Challenge Cup giving grounds for concern?

The Glovers were beaten 3-2 by L2 outfit Grimsby in their latest - and now last - South West Challenge Cup match at Torrington yesterday evening. There's another full match report on the official site should you be interested. The result means that the Glovers are now out of the tournament and will be returning home, something that will be a relief to Glovers boss Terry Skiverton going by comments he made in the regional press yesterday, when he criticised the fact that, should we have won last night, the team would have had to play again less than 24 hours later in the semi-final and potentially again 24 hours after that, should they have progressed to the final. Grimsby boss Mike Newell made much the same points the day before. Mind you, it's all very well the respective managers moaning now, they were both well aware of the competition schedule before the tournament started, the time to complain should have been then.

All in all one begins to wonder if the club will enter the tournament next year. There are obvious benefits in taking the squad away from their familiar surroundings after a fortnight of hard training, but when games are then played on poor quality pitches and apparently officiated by referees more used to controlling games involving amateurs rather than professionals, added to the problems of an inflexible and potentially damaging schedule then perhaps the cons begin to outweigh the pros? At least the petty cash float appears to have returned home with no controversy this time around.

There's been no official word as yet as to which of the triallists have made a good impression on the week away. Posters on the green room who've been to the games have praised in particular the two Spurs lads, Ryan Mason and Steven Caulker and also the striker Sam Williams, for what their opinions are worth. The first home friendly of the season is on Tuesday night against Derby. I'll be there and am looking forward to getting my first glimpse of the new faces.

Well, I'll be there if I can buy a bloody ticket, that is. I was moderately surprised this morning to roll up to Huish Park to try and buy tickets for the Derby and Bristol City friendlies only to find the ticket office closed. I know, I should have checked the ticket office opening times first and if I had I would have realised that they don't open on a Saturday morning normally, but it never occurred to me that they wouldn't be open on the one day of the week when most people aren't at work. Stupid of me I know, and stupid of me to think that the club might be open when their customers want it to be open. I wasn't the only punter disappointed this morning by the way. While I was there a couple of other fans turned up to buy tickets only to go away grumbling. But why should the club worry? It's only money.

Ex-playerwatch: Paul Warne has re-joined Rotherham. Good luck to him.