-5-2 formation with Jim McNichol as a ‘wing-back’.

Veteran player-coach Sean Haslegrave had made his name as a winger at Stoke, Preston and York, but he was more of a midfielder at Plainmoor, and a very good one, and that’s where we’ll cover him in this series.

But in 1989, after McNichol left for Exeter, Knowles did strike out in a new direction with a proper winger who could catch proverbial pigeons.

Paul Smith hadn’t quite made it in the face of daunting competition at Arsenal, but he flourished here, especially after Knowles suddenly resigned a dozen games into the 1989-90 season and Dave Smith arrived from Plymouth to take over.

Who would win a foot-race between Morrall and Smith? I’d pay to see them go head-to-head over 100 yards!

The small but powerful Smith was terrific value for two years, and he was in full cry towards the end of the 1990-91 promotion season when he suffered a cruel and complicated leg fracture at Carlisle.

Sadly, he was never quite the same force again, but he was too much for most defences before he was cut down.

He was only 23 at the time, and there’s no reason to suppose that he wouldn’t have got even better if he hadn’t been injured.

Smith didn’t emerge from United’s renowned Youth Training Scheme – it was every bit as productive then as Exeter’s would become – but Paul Hall certainly did.

The slightly-built Hall went on as a sub at 18 in the closing stages of the 1991 Play-Off Final at Wembley and established himself in the side the following season in League One.

The highlight of his Plainmoor career came in an FA Cup tie against the club which had rejected him as a schoolboy, Birmingham City.

Hall scored twice as United won 3-1.

During his brief but successful spell as manager in the Spring of 1993, Neil Warnock sold Hall to Portsmouth for £90,000 and he went on to a fine career with Pompey, Coventry, Walsall, Rushden & Diamonds, Tranmere and Chesterfield among others.

Hall also played for Jamaica in the 1998 World Cup Finals and has since enjoyed a good career in coaching and management.

But he’s never forgotten the start that the Gulls gave him, and he’s one of a sizeable band of ex- Plainmoor trainees of that era who still keep in regular touch with each other.

Although ex-Swindon Town youngster Paul Trollope took over the No.7 shirt, he was a midfielder really until Kevin Hodges, who’d briefly joined on loan a year before, arrived permanently after breaking appearance records at Plymouth Argyle.

Under Don O’Riordan, Hodges was good value until he made a seamless move into youth coaching and eventually management, making way for the explosive Gregory Goodridge.

It was only through a fortunate contact with Kevin Millard, a South Devonian who had emigrated to the Caribbean, that United secured Goodridge.

Millard ran Lambada FC in Barbados, and he was keen to give some of his most talented young players a chance here.

Millard pointed Goodridge towards Plainmoor, he signed just in time to help in the run to the 1993-94 Play-Offs and then proved a big hit the following season before QPR paid £250,000 for him in August 1995.

Goodridge often wore No.11 and he could play on either wing, but he was most effective on the right.

He later enjoyed five good years at Bristol City, had a short, less successful second spell with the Gulls and then returned home to Barbados.

But the Millard/Lambada ‘link’ wasn’t finished – far from it.

Millard and O’Riordan had become friends and, not long before O’Riordan was sacked following an 8-1 home hiding by Scunthorpe in October 1995, Millard brought Lambada to Plainmoor at the start of a UK tour.

In that squad was Rodney Jack.

There was nothing of him, but he was quick, skilful and rawly talented.

O’Riordan never did benefit from the signing of the slip of a lad from the small island of Saint Vincent, but the Gulls and their fans did.

United struggled under O’Riordan’s successor Eddie May, but he looked after Jack, giving him time to strengthen up and gain valuable experience.

By the time Hodges took over in the summer of 1996 Jack was nearly ready and it was a huge relief, at least to Gulls fans eager to see him for as long as possible, when a trial at Newcastle United ended without a reported £250,000 deal being completed because of work permit issues.

He scored ten goals in 33 league appearances that season, but it was in 1997-98 that he wrote himself into Plainmoor folklore, in spellbinding style.

Jack often played as a striker, but he was a right-winger really.

He wasn’t just quick, he was ‘bye-bye’ quick.

Scarborough, whom United met in the Play-Offs, had one of the paciest defenders in the division in Jason Rockett, who was appropriately named.

In the first leg at the McCain Stadium, Rockett thought he had Jack covered in one attack, until Rodney suddenly slipped into the ‘overdrive’ gear that so few possess and was gone... 1-0.

He destroyed Boro in an unforgettable second leg at Plainmoor, scoring twice early on to set up a 4-1 victory and a 7-2 rout on aggregate.

In the Final against Colchester at Wembley, Jack had a goal disallowed for offside as United lost 1-0 and when Crewe Alexandra, then in the Championship, offered £600,000 for him, it was too much for Bateson to turn down.

After 87 appearances (26gls) here Jack played nearly 250 games in two spells at Gresty Road, where he was as popular as he had been at Plainmoor.

Injuries sometimes blunted him – it was often the only way defenders could slow him down - but he also played for Rushden and Oldham before settling in Cheshire where he still lives.

That ever-productive youth scheme then threw up one of United’s most durable wingers, who several times seemed poised for greater things.

West Londoner Tony Bedeau, rejected by Chelsea as a schoolboy, was only 16 when he made his debut as a trainee under O’Riordan in September 1995, a few weeks before Jack also made his bow.

Over the next 13 years, split by a short spell at Walsall, ‘Beds’ made 374 appearances, the eighth highest in United’s history, and scored 65 goals.

Confidence was the key to him, but on his best days, he could be a match-winner.

United turned down sizeable bids for him from Sheffield Wednesday and Oxford United, while Bedeau himself said ‘No’ to a £150,000 move to Rochdale.

After playing under eleven different managers here – he appeared 26 times in the 2003-2004 promotion season for Leroy Rosenior - he eventually moved back to London where he appeared briefly for Kingstonian before retiring.

Yorkshire-born Chris Brandon, signed by Wes Saunders, was a wholehearted and skilful player whose time here was hampered by injuries.

He still played 83 games (10gls) for United (1999-2002) and was rightly popular until going on to prove how good he was with Chesterfield, Huddersfield and Bradford City.

Jo Kuffour is best remembered for the goals he scored up front with David Graham in the 2003-2004 promotion season, but again he was a right-winger really – short, quick and tricky.

Like Smith a decade before, he hadn’t made it into Arsenal’s first team, hardly a disgrace at the time, before he joined the Gulls at 20 years old.

He proceeded to make 160 appearances (33gls) over the next four years before going on to further success with Brentford, AFC Bournemouth, Bristol Rovers, Gillingham and Wycombe.

Bedeau’s availability on the right meant that Rosenior could play Kuffour up front, in competition with Graham and Martin Gritton.

And when Rosenior had the chance to strengthen his attack even further during the 2004 run-in, he grabbed it with his son Liam, also a right winger, on loan from Fulham.

With a following wind, Martin Phillips could still prove why he’d enjoyed a good career with Manchester City, Portsmouth and Plymouth.

But he often played in struggling sides until Paul Buckle arrived in 2007 and signed the diminutive Danny Stevens.

Stevens arrived as a right winger, and played there for a while, but he hit his best form on the left, especially after Chris Zebroski moved on, and we’ll cover him there in this series.

Stevens was on the left as United won promotion back to the Football League in 2009, when the man on the opposite flank was Wayne Carlisle.

Buckle and Colin Lee (chief exec) made many astute signings, but few were more important than Carlisle.

The Ulsterman had already enjoyed a fine career with Crystal Palace, Bristol Rovers, Leyton Orient and Exeter City.

He’d actually played a major role in the Grecians’ dramatic Conference Play-Off Semi-Final victory over the Gulls in May 2008, when City came from 3-1 down on aggregate at Plainmoor to win 5-3 – and went on to win promotion.

So when Buckle snapped him up only a few weeks later, with United fans still trying to get over that painful defeat, they didn’t exactly set off fireworks in celebration.

But what a signing Carlisle, who’d turned down a new deal at City, proved to be.

At nearly 30 he may have lost a bit of his former pace, but he was still clever, tough and a brilliant crosser of the ball.

He scored eight goals in 2008-2009, six of them away from home, and they helped United to seven wins and a draw.

On a midweek March night in front of 500 fans at Grays Athletic, a feisty, muddy game was heading for a 1-1 draw until Carlisle chased a lost cause, muscled his way into the goalmouth and forced the winner home in the 87th minute – typical of him.

Ten weeks later he delivered what many United fans insist was the ‘best’ cross of all, for Tim Sills to head the clincher in the 2-0 Play-Off Final victory over Cambridge at Wembley.

Over three years here Carlisle played 82 games and scored ten goals, before nagging injuries sent him into what’s become a successful coaching career.

He was a class act in every way.

One might-have-been right winger under Buckle’s successor Martin Ling was Lloyd Macklin.

Macklin had everything – pace, power, talent and an eye for goal.

But he’d already exasperated everyone at his hometown Swindon before he came to United, and he did the same over a couple of years here. A real shame.

Former Sheffield United youngster Jordan Chappell didn’t have what Macklin had, but he was game and persistent under Alan Knill and then Chris Hargreaves, and Gulls fans always liked his spirit.

One of Hargreaves’ good loan signings, as he tried to stop United slipping out of the EFL again, was Shamir Goodwin (later Fenelon) from Brighton, but he’s never gone on to the levels he might have done.

The same could have been said of Toby Ajala, before the arrival of Gary Johnson brought first Kalvin Lumbombo-Kalala and then Aaron Nemane.

Both could get you out of your seat on occasions.

They both left of their own accord, to Johnson’s and United’s disappointment, ex-Manchester City starlet Nemane for Notts County and now MK Dons.

Kalala has drifted around Home Counties non-League clubs and is now with the Gulls’ NLS rivals Chelmsford City.

Kalala certainly had the raw talent to play higher than that, but then talent alone never was enough.

So, who does it come down to for the right-wingers final four?

Although I saw him play several times and admired him greatly, Clarke had left Plainmoor before I began covering the Gulls properly, so I’m not going to include him.

No, I’m going for four wingers of very different styles, all of whom could be match-winners in their own right or supply that all-important ‘ammo’ for the men in the middle.

My shortlist is: DONAL MURPHY, PAUL SMITH, RODNEY JACK and WAYNE CARLISLE.

Right-Winger Shorts

If you had suggested to Gulls fans in 1983 that Keith Curle would one day win three England caps as a centre-half, they’d have thought you’d lost the plot.

Curle was a ‘whizzy’ winger then, but he somehow turned himself into a central defender as Reading, Wimbledon, Manchester City, Wolves and Sheffield United paid more than £4 million for him.

Originally from Ipplepen, lifelong United fan Kevin Millard had always dreamed of playing for the Gulls as a kid.

He never did, but after moving to the Caribbean and starting up Lambada FC on Barbados, Millard sent first Gregory Goodridge and then Rodney Jack to Plainmoor – they netted the club £900,000 in transfer fees.

Wayne Carlisle, who’d already played more than 270 games before joining United in 2008, suffered from niggling knee issues during his time at Plainmoor.

It was because he put so much pace and ‘whip’ into his crosses that his ligaments were under almost constant pressure.

Peter Coffill and United stalwart Ian Twitchin sat next to each other in nearly every team picture from 1977-1981 when they both left.

Coffill lived in Twitchin’s hometown of Teignmouth, and even after he and his wife moved to Essex, the pair continued their close friendship until Twitchin’s death in 2017 at the age of only 65.

The Shortlist So Far

Goalkeeper – Mike Mahoney (1970-75), John Turner (1978-80/1983-84), Neville Southall (1998-2000), Bobby Olejnik (2011-12).

Right Back – John Bond (1966-69), Jim McNichol (1986-89/1991), Paul Holmes (1988-92/1999-2003), Andy Gurney (1997-99).

Left Back – Tom Kelly (1986-89/1992-95), John Uzzell (1989-91), Brian McGlinchey (2003-06), Kevin Nicholson (2007-14/2015-17).

Right Centre Back – Dick Edwards (1970-73), Matt Elliott (1989-92), Alex Watson (1995-2001), Steve Woods (2001-2009).

Left Centre Back – Mike Green (1977-79), Phil Lloyd (1987-92), Wes Saunders (1990-93), Craig Taylor (2003-2007).

Right Wing – Donal Murphy (1978-80), Paul Smith (1988-91), Rodney Jack (1995-98), Wayne Carlisle (2008-11).

Tickets for the Dave Thomas Team of a Lifetime event at Plainmoor on Friday, December 13 are available to purchase from https://www.tickettailor.com/events/clearskypublishing/1440324