Casagolda

Suppose that shows how complicated these things really are. That’s taken 2 full weeks to actually get it over the line. Anyway from what I could glean, he had a cracking 20/21 season in League 2 for Leyton Orient where he scored 15 goals. He then made a sort of surprise move to Walsall-they were expecting him to move up to at least League 1 level. He was already into double figures for them the following season when he done his ACL in early April. Missed the first half of last season, struggled to find his form/way back into the team after that and was subsequently released. Basically, like I said he has definite Van Veen vibes about him. Talented but ultimately frustrating and playing at a level below his actual ability. We’ve done well getting the best out of those types in the past and I guess you just have to hope we can do the same again.

Well he’ll be 22 in a few months so he’s too old to be kicking about the youth team. I imagine he’ll just be the equivalent of Robinson signing a Newell or a Manzinga or even Alexander signing Amaluzor. A cheap punt basically. A project player with some raw ability that we think we might be able to mould into a player. If we can, we’ve won a watch. If not, we’ll release him and I’m sure the lad will find his level- plus he’ll surely be a better player for having a year of full time football under his belt. I can’t see him making much of an impact coming straight from the juniors but you never know I suppose, Kettlewell obviously must see something in him.

To be fair to Fletcher, he averaged a goal every 3.5 games playing in the Barclays and about 1 in 4 during his latter years in the English Championship. Meanwhile Van Veen averaged roughly 1 in 5 in England while playing in League 1 & 2. I mean I loved Kev but last season was a freak, as you say if he’d stayed for another year I’d imagine he’d have probably been much closer to his first seasons tally than lasts. As has already been said, we can’t replace him with directly with another 29 goal striker. If your new striker(be that Fletcher or whoever) gets you a dozen or so, you’d then be looking at the likes of Efford, Obika and Shields or whoever else you’re pairing him with chipping in with 4 or 5 each etc. Even a half fit Fletcher terrorised us on the final day of the season and he was the excellent in the previous meeting at Fir Park as well. If he’s got another year in the tank similar to last season, which is the big question I suppose, I doubt we’ll find better at our level.

We absolutely shouldn’t be hanging about waiting for either of them. It was bad enough when we use to do it for Scott McDonald back in the day. However at least then you knew you were getting someone of genuine quality with a proven track record. Not some boy in his mid 20’s who’s had a dozen or so good games at this level. Casey will be 26 shortly and before last season the highest level he’d ever played at was LOI or the 2nd tier in America- whichever one of those is considered ‘better’. I mean I liked him but letting him dictate terms and deciding when he wants to come back for pre-season? Absolutely f**k that. Both he and Goss were excellent under Kettlewell and they played a big part in our revival but it’s time to shake hands and move on.

For what it’s worth, the name I got last week was Conor Wilkinson. No idea if it was actually true, still ongoing or if it fell through. However after doing a bit of research, I can certainly see why his name would pop up in our search for a Van Veen replacement…

New striker from down south due to sign this week by all accounts.

Cornelius needs games. He’s 22 and he’s only started 31 matches in his entire career so far. For comparison, Max Johnston is 3 years younger than him and already has over 50 career starts. If he’s been offered a squad role here and first team football elsewhere then fair play to him for taking the chance. He needs to go somewhere where he can start 30-40 games next season. And if he does well, he’ll get his move up the ladder. Good luck to him, would be easy to do a Barry Maguire and hang about here for another few years but a fresh start and regular football is probably the best thing for his development.

We signed a second journeyman right back in his 30’s last summer to completely block the pathway of the clubs best emerging academy talent. The club really should be criticised for that. Regardless of whether the boy turned out more Jamie Semple than David Turnbull, we preach so often as a club about a pathway to the first team and in Johnston’s case there literally was none. We as a club haven’t been a afraid to chuck a lot of 2 year deals on decent money at some bang average journeyman in recent years. I mean I dread to think how much money we spunked on Josh Morris alone. If the club can’t invest and gamble on someone like Johnston then we’d be as well just shutting the academy down. It’s not just a Motherwell problem though, it’s a Scottish football one. Bigger clubs are now stealing our players more frequently as soon as they turn 16. If clubs like Motherwell want to hold onto them the only way we can do that is by offering them a genuine route to first team football. We can’t really wait until our best prospect is 19 anymore to introduce them to the first team. I think that’s why Lennon Miller has been in the squad so often this season despite probably being not quite ready yet to feature on a regular basis. Cause if he wasn’t getting a sniff here, he’d be just as well sitting in Newcastle or Chelsea’s academy as he would be ours.

I see Cornelius is the first of those out of contract to declare he’s off. Slightly surprised, he was the one of those out of contract that I thought might actually stay. I imagine Goss, Johnston and Casey will all follow suit shortly before we’re due back next Monday.

According to the recently updated website, his new deal runs to May 24. So it seems a bit more than just a Tanner/Dunne style short term extension. But aye, it’s certainly a strange way of going about things. Giving 3 senior players extensions but not saying anything publicly and then publishing a list of a dozen or so other players who may or may not have been offered something. In any case, I don’t envisage many if any of the others on that list to be at Fir Park next season.

While I don’t necessarily disagree, I suppose the system worked because it suited the players Kettlewell inherited. Like I was saying earlier though- Johnston, Furlong, Casey, Goss and Van Veen are all likely away. All of them have been excellent since Kettlewell took over and key to making it work. So does he want to recruit to try and replace or does he want to go a different route and build something different? I mean winning 9 out of 14 games is obviously unbelievable stuff but it’s also not sustainable. If Kettlewell bins all our wingers and 10’s he then basically locks himself into the one system. Which rarely works well over a full season when you’re playing the same teams 3 or even 4 times. Honestly, I genuinely don’t even know where he goes with it. He’s losing a lot of key players and he’s also got at least 4 or 5 guys under contract that I’m sure he’d ideally like to get rid of. How he balances it all out and builds his own squad will be interesting.

We didn’t concede a goal in the 3 and a bit games Butcher played post split. The game and a half he missed we conceded 3 goals, I think that says it all. On contracts, McGinn was in the media this morning talking about coming back for the pre-season training camp in Holland. So I can only assume he’s got something sorted as well. As a general rule of thumb though, if the seasons ended and the contract remains unsigned then to my mind that means they’re basically away. So I’m already counting Casey, Goss, Cornelius and Johnston as all gone. With Kev almost certain to be sold as well, that’s a lot of quality leaving in the summer. Basically half of Kettlewell’s regular first picks out the door. Meanwhile the likes of Shields, Morris, Maguire, McGinley etc are all still contracted for another season. I don’t envy Kettlewell, he’s going to have some amount of wheeling and dealing to do this summer.

Link I noticed SOD’s was in the paper saying he had another year to go, which was news to me. I’m sure he was out of contract, unless it was an appearance based extension we’ve yet to announce I suppose.

I’m honestly not getting what all the fuss about it. Considine kicks Sod’s standing foot- penalty. Matthew’s is then clearly off his line as he saves said penalty- retake. What am I missing here??

I mean I don’t necessarily object to paying a bit more money, especially if we were well run and simply being crippled by external factors. However we’re a business and let’s face it, one that’s been run poorly for well over a year now. I don’t think asking the fans to cover for that by paying over the odds is necessarily fair or right- especially in these time while pulling on the heartstrings with the whole we’re tough people from a tough town pish. However if I do part with my money, what exactly is my near 14% increase going towards next season? To pay off a few more managers. To cover the fact our current two best youth prospects who’ve been key in our recent revival are about to walk away for buttons this summer. To help fund another 18 signings and build another 30 man squad with our throw enough shit at the wall and some of its bound to stick recruitment policy. What is the plan going forward? As a club it feels like we’ve been a rudderless ship drifting towards relegation for nearly 18 months now. If not for a miraculous turnaround under Kettlewell, the Championship was exactly where we were heading. I know, let’s ask our new Chief Exec. Oh that’s right, the person supposed to in place before Burrows left still hasn’t been appointed 2 months after he departed for Pittodrie, over 3 months since he officially handed his notice in. So aye, it’d be nice to have some sort of clarity and assurances going forward before I start chucking more money at the club to help cover 18 months of poor decisions and a general lack of leadership/direction.

Well sacking 2 managers, both their assistants, signing 18 players and operating with a 30 man squad all to simply achieve a bottom 6 finish(with zero cup runs or significant player sales) will lead to financial gaps needing to be plugged I suppose. Like I’ve said many times before, you can trace most if not all of our current problems back to the absolutely disastrous summer we had last year and we’ll be paying for it for a while yet.

That’s Van Veen scored 6 games on the spin now with 9 goals in those games, including a goal against each half of the OF. Just 3 goals off Higdon’s total as well, absolutely ridiculous stuff from the big man.

I think it’s been that long that folk genuinely seem to have forgot what it’s like to lose. But aye even looking at the ‘stats’ alone yesterday we had twice as many shots, more shots on target, a far higher XG, completed more passes etc than we did against Livingston. Yet everyone was singing our praises about how well we played last week and how awful we were yesterday. When in reality, a couple of quick fire goals before half time last week killed at that point what was a fairly even game. This week at the start of the 2nd half Van Veen strays offside at the disallowed goal and then misses a 1 on 1, we take either of those chances and I’m sure we go on to win again. We don’t, United hit us with a quick fire double and folk get frustrated as we spend the last 20 mins struggling to break them down. It’s football, it happens sometimes. We were joint bottom with United when Kettlewell took over, looking at where both sides are just now I think we can let him have this one. Forget it and move on.

Aye I think this is a key part. Even last week, I seen a few folk say Mandron was shite. However he links the play between Goss and Furlong for the 1st goal. At the 2nd he comes short for the throw and lays it off for Johnston to fire over the top for Van Veen. In both instances if Van Veen is the one playing with his back to goal and being the link up man, he’s not scoring those goals. It was the same for his goals against St Mirren and Ross County, Obika is the one dropping deep linking the play allowing Van Veen to drift into the box. I mind when we discussed the possibility of a 352 on here and it felt like Van Veen would work well with a Shields/Efford type buzzing off him. When in reality, it feels like having a target man alongside him has taken a weight off him and we’re subsequently seeing the best of him as a result.

Motherwell star Kevin van Veen dedicates 22-goal haul to 'the haters' who doubted him Some man. Can’t wait to hear his speech when he collects his POTY award. I’m imagining some proper Father Ted, golden cleric vibes.

Aye, I think comparing what Lamie and Sol were being asked to do every week under Hammell to what the current back 3 has been asked to do under Kettlewell is just slightly unfair. Just look at Casey and Butcher’s performance in Kirkcaldy for example. A complete and utter shit show, Butcher’s attempt to play Goncalves offside at the 3rd despite being 2 yards behind him was genuinely hilarious. As you say, you can see the difference in Goss and Spittal playing in a functioning midfield. Or how much more comfortable Kelly looks in front of a settled back line. Like a lot of players, by the end of Hammell’s reign Lamie(and Sol) just looked bereft of confidence. And like the others, he deserves a fresh start under Kettlewell.

I really like the way Kettlewell has let him off the leash to be fair. Last time I mind us playing with wing backs was under Robinson and that always felt quite rigid. Where as Furlong and Johnston in particular seems to have license to bomb forward at will under Kettlewell. Yesterday Johnston was clean through on goal inside 10 mins. At Van Veen’s opener Furlong sets it up and Johnston also up in the 6 yard box to support. The third goal Spittal’s shot is saved and Johnston’s the first to arrive for the rebound. The boy spends more time in the opposition box than some of the forwards we’ve had over the years. I always worry with a back 5 it can become quite negative if you don’t have an out ball. However the pace and energy the two of the them provide down the flanks makes a massive difference. It can turn defence into attack in the blink of an eye cause as soon as we win the ball back, the pair of them are on their bikes flying forward- see the first goal yesterday. It’ll be a shame to see him leave but like you say, I imagine his agent is feeding Fabrizio the latest set of clubs ‘interested’ as we speak.

Aye was saying much the same about Furlong last week. Was brilliant at Easter Road and again today. If he’s out of contact and Brighton aren’t bothered about keeping him, I’d definitely be trying to take a punt on him. Still only 20 as well, potentially a lot more to come. Him and Johnston were excellent down each flank. An assist for Furlong as well a goal and an assist for Johnston. Having two good quality wing backs providing width and energy makes a huge difference. Kettlewell just seems to have got the whole balance right. We look solid at the back but still a real threat going forward. Good blend of youth and experience. Players happy and comfortable playing in roles that suit them. Mental to think we looked stick ons for relegation only 7 games ago. Also fair fucks to Van Veen as well, 7 goals in 4 games is outrageous stuff. As is 22 goals in a team that’s been toiling for most of this season. You really couldn’t begrudge him a decent move in the coming months if it comes about.

He was. Funny cause he’s out of contract and Slattery isn’t but based on current form, Goss is absolutely the one you’d be keeping. However as yesterday showed again, they’re much better apart than they are together and if it’s one or the other, do we have to just move Goss on in the summer? Someone who also hasn’t had a lot praise who I also thought had a good game was Furlong. Thought he was in for a tough afternoon as he struggled a bit early door with Cadden’s physicality but stuck at it and ended up making numerous important interventions and blocks in the 2nd half. Don’t know what his situation is at Brighton but might be worth keeping an eye on. By my count only 4 of the 14 players we used yesterday are under contract for next season. Which isn’t necessarily a problem in itself but it does point towards yet another huge rebuild in the summer. Johnston will go. I’d like Casey and Cornelius to stay. Everything else is pretty much up in the air. You wonder if/when we get safe if Kettlewell will use the squad and tinker a bit more in the remaining games to make some decisions for next season.

Reece McAlear has done alright as well I suppose. He was released by Norwich after only 1 first team appearance mind. Right now he can’t get a game for Tranmere in League 2 so is back up here on loan to Ayr in the Championship. Others like Tom Leighton, Robbie Leitch, Kyle Semple etc were all released without kicking a ball and have dropped down to part time football. Robbie Hemfrey was also released but is still full time albeit about 4th choice keeper at Rotherham. So aye, not exactly a great deal of success.