Barnet made it four clean sheets in a row and three wins out of four by defeating Torquay United at Underhill last night. After playing a much changed side at the weekend for the FA Cup match with Oxford, Mark Robson played his best side available last night. The Bees were missing influential Welsh international midfield player, John Oster and left back, Jordan Brown through injury, but Graham Stack returned for Sam Cowler in goal; Krystian Pearce came in for Jon Fortune, while Olly Lee and Curtis Weston dropped out of midfield in favour of Edgar Davids and Anthony Edgar. Jake Hyde returned up front in place of Collins John. Elliott Johnson made his first team debut in place of Brown at left back.
Barnet started quite well, but as the first half settled down so Torquay took control and the Gulls should have taken the lead when a dreadful pass back played in Torquay’s leading scorer, Rene Howe but instead of blasting it home he chose to chip the ball and it sailed safely past from Graham Stack’s point of view. The closest the Bees came to scoring was when a Mark Byrne free kick caused the Torquay keeper to scramble the shot round the post after it took a deflection. The Bees’ failed to create many chances and lacking any edge up front and needed to be grateful for an excellent defensive performance from the back four and Stack. Young Elliott Johnson was having an impressive debut, with his distribution and positioning good and looking very calm. In truth, Torquay maybe should have been ahead at half time as Barnet struggled to make any impact despite some nice work on the left from Anthony Edgar. Jake Hyde worked hard up front but found it hard with little support coming from a midfield that clearly missed the influence of John Oster.
HT: Bees 0 Gulls 0
Torquay continued to dominate after the break and the Bees had Stack to thank for keeping them in the game after a couple of fine saves early in the second half. The visitors had the home side pressed back in their own half and with Barnet under a lot of pressure it seemed inevitable that Torquay would score at some point. Indeed the game seemed to be following the pattern of the Oxford match at the weekend.
With a little over 15 minutes remaining, Robson made a change, bringing on Olly Lee in place of Anthony Edgar and Lee made an immediate impact, his forceful play giving the Bees’ midfield another dimension as for the first time in the game they began to press the Torquay defence with Lee making some good runs. On 79 minutes, Barnet took a somewhat surprise lead when Clovis Kamdjo and Jake Hyde played a one two and KAMDJO fired home past the Torquay keeper to give the Bees the lead.
After the goal, Barnet’s confidence rose and they could have scored again with Jake Hyde having a shot saved when maybe a bass to Andy Yiadom would have been a better option. Torquay tried hard to get level but though they had most of the possession in the later stages they didn’t trouble the home defence too much though a couple of corners forced Graham Stack to be on his toes. The Bees held on to take all three points, a result that lifts them off the bottom. After taking just 3 points from 12 games, Barnet have now taken 10 from the last four since Edgar Davids arrived. Some affect!!
Barnet Mad Man of the Match: Graham Stack
Barnet: Stack; Fuller, Stephens, Pearce, Johnson; Kamdjo, Yiadom, Byrne, Davids, Edgar (Lee 73); Hyde
Subs not used: Cowler, Fortune, Abdulla, Weston, Allen,Lowe.
Att: 1544