NLS: Torquay United V St Albans 3pm 21st September 2024

link - line up is out- 3 out last week are back but Jenkins- Davies is on the bench.

While we maintained our home unbeaten record and were unlucky not to get all three points, perhaps could have done better to get the win in spite of the poor referee. An incredibly dull first half where we didn’t work the keeper at all, Saint Albans had the best chance with Sam Dreyer performing a good block on the line. We did seem to have a very good handball penalty shout in their area early on which the referee didn’t clock and on the rare occasion Cooke managed to get away from the defender, on the left-wing, having his arm pull back by the defender, seem to be totally legitimate in the ref’s rules of the games.

Saint Albans were able to create some space to have a shot on goal early in the second half which Hamon did well to save and then shortly after Seymour was able to get away but poorly squared ball in the area when perhaps could have had a shot himself although the defender dealt with it poorly and Seymour was able to latch onto the loose ball to shoot pass the defender and to the side of the keeper to open his account for our club. Pretty much overdue as he has had one goal ruled out marginally offside, and hit the inside of the post on another occasion, so well deserved and no doubt will help his confidence.

Unfortunately, Saint Albans are able to get the goal back, fairly quickly when the ball came out to Cooke on the touch line and as he held the ball up, was clearly fouled and tripped over to lose the ball conceding possession and their player was then given too much space in front of the goal to shoot just outside the area and squeezed the ball inside the left-hand post for a poorly conceded equalizer.

Shortly later, their scorer went into Palmer late hitting his head/eye and the referee had no choice, but to award a straight red. Unfortunately Palmer was then in no condition to continue not being able to see through the eye. Hope he recovers well and maybe having a blank weekend next week is no bad thing. Having a man advantage meant we were able to dominate thereafter with Mussa coming on and doing some good work although somewhat wasteful at times with his shooting. Tonks came on as well and managed to get the ball in the box on a number of occasions causing chaos but again St Albans were just about able to survive.

Turning point came when Mussa was able to take the ball to the byline in the area and as he was just about to cross, was slid into and bowled over by the defender. From my vantage point couldn’t be completely sure whether it was a slip or trip but the below Torquay talk video is pretty clear and another crucial mistake by the referee. Poor Mussa was unable to get up and sadly was eventually stretchered off after the game. With all our substitutes used up meant we were back to 10 versus 10 and while we did have one or two other chances, notably, Carson firing over at the far post with the goal at his mercy we did not have the same bite again.

So 1-1 it ended, I think the referee also got the timings wrong at the end with 10 minutes of injury time awarded. Palmer had five minutes of treatment , three minutes was lost when a fan seemed to fall over in the family stand, leaving 2 minutes for the 2 goal celebrations, all the substitutions and other injuries / time wasting (they picked up 2 yellows for this) Think the ref just wanted to end a poor day at the office. 🤬

link and link - 2 videos of penalty incident.

Johnny Cash?

A Boy Named Sam Read. Dreadful refereeing. Foul on Cooke in the build up to their equaliser, too?

Shouldn't wonder if Ray Charles was a better Nick name given his performance.