Saints v Hearts

[Cagey]

23 minutes ago, Saintdunc said:

If, as the BBC seems to say, we dominated the first half, were Dendoncker and Brown taken off?

Both were wiped out by their big striker   in about the 30th minute & played on. McLean never even gave a foul or even spoke the guy who was outing himself about all game.

McLean is a disgrace of a referee. If we didn't know he was a Killie fan you would think he was a Jambo.

[Cagey]

19 minutes ago, MrBored said:

Lucky to get a point out of that and I'd have thought Hearts would be disappointed.

Like to see the Gordon incident again, I thought he handled outside the box and then fouled May. 

Didn't think it was a handball just before their goal, but thought their was a foul on a saints player just after it.

Second half was a painful watch. Seemed to be Davidson in the midfield by himself with McPherson and particularly Crawford, a passenger. Crawford's tracking back was awful...seemed to have a knack of jogging back and getting to a player just as he moved the ball on. When they did  get on the ball, they promptly gave it away, although to be fair they weren't the only culprits in doing that.

 

Fair summing up. Surely Craig & Bryson on Saturday.

McPherson & Crawford didn't seem to know their role in the second half.

Looked like we were playing for a draw in the second half , sitting far too deep & just getting rid of the ball ,usually back to a Hearts player.

Last 5 mins we started to play football & if Kane wasn't short with his pass ,we could have scored.

[Brian Potter]

Decent point in the end.
Hearts for all their possession were pretty toothless. They missed Boyce.

We were all over the place at times. The defence was badly exposed by a midfield with huge holes in it. I like playing two up front but not May and Kane together. 

The team has a very unsettled, makeshift feel about it just now.
 

[Cagey]

Typical BBC . Never showed Gordon handling outside the box & taking May down.

Saying the hand ball was accidental. Never mentioned the fact that Crawford had the foot taken from him.

[skivealive]

Did anyone else hear someone screaming in the car park on the way in?

[Wendy Saints]

Nop

2 minutes ago, skivealive said:

Did anyone else hear someone screaming in the car park on the way in?

Nope

[slf]

27 minutes ago, skivealive said:

Did anyone else hear someone screaming in the car park on the way in?

Nope

[slf]

FCU dudes were Braw again

[mainstand]

8 hours ago, Cagey said:

Fair summing up. Surely Craig & Bryson on Saturday.

McPherson & Crawford didn't seem to know their role in the second half.

Looked like we were playing for a draw in the second half , sitting far too deep & just getting rid of the ball ,usually back to a Hearts player.

Last 5 mins we started to play football & if Kane wasn't short with his pass ,we could have scored.

Not quite sure of the shape in the second half. Devine at right Back and Booth at Left back were both being asked by Callum to stay as wide as they can Crawford appeared to have been pushed up the pitch and in some cases was ahead of Kane and May. Thought we gave them run of the midfield and retreated to a back 5 for long spells. 

But a draw is not bad and gives us the 10 points for the first quarter that which should be the minimum target.

[saintee in exile]

Yep 7 goals in 11 league matches and how many scored by strikers?

[blueheaven]

Entertaining, exciting game and I think a draw was a fair result in the end. Yes they were on top in the second half but you can't say the opponent deserved to win if that opponent couldn't take its chances.

First half we gave them a big scare with May and Kane looking really lively. I was surprised to see us go with a fairly attacking line-up against them and I think Hearts were caught out by that as well. Hearts also seemed to struggle more with the wet pitch than we did, and were making some really sloppy errors. Clearly they gave themselves a bit of a shake at half-time and started to dominate in the second half, but given that we had to make yet more defensive changes I think we coped with it well. I think this season's constant defensive reshuffles are really demonstrating how lucky we were last season to be able to maintain such a settled back line.

Still think the midfield looks a bit unsettled with no one really filling McCann's old role. I think Bryson would have helped us a lot last night but can understand CD maybe didn't want to play him twice in a few days and risk him on that pitch.

Credit to the Saints fans in the corner of the East Stand who out-sung the Hearts support for most of the night.

To be honest I don't take much notice of referees normally, but even I picked up on that guy having a howler.

P.S. Was that the weirdest minute's silence ever?

[Cagey]

6 minutes ago, blueheaven said:

Entertaining, exciting game and I think a draw was a fair result in the end. Yes they were on top in the second half but you can't say the opponent deserved to win if that opponent couldn't take its chances.

First half we gave them a big scare with May and Kane looking really lively. I was surprised to see us go with a fairly attacking line-up against them and I think Hearts were caught out by that as well. Hearts also seemed to struggle more with the wet pitch than we did, and were making some really sloppy errors. Clearly they gave themselves a bit of a shake at half-time and started to dominate in the second half, but given that we had to make yet more defensive changes I think we coped with it well. I think this season's constant defensive reshuffles are really demonstrating how lucky we were last season to be able to maintain such a settled back line.

Still think the midfield looks a bit unsettled with no one really filling McCann's old role. I think Bryson would have helped us a lot last night but can understand CD maybe didn't want to play him twice in a few days and risk him on that pitch.

Credit to the Saints fans in the corner of the East Stand who out-sung the Hearts support for most of the night.

To be honest I don't take much notice of referees normally, but even I picked up on that guy having a howler.

P.S. Was that the weirdest minute's silence ever?

Ref even cocked up the minutes silence & never recovered all game. Probably prayed on his mind & blamed the announcer.

[blueheaven]

3 minutes ago, Cagey said:

Ref even cocked up the minutes silence & never recovered all game. Probably prayed on his mind & blamed the announcer.

Was it the ref's fault? I thought he started the minute's silence and then the announcer talked through most of it. Not sure what it was like in other stands but in the Main Stand I couldn't make out anything the announcer was saying.

[SaintJet]

Decent hard earned point. I thought the pitch was borderline unplayable.

We looked good for long spells of the first half - the work Kane does is unbelievable and on another night May with better footing might have scored. Good to have Gordon back arranging our back line. Devine looked good and we're going to have to take a chance on him and give him a run in the team. Crawford can make an impact in games but he was getting pulled about last night. We started to really to take the game to Hearts near the end of the game after weathering long spells of their possession but I thought both teams settled for a  tough point.

The PA system in the main stand was pathetic and the announcer must have been working form home for him to miss the minute of respect. Embarrassing!

Edited October 28, 2021 by SaintJet
poor spelling

[SaintJet]

It's pointless going on about bad refereeing but McLean was shocking last night.

[PauloPerth]

I thought the announcer must have pre-recorded his message on Walter Smith, and it cut out so the ref thought that was his cue and started the minute’s silence. The announcer then got the system working again and plodded on with it right through the minute’s silence.

Was embarrassing, and was one thing I didn’t think was the ref’s fault last night.

The tannoy system is very poor in the East Stand as well, struggle to make it out at times.

[Cagey]

Thought we played well up til they scored.

I think the injustice felt about the lack of free kicks given in the lead up to the goal meant we lost consitration.

That shouldn't have carried on into the second half but it did. Not sure the double sub at half time should have effected us as Devine & Ambrose were no worse than Brown and Dendoncker.

[Templar Saint]

1 hour ago, PauloPerth said:

I thought the announcer must have pre-recorded his message on Walter Smith, and it cut out so the ref thought that was his cue and started the minute’s silence. The announcer then got the system working again and plodded on with it right through the minute’s silence.

Was embarrassing, and was one thing I didn’t think was the ref’s fault last night.

The tannoy system is very poor in the East Stand as well, struggle to make it out at times.

Tend to disagree as at any minutes silence or applause the key indicator to the referee is the terminology "Will start and end as indicated by Ref's whistle".

So McLean even f**ked that up.

Edited October 28, 2021 by Templar Saint

[rik2304]

We can mostly rely on the defence to be solid but they're not being helped out much by the midfield/front holding onto the ball and taking the pressure off. 

[blueheaven]

34 minutes ago, Templar Saint said:

Tend to disagree as at any minutes silence or applause the key indicator to the referee is the terminology "Will start and end as indicated by Ref's whistle".

So McLean even f**ked that up.

But surely the announcer didn't need to start talking once the minute's silence had clearly started?

Does anyone know what the announcer was even saying? It felt like he was talking for ages.

[SaintJet]

1 hour ago, Cagey said:

Thought we played well up til they scored.

I think the injustice felt about the lack of free kicks given in the lead up to the goal meant we lost consitration.

That shouldn't have carried on into the second half but it did. Not sure the double sub at half time should have effected us as Devine & Ambrose were no worse than Brown and Dendoncker.

I actually agree with you.

[blueheaven]

21 minutes ago, rik2304 said:

We can mostly rely on the defence to be solid but they're not being helped out much by the midfield/front holding onto the ball and taking the pressure off. 

I felt there was a pretty big difference in how quickly the two teams moved the ball from back to front last night, particularly in the second half. Hearts broke quickly up the park and were able to create chances by catching us on the back foot. Saints, by comparison, were often pretty ponderous getting forward, taking too long on the ball or playing passes behind each other which often allowed the Hearts defence to get back and organise themselves. The absence of MOH and Rooney definitely didn't help with that.

[garydavidson]

2 hours ago, PauloPerth said:

The tannoy system is very poor in the East Stand as well, struggle to make it out at times.

 

5 hours ago, SaintJet said:

The PA system in the main stand was pathetic and the announcer must have been working form home for him to miss the minute of respect. Embarrassing!

I was in the North Stand for the last European game and the system was amazing far clearer than the one in the Main stand. Very weird - it was clearly different speakers to what is in the main stand.

[SaintJet]

Another wee observation from last night; I thought the home crowd was definitely bigger for a midweek game on a pretty awful night than usual. 

The young team were outstanding again and really kept the atmosphere going.

[Linky]

So lucky to get a point. MacPherson & Crawford weren’t tracking back and sometimes there were huge gaps in the middle. Muzz was getting angry at having to do all the work. We struggled to string passes together, and May was particularly poor at losing the ball. Booth struggles with Wotherspoon as an outlet. In the second half it felt like the only time we got the ball was when we hoofed it up the pitch. I’m not convinced that the new formation works.

However, defence and goalkeeper looked more solid.