Diamonds are Forever

Saw a bit of fuss on Twitter about the penalty so took a look, it's a blatant foul, and certainly looks to continue into the box which means it's a penalty. One of those ones where the contact hasn't caused Donaldson to collapse in a heap, but he has been pulled back and if you don't go down like that you don't get the penalty you deserve. Terrible defending to let him past and then panics by pulling his shirt.

Any draw I've seen definitely has 3rd place in Group A having 3 different options as Salvo's post shows. If you add in the possibility of us coming 1st or 2nd, plus 3 options for 3rd, it's almost impossible to plan ahead beyond having a well connected base.

Quite happy for Raith to strengthen as much as they can. We've only to play them once more in the league but everyone else (apart from Dunfermline) has to play them twice, so if they could strengthen and go on a run beating everyone else around us that would be grand. Points tallies from 4th down to 10th will be pretty close so every little helps! I know we have them in the cup but I still see that as a bonus, plus we seem to have their number this season anyway so we'll still have a good shot at going through.

I think that's his interview from last week from the website that they've just taken and stuck in an article, if not then very similar. Hope to be wrong but don't expect to sign anyone except maybe a loan or a youngster, that's how I take his comments anyway.

Obviously selfishly I want him to stay, but even from a player development point of view you can see the impact playing regular first team football is having and how much he is progressing. I'd imagine Hibs will make signings and, at best, Megwa will sit on the bench the rest of the season which will do nothing for him. You'd hope they'd see the benefit in him staying. Doesn't sound like his loan has actually been ended yet, just that they'd like to take a look at him for a week and then decide. So hopefully he's back in a couple of weeks. If ATS is fit I'd just stick him at centre back, move Watson out right and leave the rest. I wouldn't be moving McCabe out of midfield unless we have no choice given the last 2 performances.

A similar one to a fan of a losing team (usually a relatively bigger one) trying to appear gracious in defeat by saying 'you deserved to win', but then following that up with 'because you simply wanted it more'. They can't bring themselves to accept the other team were/are better, so it has to be because their team weren't trying hard enough.

Definitely. We were quite solid towards the end of last season but that was with going to a more experienced back-line with Ballantyne, ATS, Fordyce and Watson. At the moment we have experience at centre back with youth and energy at full-back, which is a great mix. I also think McCabe playing deep midfield takes a lot of pressure off Fordyce to be a ball-playing centre back because he'll drop deep and demand the ball and dictate play. Whereas McMaster doesn't have the confidence to do that yet which means Fordyce ends up a playmaker from the back, which doesn't work as well in possession and I think impacts on him defensively. He's been great recently when he's just able to focus on what he is good at - defending. It may even just be having McCabe on the park at all helps take some of the pressure off his shoulders and allows him to focus on his game.

Currently got the 2nd best goals against record in the league, who would have thought that at the start of the season?! Even during our poor form we're generally just losing 1 goal a game, which is fine. A lot of good organisational work going on, but also the emergence of Megwa and Hancock at full-back (and Ballantyne when he's been fit) has been great to see.

Given our limited individual quality in forward areas, and generally us having one of the lowest budgets in the league, the results that we are getting are fantastic and a real credit to McCabe. Even games that we lose are usually by one goal and there's not much in the games. We look so well drilled and organised and he is getting everything out the players. Would be interesting to know how much of an impact McCabe and Fordyce playing under Murray has had on their ability to out think him tactically so far. Also playing with Easton and Smith will have helped work out how to limit their influence. I've always said about Murray that his recruitment is excellent and his ability to build a club and add a level of professionalism is great, but he's pretty average (arguably poor) tactically. He has Plan A, and then Plan B is chuck on every substitute and hope for the best - which in fairness has worked quite a lot for Raith this season. But you'd probably hope for a bit more tactical nous if you're going for the title.

I agree, although listening to McCabe's interview I doubt that will happen. Basically says we are mainly trying for younger players which have been scouted and have sell-on value, and that the more established players are too expensive. So we'll maybe get a couple of loans or another McStravick type signing. Doesn't come as any surprise to be honest as that has been our policy until now under McCabe. I've no issue with that long term strategy but we really need a couple of ready made first team players.

I'd say that's a slight misreading of history there. We started that season terribly with 5 points from the first 5 games, Cove started to motor ahead and we never got near them again until about March time. At the current stage in that 2021/2022 season we were on 35 points with Cove on 43 and it stayed like that until March where it got as low as 5, which was the smallest gap between us in the entire season. It took an incredible run of form to even stay within 8 points, but I don't think many people ever thought there was a realistic title race until about February/March time, and even then it was an outside bet, the points tally was about 5 or 6 different then but the fact they were winning every week meant them dropping enough points was so unlikely. Cove also beat us twice and drew with us twice, so they were clearly a better team. I'm not sure what the 'shit the bed' moment was in that run of form, especially given we had nothing to lose for the whole season as we were never expected to win it, did we not go 22 unbeaten too until the end of the season? The play-offs could be argued was a bottle job but really I think that was just QP with a fit Simon Murray, if he'd been injured like he was for half the season we'd have won. Their form last season also showed they weren't a bad side. The only similarity which I think you're getting at is that there were 2 teams clearly better than the rest, which is true. But this season has been close from the first few games and is almost neck and neck now. That was never the case with us and Cove.

I think ideally that's what most fans would want, but the issue is that the players you want to sign on multi-year deals often don't want to sign-up for 2 or 3 years. We were favourites to get relegated at the start of the season and it's still possible we could be, if you are a player in your early to mid twenties who thinks they should be Championship level, maybe even Premiership in the future, it's a big risk to tie yourself to a club that could be back in League 1 next year. A good potential example (and quite a funny one) is Paton at Queens Park who signed a 3 year deal in the summer, if they don't turn things around he'll be back in League 1 for another 2 years potentially at the point where he would have been thinking about moving upwards. In terms of the manager it's maybe not as big an issue because it's such a precarious job that you'd be stupid to turn down a longer contract, although I'm sure there would be some kind of agreement about moving on if the right club came in. The only 2 ways we could encourage guys to stay would be offering huge wages, which even then might not work for someone very career driven, and obviously we can't afford that. The other is to be succesful this year so players don't have any fears about signing a 2 year contract. I think it was Kenny_m who mentioned that short term signings are important to ensure success and therefore convince guys to stay for the longer term, which I think is spot on. If we could really push on in the next few weeks we'd be an exciting club to sign up for next season, if we're battling out down the bottom players who have options will be off.

If we have Hancock and Megwa/Ballantyne available I think the system yesterday works as they are good enough to provide width and it removes the need to play with attacking wide players - definitely our weakest area squad wise. Similar thinking to the 3 at the back with wing backs that we played away at Raith in that it gives us width without having to play weaker players. If we get ahead in the game it also gives the option of McGregor off the bench on the counter, just like against Abroath, and yesterday where he nearly got in a couple of times. If things aren't going well we have Gal to come on (or whoever isn't starting that day). I thought the biggest reason it worked though was that it allowed us to press from the front more effectively as we had to 2 players up there. That meant they couldn't just pass round our isolated striker like teams would normally do, that allowed Frizz and Telfer to then follow up and press them into kicking it out of play or going long which most of the time met Fordyce's head.

Totally dominant performance. Only negative is that we didn't score from open play but we did look much closer to doing so today. Inverness never had a chance (from what I can remember) and once we scored I never thought we'd lose a goal. Hancock was superb as he has been for a few weeks, but everyone played well.

That's got nothing to do with the point though has it? You said you'd think he would show more commitment. Firstly he is a loan player so has no real say if Hibs want him back anyway, he has to do what his employers ask him to. He is a Hibs player and part of the deal with getting him is that we get a good player and Hibs get him out playing games. And he is extremely committed on the park, he's won 2 of the 3 available POTM awards since he has been here, so to try and make out that him potentially being recalled is a lack of commitment to Airdrie is absurd on numerous levels.

He overachieved last season but was also helped by Liverpool and Chelsea being terrible, and Spurs and Villa being nowhere. This season they've all stepped it up (apart from Chelsea) and they've dropped back down. I think they've also found that you can progress too quickly, they don't have the squad to deal with Champions League, Premier League and cup competitions (which they are clearly desperate to win) and it's meant their form in all of them has suffered as injuries have piled up. To your question, it will depend whether the owners think last season was the outlier that it was, or whether they think that's where they should have been and that this is them dropping off now. They have tough league games coming up and away to Sunderland in the cup. If they lose all those I think he's in trouble, I'd be surprised if anything happened sooner though.

Why? He's a Hibs player trying to make it at Hibs. He's up to match sharpness so a good training camp could see him getting first team opportunities in the second half of the season. It's not really up to him anyway, if he's asked/told he's going to Dubai then he doesn't have much choice as an employee of the club. He'd be a big loss but if Ballantyne is back around the same time then that would make up for it, no idea when he is back though? It's been said by everyone but a couple of quality signings are needed, particularly in attacking areas. However given the lack of signings under McCabe I'd be surprised if we signed anyone, plus getting that quality in January is extremely difficult. It's crucial that if we are signing players we go and get them this week instead of waiting until late January though.

He is able to plant both feet on the ground after the contact in a normal fashion, before falling over. It is never a penalty. It's one of these absurd ones where virtually everyone knows it's a wrong decision but because of the original decision it isn't deemed as 'wrong enough' to be overturned.

They surely have to though - most of the time in the case of goalkeepers 'preventing the player from playing the ball' is going to mean stopping them having a reasonable chance of saving it, which is a judgement. If Trafford had been another 5 yards to his right but was still unsighted then that goal gets given as it's then essentially a shot in to an empty goal and has no effect on his ability to play the ball. An extreme example obviously but the point is there must be a point where the referee is having to consider that. In this case I think Trafford is close enough, and as you say maybe shifting his weight to see, that I'd say offside. On your second point, I'd say that's also the case for the 'clear goalscoring opportunity' law so it's not unique for a referee to have to make some kind of prediction into the future, which does involve an element of judgement on player ability.

But the law is that it's only offside if it 'prevents the player from being able to play the ball' by being in his line of vision. Trafford was already moving the other way before the ball was struck, and given how close in it was and the pace of the shot there is no chance he was getting near it. Does that therefore meet the above criteria? Geniune question by the way. I don't know how much they have to take account of whether the goalkeeper has any realistic chance of saving it (which is clearly subjective anyway).

Smith was a couple of years older, had already played for 3 clubs in Scotland at the same or higher level, and was only on loan anyway. We were also bouncing around mid-table in League 1 so weren't under such pressure to get immediate results at the time. Smith struggled to score goals that season but overall was good and got a move to the Premiership on the back of it. Anyway my point wasn't that McStravick can't become as good a player as Smith, it's that he isn't as good a player now. And our first trip to the Championship in 10 years is not the time to be pinning hopes on an 18 year old who'd never played in Scotland and barely played in NI. I think he'd be fine as a squad option to play if we have injuries and in the odd cup game. But to be relying on him as one of our main attacking options is poor recruitment.

I find/found the McStravick signing really strange. Not criticising him as he's young and gives his all. But in terms of the signing itself it just raises questions. Firstly from what I can tell he's a number 10 type player, but he's never played there or if we does Frizz is playing in that space too. I don't see him as a wide player, he doesn't have the pace or directness to be a threat out there. We apparently paid money for him, I know it won't have been a major amount but any fee at our level is pretty rare and any available funds should have been going into ensuring Championship survival and signing ready made players. Signing an 18 year old who may have potential to essentially replace a proven player like Callum Smith makes no sense. I know the club would probably say they can't win in the sense that fans are always asking for young, talented signings. I have no issue with them as a supplement to a quality first 11, but they need time to get up to speed and earn a spot on the first time. McStravick has 'earned' his spot by virtue of having no viable options ahead of him, not because he's been particularly good.

Yeah that's my thoughts. The general consensus was that we needed to add quality, but we were limited by the budget and saying we need better signings is easier said than done. When the signings didn't really materialise I said I was willing to wait and see and judge by the results. What else can fans do anyway? We started to the season well and were promoted for the first time in a decade, it's hardly beneficial to go slating the club/signings from the off. The top end of the pitch is where we are being found out and that is where you need to spend a lot of money to get the quality players. Without knowing the budget and who was available it's hard to judge what we could have done in that area. I do think a legitimate question is were we perhaps too focused on having another League 1 campaign. The 2 Hibs boys were surely signed for League 1. Aiken has done well but not convinced we'd have signed him in the summer if we'd already been promoted. Same for O'Connor. And sounds like a few of the others were already signed up (or at least had agreed to) before we got promoted. It's difficult because promotion was decided almost on the toss of a coin with penalties so you are having to plan for 2 eventualities. Plus just being in the play-offs means you are 2 weeks behind everyone else in terms of planning. But like I said up the thread, the Hibs boys, McGregor, McStravick and McMaster all seem like signings for League 1. It may just be that is our market, but was it that we were planning for League 1 and then had to change course after promotion, but had already accounted for a chunk of the budget with signing these guys up (or being in the pipeline in the case of McStravick)?

Gabby's goals last season will always make him fondly thought of, but he's contributed nothing this season and is presumably on (by our standards) a big contract after last season, so would be a good move for the club if he was to go and allow us to try and get someone else in. Absolutely no idea why Raith would sign him though, utterly bizarre if true.

I think in a dominant team, like the second half of last season, he is a useful player as he keeps things ticking over, fills in gaps and provides a good base to build attacks from. The problem is this season we clearly aren't dominant so his keeping possession has no real end purpose and it just looks safe and negative. I'd have him in the same bracket as McGregor and McStravick, a decent young player who could contribute over a season, but he shouldn't have to be playing every week. Another year in League 1 would have been ideal for him.