Raith Against The Machine

You owe us one on that front, to be fair.

lol, lmao

I can't imagine you'd be telling anyone (unless they're already significantly out of the picture) that they're not getting a new deal. Seems like that'd be pretty counter-productive. At the same time, it'd be naive for any player to think the club aren't constantly assessing whether or not they can upgrade on anyone who's out of contract. Without any inside knowledge whatsoever, I can easily imagine a situation where a player sees something they were never meant to, with an annotation along the lines of "definitely a target for replacement" or "could almost certainly be improved upon" and they have, understandably, not been happy about it. But equally, with a day or two to think about it, I don't think it'd have to remain a mountain rather than a molehill. If you're the player in question, you already know the club are constantly updating that assessment for everyone in the last year of a deal, so that in itself can't be an objection. And the assessment itself can only really be objected to if it's hugely off the mark, and I don't think any of our out of contract players (Easton aside) can really say they've been playing our of their skin. It feels to me like it's the nature of the information being revealed that's led to any supposed falling out, rather than the content, and that it's likely to blow over. Ultimately, if you think the manager is treating you harshly by not offering you a new deal, the best way to prove him wrong is by working harder and putting in even better performances. To throw the toys out of the pram would be an act of self-harm more than anything else.

Hopefully he's better at left back than he is in goal.

I heavily suspect, as rumoured, we were in for Ashcroft weeks ago and either we've gotten fed up waiting or (more likely) we've been told outright that he's no longer available for loan. Brown feels like a warm body and not too much else, on available evidence. He doesn't directly address a weakness in as much as he'd be coming in for Millen who is by no means a bad player for us, but the option to use Brown on the right of a three is interesting (we still don't have a left sided wing back to really make that work, but it would at least put Millen in a better position). Right back was the one position on the park where we didn't have an immediate replacement (if you'll allow Callum Hannah as second choice left back) so in that sense it does improve the squad, but it does also have a "f**k it" vibe, in the sense of bringing someone else in now is better than holding on for another fortnight and potentially ending up with nobody.

What Stanton brings, moreso than anyone else, is a dynamism. And I know that can often just be a buzzword, but it really applies here. A lot of our players, as with most players at this level, are relatively 'one-note'. On the podcast, there was talk of Ross Millen and his penchant for only delivering crosses from deep, but that same thing exists across most players. If you played "What Happens Next?" with a freeze frame of a lot of Rovers attacks, you'd have a fair idea with a lot of players. And that's not a criticism, it's a reality of most footballers at any level. If it's Aidan Connolly, you know he wants to come inside to cross or shoot, although he may go outside. If it's Easton, you know he's going to try and run at you until he can get a shooting angle. When the ball comes back to Byrne, he's going to look for a pass. I'm simplifying massively, but you take the point. Stanton is a sort of free radical that you can throw into that mix. If you imagine the same scenarios but picture Stanton as the next nearest player. He might drop deep for the pass, he might go outside and try to deliver a cross, he might drive direct and go for goal, he might take a shot. That not only creates a huge advantage in-and-of-itself, it also opens up new angles and space for the likes of Connolly and Easton to exploit. Without Stanton, we're quite prosaic. If you take the Airdrie game there, if you're a defender you know what your jobs are before you begin. Don't let Connolly inside, don't let Easton in behind, don't let Hamilton get a free header etc etc. Stanton doesn't have that label. And it's not an immediate fix or a magic bullet, Stanton played the full 90 minutes in the first 1-0 defeat at Broomfield, but unlike anyone else in the squad, Stanton brings a "be anywhere, do anything" quality that pays dividends again and again. It's funny the way these things work in football. If you go back a week I'm pretty sure there's a post of approximately this length where I write Jamie Gullan off for being a jack of all trades and a master of none, but that's exactly what Stanton is, albeit covering different positions. When you play Stanton in the midfield, it almost doesn't matter what the "system" or the "role" you give him is. To use the number shorthand, he's essentially a hybrid of a 6, an 8 and a 10 at all times. As touched upon above, that's why the 4-1-3-2 works with Stanton and nobody else. He's good enough, and dynamic enough, to fill all the various parts you need in that midfield. There are a lot of things he's not individually as good as some other players at, but as a total package he's unmatched. You basically need a Venn diagram of two players to cover all of Stanton's roles. And most teams do use two players. It's why nobody plays 4-1-3-2.

The thing for me, with regards to Easton and Turner, is that there's diminished responsibility on the grounds of that's-not-their-jobs. And ultimately that's an Ian Murray decision and he has to factor that in. He either thinks Easton and/or Turner are good enough to contribute defensively when required, or he's happy to take the risk that they aren't. I suspect it's the latter (as we saw with his willingness to use Connolly and Smith as wing backs recently). You could certainly argue that Easton shouldn't be leaving Todorov in that much space, but he's seen a free man on the edge of the box and he's run in to (successfully) get a block on a shot. I don't think it's particularly fair to ask much more of your mercurial winger. I'm not sure there's much of a case for the prosecution with regards to Kev Dabrowski either. First and foremost the ball is pinging around his box and he's got to be fully focused on the possibility that it comes flying at him at any second, but also the whole thing happens over a few seconds. I'm not sure there's time for him to properly and fully communicate "Keith, there's a man over here and I need you to come and cover him" with time for it to actually happen. Direct blame I would proportion more or less equally to each of the back four. They're all experienced defenders and it different points they all make the kind of decisions you'd expect from teenagers. Indirectly, you also have to point the finger at Ian Murray for the way he's set up and the lack of protection he's offered his defence. The only brightside I can offer is that a lot of these goals we've lost recently have been a result of poor organisation and poor communication, which are symptoms of an ever changing defence. Hopefully, with Watson back fit, we'll get a run of games with a consistent defensive set up, and these weaknesses start to drastically recede.

Aye. Banging the same old drum, but there's a reason nobody else plays 4-1-3-2. Todorov is so free for the goal because Dick has had to go tearing into the middle of the park to pick up a free man, exactly where you're defensive midfield should be.

In a league that reveres such characters as "Willy Akio" and "Fraser Aird", Dario should be more than comfortable.

Ian Murray, for f**k sake. My Kingdom for a back four. A back three with one centre half in it, and no wing backs either side of them. Reckless bordering on suicidal. We've got good players in the other half of the pitch, but it feels like we've conceded from 75% of the chances we've given up in the last five or six weeks. That needs to be addressed first and foremost. Bringing in new players is difficult, but that doesn't mean you have to go fucking mental. Playing four or five guys out of position, by choice, is ludicrous.

I'd be more inclined to move Millen into the wing back position. Although Murray is an upgrade on Brown at the heart of the defence, I'm far from convinced that a back three that's two-thirds full backs is sustainable. Keep Dick, keep Murray, but get Brown or Corr in there too. Give Millen more of a brief to get forward rather than having to defend his own box.

Gullan's biggest issue is that he's not the best at any one thing, in our current squad. He's not as good a 9 as Hamilton, not as good a 10 as Vaughan, not as good a wide forward as Easton or Connolly. What he can do is play all of those positions competently. He's the epitome of "jack of all trades, master of none", as far as the final third is concerned. You can play him anywhere and he'll do a job, which is why McGlynn valued him so highly in a tight squad. But now that we've got specialists in all those positions, he's understandably found his minutes limited. And I really don't think there's much of a case otherwise. It's a move that suits both parties. Gullan needs to be playing first team football week-in, week-out and hopefully he gets that with Dundalk. He's got all the attributes to be a success, and I wonder if he needs to narrow his scope a little, be a little more selfish. If he's played as a centre forward, hang around the penalty spot a little more often, and do less running himself into the ground covering every inch. He's given us some great moments, and a disproportionate amount of his goals have been very important, but when faced with the opportunity to effectively swap him for Rudden, it's a move I agree with. Rudden's going to give us a different dimension in and around the penalty box. He brings a physicality and a directness that we don't currently have outside of Hamilton. I'm really interested to see how often they play together, because one big unit is relatively easy to defend against, but two can be a nightmare. Creates selection issues further back, but that's the Ian Murray way.

Props to the linesman for having the most Tory sounding name in a stable of officials that literally contains the leader of the Scottish Conservatives.

Take away that other goal and he hasn't scored any in his last eight. Terrible form. In fact, if you discount all of the goals he's ever scored, he's literally never scored a goal. And he's supposed to be a striker!

Ref has absolutely lost this.

Some absolutely fucking mental takes on here in the last 24 hours. Did folk think they'd signed up to watch Real Madrid every week? Where the f**k does this sense of entitlement come from? Yeah, the last few weeks haven't been good enough, but we did also win a derby away from home in there. We're playing games in the Championship, the most notoriously competitive division in the country. Who gave you the impression that we had any expectation of having it easy every week, or that Murray and this squad should be or are somehow infallible? We've been in phenomenal form. We're now in a sticky spell (and have still only lost twice, mind) but it's almost certainly nothing more than reversion towards the mean. And guess what? We'll lose more games between now and the end of the season. We probably won't win the league. We probably won't get promoted. I suggest some of you come to terms with that now, to save the rest of us from your tear stained breakdowns every other week because your favourite football team haven't performed immaculately for 36 consecutive weeks. Children.

Mullin has done enough to justify his inclusion and I'm not sure playing Masson for either of them would've been a net benefit, but you're spot on in that it's exactly the kind of goal you don't concede with two full time defenders in there. Just a wee bit too much space in behind Mullin but it's an absolutely brilliant pass into that area and then a great finish. Frustrating because we've been in almost complete control of the midfield, but we haven't really converted that into clear chances and, as we well know, you're always running a risk when you've only got a single goal lead.

Liam Dick, a teenager, a midfielder, a winger. Some back four. Some laugh.

Two big questions that will determine the line-up, as I see it: - Who's available in defence? - How does Ian Murray want to use Kyle Turner? You answer the first one and work forwards, there's really no other way. If you've got Murray, it's him and Brown and then probably McGill. But if you don't have Murray and you go with Brown and Corr, do you want more solidity in there so instead it's Masson? For the second question, Turner hasn't come in to sit on the bench, so assuming he's fit to play, you start with him and then populate the rest of the midfield and attack around him. He's at his best in the middle and with an attacking brief, so for me he goes in at 10. That means you're moving Vaughan, either to the bench or up front. For me, he's got to start and so does Hamilton, so I'm already looking at a 4-1-3-2. Byrne sits and you've just got to pick any two wide players. The acid test is then whether Turner offers enough defensively/without the ball (a la Sam Stanton).

Grass pitches should be banned in the second tier IMO.

"Well, here's your problem..."

Prioritising one signing over another. Hardly the actions of a club 'overstretching the budget', is it?

We were outbid for our own defender by Partick Thistle literally 24 hours ago.

Thanks for reading, Gaffer x