Linky

Confirmed this morning that we are close to signing Ryan McGowan. I always try to give any signing we make the benefit of any doubt and judge them on performances, but really struggling to see what the thinking behind this one is! He has had 8 clubs in the past 7 years and has been released from all of them. 
We now have Parish, Considine, Booth, Murray Davidson, Crawford, Wotherspoon, Murphy, Carey and O'Halloran in our squad who are all over the age of 30. Experience in a team is important, but there needs to be a balance between youth and experience and we are at the stage where the squad has far too many older players in it. Steve Brown talked a few years ago about the need to reduce the age of the squad under Tommy Wright, so I have no idea what he is thinking by sanctioning all these deals. McGowan, Considine, Carey and Murphy will all be on decent wages, but have absolutely no sell on value. Whilst I have no doubts that all will be good professionals, you have to question their hunger? They have all had successful careers, but they are in the latter stages of their careers. We should be bringing in players who want to use us a stepping stone to move on to bigger and better things.
It tragic to see what is happening to our club at the moment. Barring one or two people on the non playing side of things, the whole club is a shambles.
 
 

I don’t disagree, but doesn’t that just show the frustration of the fans? Things have been so badly managed across the club since we went out of Europe: transfers, kits, pitch, etc. Not to mention results.
In the past I’ve always been positive. I always spoke against sacking Tommy when others were pushing for it. I tend to give a player the benefit of the doubt even if I’m not sure of the signing.
The problem is, I’ve lost trust in Davidson. I don’t think he knows what he’s doing. He signs players then chucks them for not being good enough. Rather than being excited when we might be signing a player I think ‘oh no, who is it now, what more damage will he leave for the next manager’.

I don’t disagree, but doesn’t that just show the frustration of the fans? Things have been so badly managed across the club since we went out of Europe: transfers, kits, pitch, etc. Not to mention results.
In the past I’ve always been positive. I always spoke against sacking Tommy when others were pushing for it. I tend to give a player the benefit of the doubt even if I’m not sure of the signing.
The problem is, I’ve lost trust in Davidson. I don’t think he knows what he’s doing. He signs players then chucks them for not being good enough. Rather than being excited when we might be signing a player I think ‘oh no, who is it now, what more damage will he leave for the next manager’.

I wouldn't really call it a cut when he's been out of work for a year and a half. Not sure exactly what his source of income is now but the Saints job would probably represent a pay increase rather than a pay cut.
He's said in an interview that he wants his next move to be a management job and has had some interviews but hasn't found the right thing yet: https://trainingground.guru/articles/jody-morris-why-i-didnt-join-frank-lampards-staff-at-everton
He may or may not be a realistic candidate for Saints but I'd have thought that at the very least it would be worth a try. I think he'd bring a freshness and positivity, he'd bring some buzz back to the club and a bit of profile, he has terrific contacts, a strong background in youth development, players would want to play for him and sign for him, and he knows the club/Scottish football so would come here with his eyes open. He's also still young and hungry to do well in what would be his first management job. He pretty much ticks every box.
In general I don't really care if a candidate has history at Saints or not, but in his case I think his past here is the key thing that might allow us to attract him.

I think Tommy was a pain in the arse for Brown (as managers should be if they’re pushing for success) & Davidson isn’t so he’s happy to keep him. He’d prefer a quiet life & to save money for the club.

The balance of our squad is an absolute mess. We've brought in too many old players who are just here for their last payday, we don't bring through any of our own young players, we're overloaded in the attacking midfield area, we've signed wingers for a system that doesn't use wingers, we've wasted money by chucking transfer fees at players who don't or can't play, and the manager has done nothing to address the three areas (goalkeeper, CDM and centre forward) that are absolutely critical to us making any sort of improvement. On top of that we've chucked long term contracts at guys like Considine, Bair and Crawford, and sent a promising striker out on loan for the whole season (why??).
For the squad to be in this state when our manager has been with us for over two years is just completely unacceptable. Our success as a club has been built on having a consistent spine of players who understand the club, want to be here, are in it for the long term and only need to be supplemented with a small number of transfers each year to keep things fresh. Davidson has completely destroyed that ethos and turned us into a collection of journeymen, has-beens, crocks and other fringe players who are nowhere near good enough for the level we're playing at.
The damage Davidson has done to what previous managers had built here could take years to fix, and he needs to be removed immediately before he makes things even worse.

Davidson now saying we'll sign a few more players. I imagine this is a reaction to the last result.
Not saying he isn't right, but this pattern in itself is worrying: sign players, plays them for a bit, decides they're not good enough, ships them out at a loss, signs someone else.
Every time it's that the players are bad rather than the tactics he plays them in.

Davidson now saying we'll sign a few more players. I imagine this is a reaction to the last result.
Not saying he isn't right, but this pattern in itself is worrying: sign players, plays them for a bit, decides they're not good enough, ships them out at a loss, signs someone else.
Every time it's that the players are bad rather than the tactics he plays them in.

Ross County just signed a player and the manager said: "He is a player that our recruitment department have spent time tracking and we feel he is coming into the prime of his career," 
Imagine us tracking a player over a period of time and signing them when they're about to come into the prime of their career, rather than being hawked players by a particular agent and thinking 'he'll do' when they're clearly past their prime or unwanted by pretty much anyone else.

Life is indeed about "actuals" but the actual here is that we couldn't beat them, or even score against them, and they took more points from the game than we did.
Yes they had no shots on target, but they arguably carved out the best chance of the game when their winger ran through on goal and hit the post. I'm not sure I'd describe us as "tight at the back" based on that showing, but yes of course we had the lion's share of the ball (which is the bare minimum you'd expect when playing a team three leagues below you).
As for the other end of the pitch, we only had two shots on target (and I'm struggling to remember what they even were). Do you think that's good enough?
Are you honestly not worried about the season ahead?
 

Love it how the pro-Davdison folks are trying to tell us how a 0-0 with Annan is actually a really good result.

Classic Davidson to replace Davidson with a ‘keeper who couldn’t get a game in the Championship last season. 
“Who shall we sign to replace arguably the best ‘keeper outwith the OF? I know the reserve ‘keeper for our relegation rivals”. This will also be out last signing apparently.

Just looking at some available on free transfer who have played at a decent level:
- Alex Smithies - released from Cardiff
- Jamal Blackman - released by Huddersfield but only player one match, former England Youth international though & decent age
- Ben Foster - released by Watford but 39
- Gary Woods seems a likely option to me, just released by Aberdeen
- John Ruddy - released by Wolves
- Ben Hamer - released by Swansea

Wow - 5-1 down to a Championship side in 39 minutes is pretty impressive even for Davidson.

Try and polish it up as much as you want ,but that's a shocking result.
How the hell did Parish get a new contract?

Wow - 5-1 down to a Championship side in 39 minutes is pretty impressive even for Davidson.

Yep sounds like a fantastic workout 3 goals conceded in ten minutes, maybe that was the plan, but if it was me managing a team I think I would have a bit of concerns about the defending! And just because you see the positives I don’t, and going back before Christmas I don’t feel the management team are the right ones for this club, maybe I am at the game, maybe you are, but if your not how come you have a superior judgement in your eyes? but regardless  at any level in the game friendly or not conceding six means there’s a bit of work to do and this guy just doesn’,t cut it for me.

Wow - 5-1 down to a Championship side in 39 minutes is pretty impressive even for Davidson.

Gogic would be a fine to play in the Davidson role.

Happy with the Murphy signing.
I'd suggest we're now looking like this:
                                                                         GK (Parish)
Wright (Brown)        Cleary (Brown)         Gordon (Mahon)     Considine (Mahon)    Gallacher (Booth)
                                                        Davidson (Gilmour)     Hallberg (MacPherson)
 
                   Carey (MOH)                                                                                          Wotherspoon (Murphy)
                                                                           Bair (Kane)
 
Extras: May & Crawford - subs to throw on anywhere across the from 3
             Max and extra CM. Montgomery to play until both Gallacher & Booth are fit again.
Still think we need another CM though, and could see Gilmour go out on loan to make space. Would hope there's substance to the rumours of Crawford going out on loan too. 

Indeed. I can understand if the budget is tight, but I would say this is more important than a striker, as we have Bair, Kane & May all competing for one role.

I wouldn't see it like that.
Clark - not replaced, but will be
Rooney - replaced by Wright
McCart - replaced by Consadine
Craig - will be looking to Gilmour to fill this role
Byrson - no replaced, but will be
Butterfield - was a replacement for an injured Bryson anyway, so won't be replaced
Middleton - replaced by Carey
Vertainen - was an added extra the manager didn't want so won't be replaced
Hendry - I'd say Bair will be looked to to fill this role
Ciftci - was a stand-in for the injured Kane, so won't be replaced
 
Essentially I think we'll be getting another centre midfielder to replace Bryson, and a 'keeper to replace Clark. I could then see perhaps an extra cheap loan coming in that might be able to cover a few of the attacking midfield/striker positions.

Yep, last thing we want in our squad is a young striker with a bit of raw talent who's played for Finland U-21s and looked interested in at least trying to bring some flair and creativity to our painful, predictable, hopeless, goal-less approach. 
I can understand people thinking Eetu didn't do enough when he was here, but what I can't understand is people not thinking it might have been a good idea to try to develop and encourage and get the best out of this player, instead of chucking him in the bin. It's just absolutely bizarre to me that the club invested so much time, money and resource in getting him here, but don't seem to have been willing to invest anything in him at all once he was actually our player. They practically spent longer trying to get his work permit sorted than they did actually giving him a chance to play. It's an absolute embarrassment the way we've treated this guy.
 

Even if you think Vertainen is not very good, his moving on in this manner is still a loss to the club in terms of reputation and may make other foreign players think twice about coming here.

Rumours are that the Chairman wanted to offer over and above to Hendry, but that Davidson said that Kane will always be his first-choice striker when fit, so it wasn't worth it.