Radford 72

Especially with Jason Kerr probably, it's not just losing out on the £400k fee.or whatever but the sell-on clause. If he went to, even Wigan or Oxford and did well, you are probably talking ten times that and Saints would presumably like a slice of that pie, although I do think we'd be entitled to something anyway having developed him.

It maybe did have its place once but agree that needing to score 3 goals to avoid losing a tie, when the opposition have only scored 2 goals isn't fair. The situation described above where you lose 1-0 away then the opposition get the first goal in the home leg was just a game killer.

When I saw this photo, I hoped it was some part of the Recreation Grounds but if you follow the thread, you'll see it was actually a shop entrance on the road up to the entrance at the end of South Inch Place. I wonder if we'll ever move ground again? There were rumours that the club were looking at the possibility not that long ago...

I needed to change an age category on a ticket and emailed the club on Monday and they (Laura) got back to me within about 6 hours. Went on to renew and everything was in order and worked fine. But definitely seems to be a good number of folk having problems on certain devices, which is clearly disappointing. It might not be the answer but I think in the past some folk have managed to have success when using 4G rather than WiFi, or vice versa. Why that would be, I don't know but could be worth a try. Another thing is if you have more than one ticket as a family group, I think sometimes only one of the barcodes has worked for stuff like this, or even Saints TV at the start of the season.

This is the correct answer. A special goal.

Credit to Brian Rice for finding a role, either by design or fortune, that suits Ross Callachan. His one strength at Saints (other than apparently running around a lot) was making runs forward. Rice has taken him out of the real engine room, where his lack of technical ability and inability to tackle without ending up on his backside were big issues, and played him in an area where his primary focus is making those sort of runs and he's repaid him with goals.

Keep up, Chelsea was back In November, the week before it was Rangers and Celtic and two weeks before it was Sunderland. I think the next story Clive feeds to the media will be Cirencester Town. I've no issue at all if Scott Tanser wants to return to England, understand that completely, but his agent is not representing his client in the best way possible with all these made up "Football Insider" stories.

The goalkeeper deserves his moment. We are in the next round because of him.

That is undoubtedly one of he greatest results in our history. The League Cup wins were against poor Rangers teams and whilst this one isn't a great one, they are clearly flying high given their performances this season. But we went to Ibrox, went toe-to-toe with them and beat them. Forever in the history books.

He recovered pretty well from the Rangers game at Xmas but was just worrying he was starting to dip again but what a way to banish those doubts. Thrilled for him and hopefully it's the shot of confidence that he maybe needed. He puts on a brave face but I think he must know there are goals he could have done better with this season. Maybe part of the problem for him has been when he does lose a bad goal, he's so rarely tested that he can't get back into the swing of making saves. Was asked to do that last night and was faultless. Great night for him.

Definite benefit of the shape we used yesterday is how far advanced it allows the wing backs to progress. Without Wotherspoon, I thought Booth struggled a little bit to get into dangerous areas but did put some good crosses in. Rooney had a good game. Back three were solid but largely untested. Craig Bryson has taken his performances up a level in the past couple of months and thought he was very good yesterday. Good touch, used the ball well and drove forward at times. We have good options in the centre of the park with Liam Craig in such good form, so it's about the manager picking the right players for the right games.

I think we are past the stage of debating the aesthetics of the 5-2-3. Even if you accept football doesn't need to be simply about winning games, it's harder to look past the idea that the primary aim is to score goals. For a spell this season, I enjoyed watching us play the new system at home and even yesterday, the first half was a dominant display. But the evidence is damning, we don't score goals at home and 17 games into a league season, the manager shouldn't still be banging his head off a brick wall hoping something miraculously changes. The nature of the formation means there are always positives in individual performances and I can see why there are elements of the display he's happy with but it's just a broken record as it's the same every time we use it. The positives yesterday were the back three were solid again, the wing backs were advanced and I thought Bryson was very good. He's stepped up a level over the past few months. Conway is an intelligent player who knows the system but the legs hold him back. After a bright few minutes to open, Middleton was very quiet but would have liked to see the manager try to switch him over with Conway. The other two players who were disappointing were McCann and Kane. The latter is back to looking like a guy who is incapable of scoring goals. He's a bit like the individual embodiment of the team under this system, looks good at a lot of what he does but can't do the most important thing. If Bryson has stepped up his performances recently, McCann is probably having his poorest spell since coming into the team. A guy that used to never give the ball away but is sloppy with his passing at the moment. Not sure anyone scouting him at the moment will be too impressed. Disappointed we failed to put the pressure on Livingston but league on the back burner for a few weeks now. Get past Clyde, get through the Rangers game then have a real crack at this quarter-final.

Harry Curran doing the business for Saints back in the day.

Think we have to see how the 3-5-2 (3-4-1-2) goes today. Important that Wotherspoon doesn't get bogged down in midfield like he did when they beat us in December and can find the areas he did last week, when he was very good. Won't be a day for great football but looking forward to seeing how we approach this. Feel it's actually pretty important we don't lose ahead of the final, although accept it'll be a very different game on Hampden pitch. Losing to them three times not great psychologically though, as we saw for United in 2014.

This is as I feared. I haven't emailed them yet as wanted to hear how folk got on. Sadly, especially considering the club in question, suspect it's just not worth the hassle. I was fortunate in two regards, one that I was in France so could watch the game on Saints TV after the Rangers link failed and secondly that it's the first stream that's failed for me all season. Ironic considering their support were questioning whether Saints' PPV would cope with their support numbers for the game in December.

The penalties aren't included is all.

He was a little poor for the County goal - but redeemed himself later - but that apart, it's been a good recovery from that Rangers game for Clark. Stats won't show that for a while as he has a fair bit to make up from earlier in season. Good character from him to bounce back.

Think it was this guy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manel_Expósito Tommy Wright also took this guy on trial a few years ago: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josu

Football is a squad game but what a difference having McCann and Wotherspoon back in the team. It allows us to play football. I'm not convinced that the former ever really needs rested and if the latter does, it should be as little as possible. I know Liam Craig never lets the side down but having Murray Davidson playing as he can makes such a difference as well, he was also very good this afternoon. To keep their cool in the face of adversity and believe they could play their way back into the game is testament to the players and the way they are coached. Huge win and despite the situation we found ourselves in (defending was poor for their goals), it was a deserved victory. Bit of breathing space now but three hard games coming up... Plus a home game with Celtic...

The finances at Dundee (as always) are certainly interesting. It's hard to see how Cummings fits into this reduced wage structure and I see McPake is talking about how they had to "get creative" which is the same way he spoke about he Charlie Adam deal, where outside investors are subsidising his wage. Dundee certainly aren't alone but there seems little attempt to balance the books, with Timothy Keyes happy to cover any shortfall come the end of each season. As said, he's far from the only guy in Scottish football doing that though. Saints are still run as they were 35 years ago where they don't spend what they don't have. We just have to work that but harder to make sure the signings are right. Agree about our strikers too. The only type we lack is a bigger presence but the manager has shown little inclination of adding that type. It's up to him to get a better tune out of the options he does have.

Like it generally (i.e. for Liverpool, Man City etc...) or for Saints? I thought it took some getting used to in the early weeks of the season as it was a big change from the previous manager. Added to watching the games only on TV and I struggled to buy into it but there's no doubt that the manager got the players well versed in it and for a while in the autumn, I thought we looked a decent team. You've been posting on these forums as long as me and I know you've always been strong on players make a performance, not tactics but it doesn't really tally for me that we can score goals and get results on the road but find it so hard at McDiarmid. I just think we are past the stage of keeping on and simply hoping for a change of fortune. Touched on it in the Killie thread but suspect we are past the stage of moving to a back four this season (having only started with it once) but I think the 3-5-2/3-4-1-2 has been more effective at home and we need to try it more often. Saw the benefits of the 5-2-3 in defending a lead against Hibs but we were fortunate to get ahead with it. It's not about ditching it completely but there is a lack of flexibility from the manager IMO and they will probably make us predicable. Cheers for the constructive reply.

Touched the ball once in the box all night. The positive at least was that the touches he did have were fairly central, as opposed to what we've seen at times when May has started and everything is out wide. You can kind of envisage what sort of striker you need for the system. You can't envisage that sort of striker being attainable for Saints.

We have enough decent players to put out a decent team but that certainly shouldn't include Bryson, Conway or, on current form, O'Halloran. Ali McCann should start every game and David Wotherspoon as often as is possible. Not that I mind the back three but think it's a bit disappointing that, at this stage of the season, you'd be worried about switching to a back four as we haven't used it. Going into next season, I think you need to be flexible enough to switch between both. Usual back five, McCann and Davidson/Craig, then either Wotherspoon and two strikers, or Wotherspoon, Middleton and Kane. Could really do with the three points ahead of games against Old Firm and Livingston.

Is there any attainable striker that would score goals in our preferred system? Think Jason Cummings is a great signing for Dundee. Will build up his confidence in the Championship and take that into the Premiership if they get promoted.