OrlandoDon

Really curious to how thelin approaches us. Yes he seems to have his style, and yes we have squad rebuilding this summer, but I’d expect at least 50% possession against all teams in the league except the old firm, maybe hearts. I like that we’ve also gone back to a more possession/ passing style of play than just mindless long ball. Robson tried what thelin seems to do but it’s was mind numbing and eye bleeding stuff all season until he left.
Hibs game today the commentators made the point that it looks like the shackles have been taken off and we have players who can play. I’d say it’s the threat of relegation gone for the most part today! Polvara clarkson and McGrath for example are all pretty technical players, and while I’d say clarkson is the only legit starter, don’t see him wanting to chase all game. (Barron too but I suspect he’s gone.)

5 hours ago, Kowalski said:

Looking like we’re a better team without Shinnie. 

Don’t think so. Hibs after 15 mins were poor and gave our midfield so much time and space. I actually don’t think Barron and clarkson are a great midfield, and shinnie clarkson and a new player, with polvara as back up will be what we have next season.

thought polvara had another decent game, the goal doing his confidence wonders. Actually think resting Shinnie and giving polvara time right now isnt a bad idea. Gives polvara good minutes to get better. Robson ran shinnie to death, not playing him every minute right now isn’t a big deal.

Yup good game. First 15 mins hibs were better but after that all us and could have been more if we were ruthless. Saying that, hibs did miss a chance or two. Keep in mind last two 1-0 wins could easily have been 4 had we taken our chances, so I wasn’t totally surprised today. Thought Barron was good although he still gave us his once a game caught in possession counter. Is Boyd the Barron replacement?? Mackenzie has surely locked himself in as our permanent left back, another good performance. Clarkson had some quality passes, and from the last few games I’m hoping 3 at the back becomes a distant memory.

agree hoilett could get another year, has played well and definitely contributed over the last month. He’s given us much needed width and creativity.  The fourth goal shows what duk can do with a brain. Hope he’s like Ronaldo who eventually learned decision making.

would love to hear some signing targets. Positive results these days and finishing the best we can, can we please start the rumors!?!?

Ok, so let’s take a look at elfborg. Haven’t seen them playing so pretty much a wild guess based on a random 5 minute internet search. These ‘could’ be some of their better players. Taking a peak at positional needs, anyone know anything about…

Isaak Pettersen - 26 - keeper, Swedish, 2 caps

Michael baidoo - 24 - attacking mid, ghanian

Arber zeneli - 29 - left winger - Swedish born, kosovo internationalist

andri fannar baldursson - 22 - center mid - Iceland internationalist  - on loan from bologna of all places, been out on loan for about 3 years, figure something out there?? At 6’2’’ sounds like the type of player we’d like.

ahmed qasam - 20 - right mid - Swedish 

Couple of central defenders of decent value but we need to rid ourselves of one or two before spending there I think.

Ex don??? Championship goal of the season I think.

I just don’t know the rules any more. Bayern equalized in the last minute but offside given, even though he’s not offside. Seems like the linesman incorrectly flagged too early and the ref blew (too early) and it wasn’t reviewed??

55 minutes ago, redordead said:

I'd take him in a heartbeat. Taylor made replacement if Barron goes.

Seems talented but not what I think we need. We have clarkson and McGrath who provide flair in center mid, think we need size, strength, and physicality/mobility in the middle. We are too lightweight and other than shinnie we don’t have the battling type. Hoping we add flair/creativity from a couple of new wide players.

David Watson at killie any good? Young player of the year?? What kind of midfielder given we are very limited in midfield?

1 hour ago, RicoS321 said:

Never heard of them.

But you’ve heard of Nigel Pepper, Greg Tansey, and our modern marvel Shayden Morris?

One of the comments burrows (I think) made was that he plays a style that suits our league.  For the level of league and the players we can afford, tika taca is going to be tough to do. Sounds like he plays a counter type of game, eg get forward asap, but not just blooter it long and hope.

while not my preference of style of play, I’d suggest it’s realistic to our league and what we can afford??

34 minutes ago, Panda said:

Mad thing is, if you told us before the campaign we'd beat Frankfurt, win at Ibrox, get to Hampden three times including a cup final, take Celtic to a penalty shoot-out, and Miovski would score 25 goals, we'd be thinking we're in for a no-bad season.

I guess the old question of "would you accept bottom six but make a cup final" has been answered.

 

To be honest, I don’t give a fuck about cup finals if we don’t win them. A trophy makes up for a poor league season but just making the final or being plucky semi losers means nothing. 
it’s been a horrible season, league position and failure to qualify for Europe, but Robson has taken the passing game and fucked us royalty. We were an awful watch for most of the season. We were a piss poor long ball 3-5-2 team. In recent weeks we’ve gone 442 or 4231, but 4 at the back has helped significantly, part of that being what Macdonald brings us. We’re also a much better possession/passing team in recent games, and are creating chances again.

what’s interesting is thelin and the reputation he brings. In recent week we’ve had success with short passing/possession game, not so much what I hear thelin’s team does. Still, you coach with the squad you build, intrigued for the future.

2 hours ago, RicoS321 said:

We're on course to become bottom six champions. Next week is massive for everyone involved at the club.

A fairly tired performance today, a real lack of sharpness all over, but we were fairly comfortable against a shite team. Another clean sheet too, but it's difficult to tell if it was confident defending or just zero threat from the opposition. I suspect the latter, as Devlin and MacDonald both made stupid decisions at times, with Barron and Clarkson giving the ball away in positions they shouldn't too. A real lack of balance in the team, as there has been all season. That trio of McGrath, Clarkson and Barron just too similar. With Polvara just an average midfielder also. Anyway, a much needed three points. 

I thought we looked quite energetic, but at the same time, I was stunned how bad st Johnstone were. Much like the Motherwell game, so wasteful in front of goal that we kept them in the game.

weve talked about players from other teams as targets, the pacy boy up top for st Johnstone has looked decent the last couple of times we’ve played them. Duk replacement if he moves on? Would rather have him than gueye too. Didn’t see anything to suggest motiv is the keeper we should be targeting this summer.

Played well at times, but partly because st johnstone were absolutely shit. Much like last week, we missed chances and should have scored 3 or 4, poor finishing. St Johnstone had a couple of chances too but better team win.

officially survived this season, 10 ahead of second bottom with 3 games to play.

21 hours ago, redordead said:

Good luck to Barron. Good player stifled for too long by Robson. 

I'd genuinely like to see us look down the leagues for talent. It's cheap and many that I've seen are every bit as capable as the current mediocrity We've brought in.

I made a similar comment recently, although not just lower leagues but the best of the rest, Kenny McLean, Lewis Ferguson, shinnie, Jonny Hayes etc. 

with the exception of mitov, who else is worth stealing? The killie winger Armstrong? Although he’ll prob have European football (couple of games anyway.)

8 hours ago, BigAl said:

Hoilett making noises about looking to extend his stay with us.

Got to say, I'm pretty surprised about this as thought he'd be offski for certain at the season end.

What's everybody's thought on extending his stay.

Personally wouldn't be adverse to a twelve month contract, depending upon his wage expectations, but suspect he'll probably want a two year given his age.

Decent guy to bring off the bench, doesn’t seem to have the legs for a full game. Limited in pace too and will he get slower? Both him and duk are good options to bring on but will either player accept that role? I’m hoping for more consistent wingers signed for next season. 

1 hour ago, RicoS321 said:

Any chance of getting Mitov from St Johnstone? A year left on his contract. The keeper situation worries me, and I'd like for us to have a known quantity, and he's been very good any time I've seen him. Kicking maybe not brilliant, but not terrible either.

I’d assume if we help get them relegated he’d be available!

9 hours ago, Panda said:

He wasn't losing possession that much though (I'll check the stats properly later). Usually he was either getting shots off (granted, should have been more clinical), winning corners (we had 16, we scored from one of them) or was drawing defenders out of position then passing to Devlin in space to put in a cross unmarked (although Devlin wasted many of them). 

All this playing in an unfamiliar position as he's not really been played on the right much.

 

I also watched the highlights after posting, I will say he had one of his better games. But it’s end product that ultimately matters and he and others were overly wasteful. I’m not really a duk fan but yesterday showed he’s a good player to have on the bench as he can have an impact (granted he can also be awful.)

6 hours ago, Panda said:

Very harsh. Red certainly helped us, but think the switch of Duk on for Barron was a big factor too. Gave us good width, Hoilett & Duk terrorised them in the second half, and we should have finished off far more than the one chance that we did. A 4-0 win wouldn't have flattered us.

I don’t think so, a half decent team smashes 10 man Motherwell today. I’d argue Motherwell looked the better team up until the red. They collapsed a little after that but we showed a real lack of quality. You say duk terrorized them, I say he was typical duk, dribble until he loses it and waste possession. He had a couple of decent runs but it’s the end product that matters. It could easily have been 4 or 5 but we did an excellent job of royally fucking up chances, plus I still thought we gave Motherwell too much time and space. Right up until the end I was worried our inability to get a second would cost us and they’d equalize.

still, a win is a win and 3 points closer to guaranteed safety.

Red won us the game but we still looked pretty shit. Dominated when they went to 10 but we pretty much fucked up some really good chances to add to our lead, plus gave Motherwell more of the ball than we should. Still, three points and another shutout.

Shit so far. Zero attacking threat. Horrible team for miovski to play in. Hoillet has no pace and McGrath is no right mid, both poor which really hurts the attack. Duk at least gives more attacking threat, he’ll bring something second half. Zero shots on or off target. No sure their keeper has touched the ball so far.

very little from clarkson and Barron, I really think it needs to be one of them with shinnie and a Rama type. Polvara is the best of the center mids so far, tidy touches.

4 hours ago, Jute said:

Pretty sure Shinnie will be suspended for this one which means Polvara in the middle. Think he struggles in games where teams don’t give him time and space in midfield. Motherwell definitely won’t do that. Not sure who else we can play there as not a fan of Phillips either and Duncan is not a central midfielder. Just need to win this and get season over with so I can concentrate on build up to Euros.

In

Bus then pub

Y

Bus back to capital

2-0 Miovski and Sokler 

I disagree regarding the space comment, although there’s a very good chance you’ll have seen him play more than me. Polvara is very skilled, has lovely touches, think he’s good in limited space. He’s not physical enough though, I’d agree if that’s what you mean. Not combative/a battler. He’s a lightweight Rama (more skilled) but playing in the heavy weight division. As has been mentioned, if he was more physical/aggressive and more imposing he could be very good, but he’s a typical American player, lacks the ‘Scottish’ qualities.

think we’ll play well tomorrow….ha…..

3-1 us, bojan, clarkson, McGrath

44 minutes ago, BigAl said:

Jimmy out

4-2 down

 

Told you John Hughes was a better option despite poorer English.

I’d agree, it’s ruby that is pollock’s replacement. Don’t think ruby and pollock are our perfect partnership. I think in an ideal world we have devlin at right back, Mackenzie and Jensen to compete for left back, and ruby and one other in left central defense. A scales type but affordable, perhaps thelin has lined up the Swedish scales? Macdonald is the odd one out unfortunately but I think it’s he or ruby and ruby has the bigger upside.

id certainly take scales back, but I’d compare him to Ryan Christie. Solid loan with us, game time at Celtic as a result, and now we can’t afford him. (If we ever take a Celtic player on loan again a fee has to be agreed prior to the loan even happening.) 

id like to see us find the next Kenny McLean, Lewis Ferguson, Johnny Hayes, mcginn, shinnie etc, quality talent from the rest of the league. Plus Scottish players. Anyone rate Glenn Middleton? Armstrong from killie? Or is he the next Matty Kennedy? Baccus was linked before…

5 hours ago, BigAl said:

Incredibly this is the most recent thread with his name in the title 

Hopefully this is a crock of shite and given the source it potentially is, but this is something I think we could do without

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-transfer-news/peter-leven-barnsley-next-manager-32653435

Perhaps the return of warnock needed as intern until Jimmy gets here?

Lost 2-1. Hopefully they hire their new guy asap and send jimmy to us early. Makes sense to both parties.