The Ultimate Torquay United team: Left-Wingers

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

Let me take you back to Good Friday 1968. Torquay United, top of Division Three (League One), playing Bristol Rovers at Eastville in front of nearly 20,000 fans.

The crowd was swelled by 5,000 Gulls supporters, yours truly among them.

Tony Scott cut in from the left wing, beat two men in a trademark dribble towards the byeline and slipped the most inviting of passes into the path of Robin Stubbs.

Stubbs, the goal machine, couldn’t miss, surely?

But miss Robin did, over the bar. Rovers went on to win 1-0, United also lost 0-2 at home the next day to struggling Mansfield Town, and in those 24 hours their promotion charge was dealt a blow from which it never recovered.

Who knows what might have happened to the history of TUFC if Stubbs had scored? But the man who laid on that wonderful chance was one of the best left wingers ever to play for the club

Signed from Aston Villa, former West Ham youngster Scott was so slight, he looked as if a gust of wind might knock him over.

But he had mesmerisingly quick feet and loved to top off his box of tricks by, just when full-backs thought they’d shown him ‘down the line’, crossing the ball with the outside of his right foot.

When United eventually sold him to Bournemouth in 1970, centre-forward Ted MacDougall credited Scott with setting him off on the goal-laden career which took him to Manchester United and England.

None of Scott’s successors in the 1970s – Cliff Jackson, Merseysider Dave Kennedy or the gutsy and popular Peter Coffill – could quite match his quality.

Ex-Swindon and Plymouth man Jackson came with the right CV – he’d been top scorer when Crystal Palace won promotion to the First Division for the first time.

But, in a side on the slide, he never approached those heights at Plainmoor.

The early 1980s saw Willie Young, another ex-Villa player, and Londoner Colin Barnes try to pick up the left-wing mantle.

But during that era a teenager as good as any who ever pulled on a United shirt arrived at Plainmoor.

Mark Loram came not from one of the upcountry powerhouses of the game, but from the other side of Torbay.

Loram was a prodigious talent from his earliest days with Brixham Grasshoppers.

He had a left foot to die for, deceptive pace, instinctive awareness and he could make the devilishly difficult look shoulder-shruggingly easy.

Loram was only 18 when, after two tough seasons in a bottom of the table side, manager Dave Webb packed him off to First Division Queen’s Park Rangers.

He was as good as anything at Loftus Road too, but he was hopelessly homesick in West London and drove their veteran boss Jim Smith to distraction with his AWOL ventures.

Stuart Morgan brought him back properly just in time to play a huge role in the 1987 Great Escape, and he never left town again.

Cyril Knowles could hardly believe his luck when he took over that summer and realised what a player he’d inherited.

Knowles also learned quickly that something was missing.

That ‘something’ wasn’t physical. It was just an almost complete lack of ambition.

It wasn’t that Mark didn’t love the game – after all, he played 332 times for United, scored 63 mostly classy goals and then turned out two or three times a week for any part-time or amateur side who gave him a call.

But the thought of making the sort of sacrifices that would have raised him to the levels that his talent cried out for – well, he simply couldn’t, or wouldn’t, do it.

Knowles kept him more or less on the straight and narrow, and he was a key man in the 1989 and 1991 Wembley sides, after he’d been diagnosed with diabetes, but his lifestyle ensured a gradual decline after that.

It’s easy to settle for the ‘what-a-waste’ verdict, but those of us who watched Loram over those ten extraordinary years surely prefer to remember that breathtaking talent and those many moments of jaw-dropping brilliance.

Like the night at White Hart Lane in October 1987 when, with a League Cup-tie against Spurs very much in the balance at 1-1, Mark beat Gary Stevens so completely that he left the England right-back on his backside.

‘Oi, Gary,’ shouted a nearby Tottenham fan, ‘he’s taking the mick out of you. Sort him out!’

Moments later Loram got the ball again – and once more the hapless Stevens was left in the same undignified heap.

Was Loram better than Lee Sharpe, the quicksilver youngster who took his first steps in the senior game alongside Loram in 1987-88?

Well, let Sharpe make that decision.

When Knowles sold him to Manchester United (for £185,000) as a 17-year-old in the summer of ’88, Sharpe forced his way into Alex Ferguson’s first team within a matter of months.

One impressed member of the coaching staff asked him whether there might be any more like Lee on the English Riviera.

Sharpe replied that there was a player at Torquay who was better than he was, but there was little point chasing him.

Sharpe, who went on to stardom with United, Leeds and England, already knew that he and his former teammate were cut from different cloth.

A young player you had to feel a bit sorry for at that time was Mark Gardiner.

He’d been signed by Morgan from Swindon Town, with pace, a decent left foot and lacking only experience.

In a little over 18 months Gardiner made 57 appearances, and that was in competition with Loram and Sharpe.

Knowles was often on his case, trying to toughen him up.

Substitute Gardiner scored a screaming late winner at Bolton (2-1) one day, only to receive a right royal rollocking from Knowles, who’d told him to go on and ‘corner-flag it’ in defence of a point!

Many of us felt that Cyril might have tried harder to keep him, especially with Sharpe leaving for Old Trafford, and Gardiner went on to play more than 200 games for Crewe.

When Loram eventually bowed out, former trainee Scott Colcombe and then Ian Hathaway took over.

Hathaway, signed from Rotherham by Don O’Riordan, was an important part of the 1994 Play-Off side.

Every right-back tried to stop him going on the outside, but his feint was so good and his left foot so deft that it was almost impossible to stop him doing it when he was on form.

More than 160 games and 17 goals were testament to his talent, even if he could have days when he let games pass him by.

I remember spotting a well-known Manchester City scout at Bury one Tuesday night.

Surely he was chasing one of the Shakers players, I assumed, only to be told by a reliable source that he was actually watching Hathaway.

Sure enough, ‘Hath’ disappointed that evening. Another what-might-have-been?

When Kevin Hodges eventually let Hathaway go in 1997, he had a replacement lined up, from Western League Torrington Town of all places, who could hardly be more different.

Kevin Hill wasn’t blessed with a silky left foot or a built-in ‘trick’ to beat his man, BUT..!

Combine tireless fitness and spirit, prodigious ability in the air, an eye for goal, a desperation to improve and a never-say-die attitude, and you had all the ingredients for someone it was almost impossible to keep out of any side.

Over eleven years, a club record 474 appearances and 57 goals, Hill went from stacking shelves at a Budleigh Salterton supermarket to booking his own place in the hearts of Gulls fans in a way that few had done before or since.

He never bothered to employ an agent, and he finally overtook 1950s record holder Dennis Lewis’ appearance total at, fittingly, Wembley in the 2008 FA Trophy Final.

Perhaps the biggest tribute you can pay to ‘Hilly’ – and it’s still the thing he’s most proud of – is that when Leroy Rosenior put the final touches to the best footballing team that Torquay United has fielded in most of our memories (2003/4), he was in it.

The powerful Chris Zebroski and then the diminutive Danny Stevens finally succeeded Hill.

Rejected by Spurs as a schoolboy and then Luton, Enfield-born Stevens fought against the perceptions of him and his build (5ft 4in) to become nearly as popular as Hill had been.

He started on the right wing, but really flourished on the left, first under Paul Buckle and then Martin Ling, who both posted him in front of left-back Kevin Nicholson to great effect.

Stevens was quick, clever, with a surprisingly good shot and he ended up playing 214 times (2007-2014) and scoring 28 goals.

Right winger Wayne Carlisle is often lauded, and understandably so, for his part in the 2009 Play-Off victory over Cambridge United (2-0) at Wembley.

But Stevens was also terrific that memorable afternoon, first helping to nullify the threat of the U’s dangerman Robbie Willmott and then carrying the fight to the opposition as Torquay regained their Football League status.

Few left wingers have really left their mark over the last decade of non-League action.

Gulls fans instantly took to Sunderland loanee Stephen Wearne a couple of years ago, and he’s gone on to better things with Barrow and MK Dons.

But the most talented was Jake Andrews.

Former Bristol City starlet Andrews had a touch of the ‘Loram’ about him – good first touch, eye for a pass and a goal – and he could be a match winner on his day.

But that ‘edge’ was missing, so was the drive to be as fit as he needed to be, and he’s ended up playing in the Southern League long before he should have done.

Well, a shortlist of four real good ‘uns to play out on that left wing...

Forgive me if I don’t include Lee Sharpe – of course, we loved him for the brief time we had him and he went on to do great things, but he made only eleven starts and eight sub appearances here, and then he was gone.

So, I’m going to go for TONY SCOTT, MARK LORAM, KEVIN HILL and DANNY STEVENS.

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.

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

On April 9, 1988, in a promotion six-pointer at home to Cardiff City, United had the chance to break the deadlock with a penalty.

Lee Sharpe had won a spot-kick competition during the previous training session, so he stepped up and coolly stroked the ‘pen’ past Scottish international George Wood. He was 16yrs 285days old (Utd won 2-0).

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).

Left Wing – Tony Scott (1967–70), Mark Loram (1985-93), Kevin Hill (1997-2008), Danny Stevens (2007-2014).

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