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Atlis I agree with some of what you're saying, but I don't hold back, what I see in a game, I speak my mind
The biggest problem is this system of playing 2 defensive midfielders

Bartley is finished, Holt does nothing  positive, constantly hiding, passes the ball back and to the side, midfielders should be going forward, not playing in front of a defence, If the team is struggling in a game, get another defender on, and leave the midfield for getting  forward.
In other words there shouldn't be such a thing as a defensive  midfielder.

Lawson is another player we know can be good, but also can disappear more often than not

Sibbald and Pittman can be good, and would benefit from another 2 good attacking  midfielders alongside.

Fizzywater in my opinion is not a central defender, he's lightweight, not  solid or commanding enough, gets caught out of position too often.

Overall there's way too many players that panic and rush passes, not enough composure, Forrest, and Pittman to lesser  extent come under this category

Jet could  be ok for 45min if he had another striker and more attacking midfielders around him, playing up front himself is totally  baffling

What I've seen of Hamilton is not good enough for this league, he's not mobile enough, his lack of a good positioning sense and work rate is limited .
 
The very first thing Martindale needs to do is look at his formation, because 4-2-3-1 is not working.
You can keep changing  players about, but that won't solve you're  chance of winning  with this system

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2 hours ago, Scrutinizer said:

Atlis I agree with some of what you're saying, but I don't hold back, what I see in a game, I speak my mind
The biggest problem is this system of playing 2 defensive midfielders

Bartley is finished, Holt does nothing  positive, constantly hiding, passes the ball back and to the side, midfielders should be going forward, not playing in front of a defence, If the team is struggling in a game, get another defender on, and leave the midfield for getting  forward.
In other words there shouldn't be such a thing as a defensive  midfielder.

Lawson is another player we know can be good, but also can disappear more often than not

Sibbald and Pittman can be good, and would benefit from another 2 good attacking  midfielders alongside.

Fizzywater in my opinion is not a central defender, he's lightweight, not  solid or commanding enough, gets caught out of position too often.

Overall there's way too many players that panic and rush passes, not enough composure, Forrest, and Pittman to lesser  extent come under this category

Jet could  be ok for 45min if he had another striker and more attacking midfielders around him, playing up front himself is totally  baffling

What I've seen of Hamilton is not good enough for this league, he's not mobile enough, his lack of a good positioning sense and work rate is limited .
 
The very first thing Martindale needs to do is look at his formation, because 4-2-3-1 is not working.
You can keep changing  players about, but that won't solve you're  chance of winning  with this system

I'd like to see us go back to the 352 or do a 433.

If we could pick up someone like Regan Hendry then we're laughing. Bartley was finished at the start of the season according to some but he's done well in a lot of games. Maybe not got it in him to do anything against Hibs/Celtic/Rangers but one for the likes of Hamilton/Motherwell etc... where he can use his experience to the betterment of the result.

Holt's big issue is that he's good at many things, perfect at none. He has so many good qualities but nothing sets him above another. Good player for supplementing real star level quality which we don't have. 

Lawson hasn't showed what it takes to stay. Good guy but the epitome of inconsistency and always prone to a mistake.

Sibbald/Pittman/Hendry middle 3 would be fantastic IMO but maybe a bit prone to not having that real powerhouse in the middle. Here's hoping (if we buy him) Diani can bulk up and become that for us. He's about 6'5, if he puts on muscle he'll be incredible. Saw someone mention prime Yaya Touré just from his physique alone :D Wonder what Odoffin's contract situation is if Hamilton go down, maybe a relegation clause? 

Fitz is on a 3 year deal, so I can't see him away. Will concede that he'd be a decent backup/rotation option for us until he gets more consistent or just gets better in general. 

I don't reckon it's worth keeping Jet around for an occasional hit or miss 45 minutes

Hamilton needs a chance, a full run of a season in the team or off the bench to see how he competes. He's scored something like 13 goals in 20 league games. If that was any other player in League 1/Championship we'd be falling over ourselves to beg the club to sign him. He's still only 20. He turns 21 in June. Over 3 leagues and 2 cups this season he has a goal every 141 minutes. He needs to get a chance.

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Before people start talking about binning player I would point out that we're not in the financial position to replace them.

Unfortunately we don't have a reserve system and the youth system has been out since the Braveheart debacle.

At the moment financial survival should be the primary concern.

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3 hours ago, Durnford said:

Before people start talking about binning player I would point out that we're not in the financial position to replace them.

Unfortunately we don't have a reserve system and the youth system has been out since the Braveheart debacle.

At the moment financial survival should be the primary concern.

We can always replace those on the same wages as those outgoing? We've settled all of our remaining debt with Nixon and hold no further debt. I see absolutely no reason why there should be any worry about financial survival at all. We do have a reserve/youth team though, just not a youth system. Remember we also have links with local junior sides as well 

 

3 hours ago, Yflab said:

....

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Suggestions that Bartley is finished are absolutely insane. He's been arguably our best player this season. Perhaps he wont play 40 games next season if he'll be 35, but there'll be a role for him at Livi for a couple of years yet.

Both 4-2-3-1 and 3-5-2 have been great for us in our time in the Premiership. We have the 2nd lowest budget in the league and we're currently 5th, it's clearly working quite well. That's not to say there couldn't be improvements however. I don't think formation is our problem, IMO our biggest weakness this season has been at set pieces - we were phenomenal at them for our first 2 seasons in the prem but I suspect that high player turnover has led to this being eroded a little. I reckon pre-season will include a lot of set-piece training, Martindale's made a couple of comments suggesting that he sees this and is aiming to rectify it.

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Cant help thinking there was a fundamental difference between the long throws taken by Cairon Brown and Nicky Devlin.

Both seem to get more or less the same distance but Devlin's throws seem to use height to gain the distance whereas Brown seemed to use pure power.

Unfortunately the recent throw-ins by Devlin seem to hang in the air; giving the opposition defence ample time to prepare; by contrast it did seem that Brown's deliveries got to their location far faster almost acting like a corner of free kick.

We know in the past Lithgow's throws to the near post were particularly effective but unfortunately he's currently almost a passenger elsewhere. Bringing him on at the Celtic game seemed almost a swansong move.

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3 hours ago, thruthenight said:

Suggestions that Bartley is finished are absolutely insane. He's been arguably our best player this season. Perhaps he wont play 40 games next season if he'll be 35, but there'll be a role for him at Livi for a couple of years yet.

Both 4-2-3-1 and 3-5-2 have been great for us in our time in the Premiership. We have the 2nd lowest budget in the league and we're currently 5th, it's clearly working quite well. That's not to say there couldn't be improvements however. I don't think formation is our problem, IMO our biggest weakness this season has been at set pieces - we were phenomenal at them for our first 2 seasons in the prem but I suspect that high player turnover has led to this being eroded a little. I reckon pre-season will include a lot of set-piece training, Martindale's made a couple of comments suggesting that he sees this and is aiming to rectify it.

Yep, as is saying Holt does nothing positive, complete nonsense. This guy pops up whenever we have a bad result and tells us how pish our players are, what about all the games we won and drew to get us 5th in the league, that doesn't suggest our squad is full of imposters. On our budget we have absolutely no right to have back to back top 6 finishes, St Mirren just missed out on top six and are not scrambling to hold onto 8th place, which btw, would still be a good finish for them with the budget they have, and they're above us on that score, which shows how much we've punched above our weight.

This is the same squad of players that had back to back draws with Celtic, lost by just one goal at Celtic park before that, got a draw against the best team in the Country by a mile at home, only just lost by one goal in the 87th min the next time we played them at home, beat the 3rd best team away, and drew at home with them too (and Holt was one of our best players in that game). 

Yes we have bad results too, that same 3rd best team humped us silly at home earlier in the season, does that mean those same players should all be binned, course not, and neither does us being gubbed by a rejuvenated Celtic going for a Scottish cup win over Sevco next week.

Our heaviest defeat against the title winners this season was 2-0 at Ibrox, we've conceded 3 goals in 3 games against them (so far anyway), teams far bigger than us have been humped by them, Aberdeen lost 4-0, bad results happen, esp against the top 2 teams on their own patch, we've had a few 5-1 defeats against Celtic, the best Livi team in our history, that finished 3rd lost 5-1 to Celtic at Celtic Park, just lucky for them Scrutinizer wasn't around to tell them like it is about how shite they were.

 

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10 hours ago, ATLIS said:

We can always replace those on the same wages as those outgoing? We've settled all of our remaining debt with Nixon and hold no further debt. I see absolutely no reason why there should be any worry about financial survival at all. We do have a reserve/youth team though, just not a youth system. Remember we also have links with local junior sides as well 

 

???

If we start making wholesale squad changes we're in danger of having a season like Hamilton, sticking as closely to unforced changes, and having as much continuity as we can has served us well these past 5 seasons, there are areas we need strengthening but that doesn't mean ripping up the squad to start again, that would be disastrous imo. We've still a decent spine to the team, as thruthenight said, set pieces have been our main weakness for conceding goals, and we're looking to bring in a couple of big physical defenders for next season. 

Edited by LIVIFOREVER
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I think it's a case of "better the devil you know" with a lot of these players. The majority of them have helped us to our second and third best placed finish, so I'd be wary of any wholesale changes in the squad as bringing in 10/15 new players, on our budget, could easily see us relegated. 

From memory, our last spell in the SPL saw massive squad (and managerial) turnover the last two years, so once you're in that cycle it's easy to continually be sucked into relegation battles. 

 

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9 hours ago, LIVIFOREVER said:

If we start making wholesale squad changes we're in danger of having a season like Hamilton, sticking as closely to unforced changes, and having as much continuity as we can has served us well these past 5 seasons, there are areas we need strengthening but that doesn't mean ripping up the squad to start again, that would be disastrous imo. We've still a decent spine to the team, as thruthenight said, set pieces have been our main weakness for conceding goals, and we're looking to bring in a couple of big physical defenders for next season. 

I'm not sure we'll miss the likes of Lawson, Robinson, Jet, Lithgow and ATS. I'd say it's healthy for the squad to have some rotation in the squad. Nearly all of those players there have struggled to make an impact/step up. If we get guys like Obileye/Hendry in to replace them, it's bringing in guys who can compete with Guthrie/Bartley/Sibbald and show what they can do. Whereas Sibbad/Guthrie/Bartley has won the battle against those mentioned at the start. Healthy competition and improvement on the players leaving.

I wouldn't say all of those leaving is ripping anything up as only 1 is a regular starter and that's Jet :D The wages they're on could absolutely go towards a player showing up strongly in the Championship and ambitious for the step up or a gem from abroad

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Hamilton deserves a chance I’d say. He’s had some very good all round games and some poor performances too but he knows where the goal is. Always fancy him to get a goal from somewhere. He’s still young, I think a season of getting games at you will be great for you and him. 

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19 hours ago, ATLIS said:

I'm not sure we'll miss the likes of Lawson, Robinson, Jet, Lithgow and ATS. I'd say it's healthy for the squad to have some rotation in the squad. Nearly all of those players there have struggled to make an impact/step up. If we get guys like Obileye/Hendry in to replace them, it's bringing in guys who can compete with Guthrie/Bartley/Sibbald and show what they can do. Whereas Sibbad/Guthrie/Bartley has won the battle against those mentioned at the start. Healthy competition and improvement on the players leaving.

I wouldn't say all of those leaving is ripping anything up as only 1 is a regular starter and that's Jet :D The wages they're on could absolutely go towards a player showing up strongly in the Championship and ambitious for the step up or a gem from abroad

Yeah Lawson is too hot and cold, never seems to play the same 2 games running, think JET has shown signs he could be decent for us next season though, esp after a full pre season training under his belt, wouldn't mind keeping him on. Jury is out on Lithgow, at least deserves a chance to see if he's able to get back to his best, hopefully see him getting a couple of games in, but suppose it depends on us having 5th place secured from St Johnstone, or if we're even still in with a chance at 4th.

 

ATS has been shut out this season, so doesn't look like he'll be here next season, same with Robbo, the likes of Hamilton still has a chance of making it in the first team, would like him to get his chance next season, not sure about Tiffoney, but he's doing well at Partick, maybe just needs a decent run of games at Livi. 

One thing this time round, it doesn't look like we'll lose as many big players as we did the prev 2 seasons, i like Robbo, he's been a good player for us, and gives it everything when he plays, but he isn't a Dykes or Lawless that we'll miss him as much. Marv and Holt will still be here, imo they'd be bigger losses than Robbo, they bring a lot to our midfield, Marv's experience is invaluable for us too, Sibbs has come into his own too, so signs are looking good for us next season if we can just add a few new faces to push the players we have, and keep this incredible journey back into the top flight going.  Martindale knows the areas we need to strengthen too, and is already making moves to bring in some big physical players.

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On 11/04/2021 at 19:07, Scrutinizer said:

midfielders should be going forward, not playing in front of a defence, If the team is struggling in a game, get another defender on, and leave the midfield for getting  forward.
In other words there shouldn't be such a thing as a defensive  midfielder.

Arrigo Sacchi first popularised the flat back 4 in the early 1990s. He pushed up the sweeper to in line with the centre back, creating two centre backs. This pushed the full backs wider.  The "libero" function the now-defunct sweeper role had previously performed; that is, starting attacking build ups by bringing the ball out from the defensive line, was from then on instead performed by a holding central midfielder. The holding (though not necessarily always defensive) central midfielder holding their deep position while the team had possession allowed the full backs to join attacks - becoming the new wingers, and wide midfielders to drift infield - becoming the new attacking midfielders, as the full backs overlapped them.

 

The second advantage to using a holding central midfielder rather than a sweeper was it allowed defensive lines to play much higher, which shunted the entire team higher and put more pressure on opponents both with possession and without. The higher starting position of a holding midfielder compared to the sweeper position it replaced also allowed opposition counter attacks to be snuffed out earlier, farther from goal.

If you want to do away with holding central midfielders then you'd be going back to the 1980s, which is the last time teams played without them.

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Lawson is possibly our most frustrating player; on his day he's almost unbeatable; unfortunately that day only seems to appear in about 25% of his games. The rest of the time he's error prone and second to pretty much every ball. If we could isolate that 25% Steve Lawson so that he played like that every game then we'd have a world beater.

Robinson's speed and tenacity up front will be a miss but hopefully Tiffoney or even Kouider Aissa could fill into that position. I Though Reilly had started to show some promise before he got injured as well.

Jet is a difficult one - I believe his physical strength and control means he's a real asset in the opposition penalty area; unfortunately his lack of acceleration means that he's quite easy to defend against as a lone striker. I'd like to see him remain but only with adequate support.

Lithgow; I've made my position clear previously - undoubtedly a great servant to the club but unlikely to ever reach the level he attained before his series of injuries.

As for ATS he (and for that matter Jack McMillan) is a bit of an enigma. Seems to have moved right down the pecking order but I'm not convinced he's any worse than either Fitzwater or Longridge TBH.

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13 hours ago, FreedomFarter said:

Arrigo Sacchi first popularised the flat back 4 in the early 1990s. He pushed up the sweeper to in line with the centre back, creating two centre backs. This pushed the full backs wider.  The "libero" function the now-defunct sweeper role had previously performed; that is, starting attacking build ups by bringing the ball out from the defensive line, was from then on instead performed by a holding central midfielder. The holding (though not necessarily always defensive) central midfielder holding their deep position while the team had possession allowed the full backs to join attacks - becoming the new wingers, and wide midfielders to drift infield - becoming the new attacking midfielders, as the full backs overlapped them.

 

The second advantage to using a holding central midfielder rather than a sweeper was it allowed defensive lines to play much higher, which shunted the entire team higher and put more pressure on opponents both with possession and without. The higher starting position of a holding midfielder compared to the sweeper position it replaced also allowed opposition counter attacks to be snuffed out earlier, farther from goal.

If you want to do away with holding central midfielders then you'd be going back to the 1980s, which is the last time teams played without them.

Yeah both our 'holding midfielders' push up anyway, Marv has made runs up the wing now and then, last season he planted one on Dykes head for him to score, after hitting the byeline. He played in Devlin for his assist a couple of games ago, a lot of nonsense saying he just stays in his own half and doesn't attack. Same with Holt, pretty sure it was him that played in Serrano for his thunderfuck shot of a goal against Celtic in our 3-2 defeat there earlier in the season, and had the assist for Robbo's winning goal against Killie away. Could be wrong but i think it was also Holt that played a ball to the back post for Devlin to score a goal this season too.  Both of them help out in attack when they can, but against the better teams we'll be pinned back and it's harder for them to get up the pitch as much.

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9 hours ago, Durnford said:

Lawson is possibly our most frustrating player; on his day he's almost unbeatable; unfortunately that day only seems to appear in about 25% of his games. The rest of the time he's error prone and second to pretty much every ball. If we could isolate that 25% Steve Lawson so that he played like that every game then we'd have a world beater.

Robinson's speed and tenacity up front will be a miss but hopefully Tiffoney or even Kouider Aissa could fill into that position. I Though Reilly had started to show some promise before he got injured as well.

Jet is a difficult one - I believe his physical strength and control means he's a real asset in the opposition penalty area; unfortunately his lack of acceleration means that he's quite easy to defend against as a lone striker. I'd like to see him remain but only with adequate support.

Lithgow; I've made my position clear previously - undoubtedly a great servant to the club but unlikely to ever reach the level he attained before his series of injuries.

As for ATS he (and for that matter Jack McMillan) is a bit of an enigma. Seems to have moved right down the pecking order but I'm not convinced he's any worse than either Fitzwater or Longridge TBH.

I'd agree with all of this to be honest, I think ATS's main issue is he was signed as an attacking LB yet this season he's replaced Cieron Brown as a LCB/LB. I'd like to see McMillan given more of a chance, before this season he seemed to almost be an automatic pick against the Old Firm and other big games so it's weird he's been dropped in favour of Serrano, Brown, Longridge and (briefly) Ambrose.

In terms of those leaving Lithgow has always been fairly limited in the Premiership and given he's been injured for over a year, while we've pushed into the top 6, I'd be surprised if he stays. Robbo is a loss, however it's not exactly Dykes/Lawless/Halkett leaving and I'd say Poplatnik/Tiffoney can give us the energy up front. 

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Yeah both our 'holding midfielders' push up anyway, Marv has made runs up the wing now and then, last season he planted one on Dykes head for him to score, after hitting the byeline. He played in Devlin for his assist a couple of games ago, a lot of nonsense saying he just stays in his own half and doesn't attack. Same with Holt, pretty sure it was him that played in Serrano for his thunderfuck shot of a goal against Celtic in our 3-2 defeat there earlier in the season, and had the assist for Robbo's winning goal against Killie away. Could be wrong but i think it was also Holt that played a ball to the back post for Devlin to score a goal this season too.  Both of them help out in attack when they can, but against the better teams we'll be pinned back and it's harder for them to get up the pitch as much.
I don't get people moaning about Holt or Bartley dropping deeper. The same people moan that Devlin doesn't get forward enough. It's Bartley and Holt's jobs to cover for the full backs bombing forward.
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On 09/04/2021 at 19:47, ATLIS said:

Livingston face European football exclusion over regulations failure - BBC Sport

Hope to f**k we sort this out if we do qualify. Would be a sickener to miss out

Fact, LFC will not play in Europe next season be because of the no production of 19/20 Accounts. 

1. Can someone tell me why please? 

2. Why they have not been produced? 

3. What the problem is? 

4. What is the names of the Auditors and Accountants responsible for this? 

5. Who at the club is responsible for not submitting and ultimately denying our club the right to play in Europe should we achieve the desired position in the league? 

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