westenddon

I presume there'll be the usual "will they, won't they" carry on with all our out of contract players until well into the summer, especially since we apparently want to keep the majority of them. Token Killie fan at work wasn't worried about the prospect of losing Bell since they've got some young Finnish keeper coming through.

Cautious optimism. I don't think we'll really know if we've turned a corner until our first defeat or poor result, and the reaction to it in the subsequent game.

As far as I was aware he said we had 12 players signed up, so to achieve a squad of 18/20 we'd need another 6/8 players signed up - think that includes potentially the likes of Nelson/Grassi, I think it's only the EE and the like who've ever tried to say will be 8 new players coming in. Could be wrong mind. Personally I think having Diamond and Considine fit for at least one game together next season will make a difference, as will the return of Pawlett. Not like new signings, but I guess he'll be looking forward to have every first teamer fit for once. We have one new recruit already with six weeks to go till we start our pre-season games. It's not quite panic stations just yet, and after last summer I guess the cloak and dagger approach is preferable to being too open with the press as he was last summer when we were chasing Hughes and Johnson.

Not with our board it wouldn't. Not disagreeing that a "big name" would help ST sales initally, especially given the season we've had and the scepticism of many towards the management. But then I'd sooner have an unknown yet promising striker with the right attitude that'd score 15 goals than a lazy has-been who'll flatter to deceive and won't muck in. I imagine an announcement that Kerr, McDonald and Mulgrew have had any contract offers withdrawn will result in an immediate rise in renewals.

Good stuff mannie If McGhee was brought in with the remit of bringing through the youth and rebuilding the squad long term, then he's done well on the first target and the jury is obviously still out on the second target, what with it being a long term target and all. If he was brought in with the remit of "make us the finished article by the end of the season at the very latest" then I imagine his tack in the transfer market would've been different, and he probably would deserve the sack if those were his agreed targets.

Yet the most scathing criticism from him so far came the other day when he described his own signing MacLean as playing "rubbish" on Saturday. Don't see much deflecting from the manager, he's taken his share of the blame as far as I can see. Criticism of the players IMO has generally been merited throughout this season rather than being used "purely as an excuse" - if anything until recently I thought McGhee had gone out of his way not to criticise individuals

Thanks for your kind words. You said I said something and I asked you to show where I said it - zat is all No denial on the knickers front, mind. Or inference either.

So within the space of an hour or so, it's gone from "you said it" to "you infered it" Love it up me though. Bumming is me.

Well actually, Jagerdeen said "some of the protestors" wanted us to lose against Caley that day, then accused me personally of wanting us to lose. Then when asked to provide evidence he refused, and got a bit wound up at the very notion. But let's roll with your version anyway. Well no, I claimed you were reading the wrong thing into it to suit what you believed to have been said. You said "you would have looked less of a fool if it had been a success" which, maybe, sort of indicates you didn't think it was a success, which maybe, sort of indicates you thought it failed? Just a thought like. The middle paragraph was an example of another way an Inverness win might have "benefited" me, what with Caley being a better away trip than Falkirk. It doesn't disqualify from the original point, that I at no point said that I wanted us to lose against ICT in order to prove a point and that Jagerdeen was at best mouthing off with nothing to back it up, and at worst peddling lies.

Well usually if somebody constantly mouths off about folk without anything whatsoever to back it up then they get called up on it. Nae my fault if you're not used to that sort of outrageous behaviour on here.

Thought not

Protest done, Jimmy gone - if 200,000 were there and Jimmy was still here then it'd have failed so I'm not massively sure wtf you're on about. I'd rather Caley stayed in the SPL last season than Falkirk, so going by your logic I'd have rather we lost that day and they'd stayed in the SPL. If we're talking "infering" then there's a few folk on here who're far more intent on seeing us lose than that solitary post you're clinging to.

It's far easier for people like this to stay here where they agree with each other, swear a lot and convince themselves that lies and myths are fact. They don't like it up 'em, to coin a phrase.

A case of you reading what you want to read - if you want to take from that that I paid my money that day hoping for us to lose then feel free. The point of the protest was to make the point that we felt Jimmy's time at Aberdeen was up - the point was made that win, lose, or draw the protest would take place. Larger numbers might have reinforced the point, still doesn't mean I wanted us to lose to re-inforce said point.

I said a less favourable result would bump up numbers, not the same thing as wanting us to lose or even that I valued numbers at the protest over a win that day. If we lost that day, numbers had been up - fairly obvious logic there, rather than wanting my team to lose.

And where have I (or any of the others present) said I hope we lost against Caley?

Should be fairly easy to find where I said that then in that case? No argument against it other than the fact that I never said it. Just admit you made it up and we can all move on.

Oh aye, that one. A few weeks before fatty got the dunt. Any evidence of some protestors willing the team to lose that day, or was it another post of unadulterated shite?

Evidence please

If we're going down that road then I feel that McGhee got the choice of captain completely wrong, which is arguably the biggest decision he's made since coming to the club. I understand that some have doubts over McGhee, but I'm encouraged by the good improvement in defence, the selection of youth over dross, and the acknowledgement that what we have in the squad at the moment isn't good enough. Mistakes were made by McGhee during a few games this season, however it wasn't the previous manager's mistakes that led me to believe he wasn't the man to take us forward - it was the inability to a) identify them, and b) learn from them over a long period of time. I'll disagree that I'm unable to judge this objectively, perhaps it's more of a long haul than I expected - however I'm still positive about McGhee as the signs are there that some of the wrongs I felt were there under Jimmy are in the process of being sorted out.

Would like to think he's not immune to praise from some quarters either.

While the goals for column is sparse, these clean sheets aren't to be sniffed at and shows McGhee has done a good job in sorting the defence out after the Sigma defeat especially? Wouldn't say it's papering over any cracks either, if we aren't scoring goals then it's fairly clear that we won't win games irrespective of how many clean sheets we've had. We've signed a no-nonsense CB at long last and arguably our best CB has been out all season - struggle to see how people can't take encouragement from that?

I'll have an apology for that, born in 83 thanks!

How many competitions were we in under Calderwood when we failed to make a final even. 10 was it? Some pathetic surrenders and embarrasments in there. It'd seem Calderwood wasn't able to motivate the players for the majority of the big one off games, chugging along racking up the points is fine but when it came down to beating a team inferior to us when we had a good chance to acheive something and get a trophy - it wasn't there and if it happens again and again and again then clearly there's a problem somewhere. He had a year to sort us out after QoS and he blew it again in carbon copy fashion. Hard to say without judging it on it's own merits. If we're struggling in the league (say 6th or 7th rather than 10th) then I'd say it'll be really disappointing to go out earlyish as we're wanting to keep our season alive. If we're clear in 3rd and are knocked out of the cup then it's perhaps not the be all and end all. Also depending on what happens in the game, if we're hanging on with 10 men at Tynecastle and the ref is a cheat and we go out on penalties then it's more acceptable if we've just been crap and been beaten 2-0. It starts to become a real issue when a manager has been here a while and horrific things like QoS and Dunfermline become the norm. That's also the point where there's less tolerance of previously "acceptable" cup defeats as the manager has had so many chances previously.

That's fair enough. On the unrealistic expectations note, I put it forward on the Hat that the unrealistic expectations thing would come out again when folk seemed to expect McGhee to rubber Celtic and drive straight up to Aberdeen.