Hearts v Saints at MURRAYFIELD


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Lineup today only included Scougall & O'Halloran as players signed by Tommy. We have too many OLD guard.

Six players aged 25 or under featured yesterday, this "TW only plays old guys who are past it" shtick is a bit of a nothing statement in reality. I'd probably be arguing that Millar was one of our best midfielders yesterday. And it's not exactly a terrible choice that he keeps selecting MacLean up front, when the alternative is Cummins or Johnstone 

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The default setting for some football fans seems to be set to panic mode on a permanent basis. A bad result or two (no matter the opposition or circumstances) and the end of the world is nigh. There were disappointing elements of yesterday's performance but it certainly wasn't the awful showing that some posters seem to have witnessed. We defended much more like ourselves and in Scougall and O'Halloran have two exciting players that will push us forward. The referee yesterday offered neither much protection, which might have changed the outcome of the game.

Aside from the final ball, which isn't causing me much long-term concern at this stage, the one big negative, that has been picked up on, is the striker situation. MacLean still merits his role in the squad but when the final pass isn't there, he isn't going to make something happen himself, so we need an alternative. Cummins has his role too as a worker and more physical presence but Johnstone looks every inch another dud. The chairman and manager need to work together here and try and get a top target. Where did Johnstone rank on TW's summer list? Even in the top ten? That's as big an issue maybe as the manager's identification of potential forwards. The arguement will be that teams will always pay more for a striker and with out budget, it leaves us susceptible to missing out. If David McMillan is a player the manager really wants (and I don't think Johnstone falls into that category) then we've got to try and make it happen. I find it hard to be too critical of Wright on the striker front as I'm sceptical to what level of player he's being restricted to.

We've seen these poorer runs of results before and the management and players never panic. I don't expect any different here and in a few weeks, we'll have another couple of wins to our name and the post-match threads will be dead again...

Here's hoping.

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Guest ScottMann
 

Our good start to the season masked the fact that we were not actually playing that well and the warning signs were there to see

I agree with a lot of your views Ed and most of this sentence but you also use a phrase that I have never agreed with and I think has masked the current situation...our good start to the season. I don't think we actually had a good start at all. At best it was mixed.

People are writing it off all too easily but the fact remains that we were dumped out of 2 cup competitions, P3 L3, while having our magnificent unbeaten table topping start. Turns out what happened was we had a little decent spell where we picked up 3 wins but this has been the exception. We have won 4 games out of 13 all season, 3 against the bottom 3 clubs and the 4th against a side that ended with 8 men. The flaws that saw us dumped out by Trakai are the flaws that see us struggling right now and have been obvious from June.

However I don't think it's nearly as bad as being made out by some.Errors at the back are being magnified because we're poor up front and we're going through that notoriously difficult spell in football, the transitional period. Scougall is a brilliant signing who should have the team rebuilt around him(!), I still have high hopes for Alston and looks like we've a few decent defenders about to break through. Sorting out our final ball and finally getting someone to score and the world would be a far different place. 

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Scougall was great yesterday and Spoony is starting to get some form back. Mikey suffered from being kicked all over the place and lacked support from Easton (compare that to the way Comrie supported Scougall on the other flank).

Thought we were ok defensively but failed again to play the ball out of defence, rather preferring to hoof the ball up the park. But Comrie is looking stronger with each game and IMHO deserves to keep his place ahead of Foster.

On the poor side as well Macca seems to really be struggling when up front more or less on his own - playing high balls in don't help either. How often yesterday were decent crosses across the box found wanting because of a lack of blue shirts.

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Scougall was great yesterday and Spoony is starting to get some form back. Mikey suffered from being kicked all over the place and lacked support from Easton (compare that to the way Comrie supported Scougall on the other flank).

Thought we were ok defensively but failed again to play the ball out of defence, rather preferring to hoof the ball up the park. But Comrie is looking stronger with each game and IMHO deserves to keep his place ahead of Foster.

On the poor side as well Macca seems to really be struggling when up front more or less on his own - playing high balls in don't help either. How often yesterday were decent crosses across the box found wanting because of a lack of blue shirts.

I am to football tactics as Trump is to peace and harmony, but why would you cross the ball if there was no one there to do anything with it?

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Guest ScottMann
 

I am to football tactics as Trump is to peace and harmony, but why would you cross the ball if there was no one there to do anything with it?

That's exactly what goes through my little mind when you hear a tv chappie saying 'That was a lovely ball in from so and so but there was nobody there to take advantage of it'. Well surely so and so should have been aware of where his team mates were and not just lumped in a ball to nobody in hope, lovely or not.

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The default setting for some football fans seems to be set to panic mode on a permanent basis. A bad result or two (no matter the opposition or circumstances) and the end of the world is nigh. There were disappointing elements of yesterday's performance but it certainly wasn't the awful showing that some posters seem to have witnessed. We defended much more like ourselves and in Scougall and O'Halloran have two exciting players that will push us forward. The referee yesterday offered neither much protection, which might have changed the outcome of the game.

..

We've seen these poorer runs of results before and the management and players never panic. I don't expect any different here and in a few weeks, we'll have another couple of wins to our name and the post-match threads will be dead again...

I don't agree with your opening paragraph Radford. I don't think it's panic mode, it's just a frustration at attending a game with not a single moment of excitement for a Saints fan as Ghostie said.  And, be honest, we had a brilliant start to the league season results wise, but other than an excellent first half against killie, how often have we put a performance together other than in short spells in matches?

I agree the defence looked better, and if it wasn't for a lucky goal we'd have been saying shite game but decent point.  But I can hardly remember a decent shot at goal or chance in the past 3 games. It's not great to watch, and the problem with not being entertaining will always be highlighted more when results go against us. If we're shitfesting our way to victories then people accept that kind of performance.

Tommy was right in his post match interview that we couldn't cross the road right now.

And your last paragraph I agree with, TW has been one of the best managers in this league over the past decade or so at managing to turn round the fortunes of the team after a bad run, and coming up with the goods in the end. Let's hope the same again, as folk have predicted our good run is over for at least the past 3 seasons in a row when we've hit a bad spell.

 But please let us just see Scougall central off the front player for a game or two!!

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Tw must be the only guy that thinks Scougil is a winger. Gordon looked a class act so calm. Mikey looked like he was the only one who tried to go fwd. 

im not actually sure how we played cos the view was awful sitting close to the front. even the view at aberdeen is better. 

Tram and Murrrayfield hotel were braw

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One of the guys said it on the banter page that the players walked off at the end without acknowledging the support, the have got to realise although they were hurting we are all in it together

That's not true, the players did start to head towards the fans to acknowledge but got little response from the fans who in the main had their backs to the pitch and were streaming out. The majority of the players acknowledged the fans and a small minority of the fans responded. 

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That's not true, the players did start to head towards the fans to acknowledge but got little response from the fans who in the main had their backs to the pitch and were streaming out. The majority of the players acknowledged the fans and a small minority of the fans responded. 

Not quite as I saw it , must have missed it

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One of the guys said it on the banter page that the players walked off at the end without acknowledging the support, the have got to realise although they were hurting we are all in it together

I left straight as the whistle blew in disgust, if the players felt the same way and just wanted off the pitch then fair play to them. Im not one of these "I pay my money and deserve to be applauded by the players" type people, though 

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In a league game, I don't care if the players acknowledge the crowd or not tbh.

If they do, great, if they don't, no biggie

 

 

I left straight as the whistle blew in disgust, if the players felt the same way and just wanted off the pitch then fair play to them. Im not one of these "I pay my money and deserve to be applauded by the players" type people, though 

Agree. I always feel it's a bit of a token gesture a lot of the time when players clap their support after a routine defeat. That's in general, not specifically relating to Saints.

Unless the fans have given unbelievable vocal backing throughout the defeat, then maybe some recognition is fair enough.  But a clap for just turning up, ffs it's our job, and we shouldn't be rewarded for such mediocrity. We have to expect more from ourselves as a support ..

:laugh:

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Thought Scougall was OK, but Spoony consistently dribbles like Pele then passes like Pingu.

He had a moment where he was surrounded by two players on the edge of the box, a shimmy and a step over takes him beyond both and opens them up, then he shanked his pass out of play with the ball never going near a Saints player. 

Wish someone had recorded it, as it was pretty much him in a nutshell 

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Great to get the chance to tick off seeing Saints play at Murrayfield but that was one of the strangest atmospheres I've ever experienced - 18,000 people sitting in complete, eerie silence to the extent that you could hear the players shouting at each other like you can in League Two matches. Bizarre. McDiarmid Park takes a lot of stick, sometimes justifiably, but it's never like that.

Personally I felt Saints played OK and a draw would have been a fair result, but as others have said we're never going to win any of these games if we can't create any chances. I'd be more than happy if Mikey was told to basically never pass the ball again because the only time we look like troubling defenders and making inroads towards goal is when he takes it for a run and either gets fouled or tries to get a shot off.

I don't feel the squad needs major surgery, but the lack of an alternative striking option to Macca is really hurting us. He still wants to be everywhere on the pitch which is fine if he has a penalty box striker playing alongside him, but as things stand it just means that on the rare occasion we get a cross in, there's no one there to capitalise on it. At this stage it's really hard to make sense of the fact that we gave Chris Kane a new contract (why?), sent him out on loan (why?) and brought in someone else on loan who just doesn't look good enough (why?). For a club that is famously so tight with the purse strings, all of the above feels like a big waste of money to me. We'd get a lot more value for money if we just spent a bit more on someone who'd actually start games and make an impact - which must be incredibly frustrating for Tommy.

Things aren't quite working at the moment and I'd like to see Scougall given a chance to play more centrally for a run of games, to see what he can do. He's a good player with a great touch but there just hasn't been a huge amount of end product from him from what I've seen so far and I'd like to see how much more he could influence the game from the middle of the park. Didn't he always play centrally before he came here? And we have Spoony and Alston who can both take his place out on the right.

I thought Gordon looked promising for the future, incidentally. Good to see guys like him and Comrie getting a game at the moment.

 

 

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