Partick v Saints 28/10/17


Tranmere Saintee
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I think most of us agree that goals will come.

However, we have one point from the last fifteen, four from the last twenty one. That concerns me more, that says the whole team is not competing, not just a couple of strikers going through a barren patch.

We all know if Macca gets the ball to feet in the box he'll likely score. Likewise a decent cross on to Cummins head. They're only as good as the service they receive and are not solely to blame for the last few horrible games.

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Guest ScottMann
 

The sole purpose of a football team is to score goals.

Not any more I'm afraid. The days of simply wanting to score more goals than the opposition are long gone. Now it's all about conceding less than them.

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Short memory?  He was one of our best players last season. Consistently on form.   

Not really, he had a good wee spell, maybe played out of position, but wouldn't really go overboard and think he was a model of consistency, as with any player I want to see them progress at saints, but what I seen on Tuesday he has gone back the way

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Not really, he had a good wee spell, maybe played out of position, but wouldn't really go overboard and think he was a model of consistency, as with any player I want to see them progress at saints, but what I seen on Tuesday he has gone back the way

Alston was one of the players I wanted signed & he did OK last season despite being played out of position. This season he has been poor.

Tommy is doing the same with Scougall so I would imagine he will regress as well.

 

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Alston was one of the players I wanted signed & he did OK last season despite being played out of position. This season he has been poor.

Tommy is doing the same with Scougall so I would imagine he will regress as well.

 

Wonder what we'd achieve with a good manager.

Guess we'll just have to make do.

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Alston has played about 4 games at most been injured most of season. Did okay last season give the lad a break, myself start of the season would of dreaded Tommy leaving know not really fussed, he has been great manager but saints are stall at the moment.200 games great record, I would take the compensation if we got it and thank him for being a great ambassador for us.

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Alston has played about 4 games at most been injured most of season. Did okay last season give the lad a break, myself start of the season would of dreaded Tommy leaving know not really fussed, he has been great manager but saints are stall at the moment.200 games great record, I would take the compensation if we got it and thank him for being a great ambassador for us.

One wee bad patch and let the best manager Saints have ever had go?.! did ok for the last four seasons " Give the Man a Break"  same as you want for Alston .!

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One wee bad patch and let the best manager Saints have ever had go?.! did ok for the last four seasons " Give the Man a Break"  same as you want for Alston .!

I agree re the sentiment re Tommy, but unfortunately football is a very 'now' environment. Living on sentiment and past glories can be dangerous.

For me, we are not in that position, yet, with Tommy. However, the next 6 games are really important for him. We don't start scoring and keep sliding down the league and I have no doubt that the Chairman and Board will be having discussions. 

Hopefully we will do enough to stay safely out of the bottom 3 or 4 until January. Then Tommy will get a chance to regain his position of confidence with a growing portion of the support

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, fans don't turn up (barely 2,000 home fans on Tuesday?) so Steve Brown worries about spending money and the cycle continues. We routinely fail to retain our best attacking entertainers though, which isn't the best way to keep or entice fans. If SB pays a fee to keep O'Halloran, are the Perthshire public likely to reward him for it by turning up in greater numbers?

I know we tend to try and defend our crowds but they are really disappointing at the moment.

I've felt this for a while. We can take 15000 to a cup final, get crowds of 6-8000 all home fans for a big European game, yet we often get around 2000 Saints fans for home games. This is despite the most successful period in our history, 5 of the last 6 season qualifying for Europe, and the best admission prices for families in the country.

Our home support is brutal these days.

 

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I've felt this for a while. We can take 15000 to a cup final, get crowds of 6-8000 all home fans for a big European game, yet we often get around 2000 Saints fans for home games. This is despite the most successful period in our history, 5 of the last 6 season qualifying for Europe, and the best admission prices for families in the country.

Our home support is brutal these days.

 

Our home support is brutal these days I totally agree but why is that ?i still think it’s because we haven’t brought in any players that the paying public might want to go and watch.We had a load of cash that was going on infrastructure but does anybody notice anything drastically changed at McDiarmid? I for one don’t ,jeez it was only a season ago we were still watching a silly wee fat portable telly in the Muirton suite for the fitbaw results after the game,and while I’m at it we have they bloody awful orange plastic chairs sitting next to the dugout ,it’s verging on the embarrassing.

Time to spend cash and get the public interested in us .

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I think most of us agree that goals will come.

However, we have one point from the last fifteen, four from the last twenty one. That concerns me more, that says the whole team is not competing, not just a couple of strikers going through a barren patch.

We all know if Macca gets the ball to feet in the box he'll likely score. Likewise a decent cross on to Cummins head. They're only as good as the service they receive and are not solely to blame for the last few horrible games.

Guess I must be one of the "least of us" then.  I have no confidence whatsoever that we are going to start scoring any time soon, let alone start taking anything out of games.

We're watching a dead team with no self-belief now.  I saw a lot of the Hibs side of a few seasons ago that ended with them being relegated, and this Saints team horribly remind me of that.  Poor quality, predictable, bad to watch, lacking in confidence, some awful signings, and whether anyone wants to hear it or not, a management team that don't actually know how to make it better - or if they do, the're not doing it.  A rebuild has been needed for a couple of seasons now, but we've not done it, and unfortunately this has been coming.  At this level, unless you're a club that has cash to spend, I'm afraid everyone at a club in any capacity has a shelf life - players and managers.  When a team becomes stale, the forward looking clubs that change on a regular basis generally wise up to it pretty fast.  That's what's happening to us now.  Other teams have sussed St Johnstone out.  They know our players, and they know our game plan (when there is one).  In short, they know how to win against us.

As Edstar said, there's no room for sentiment.  The manager failed to rebuild the team from the bottom up when he should have 3 seasons ago, and has relied on largely the same core set of players doing pretty much the same thing the same way.  That team peaked back then.  Look at the big sides when they win something, what's the first thing they do?  Pretty much dismantle it and start again.  I'm not saying that it's the manager's fault, things could have been beyond his control, but for whatever reason, it wasn't done, and we are where we are now.  In my opinion, the manager needs a new challenge and Saints desperately need fresh ideas.  I'd hate for this to go on and see Tommy Wright forced out under a cloud.  But as I said, the comparison to Hibs under Fenlon and Butcher to they way we're playing is scary.

Having said all that, we'll probably go out and beat Celtic on Saturday...

Edited by HertsAgain
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Guess I must be one of the "least of us" then.  I have no confidence whatsoever that we are going to start scoring any time soon, let alone start taking anything out of games.

We're watching a dead team with no self-belief now.  I saw a lot of the Hibs side of a few seasons ago that ended with them being relegated, and this Saints team horribly remind me of that.  Poor quality, predictable, bad to watch, lacking in confidence, some awful signings, and whether anyone wants to hear it or not, a management team that don't actually know how to make it better - or if they do, the're not doing it.  A rebuild has been needed for a couple of seasons now, but we've not done it, and unfortunately this has been coming.  At this level, unless you're a club that has cash to spend, I'm afraid everyone at a club in any capacity has a shelf life - players and managers.  When a team becomes stale, the forward looking clubs that change on a regular basis generally wise up to it pretty fast.  That's what's happening to us now.  Other teams have sussed St Johnstone out.  They know our players, and they know our game plan (when there is one).  In short, they know how to win against us.

As Edstar said, there's no room for sentiment.  The manager failed to rebuild the team from the bottom up when he should have 3 seasons ago, and has relied on largely the same core set of players doing pretty much the same thing the same way.  That team peaked back then.  Look at the big sides when they win something, what's the first thing they do?  Pretty much dismantle it and start again.  I'm not saying that it's the manager's fault, things could have been beyond his control, but for whatever reason, it wasn't done, and we are where we are now.  In my opinion, the manager needs a new challenge and Saints desperately need fresh ideas.  I'd hate for this to go on and see Tommy Wright forced out under a cloud.  But as I said, the comparison to Hibs under Fenlon and Butcher to they way we're playing is scary.

Having said all that, we'll probably go out and beat Celtic on Saturday...

This is the usual overreaction to a poor run. You can't possibly know how things will or may turn round. Because we are on a similar poor run of results as a past years relegated teams doesn't mean anything.

In this league every team apart from Celtic have barren runs and fortunes turn round on the back of a couple of results - look at Partick- 7 points from nine in a week means instead of staring at the relegation spot they are now chirping about being in the top six.

Another thing which is absolutely crucial in this league is losing the first goal. We are losing games by the odd or fluke goal leaving teams to go in to a defensive preservation mode; there is no obvious chasm of quality between most of the clubs in this league just the rub of the green. 

If we are bottom at Christmas it'll be time to panic.

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Guess I must be one of the "least of us" then.  I have no confidence whatsoever that we are going to start scoring any time soon, let alone start taking anything out of games.

We're watching a dead team with no self-belief now.  I saw a lot of the Hibs side of a few seasons ago that ended with them being relegated, and this Saints team horribly remind me of that.  Poor quality, predictable, bad to watch, lacking in confidence, some awful signings, and whether anyone wants to hear it or not, a management team that don't actually know how to make it better - or if they do, the're not doing it.  A rebuild has been needed for a couple of seasons now, but we've not done it, and unfortunately this has been coming.  At this level, unless you're a club that has cash to spend, I'm afraid everyone at a club in any capacity has a shelf life - players and managers.  When a team becomes stale, the forward looking clubs that change on a regular basis generally wise up to it pretty fast.  That's what's happening to us now.  Other teams have sussed St Johnstone out.  They know our players, and they know our game plan (when there is one).  In short, they know how to win against us.

As Edstar said, there's no room for sentiment.  The manager failed to rebuild the team from the bottom up when he should have 3 seasons ago, and has relied on largely the same core set of players doing pretty much the same thing the same way.  That team peaked back then.  Look at the big sides when they win something, what's the first thing they do?  Pretty much dismantle it and start again.  I'm not saying that it's the manager's fault, things could have been beyond his control, but for whatever reason, it wasn't done, and we are where we are now.  In my opinion, the manager needs a new challenge and Saints desperately need fresh ideas.  I'd hate for this to go on and see Tommy Wright forced out under a cloud.  But as I said, the comparison to Hibs under Fenlon and Butcher to they way we're playing is scary.

Having said all that, we'll probably go out and beat Celtic on Saturday...

No chance we are like that Hibs side. There is plenty of heart in the current Saints side, we're just lacking creativity.  Were you at the Thistle or County games?  We're not playing that much different from many of our matches over the past 3 years, just we're on the wrong side of the 1-0's for now.

 We've brought in Clark, Comrie, Shaughnessy, Scougall in the past couple of season who are all young first team players (with Gordon and Alston on the fringe), so I don't think you can argue we've completely failed to replace ageing players and rebuild the squad.

The only thing I agree with is we've failed to build on things in forward positions, though not for the lack of trying.  We really could do with another couple of options there, and a creative central midfielder. Though I think we have the latter already in Scougall, it's just we're not playing him there for whatever reason.

We've been through these runs every season (usually around about this time I think) so as SaintJet says, let's not stir up the panic just yet.

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Guess I must be one of the "least of us" then.  I have no confidence whatsoever that we are going to start scoring any time soon, let alone start taking anything out of games.

We're watching a dead team with no self-belief now.  I saw a lot of the Hibs side of a few seasons ago that ended with them being relegated, and this Saints team horribly remind me of that.  Poor quality, predictable, bad to watch, lacking in confidence, some awful signings, and whether anyone wants to hear it or not, a management team that don't actually know how to make it better - or if they do, the're not doing it.  A rebuild has been needed for a couple of seasons now, but we've not done it, and unfortunately this has been coming.  At this level, unless you're a club that has cash to spend, I'm afraid everyone at a club in any capacity has a shelf life - players and managers.  When a team becomes stale, the forward looking clubs that change on a regular basis generally wise up to it pretty fast.  That's what's happening to us now.  Other teams have sussed St Johnstone out.  They know our players, and they know our game plan (when there is one).  In short, they know how to win against us.

As Edstar said, there's no room for sentiment.  The manager failed to rebuild the team from the bottom up when he should have 3 seasons ago, and has relied on largely the same core set of players doing pretty much the same thing the same way.  That team peaked back then.  Look at the big sides when they win something, what's the first thing they do?  Pretty much dismantle it and start again.  I'm not saying that it's the manager's fault, things could have been beyond his control, but for whatever reason, it wasn't done, and we are where we are now.  In my opinion, the manager needs a new challenge and Saints desperately need fresh ideas.  I'd hate for this to go on and see Tommy Wright forced out under a cloud.  But as I said, the comparison to Hibs under Fenlon and Butcher to they way we're playing is scary.

Having said all that, we'll probably go out and beat Celtic on Saturday...

Every season we have a bad spell like this, and every season similar comments get made, and every season Tommy has pulled us out the other side of the bad patch stronger.

I wasn't at the Partick game but have seen a few games this season and from what I've seen the squad doesn't need major surgery. We have plenty of young players, we're largely still the same well-organised unit (let down recently by some sloppy individual errors), our games tend to be fairly close and it's only really the lack of a good, impactful striker that is a big problem (and the lack of a fast/creative player if O'Halloran goes in January). I think the comment about him failing to rebuild the squad 3 years ago is harsh, because as I remember it he released some players (Cregg, Hasselbaink) in order to free up space for new arrivals, but then the chairman pulled the rug out from under him by not allowing him to sign any replacements. He also lost May shortly after that - and yet we still went on to adapt to those circumstances and finish fourth.

I'm not blindly pro-Tommy and my main criticism of him would be that I think the balance of the squad is wrong. We have way too many midfielders. If you consider Wotherspoon, Davidson, Paton, Scougall and O'Halloran to be the favoured five, on top of those we have Millar, Craig, Alston, Thomson (who seems way down the pecking order) and McClean (who was apparently signed to go straight into the first team squad but doesn't seem to be anywhere near it). Do we really need all those midfielders? On top of that, up front we give a contract to Kane but send him out on loan, spend more money on Denny Johnstone but don't give him a game (has Tommy already decided he's not good enough?), bring in Callum Hendry and talk about him being promoted to the first team but never use him. People talk about Tommy not being given the budget he needs, but actually I'd say our squad is too big and I think we could comfortably lose three players to bring in one good quality front player and we'd be better off for it.

 

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Guess I must be one of the "least of us" then.  I have no confidence whatsoever that we are going to start scoring any time soon, let alone start taking anything out of games.

We're watching a dead team with no self-belief now.  I saw a lot of the Hibs side of a few seasons ago that ended with them being relegated, and this Saints team horribly remind me of that.  Poor quality, predictable, bad to watch, lacking in confidence, some awful signings, and whether anyone wants to hear it or not, a management team that don't actually know how to make it better - or if they do, the're not doing it.  A rebuild has been needed for a couple of seasons now, but we've not done it, and unfortunately this has been coming.  At this level, unless you're a club that has cash to spend, I'm afraid everyone at a club in any capacity has a shelf life - players and managers.  When a team becomes stale, the forward looking clubs that change on a regular basis generally wise up to it pretty fast.  That's what's happening to us now.  Other teams have sussed St Johnstone out.  They know our players, and they know our game plan (when there is one).  In short, they know how to win against us.

As Edstar said, there's no room for sentiment.  The manager failed to rebuild the team from the bottom up when he should have 3 seasons ago, and has relied on largely the same core set of players doing pretty much the same thing the same way.  That team peaked back then.  Look at the big sides when they win something, what's the first thing they do?  Pretty much dismantle it and start again.  I'm not saying that it's the manager's fault, things could have been beyond his control, but for whatever reason, it wasn't done, and we are where we are now.  In my opinion, the manager needs a new challenge and Saints desperately need fresh ideas.  I'd hate for this to go on and see Tommy Wright forced out under a cloud.  But as I said, the comparison to Hibs under Fenlon and Butcher to they way we're playing is scary.

Having said all that, we'll probably go out and beat Celtic on Saturday...

Deary ****in me!!

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