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Holmes at Dover is apparently “assistant manager”. Hall / Moxey fur us in the future?

MellowYellow wrote: 05 Jul 2023, 22:57 Not sure what kind of team Dover are going to put out. Their first signing is 36 years old winger Ricky Lee Holmes who has had more clubs than Captain Tom has had birthdays. Then they announce their second signing Ade Shokunbi on 9th June but he did a u-turn and signed for Dulwich Hamlet. Dover have now announced they look forward to announcing players who actually want to play for the club. Welcome to NLS.

Holmes is the playing assistant-manager obviously saves money on getting another player in.

Sadly seeing these fixtures just brought home where we are. To make it worse most of our decent away games seem to be on Tuesday night. Gutted first game away at Dover, train would need a mortgage to afford a ticket or a horrible long drive with many traffic jams in August. Can't think of a worse first game of the season. Thoroughly depressed.

GULL 67 wrote: 06 Jul 2023, 13:56 Sadly seeing these fixtures just brought home where we are. To make it worse most of our decent away games seem to be on Tuesday night. Gutted first game away at Dover, train would need a mortgage to afford a ticket or a horrible long drive with many traffic jams in August. Can't think of a worse first game of the season. Thoroughly depressed.

My first thought exactly re the Tuesday night games. Was looking forward to some decent Saturday away days but I can understand why. If midweek games need to be factored in, they might as well be as near as possible.

Cheddargull wrote: 06 Jul 2023, 09:18 Holmes is the playing assistant-manager obviously saves money on getting another player in.

My point was that with 4 players retained and one player/coach signed I don't think Dover have the money to bring players in and will be reliant on making up the squad with their youth players who won the U19 National League South title

It’s a good fixture to get out the way - always look on the bright side of life!

That may be true, but wish it was a first away game at Taunton. Sunny day, 1200 Gulls fans and a 4-0 victory! Would set us up great. Instead a massive long haul to stinky old Dover, scrappy 1-1 draw and moans all round!

GULL 67 wrote: 07 Jul 2023, 15:17 That may be true, but wish it was a first away game at Taunton. Sunny day, 1200 Gulls fans and a 4-0 victory! Would set us up great. Instead a massive long haul to stinky old Dover, scrappy 1-1 draw and moans all round!

should really beat Dover - they were fortunate not to get relegated last season and they only have 7 or 8 players contracted right now. The expectation is that they'll have to use some of the U-19s team (budget issues, maybe).

anyway - we should absolutely be expecting to beat them, and probably fairly handily, if we're to have the kind of season we all hope/expect

Taunton's capacity is 2500 should be interesting!

Average crowd 800, we could have two thirds the crowd then if they let us have 1500 or so tickets but then it's a Tuesday night so maybe not.

Based on the numbers that travelled to Weston I think 1500 is achievable. Incredible and surreal atmosphere that night (despite the result). Taunton had best just remove all bins from the terraces.

My boy was about 7 when we attended the Weston game. We were stood at the front when a youth suddenly appeared and threw that bin on the pitch. When the steward appeared , to my boys horror, I pointed to him. All the way home I wound him up telling him it was out of order. This has continued over the years to the extent that he now actually thinks it may have been him!!!!

I seem to be one of a few who actually enjoy a day out in Dover. Geography makes it easier granted (just over 1 hr from King’s Cross and £14 each way), but nice few pubs in Dover, taxi to ground, 3 points, couple of pints in the juicer outside Crabble, stroll down to the beach (yes they have seen one), celebratory snifter in the hotel bar on the front, maybe some live music in the station pub waiting for a late train home. That’s how I see it. Can’t wait.

Not keen on all this talk about taking large number to Taunton, WSM, Plymouth Parkway etc etc, yet again I'll reiterate, we shouldn't be in this league, nor the one above it, we were a solid 4th tier club, to some fans maybe they buzz off being a big fish in a goldfish bowl, beating part timers I don't want to see fist pumping, flares going off, phony hype, us taking the piss out of set ups smaller than ours...I want to respect the league, the opposition, be fully focused, go about our business in a decent way, GJ has a major habit of pissing people off with his antics, he isn't popular at all, let's just see what the season brings, but sadly, something tells me we've found our level, 6th tier regional football.

That match at Weston didn't cover us in glory. There were some 18,19yr old Torquay "fans" giving the Weston goalie out of order abuse throughout the 2nd half. They should have been kicked out. They were chanting "Gary Johnston's Yellow Army". Yes, they didn't even know the name of their manager. Then the bin. My mate (not a gulls fan) said "You're just a bunch of yobs!" He was of course correct. The actions of the few tarnish the many.