R.R.FC

Not to answer for RATM but I think you’ve misunderstood. He wasn’t saying Queens Park were set up to play defensively. He is talking about the set up of your team’s defence which played an almost suicidal high line until the red card. We created numerous chances in the first half because of it.

32 games and 23 years since our last win against Inverness in 90 minutes. I know all Rovers fans know that but it really is quite incredible. Current form suggests we really should be looking to win this but history suggests we’ll find some sort of daft way to lose/draw. In reality it’s a different squad of players that hopefully won’t take much notice of the past and will just get the job done. Very difficult to predict what our starting line up will be. Keith Watson and Sam Stanton weren’t even in the squad at the weekend, were they injured or just rested? Assuming they are both fit and Millen makes it, the back 4, midfield 2 and striker picks itself for me but the 3 behind Hamilton is very difficult. Ahead of Brown and Byrne we have Smith, Connolly, Mullin, Easton, Vaughan, Stanton, Gullan and Ross competing for 3 places behind what will surely be Hamilton as the number 9. Ross, Connolly and Gullan will be on the bench but the decision after that is really difficult. Callum Smith has been our form player in recent weeks with 4 goals and 1 assist in his last 6 starts. I think the 3 of him, Stanton and Mullin has a real nice balance to it with Smith’s pace in behind, Mullin’s width and delivery (which I thought we really missed first half on Saturday) and Stanton picking up pockets, being excellent on the ball and all 3 working very hard off the ball. However, Vaughan has 3 goals and an assist in his last game and a half and he and Easton changed the game against QP and ran the show second half on Saturday. Really interesting to see what Murray goes with, certainly a good ‘problem’ to have but, assuming everyone is fit, at least 2 players are going to be very rightfully pissed off to be on the bench. I think as he’s done in the past he’ll pick the team based on most recent form, it’s the easiest to justify when trying to explain the decision to players missing out and keep them onside and he’ll go with: Dabrowski Millen Watson Murray Dick Brown Byrne Smith Vaughan Easton Hamilton It’s not what I’d go with but it’s what I think we’ll see.

Yeah it appears some people are fooled by Charlie Fox doing the thing every defender does of continuing to run back as the foul takes place and also after the ref has given the free kick so he looks like he is well back and covering when the reality is without the foul he would have been nowhere near catching Hamilton. The picture from when the foul took place to when the ref arrived on the scene is very different but thankfully he was switched on enough to come to the correct decision. The first picture is after Hamilton has went down and the whistle has been blown and it looks like Fox is covering (still wide and quite far from the ball mind you). Second photo shows the actual foul taking place and Fox is barely in the picture he wasn’t getting back to cover. You could make the argument about the distance to goal but given it is a completely free run with no defenders it’s a pretty clear cut goal scoring opportunity to me and the ref and subsequent appeals panel clearly agree.

I’m not sure there’s much mystery about it, it’s the two factors you have mentioned plus more money. John Potter has been spoken about by nearly all our new signings for the part he has played in them signing so the new structure has definitely helped provide support and focus. Also, Murray had about a 2 months headstart in terms of knowing what league we’d be in as things petered out last season as opposed to taking over late May the previous year. Finally, Sim stated the budget last season had been cut by around 50% compared to McGlynn the previous campaign. Looking at the signings we have made, I would imagine the budget is now back to where it was under McGlynn and obviously more money helps build a better squad both in terms of quality and quantity.

For the early rounds of the Challenge Cup, I’m actually quite looking forward to this. Nice to be playing someone a bit different and a good opportunity for us to mix up the team and give game time to those who need it and see more the squad. Sensible pricing by the club, obviously we won’t have anywhere near the 3000 mark that we’ve had our last two league games but hopefully another decent crowd to continue the momentum both on and off the pitch. What’s the reason for the 2pm kick off? Will be interesting to see what line up Murray goes with. He’ll want to keep the positive results going but it’s important given the strength of the squad we see some rotation. The only issue is whether those who have been starting but missed pre season still need minutes or if a rest is better for them? Thinking of the likes of Millen, Murray, Brown, Byrne and Hamilton. Also does he rotate the goalkeeper to give Thomson a runout as you would expect in this cup or does he play Dabrowski to give him a chance to rebuild his confidence after Saturday? Murray says he has targeted this game for Connolly too but would imagine he won’t be ready for a start at this stage and will get 20/30 minutes off the bench which will still be a great boost. I think I’d go for something like: Thomson Millen Masson Murray Dick Arnott Easton Gullan Vaughan Ross Hamilton Could potentially have McGill in for Arnott or even Millen but would rather have some experience around Masson to help him. The team above would be 8 changes from the weekend but still looks strong enough to get a result which is testament to the squad built. If they were fully fit you could have Corr in for Masson, Matthews for Arnott and Connolly for Gullan which would still be 8 changes but look even stronger. A confident, comfortable performance winning by a couple of goals with a clean sheet would be nice but our games so far suggest that’s far too much to ask.

How has Barry Hepburn been for QP? Was Saturday the norm or just a bad day at the office? Thought McKenna and Spong were the clear standouts for Queens Park. As a Scotland fan, McKenna’s performance was very exciting. Calm and composed on the ball but made some excellent saves and even dealt with a few crosses well. Certainly doesn’t look like a 16 year old both in terms of performance and stature. Spong hardly gave the ball away all day and has that gift of always seeming like he has loads of time on the ball due to his ability to find space. Looked a class act.

I find it wild anyone can’t see the balance and quality Mullin adds to the side. It would be great to have two rampaging wingers beating full backs for fun on either side but players that can do that and have a quality final ball and also work back the other way don’t exist in the Scottish Championship. We have the pace and running in behind of Smith on one side and Mullin offers great balance on the other side with a bit more control in possession and excellent delivery added to a fantastic workrate. Find it strange anyone would watch the game and think that was our area of concern but everyone’s entitled to an opinion. Doubt Mullin will play next week as there will be quite a few changes so I guess we’ll see if someone does enough to take the shirt. Seen someone mention the tactical change at half time with Gullan coming on, surely Hamilton had a knock? Don’t see Murray making that change unless it was enforced. I’ve defended him in recent weeks but that is an undeniable howler by big Kev for the first goal. Second goal is awful from Watson and McGill. Conceded 2 goals in 6 of our last 7 games, that really needs to be fixed quickly but we showed at East End Park we have it in us to be a solid defensive unit. Great win, fantastic character by the team once again. Genuinely felt confident once we got the equaliser we’d get a winner. That’s 5 times already we’ve came from behind to get something from a game, pretty sure that’s all we managed in the whole of last season.

Murray said a few weeks ago he was looking to bring in a full back, midfielder and a striker. Since then we have signed Byrne so would imagine imagine Mitchell going on loan suggests Murray is still confident of adding another striker.

Murray would take the job in a heartbeat. However, I don’t see anything on his CV, other than being an ex Hibs player, that would justify him getting the 5th biggest job in the country. He may well get an interview but I would expect them to have better options.

There were 4 sections sold out just the section on the far right of the picture which wasn’t before the game, albeit I don’t think the front few rows were sold in any section. Even accounting for some groups standing together and being more than one person per seat, there still seemed much less in attendance than tickets sold. Good atmosphere nonetheless though as you say. Probably had over 6000 Rovers fans at our last 3 games, with two being away from home, definitely a step in the right direction. Hopefully another good crowd on Saturday.

As others have said the clearest change is the character and leadership in the side. It felt like we had to play well and be close to our best to get anything in games last season and even then we didn’t always get the points we should. This season, I don’t think we have been anywhere near our best in the first 3 games yet we have 7 points. I genuinely think last seasons team would have had 1 or 2 points at best from the same performances. Passing and fluidity will come as the team start to gel (8 of the starting 11 yesterday were summer signings) but the thing you can’t really coach is the togetherness, determination and character in a squad to grind out games and not give up, we didn’t have that last season but evidence for this season so far looks very promising.

Connor Smith in the away end today. Although given we have about 500 options in his position, it’s safe to assume he was just along supporting his brother rather than anything more to it.

Very sensible and reasonable post. Less of this please.

‘McPake will have us do our talking on the pitch’

Didn’t the CVA only get through because Masterton waived his vote as the highest creditor too?

McGill straight to left back for me, limits the disruption to the back 4 and weakens only 1 position rather than 2. Think McGill has played left back quite a few times in his career anyway. Started a game there for us last season and I am sure Murray mentioned he had played there a few times for him at Airdrie too.

With the greatest of respect to Liam Dick, the fact that him missing is a significant blow is a clear example of why Rovers fans were stating earlier in this thread, that our squad is not strong enough to be in the conversation for the title mix. Hopefully we can see some full back cover arrive in the coming weeks, preferably someone capable of pushing to actually be first choice at left back.

You are probably right in that it’s the only position we have signed that isn’t proven Championship quality but I think he is a decent keeper and has been fine so far. I think that 1 on 1 save on Sunday was excellent and isn’t one that every keeper would make. Also, you are comparing him to the 3 best keepers we have had in the last 30 years, that is a very difficult level to measure up to at this stage. We are only 7 competitive games into the season, he is not going to have the catalogue of outrageous saves that those goalkeepers did. I am pretty sure after 7 competitive games nobody would have predicted with certainty David McGurn would be our best keeper in a generation. I agree that nobody can say with any confidence that Dabrowski will be a roaring success at the moment and there are questions to be answered. There is still a bit of nervousness and uncertainty around him but I just think he seems to be getting a harder time than most for whatever reason. The first Morton goal and the second Hibs goal, people’s first reaction was to point the finger at the goalkeeper which was strange given both saw the wide player get the ball in the box far too easily and saw the striker score unmarked inside the box. Far more blame on the defenders than Dabrowski in both instances but not given the same scrutiny by most.

If you’re expecting him to make saves that nobody else at this level would make that’s a pretty high and very harsh standard to judge him by, surely? He made an excellent 1 on 1 save yesterday and a brilliant save at Killie off the top of my head. Not to mention 2 penalty saves to get us what turned out to be a crucial bonus point in getting us out the League Cup group stages. He has played his part in a positive start to the season. There is room for improvement of course, I’d expect that for a goalkeeper with less than 100 career games under his belt. However, there is room for improvement for everyone in our defence so far (players with far more experience than Dabrowski) and I’m hopeful with more time, we’ll see that improvement. It strikes me as very similar to the issues Kevin Cuthbert faced when he took over from David McGurn.

I am the same, I don’t see us as title challengers at all. However, we should definitely be looking for the play offs and I suppose given how tight this league can be, if you’re in the play offs you could well be in the title mix. I guess from the outside it comes as we have strengthened whilst some of the sides who finished above us last season (Ayr, Partick and Inverness) look to be weaker. I am actually looking forward to seeing where we’re at this weekend. We’ve been good at Killie and for the most part against Hibs but been poor for decent chunks of the 2 league games. Brown and Byrne should help improve the frailties we saw against Morton and Partick. My overriding feeling is we have a lot more about us than last season, a defeat might test that faith but a win and positive performance here could go a long way in helping growing that belief amongst the players and support that we can be right up there.

On Ross Millen, it’s yet another obvious example that players can improve and be better at different clubs. I don’t think any Rovers fan saw Kyle Benedictus being a defensive lynchpin for a side with one of the best defensive records in the country when he left us but here we are, it happens!

It’s been a derby dominated by the home teams since that 2009/2010 season where we won at East End Park and the Pars won twice at Starks. Since that season there have been 3 away wins in 25 games (2 for the Pars and 1 for the Rovers).

I genuinely think Dabrowski has been fine for the most part and seems to be a little bit of a scapegoat. I thought he was mostly good yesterday, made more of an effort to come and punch crosses and a great one on one save before the Hibs goal. His kicking still needs a lot of work though. I do think he could have done better at the Hibs 2nd goal, but it wasn’t a howler and you could also just as easily say that Dick and Watson/Murray should have done much better with that too. I get what Murray is saying about Youan’s pace but the issue is more that Dick let’s him run inside of him because he has got his body shape wrong, if Youan had to go on the outside, they probably don’t score. I also think people are comparing Dabrowski to the best of Jamie MacDonald and overlooking the fact that MacDonald himself dropped his levels last season and wasn’t perfect. It’s a completely new centre back pairing and goalkeeper it will take time for that to bed in. We absolutely have to stop conceding 2 goals per game but I do actually think we look better defensively than last season. 2 goals conceded from set pieces in the last 2 weeks is frustrating but we’ve faced almost 20 corners across those two games and a whole load more free kicks and throw ins around the box and for the most part defended them quite well and much better than last season. Law of averages though if you keep giving teams the opportunity to put the ball into your box, they will eventually get chances.

I think we’ll see the same line up as yesterday. It’s not necessarily what I’d go with but I think it’s what Murray will decide. If Dick isn’t suspended, the back 4 and goalkeeper pick themselves. Brown and Byrne have to play for me and with more minutes in their legs yesterday will hopefully be closer to managing 90 minutes. That leaves the front 4 positions which is where the real selection decisions are. You could pick any 4 from Smith, Mullin, Vaughan, Stanton, Easton, Ross, Hamilton or Gullan that could just about justify their place in the team which is a great problem to have. For me, Mullin and Smith have to play. Mullin’s workrate is excellent and his delivery outstanding, don’t see a natural replacement for him wide on the right with Connolly still out. I think he’s underrated amongst the support. Smith is pretty straight forward, he was someone I thought would be a bit part player in the squad but 3 goals in his last 4 means he has to keep his place. I think Ross was good against Partick and Morton but I don’t think he’s done quite enough to push his way back into the team yet, likewise with Gullan. Thought he started the season well but he’s been out so now lost his place. That leaves the final 2 starting places between Hamilton, Vaughan, Stanton and Easton. All have started the season well when they’ve played and it’s definitely the hardest choice. I would probably sway towards Stanton and Hamilton but Vaughan has a goal and 2 assists in his last 2 games so would be harsh to be dropped. Likewise Easton has been good but going off early against Morton and then being suspended yesterday probably means he has lost his place now. Nice to have some positive selection dilemma’s and hopefully means we will have plenty options off the bench to change things if needed assuming we don’t pick up our standard 2/3 injuries this week! Think most Rovers fans will be relatively encouraged by our start to the season but given our record at East End Park, it’s hard to feel particularly confident. I’ll be kind of optimistic and go for 2-2.

Don’t disagree with your selections but it’s wild that 4 of them were with us during one of our best seasons in the last 25 years. Add those 4 to Fernandy Mendy and 37 year old Iain Davidson and it shows how good the rest of that side were. Also makes you think how far we could have went with a better January transfer window. Cooney, King, Kennedy, Abraham and Gullan in for a big outlay and all were varying levels of disappointing.