00:00 Hi, I'm Mark Dunford and I'm a sports editor of Sussexworld.co.uk and editor of the Crawley
00:08 Observer.
00:09 I am delighted to be joined by Crawley Town legend Sergio Torres.
00:13 Sergio was part of the Crawley Town team that got promoted from non-league to League Two
00:19 to League One under Steve Evans in the 2011, 12, 13, 14, all those years.
00:27 And yes, he's here with us now and we're going to talk about Crawley Town getting to Wembley.
00:31 But first of all, Sergio, tell us where you are.
00:33 It looks lovely there.
00:34 Hello, Mark.
00:35 Good afternoon.
00:36 Yeah, it's beautiful.
00:37 I moved to Mallorca about two and a half years ago with my family from sunny Sussex to sunny
00:47 Mallorca.
00:48 Yeah, it's stunning.
00:49 It's about 22 degrees right now.
00:50 So yeah, very beautiful.
00:51 Lovely.
00:52 And what are you doing out there?
00:53 So I work, I'm still coaching.
00:57 So I used to work for Russell Martin Academy in Brighton for Russ, you know, I'm a good
01:08 friend with Martin.
01:09 And when he set up the academy in Brighton, I was working there for six years and then
01:14 I moved here.
01:16 And Russell's foster brother, he lives here for 10 years, Rob, and he's set up his own
01:23 academy here as well called Russell Martin Academy.
01:26 So perfect, perfect transition from one place to another.
01:31 And also we started about two years ago, we started coaching professional players when
01:37 they come in off season.
01:40 That's through Mallorca Pro Training.
01:44 We had James Madison, for example, last year training here, just this pitch behind us.
01:50 We've got a few bigger players, so I'm looking forward to this June.
01:54 Hopefully we're going to have some more players.
01:55 Oh, wow.
01:56 That sounds great.
01:57 So we're here to talk about Crawley Town getting to Wembley.
02:01 How much have you followed Crawley Town this season?
02:04 Yeah, to be fair, whenever I can, you know, I've got time on Saturday afternoon, I'm flicking
02:09 between all the games, between all my old clubs, Crawley Town, Wiccan Wonders, and of
02:16 course I watch Southampton because of Russ.
02:18 So I've been watching it a bit and then I've been, I have to tell you, I've been so impressed.
02:23 I watched the last two playoff games last week and they play better football than we
02:30 were there.
02:31 Absolutely amazing to watch.
02:35 I was so impressed with so many of the players and Scott is doing an amazing job.
02:41 It's funny because I know Scott from a long way back.
02:44 I went on loan to Lincoln when I was at Peterborough for his three.
02:50 He was a first team coach there with Chris Sutton.
02:54 When he took over at Crawley, I messaged him and he remembered me from them times.
03:02 So I'm really, really looking forward to seeing him on Sunday.
03:07 Yeah, so when you first met Scott Lindsay and you saw him as a first team coach, could
03:12 you tell he had what it took to lead a team and take them to Wembley?
03:16 To be fair, I think I only played for Scottie and Chris Sutton about three games because
03:23 I got really bad ankle injury.
03:26 But in the first game, I remember we won 1-0 against Old Ashore and I scored a winner,
03:32 which doesn't happen very often.
03:36 I remember Scottie from, you know, I was only for, like I say, a few weeks, a couple of
03:41 months and I was really impressed.
03:44 Really, really nice guy and his sessions were brilliant.
03:48 So I was so impressed to see him.
03:51 So happy to see him doing well at one of my clubs at Crawley now.
03:55 Absolutely.
03:56 Yeah, you talk about how what good football they play.
04:00 Can you imagine a team when you were playing in League Two, was it 12, 13 years ago, playing
04:05 football like this and succeeding?
04:07 No, no, absolutely not.
04:12 You know, with Steve, we had a great, great time and amazing from back to back promotions,
04:17 but we didn't play this amazing style of football playing from the back.
04:21 It was more winning second balls and playing their half, which worked because we have very
04:27 strong defenders.
04:28 But I was so, so impressed and I always wondered why it doesn't work in League Two conference
04:34 to play this lovely style of football and succeed.
04:37 So I was so pleased to see both teams.
04:40 I know Mike Williamson as well at MK.
04:41 I used to play with him.
04:43 Both teams playing the right style of football and then succeeding in League Two.
04:49 I'm really, really hopeful that Scott and the boys can do a Wembley on Sunday.
04:56 Yeah.
04:57 And what players have impressed you for Crawley Town so far?
05:02 The centre, Mikelle, I thought he was outstanding in both games.
05:05 He was absolutely, absolutely.
05:09 Like making things, I don't think he ever got tired, that guy.
05:11 I don't know.
05:12 I wasn't as good as him, but it reminds me like, literally when I used to play there,
05:18 I used to run everywhere and then trying to get involved in defence and attack.
05:23 And I thought he was amazing.
05:24 I was impressed, very impressed with the goalkeeper as well and the striker, Orsi.
05:30 I thought he was brilliant.
05:32 But the whole team, they have, I don't know, they seem, I don't know personally any of
05:37 the players, but they seem to have a really good connection in between them, looking at
05:41 it from the outside, working as a team and they believing in what Scott is doing.
05:47 Yeah, absolutely.
05:49 Obviously you had a huge game when you were at Crawley Town, going to Old Trafford.
05:54 You probably got an inkling how these players are feeling right now, leading into a big
05:59 game.
06:00 What advice would you give to those players this week who probably have never played at
06:04 Wembley?
06:05 You know, my dream since I moved to England, one of my dreams was to play at Wembley.
06:12 I never had the chance, so I couldn't really tell the players anything.
06:18 But yeah, playing at Old Trafford is still a big game and it was FA Cup.
06:23 The memories I got from that game is the night before I didn't sleep.
06:26 So I don't know what can I recommend them for to try to sleep the night before and trying
06:32 to enjoy the occasion.
06:34 I know it is massive for a club like Crawley, a family club, first time in the history to
06:40 play at Wembley.
06:43 I think enjoyment is the right word, trying to take everything in.
06:48 These moments, like you mentioned, they don't come very often.
06:52 I played 10, 15 years in England and I never had a chance to play at Wembley.
06:57 I played at Old Trafford, Stamford Bridge, but Wembley is that place where everyone dreams
07:03 of playing.
07:05 And we have experienced this season, the fans at Crawley Town have been incredible and they've
07:11 really taken to this team.
07:13 You were a huge fan favourite when you were at Crawley.
07:16 How much do you miss those fans and what was it like playing in front of them when they
07:20 were on full song?
07:21 Honestly, I have the best memories at Crawley.
07:26 It helped as well that we hardly lost any games in the first season.
07:33 So we got them on site pretty quickly.
07:35 But yeah, I think that particularly with me, they enjoyed that.
07:40 I had bad games, but at least I put all the effort, I was always giving 100%.
07:46 I got the best memories, honestly.
07:48 It was really sad the day I left.
07:51 I shed one or two tears.
07:53 I've always been in touch.
07:55 Whenever my parents came from Argentina to watch, to travel to the game, everyone absolutely
08:01 looked after them and that made me feel so proud of the Crawley fans.
08:07 I can't wait to see them on Sunday and hopefully I will meet one or two old faces.
08:10 Yeah, so you're going on Sunday then?
08:13 Yeah, yeah.
08:14 I've been invited by the EFL and I'm really, really excited.
08:20 I will be there from Sunday morning and watch the game and hopefully see Scott and meet
08:27 some of the new players.
08:28 Brilliant.
08:29 Excellent stuff.
08:30 Finally, I spoke to Matt Tubbs earlier and I asked him how would the Crawley team from
08:37 2011, who played at Old Trafford, get on against this Crawley team this year, do you think?
08:43 I think I've got an inkling from what you said earlier, but what kind of game do you
08:46 think that would be?
08:47 I don't know.
08:48 I think they will try to play from the back.
08:54 We will press the hell out of them.
08:58 We're definitely going to press the goalkeeper and try to make mistakes.
09:03 Tubbs and Maka were near-time and we had in the middle, Bully, Josh, myself, whoever played
09:13 there, we were just like dogs.
09:15 We'll be a long ball style in playing second balls and playing on the half against a good
09:22 team playing good football.
09:23 It will be an interesting game, I tell you what, because we have amazing players like
09:28 Kyle, Pablo Meos, Dino, Hanti.
09:35 We have really, really good footballers in the squad.
09:38 I think that's why it worked as well because we were running like dogs, but we also have
09:45 players who, Tubbs was unbelievable, who decide games for us.
09:49 Yeah, absolutely.
09:50 And finally, what's your score prediction for Sunday?
09:55 I predict 3-1.
09:56 I know it's a bit ambitious, but that's my score.
10:02 Excellent.
10:03 Well, thank you so much for talking to us, Sergio.
10:05 It's been an absolute pleasure, as always.
10:07 I think we last spoke at Leeds, didn't we?
10:09 I think it was when they beat Leeds, you were in the stadium.
10:12 Yeah, I spoke to Sergio.
10:15 Well, hopefully we're celebrating a similar victory on Sunday and I'll hopefully see you.
10:19 So thanks for joining us.
10:21 No, fingers crossed, Mesh.
10:23 And yeah, hopefully I will see you Sunday.
