Celtic V St.Johnstone - Saturday 16th March

[Cagey]

Clark our only goal threat never got off the bench.

[tucker]

Sprangler could be out for a while with ligament knee injury that's a massive blow in nothing challenge must say from the Celtic lad

[Havana Saint]

3 hours ago, SaintJet said:

Get behind the team instead of continually berating them. 
I conclude what a fan is when they go through the mill with their team through thick and thin- your clearly a very young individual with a sense of entitlement.

I assure you attempting to score was very much in the game plan but you’ll learn that when you get to high school.

 

To be fair, since 2021 things have been desperate

Kelty Hearts

Stenhousemuir

Stirling Albion

Ayr United 

Airdrie

 

Comfortably less than a goal a game on the league and a culture of losing games.  As a season ticket holder for years we are really struggling.  Been so long since we comfortably beat anyone. So many things wrong 😢

We are despised by so many fans of other clubs because we are so boring.  Yes we need the fans, but I think the Saints support (what's left of attending currently) have continuously given their backing this season which is admirable considering how desperate a season it has been since July 2023. Absolutely garbage in many games.

We all need to do a lot better, players and staff particularly.

[Havana Saint]

Levein's post match interview can be comfortably assessed as dispirited and uninspiring for players, staff and fans. 

We really are up against it. County definitely have the wind in their sails. We are just blowing our own wind.

[templeofsaints]

1 hour ago, Cagey said:

Why did Le vein bring on Gallagher to replace Robinson instead of Considine who looks fecked. 

Not sure but Gallacher's performance off the bench was pretty good.

[Tattie-bogle]

Carey on a personal level I really feel for him. On a professional level he is so much what is wrong with this club right now

[RandomGuy]

7 hours ago, templeofsaints said:

Crap - mindset has little to do with it. Yes we've got a turnover of 12m but what is Celtics turnover compared to that. The fact is they can stick millions of pounds worth of players on the bench while we have the likes of Gallacher, Fran, May and a relatively untried non-league player up front. 

None of that prevents our players from being able to complete simple passes under pressure. Its embarrassing watching them. Phillips was horrendous and ended up scooping the ball into the air every time he tried a first time pass.

Its clear they dont do much, if any, on the ball work in training. Theres just no muscle memory about what to do when the balls coming at you and so is an opponent. 

[rik2304]

This team is absolutely characterless. 

[Cagey]

9 hours ago, Havana Saint said:

Levein's post match interview can be comfortably assessed as dispirited and uninspiring for players, staff and fans. 

We really are up against it. County definitely have the wind in their sails. We are just blowing our own wind.

Saints haven't had much luck with managers that can interview with Davidson , McLean and now Levein who almost sends you to sleep and sees a game differently to everyone else.

[Cagey]

2 minutes ago, rik2304 said:

This team is absolutely characterless. 

Reflection of their management.

With him in charge we are going down. We will not shitfest enough games 0-0 to stay up.

County are on the up and can't see us reeling in Aberdeen or Motherwell.

[blueheaven]

I know there's always the chance of taking a hammering at Celtic Park or Ibrox no matter what we do (far, far better Saints teams have gone there and lost by more goals), but our team just feels so flat, unmotivated and poorly organised at the moment, and that's a big worry regardless of the opponent.

I've no problem with us playing one up front as it can be effective if done well (we basically won two cups and qualified for Europe with one player up front - ironically a player who is still ours but apparently surplus to requirements), but what was the actual plan yesterday? Our five defenders just camped out on our own 18 yard line and invited them to come at us. Celtic just had to bide their time and wait for us to crack. On our part there was no pressing, no pressure on the ball, no one looking to have a go. Why do we never go to places like this and press them any more? Is it a fitness issue?

Sidibeh did everything he could up front but honestly, what did Levein expect him to do? Outpace the Celtic defence and beat two or three men on his own? Seriously, we need to have a better plan than that.

I've been saying this for years now but I really feel Stevie May would bring a lot to our midfield, especially in games like this one. He tracks back, he breaks forward, he tries to force opponents into making mistakes, he's the only guy who seems to move when we have the ball. He'd bring way more energy to our midfield than Carey (for example) does.

Levein himself sounds like a defeated man in his interviews: as flat and out of ideas as the team, and way too quick to criticise the players when perhaps it's his own approach that is the real problem. I'm sorry to say that I just have absolutely no faith in him at all. Whether we stay up or not, I want a fresh approach for next season.

[Cagey]

Levein said we played well without the ball 😂 FFS you can't score without the ball.

The pundits saying Celtic are back to their best. No Saints made them look good just as they did Livi last game.

 

[Maskrey]

On 3/16/2024 at 8:54 PM, Dav69 said:

Perhaps if we had a team that could even attempt to LOOK to stop them being at it from the get go and even a defeat would instil confidence in most fans to look ahead to the remaining fixtures . It’s a stale league and a drop would let us rebuild and look to add a freshness on return and perhaps have more bums on these rusted bolted supports of the seats. 

Be careful what you wish for.  We could languish in the lower league for years.

[blueheaven]

27 minutes ago, Maskrey said:

Be careful what you wish for.  We could languish in the lower league for years.

Yep, I really think relegation would be disastrous for us and we could end up stuck in the lower leagues for a long, long time. Just look at what's happened to Hamilton, Partick, ICT, Dunfermline, Falkirk etc. If we went down we could easily find ourselves struggling just as much in the Championship as we have been in the Premiership. For me it's absolutely vital that we keep our place in the top flight, no matter how we do it.

[SaintJet]

On 3/17/2024 at 6:44 AM, RandomGuy said:

None of that prevents our players from being able to complete simple passes under pressure. Its embarrassing watching them. Phillips was horrendous and ended up scooping the ball into the air every time he tried a first time pass.

Theres Its clear they dont do much, if any, on the ball work in training. just no muscle memory about what to do when the balls coming at you and so is an opponent. 

This must be one of your top posts in a long line of utter nonesense posts!

[SaintJet]

1 hour ago, blueheaven said:

Yep, I really think relegation would be disastrous for us and we could end up stuck in the lower leagues for a long, long time. Just look at what's happened to Hamilton, Partick, ICT, Dunfermline, Falkirk etc. If we went down we could easily find ourselves struggling just as much in the Championship as we have been in the Premiership. For me it's absolutely vital that we keep our place in the top flight, no matter how we do it.

You just need to look across the road to see how utd are struggling to get out of that league to see what a nightmare going down would be. Next season, Falkirk will be in the fray and Livingston if it is them will have the battling qualities required for the dog days of January and February. We have to find a away to stay up and the players in the squad know this.

[SaintJet]

On 3/16/2024 at 10:10 PM, RandomGuy said:

Please, please, remind us how bad it was 50 years ago and how thats our level.

The 3rd most successful club in Scotland over the past decade with a turnover of over £12m, and a group of older fans still think we're a part time outfit dreaming of the top flight.

Times change, and you should probably remember the mindset that dragged us out that shiteheap and moved things upwards. It certainly wasn't "what do you expect? We're a wee diddy outfit who are lucky to even share a park with top flight sides".

I couldn't be arsed responding to this pi sh on Saturday but please enlighten me; what does where we were fifty years ago have anything to do with where we are now and where in my post did I allude to this?

 

[jjohndb]

On 3/16/2024 at 10:10 PM, RandomGuy said:

Please, please, remind us how bad it was 50 years ago and how thats our level.

The 3rd most successful club in Scotland over the past decade with a turnover of over £12m, and a group of older fans still think we're a part time outfit dreaming of the top flight.

Times change, and you should probably remember the mindset that dragged us out that shiteheap and moved things upwards. It certainly wasn't "what do you expect? We're a wee diddy outfit who are lucky to even share a park with top flight sides".

Ach it just strikes me that the managers who pulled us out of the doldrums did it with hard training. Ormond didn't let them have balls to play with it was just physical stuff. Sturrock stopped them going to the pub in the afternoon and made them train instead, some said too much but the results say otherwise.  Yes Saints are a minnow but David slew Goliath and we've been near that at times too. Get them trudging up and down the dunes in the off season. 

As to who's a fan? We should welcome anyone who wants to be, maist o' us are Scots so we are used to crushing disappointment at best. I've stuck it for 60years now and while there is still breath in my body I will carry on. Proud of Perth and the saints. If by shiteheap you mean Muirton watch yer mooth. Despite haeing to pee on half bricks it had the best and biggest pitch in the country. I've only been to a funeral at Mcdiarmid but to me it lacked atmosphere/history. I must rectify that by coming up for a game soon. 

[RandomGuy]

On 3/18/2024 at 10:30 AM, SaintJet said:

what does where we were fifty years ago have anything to do with where we are now and where in my post did I allude to this?

 

The "you're clearly a young fan who's spoiled by success" line is the shite we got from older fans who happily seal clapped while Callum Davidson and Ian Flaherty drove us into the ground losing almost £2m over a year.

I can't see that type of comment now without assuming the next comment is along the lines of claiming anyone under 20 isn't a real fan because they've never experienced the 3rd tier or lower.

[Strawman]

12 hours ago, jjohndb said:

 If by shiteheap you mean Muirton watch yer mooth. Despite haeing to pee on half bricks it had the best and biggest pitch in the country. I've only been to a funeral at Mcdiarmid but to me it lacked atmosphere/history. I must rectify that by coming up for a game soon. 

I have fond memories of Muirton but very hard to argue it wasn’t a shitheap by the end, only half the main stand able to be used, having to be helped by Aberdeen for a new segregation fence to allow a cup game to be paid there etc

Being on the pitch when we won promotion from league 2 and the Cup quarter final against Morton are my best memories, Balavage scoring against Hibs Pre season was funny. There’s better memories but these are ones from someone my age.

I don’t think we d have been even close to being as successful if we’d stayed at Muirton, it’s the move that kickstarted everything in my eyes, full time football being the main one.

The atmosphere at McDiarmid isn’t always good but to say it lacks atmosphere/history but then admit you’ve never been to a game there.

I’m too young to have been at any of the European games at Muirton but there have been many more European nights at McDiarmid and atmosphere pretty good.

McDiarmid now has coming up 35 years of History, some great games to look back on ( granted lots of poor ones as well ) 

[Radford 72]

On 3/17/2024 at 9:00 AM, rik2304 said:

This team is absolutely characterless. 

Just look at who put the majority of it together.

A lesson to learn moving forward is to ensure a manager has the charisma required to assess the personality of potential signings.

[Muirton Saint]

14 hours ago, RandomGuy said:

"you're clearly a young fan who's spoiled by success"

I personally don't understand this way of thinking. I'll admit I'm a younger fan, but why is it a bad thing to have standards?

Should we be winning league titles? Absolutely not, but from 2012/13 to 2020/21 we finished no lower than 8th. 

3rd 1x, 6th 1x, 4th 3x, 8th 1x, 7th 2x, 5th 1x. 

Six times in the top 6. I see that as setting mid-table as a standard which is on the players to uphold, why shouldn't the fans have reasonable expectations given the last 10 years of results?

[Radford 72]

Can you imagine any other business where hard work, dedication and competence drives standards up, then the customers just accept the acquiescence to how things used to be?

Customers would just walk away. Especially if the price of an inferior product was only rising.

[blueheaven]

On 3/20/2024 at 10:55 AM, Muirton Saint said:

I personally don't understand this way of thinking. I'll admit I'm a younger fan, but why is it a bad thing to have standards?

Totally agree (and would add, why is it a bad thing to be a younger fan?).

It feels very unique to Saints that there's a section of the support who seem to constantly want to argue against any attempt to show ambition, and seem to be of the view that if things aren't as bad as they were in the 80s, then by default it means everything's fine and we should change nothing. Any suggestion that we could and should be doing better is met with "be careful what you wish for" or implying that we're a small club so should know our place.

It goes hand in hand with the bizarre view that there are certain clubs (weirdly including Hibs) who we couldn't possibly hope to compete with, and who are more or less guaranteed to be in the top 6, so it's unrealistic to expect Saints to target being at that level. This is despite the fact that we've regularly finished above many of those clubs for years now, and even this season we've seen Killie, St Mirren and Dundee occupy top 6 places at the expense of some of those clubs for most of the season.

[andrew]

1 minute ago, blueheaven said:

Totally agree (and would add, why is it a bad thing to be a younger fan?).

It feels very unique to Saints that there's a section of the support who seem to constantly want to argue against any attempt to show ambition, and seem to be of the view that if things aren't as bad as they were in the 80s, then by default it means everything's fine and we should change nothing. Any suggestion that we could and should be doing better is met with "be careful what you wish for" or implying that we're a small club so should know our place.

It goes hand in hand with the bizarre view that there are certain clubs (weirdly including Hibs) who we couldn't possibly hope to compete with, and who are more or less guaranteed to be in the top 6, so it's unrealistic to expect Saints to target being at that level. This is despite the fact that we've regularly finished above many of those clubs for years now, and even this season we've seen Killie, St Mirren and Dundee occupy top 6 places at the expense of some of those clubs for most of the season.

I’m in my 60’s and recall our slump in the 80’s very well. That has nothing to do with the fact we worked hard to establish ourselves with top 6, Europe and trophies. Different eras in the club’s history. One doesn’t have to affect the other. What angers me is that Brown, Flaherty and Davidson almost destroyed our hard won elevated status, and failed to build on TW’s good work, allowing the likes of Killie and St Mirren to overtake us in a short period of time.