Torquay United boss eyes new signings

Gulls at full stretch for cup trip to Hereford

Torquay United manager Gary Johnson has an eye on new signings as he prepares to take his team into FA Trophy action this weekend.

Johnson conducted his weekly press call beside a board carrying a list of his injured players, highlighting the plight of his squad.

He will go to Hereford for a fourth round FA Trophy tie on Saturday afternoon without Aaron Jarvis, Kevin Dawson, Tom Lapslie, Finley Craske, Brad Ash, Jack Stobbs and Ryan Hanson, all of whom are injured. Only Craske has been injured during training, with the rest ‘crocked’ during matches.

United will also be without the cup-tied Ethon Archer.

Some of the injured players are close to a return to the side, but others are still several weeks away from fitness, meaning the Gulls will have to look outside the club.

For the last round of the FA Trophy at Frome before Christmas, United turned to their youth squad to bolster the regular first-teamers, and it would be no surprise to see some of the young Gulls at least on the bench for the cup tie.

But new faces are also likely in the coming weeks.

“We’re hoping to make a couple of signings in the next couple of weeks, if not before,” said Johnson. “We’ve got people that we’ve chased and got very close to, but we’re competing with a lot of teams for them.”

The January transfer window does not apply to movements between teams outside the Football League, but it does govern the movement of players between league clubs and non-league outfits such as Torquay.

Plenty of players and agents are keeping their options open until later in the month before committing themselves to moves.

Looking at his list of injured players Johnson said: “If only I could go out and sign those players up there. There’s eight great signings there.”

Hereford will give Torquay a tough test on Saturday. They sit in fifth place in National League North and were on a good run of form until they lost at Scarborough last weekend.

“It’ll be a tough game, because they’re doing OK,” said Johnson. “But we do our preparation and we work on our tactics. We need to make our players the danger players.”

The stretched Torquay squad faces a packed schedule of fixtures, with eight games already crammed into the February diary, but United are still determined to make progress in the FA Trophy.

“It’s the highest priority at the moment,” said Johnson. “We go into every game wanting to win it.

“We are looking forward to playing Hereford. It’s a nice little stadium, and it would be a good one to win.”