Boro don’t like the ball played on the floor - Paul Buckle

BORO boss Graham Westley says he had no complaints after seeing skipper Mark Roberts sent off in the 2-0 defeat to Torquay United on Saturday.

Roberts was sent off with just over 20 minutes remaining in the game for bringing down Chris Zebroski after Scott Laird’s complacent back-pass to Day was intercepted by the Torquay forward.

Westley said afterwards the referee was correct to show Roberts a red card and award the Gulls a penalty.

“It’s unlike Scotty to make a mistake as catastrophic as that and it left Daisy (Chris Day) short, and whatever Daisy’s efforts were Robbo ended up pulling the boy down for the penalty.

“We can’t have any complaints. It was a penalty, it was a foul and he probably had to send Robbo off.

“He wasn’t the last man (Jon Ashton had dashed back to the line to cover for Day) but he probably did deny a goalscoring opportunity and I’m sure the ref made the right decision.”

Westley said he was pleased with his team’s first half display but he was disappointed to concede to Danny Stevens’ superb volley just 30 seconds after the restart.

“(I was) really disappointed with our second half display. We’ve been on a good run of form. We came here and I thought we performed very well in the first half.

“Our game plan went exactly as I hoped it would. We were on top of them, we really didn’t allow their brightness to enter into the fray.

“We created a couple of really good chances, could have easily been ahead at the break through Bridgo (David Bridges), and we were the better side at half time.

“We came out, conceded the early goal…but we lost concentration, it was a sloppy goal to concede and we never recovered which again is very unlike us.”

Torquay United manager Paul Buckle said his side’s game plan was to keep the ball on the floor and play around Stevenage, something he believed worked well.

“From the start of the game we wanted to try and pass the ball,” Buckle said afterwards.

“We knew Stevenage would come and play a certain way and we had to cope with that. They’re a big, strong, physical team. When you see them in the tunnel you know you’re in for a physical match. Their balls up to the front we coped with, and we got it down and played.

“I felt that if we played long and tried to force it then we’d play right into Stevenage’s hands, and I felt if we played it on the floor we’d cause them problems and it panned out that way.

“If you play against a big, strong team then they don’t like the ball being played on the floor and I thought in the end they struggled to contain us.”