CallumPar

With the exception of Falkirk and Airdrie, teams have come to East End and sat deep, playing for 0-0. It’s meant that we’ve had to try and be very patient - often frustratingly so. We seem to try and wait for a mistake/someone to come out of position, rather than trying to break them down with our quality/ability. I think we need to have KRH/Mochrie running with the ball more often, drawing men out of position. Also need to get Todd back into that role, where he will make forward runs in between the defenders. This Saturday, I’d say just need to go for the same plan as last time we went there. Try and start fast, run at them. Put them under pressure early and hope that something gives and we get a goal. With the exception of Montrose, we’ve looked a lot more comfortable on plastic pitches this season.

To be fair, a lot of folk I know are back to work today. I’d imagine there are also other issues in terms of costs/availability of police/stewards/officials at 24 hours notice. Police/stewards will either have not been scheduled to work today, or have been allocated to another job today. Would be really hard to organise enough for a high category football match at such short notice. Also got to remember our officials are all part time, with other jobs. So a lot of them possibly have other commitments today. I’d imagine majority of SPFL/SFA office staff were also off yesterday, so wouldn’t have been around to arrange/organise this. I also wonder if the Airdrie game (and/or this game) might not be announced until we know who is in the next round of the cup/who might have a free weekend on 11th Feb - Airdrie already out, so will have a free weekend.

Strange brag. Have you forgotten that you didn’t have a shot on target until the 93rd minute at your place? You were that bad, McGlynn had to use number of corners to argue that you were better than us!

All jokes aside, are you ok? If this isn’t a wind up, I’m genuinely concerned about your mental health. A football match being postponed shouldn’t have this kind of impact on someone. If you’re having a tough time right now, speak to friends and family and/or reach out to someone for some moral support. Talk things through with someone and I’m sure you’ll discover that things aren’t as bad as they seem. Hope everything’s alright.

What are you talking about here? Somehow criticising Dunfermline because the SFA arranged for another referee to inspect the pitch? Demanding a statement about broken under soil heating is also strange behaviour. Since you seem to know so much, what did/didn’t we do to try and get the game ahead? What more should the club have done? Pitch is frozen, match is postponed. That sort of thing happens, particularly at this time of year. It’s disappointing for all of us, but doesn’t justify your pathetic tear-stained rants on here. Nobody forced you to travel so far. You did so through choice.

Don’t understand the “won’t have as many match-day costs” theory. In terms of policing/stewards, we’ll have to pay costs for today and the rearranged fixture. People were scheduled to have shifts and I can’t imagine we’ll get away with not paying for today’s costs at such short/late notice. Then we’ll have to have floodlights on for at least an hour pre-match for the rearranged game and 30-45 mins post-match. Today, would likely just be second half and post-match.

Or you’ve clicked on DAFC v Peterhead, thinking it’s the Falkirk game, due to lack of brain cells…

You know our game away to Airdrie was postponed 2 weeks ago? Because of a frozen (plastic) pitch…

Really disappointing. Club will be losing money from this, atmosphere will suffer too.

Our official site’s update says that the under soil heating system developed a fault in the boiler.

Yep. I feel like they’d have said something if they thought it might be on. If the USH is broken, they had a couple days notice (previously mentioned it has to be on a couple of days before). So if they haven’t done anything to make it playable, it’s very poor from the club.

Valid point. 12pm pitch inspection could be a precaution, to see if areas of the pitch will need worked on in the next 2 hours to get the game on. Certainly happened before. Would be terrible if the club haven’t taken necessary precautions to get this on, particularly given the size of crowd expected and money to be made from the bars/hospitality. They’ll also have to pay for police and stewards for today and for a rearranged fixture, which won’t be cheap.

Decent result. Thought we deserved it in the end. Kelty looked decent in spells going forward. Agyeman and Austin caused us problems. But defensively they always looked suspect/dodgy. Bizarrely, they looked even worse defensively once Hill came on. He looked completely finished. He should only be used as a very last resort, not someone to help the team see out a result. McCann played well when he came on. Haven’t been a fan of him on the wing before. But he seemed to get the better of their RB more often than not and it was a terrific leap and header for the goal. Actually thought all the subs made a positive impact. Defensively much more solid with the back 4 today. Kelty’s wingers were doing a good job exploiting the gaps behind the wing backs up until our shape change. Hamilton was also very good in his role. Todd really unlucky not to extend the lead at the end. MacDonald obviously got the assist for McCann’s goal and his work-rate helped us defensively at times too. Kelty suffered from Potter’s negativity. Tried to hold on at 1-1, rather than going for the win. Which meant that our 4-2-4 just piled the pressure on them until we eventually scored the winner. Once we scored our second, they didn’t have the personnel on the park to pose a threat.

Yep. Lack of depth/options is ann issue. Of those that started on the bench today, only Hamilton and Todorov have the ability to come on and change the game/improve the team. I know we have 3 long term injuries, but I think we need to add more quality/depth in January if we’re going to win the league. Right now, even if we had no other injuries, a CB or full back getting injured or suspended would have us really struggling for someone capable of covering for them.

Not a terrible game for a neutral. Both teams going for the win, particularly second half. But not a great game for a fan. Both teams will probably feel they should have won it. But on the balance of play, a draw is probably a fair result. With Falkirk dropping points, probably a better point for us than it is for QoS. From a Pars perspective, first half was horrendous. Bringing Todorov on made a big difference. Thought he’d won it with his shot at the end too. Mochrie had his worst game by far. He was like being a man down. But he’s been outstanding in other games, so don’t want to be too critical. Midfield in general went awol for a lot of the game. After the change of shape, we did well using Mochrie and KRH on the right hand side and that’s what got us the goal too. Queens looked better than I expected, but with no major threat. Once they took Connelly off, I thought they offered next to nothing. Reilly was every bit as bad as he was in his spell with us. Gibson fairly good with the ball, but he was left man for man with Edwards, who beat him with the same trick at least 5 times. Referee was horrendous. He ignored really blatant fouls for both teams. Blatant trips, late challenges, pulling back etc, he just wasn’t interested. Got quite a few throw ins and goal kick/corner decisions wrong when they seemed like really easy decisions too. Didn’t impact the result at all, but both sets of players and coaching teams were getting so frustrated with his uselessness. He looked so far out of his depth. Wasn’t a surprise that when the first card came, it was for a player complaining about one of his many bizarre decisions.

I’m impressed that the OP has edited his post, but hasn’t corrected himself saying ‘back to domestic football’ after a Scottish cup game. Being honest, I think we should be winning most of our games this season. We’ve played 16 league games so far and kept 10 clean sheets. I do think that we are the best team in the league and QoS seem to have been poor disappointing. We have a solid defence and attacking players capable of scoring goals. We’re 7 points clear for a reason and it’s up to us to keep it that way/extend the lead at the top as the season goes on. It won’t be easy, very few games have been. But given the last 16 league games we’ve played, I have faith that McPake is the right man for us and the team are more than capable of going out and getting a result most weeks. Obviously there will be a few more hiccups along the way (already had Clyde/Peterhead at home and Montrose away), but I think we’ll continue our charge towards the title with another win next week.

Just watched this. Saw Cardle and Docherty got sent off at the same time and thought it might be entertaining. But just two stupid/needless red cards without adding any entertainment. Definitely looks like Docherty stamps on Cardle and Cardle had lost the head. He went flying in over the top of the ball with the challenge and that merited the red card in itself, he was out of control and dangerous. Did Lawless get booked? Seemed to be quite aggressive with Cardle, pinning him to the ground and looked like he had his hand on Cardle’s throat area when trying to keep him down. I think that’s when there’s the potential ‘punch’ from Cardle? Either way, definitely looks like two red cards. Referee didn’t really have much option with them.

Routine win. We were never in trouble and could have easily scored more. Credit to McPake and the players for getting the job done and putting in a decent performance. A lot of players (particularly defence/keeper) did nothing wrong, without having much to do. Hope KRH is ok and just went off as a precaution.

Been very good, but needs to come off. Forfar number 19 is a thug that’s horrendous at football and has been kicking him all game. Challenge at the end of the half was a shocker, right down the Achilles.

I hadn’t seen that until I read your post earlier. Hopefully they can all play - suggests clubs might want them to stay here beyond January, which would be good.

Be interesting to see how we approach this. Will McPake try and have us blow them away early on, so that he can give fringe players/youngsters game time and give first team players a rest late on? I certainly don’t think we can afford to risk playing a weakened/rotated side from the start. I wonder if our loan players will be able to play? Think in the past we’ve had players whose parent club refused to allow them to play, in case they were recalled in January.

Agree with this. You need to have sustained success before you start worrying about style. But it’s worth noting, as a manager, if you have an ‘unattractive’ style of play, you will be given less time by the fans/board. There are downfalls to having a set style of play. For example, I believe Klopp and Liverpool are struggling due to teams working out a way to play against them. Klopp seems to have no real solution. Everyone at the club is there to suit his ethos. When that isn’t working, there’s no alternative. As a fan, I just want my team to win. The Falkirk game wasn’t pretty on the eye, but I thought we played well and deserved the win. If there’s one thing we found out last season, possession counts for absolutely nothing. You can pass the ball about the back all you want but football is, and always has been, about scoring more goals than the opposition.

Another test for McPake this weekend. Can he end our Scottish cup curse? Our last win in the competition was 18th November 2017 - over 5 years ago. Last goal we scored was 20th January 2018 - Declan McManus v Morton. We’ve appointed a total of 4 new managers since we last scored a Scottish cup goal. In fact, last time we scored a Scottish cup goal, Falkirk were a championship club. I know you can be unlucky with tough draws, but we haven’t been drawn against a side from a higher division during this run.

They might might got a point today if they hadn’t accepted his resignation.

Two updates - Alan Main’s been removed from the management team on the official site. Also, Arbroath game is Friday 9th Dec at 7:45pm.