Slim

Hanley is absolute horse shit. One of those defenders (Colin Hendry at higher end of the scale, Zander Diamond at the lower end) that can sometimes look deceptively good with last gasp tackles or goal line clearances but more often than not the scoring chance only came about because they lost their marker or were caught out of position.

Ferguson not on the bench tonight?

Sounds like a Forrester type, always injured and no desire to fight for a place in the team: And did he show the hunger required of someone desperate to break into the team? It was something Mowbray had questioned, stating earlier in the season: "He’s a lovely boy and I’ve told him so many times that he has to find personality, some anger and frustration in his belly when he’s not picked."

Part time status will make it difficult to get anyone decent in, Paul Sheerin maybe?

Shinnie is a no-brainer if he’s available. Should fit in with the Albanian chap if we mirror our best midfield 3 in recent years. Ramadani can fill the Ryan Jack role, Shinnie can fill the Graeme Shinnie role and Ferguson/replacement can do the Kenny McLean role.

Hopefully that’s the last we see of Hanley. We should be cementing our long-term back 3 around Souttar, Hendry and McKenna. I’d stick Hickey in midfield where he’s been playing quite a bit in the Serie A, at least until Gilmour does enough at club level to justify his place in the team. He’s getting nowhere near the Chelsea team and has just wasted a development year being pish at Norwich.

They did a U-turn on Considine?

I’d have Callum Hendry too if he’s going free and cheap. He started to look serviceable in his last few games on loan with us and has been in good firm for the last 6 months or so in a shite St Johnstone team. I think there’s enough talent in there for a back up striker role at least, something different (more direct) from the bench if Ramirez is still here and not having much joy. Edit - that was weird

Port Vale currently winning despite fielding a forward pairing of James Wilson and Ryan Edmonston.

Papers this morning regurgitating the Ferguson to Cagliari for £3.5m story from January. Considering they’re in the Serie A relegation places with 2 games to go and Inter up next, I doubt there will be much in that.

“We’ve spoken to Luke and his representatives," Goodwin told The Press And Journal. "We believe it’s probably in Luke’s best interests because of the players we’ve got coming through. “Luke has had a really good loan period over in Northern Ireland and has done particularly well. However, we just believe it’s a little bit short for what we’re looking at in that area. “We’ve got another one or two good young centre-backs coming through the system and you’re always wary of blocking that pathway. “It would have been easy to give the young man another year or two and do the same again with him next year. But we felt it was right just to give him the opportunity to go and find something a bit more permanent somewhere else. “These decisions have to be made. In hindsight, you hope to be proved that they’re the right ones.” Doesn’t really seem to clarify anything really, have we had any of these young central defenders on the bench in recent weeks?

Can anyone copy and paste what Goodwin’s saying about it in the P&J this morning?

I don’t know about that, I’d be more of the opinion that if you send a young player out on loan with the objective of making an impact and he ends up winning an award for the best young player in the entire country while winning silverware with his team, he would automatically deserve at least a year extension to see if your preconceptions about him may have been wrong or if he’s a delayed bloomer. Especially if his position is exactly the same as one we’re desperate to fill. I would go so far as saying giving him a modest extension would be a lower risk than any other signing we will make this summer.

Just seems mental that we wouldn’t take a punt on an extended contract. Worst case scenario we can send him back on loan to Northern Ireland if he doesn’t make the step up.

I sort of agree with it, it’s a bit crass really making fun of people because of their socio-economic status which is often largely out of their control. Best sticking it to them based on their behaviour and character traits. Which fortunately allows us to continue reminding Rangers/Celtic/Dundee United/Hearts/Hibs fans that they’re scum (and they know they are).

Top tier football players are wired differently to people like us. Take Ramsay for example, he’s played football for the last 10 years and all he has ever known is being one of the best (if not the best) players on whatever team he has played for. He’s never experienced being out of his depth or the feeling of not being good enough. There’s more chance of him fully expecting to go down the road and displace Trent Whatshisname from the Liverpool team than him sitting at home right now weighing up the pros and cons of staying at Pittodrie or being loaned out to Rotherham. If he really is destined for the top, he won’t even be contemplating failure.

Stuart Findlay isn’t getting a game for Philadelphia in the MLS, he’s left sided. Could offer them Ramirez as a swap if he really is intending to move back.

Jak Alnwick expected to sign for Cardiff

And drop Ojo? Are you crazy?

Unless I’m getting my timelines mixed up, Milne also had the opportunity to buy up the land behind the Merkland and South Stands so we didn’t need to be in this pickle in the first place. An incredibly stupid business decision by whoever it was calling the shots (assuming there wasn’t an inherent desire to tear us away from Pittodrie). Even if the chances were minimal that we’d build on the land, it would still be an appreciating asset that could easily be sold again later if we truly didn’t need it.

It’ll be fine, chuck in Considine’s coaching gig as a sweetener. We need to properly clean the stench of Scott Brown from our club.

Yeah this whole “actually it’s not my fault, I didn’t really want to hire him anyway, big boys did it and ran away” shtick is embarrassing. As is the whole realisation that he’s responsible for the delivery of a new stadium and is putting all of his eggs into the basket of the usual local council pre-election pie-in-the-sky promises and trying to distance himself completely from Kingsford which I’m sure he had a massive say in from the very start. He’s going to look an even bigger cock if the party promising the new stadium/pier loses the election and/or it turns out the location proposed with a smaller footprint than our current stadium is not feasible from an engineering point of view (e.g. cost of groundworks). He’s basically David Brent with better teeth. Who’s actually running the club on a day to day basis these days anyway since they got rid of Duncan Fraser? Rob Wicks? Or is he just on the commercial side of things?

Graeme Shinnie isn’t getting much game time at Wigan, taken off at half time in the last (rare) game he started. They only paid £30k for him, wouldn’t be surprised if he’s available on the cheap.

Especially if he was the only candidate interviewed.