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In fairness, Hector makes a decent point. We know from Twitter that Craig Stanley (not the brightest fella, but probably reliable in this instance) didn't find out that the Shots were in administration until he saw it on Sky Sports News. That's got to be considerably worse than sacking a manager by phone.

That said, I disagree with the idea that managers (at clubs like ours) get the boot for an average run of results. I'm bored with repeating just how ordinary (rather than terrible) our record was under ML this season, suffice to say that I've never seen a TUFC manager sacked in similar circumstances. At some sacking clubs (Rovers, Chelsea et al), then yeah, he'd have been out the door, but not at Torquay, that's just not what we do.

Matt.

EddUK12 wrote:maybe you have witnessed a watershed moment and common sense will be a big factor in the running of the club going forward.

And integrity...?

EddUK12 wrote:matt

maybe you have witnessed a watershed moment and common sense will be a big factor in the running of the club going forward.

the world continues to change and tufc must adapt

Not quite sure what you mean, if I'm honest...

Matt.

Late Kick Off really needs to be confined to the dustbin to support other great shows such as Citizen Khan, My Family and Splash. It's a truly awful watch, no structure, impossible to cover that amount of clubs in half an hour properly so the mismatch of cutting from L1, back to Champ, to Prem, L2 then back to champ again is just awful. The interview with Wayne Bridge is possibly one of the most pointless/worst things I've ever seen. Yes you played for Saints, chelsea, England tell us something we don't know mate. zzzzzzzzzzz rubbish.

Here's Martin Ling who has just been sacked, his facial expression at that was 'yeah cheers', utter car crash TV. As for the actual interview, told us nothign we didn't know, would have been nice to find out what was actually wrong with him but he towed the party line which would suggest the booze rumours could have some substance, as admitting that would probably mean he wouldn't get another chance somewhere but hey ho. Think he's gonna struggle anyway to be honest, not only because whoever takes him would be taking a risk but once you get sacked by Torquay there aren't many places to go!!

It was the right decision by the club not handled very well at all and not done the way I think it should have been done but it is what it is, wish Ling well as he did his best here and did a fairly decent job in his 2 years.

For those of you that want to watch the interview on iPlayer, here's the link below.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... Episode_9/

Start watching from 17 min, 40 sec

Brent Pilnick, sports reporter for BBC South West, has just finished an interview with Ling. He's tweeting a few things:

@brentpilnick

#TUFC - Ling describes club as 'unprofessional' for the way he was dismissed.

@brentpilnick

#TUFC - Martin Ling tells me he will miss the fans, who 'treated me wonderfully'

@brentpilnick

#TUFC - Martin Ling says rumours he has an alcohol problem 'could not be further from the truth'

New BBC interview with Martin Ling: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/22433025

Haha that BBC article, are you mad Martin?

Seems your 70k payoff wasn't enough, I suppose he's got to show he's ready to manage again, lets all raise a glass to knill signing

Least Lings got some ££ for some

So Mr Knill wasn't scared off by the hideious treatment of the former incumbent then? That's weird. Perhaps the club didn't believe as disgracefully as some might like to believe.

PlainmoorRoar wrote:Haha that BBC article, are you mad Martin?

Seems your 70k payoff wasn't enough, I suppose he's got to show he's ready to manage again, lets all raise a glass to knill signing

Least Lings got some ££ for some

Think it's about time you put your sword away.

Worse things happen all the time in the world of business. It's a big bad world and some of the posters on here show naivety with their views.

Time to get on with things and leave Martin Ling to make peace with his own situation. He's not doing himself any favours by bleating on about how nasty and horrible the Torquay Board are.

On another note, it lookss like Simon Baker gave assurances over Martin's role, which wouldn't surprise me in the slightest......

Taken from the BBC article linked above.
Ling was sacked the day Alan Knill had kept the club in the Football League, despite vice-chairman Simon Baker saying they were set to meet him as he prepared to return to his job.

SteveDeckchair wrote: On another note, it lookss like Simon Baker gave assurances over Martin's role, which wouldn't surprise me in the slightest......

Taken from the BBC article linked above.
Ling was sacked the day Alan Knill had kept the club in the Football League, despite vice-chairman Simon Baker saying they were set to meet him as he prepared to return to his job.

Does it look like that, though? All that article says is that Baker told Ling he would meet with him. That meeting coup have been to sack him, as was the case. I Ling took that to mean he was coming back for definite, then more fool him. It was quite obvious from the statements at the AGM over a month ago that it wasn't certain Ling would return.

Of course, what was said behind closed doors we will never know.