The New Raith Rovers Thread

[Been going too long]

56 minutes ago, Wardy said:

I’d prefer to see Zannatta play through the middle. 

You forgot to add at another club

[raith1974]

Zanatta has looked quite good 2nd half, still sadly lacking someone or someone's up front, Berra not convinced about and we need someone else in midfield.

[raith1974]

Also the trialist that came on 2nd half is nowhere near good enough. The boy from Ireland had some nice passes and keeps it simple but sits far too deep and doesn't appear to have a tackle in him.

[Been going too long]

1 hour ago, raith1974 said:

Zanatta has looked quite good 2nd half, still sadly lacking someone or someone's up front, Berra not convinced about and we need someone else in midfield.

He infuriates me, he can beat a player no doubt about it but doesn’t work hard enough but hopefully Mcglynn will get a performance out of him , the Irish lad was ok but is he the answer Hoping Mcglynn has a couple of good loans lined up

Edited June 29, 2021 by Been going too long

[grumswall]

He infuriates me, he can beat a player no doubt it but doesn’t work hard enough but hopefully Mcglynn will get a performance out of him , the Irish lad was ok but is he the answer[emoji2371] Hoping Mcglynn has a couple of good loans lined up

This is what baffled me about mcglynn signing zannata. He isn't known for his work rate. There is a player in there though. If anyone can get it out of him then mcglynn can.

[TxRover]

Watched little of today’s Clyde “match”, but Liam Dick looked tidy and capable. listening to the post game from Saturday, Greg Young of Fife Elite was the trialist for the  game at LB, and JMcG seems to like his development for his age and lack of recent playing time over the shutdown. He also seems hopeful that Arnott will play a role in the middle, pretty happy with Mitchell and very high on Keatings. Makes me suspect additional signings may not be likely, and it’ll simply be loanees, except perhaps another mid.

[renton]

3 hours ago, TxRover said:

Watched little of today’s Clyde “match”, but Liam Dick looked tidy and capable. listening to the post game from Saturday, Greg Young of Fife Elite was the trialist for the  game at LB, and JMcG seems to like his development for his age and lack of recent playing time over the shutdown. He also seems hopeful that Arnott will play a role in the middle, pretty happy with Mitchell and very high on Keatings. Makes me suspect additional signings may not be likely, and it’ll simply be loanees, except perhaps another mid.

Even with Matthews and Masonda fit (and to a lesser degree, Lang and McKay)  we'd still be 3 to 4 guys short. Guys good enough to be consistent starters, to provide competition. We have two wide players and two forwards. We won't make it far into the season with those kind of numbers: Grant Murray tried that in 13/14 and went on a 21 game run with no wins.

Nah, if McGlynn is looking at that and thinking, yeah that's a good enough squad for the season then we're as well breaking out the Grangemouth tourist guides.

[Jilted John]

Ok so here’s my tuppenceworth so far in no particular order…

I’m quite surprised that Berra has taken a bit of stick on here so far. I thought he looked decent enough in the two games.

Connolly looked useful. I think once he gets a bit of sharpness about him he will get back to the player we had a few years ago!

I’m not convinced that Vaughan/Keatings will work as a front pairing. Both are too similar. 

Tumilty is the best right back in the league.

Coulston and Mitchell have very bright futures ahead of them.

[Wardy]

33 minutes ago, renton said:

Even with Matthews and Masonda fit (and to a lesser degree, Lang and McKay)  we'd still be 3 to 4 guys short. Guys good enough to be consistent starters, to provide competition. We have two wide players and two forwards. We won't make it far into the season with those kind of numbers: Grant Murray tried that in 13/14 and went on a 21 game run with no wins.

Nah, if McGlynn is looking at that and thinking, yeah that's a good enough squad for the season then we're as well breaking out the Grangemouth tourist guides.

Have you seen some of the other teams signings? Lower mid table yes. Relegation? Hmmm. But we all know how easy it is to get trapped down there with useless pish for players and managers. Can’t see that under McGlynn. 

[R.R.FC]

An important thing to remember about most of the new signings is that they have not played a lot of football recently (obviously that raises some red flags of its own but still…). Whilst we played our last game on the 15th May, they have the following (if soccerbase is correct):

Christophe Berra - 2 appearances since January, last appearance in March.

James Keatings - Last start March

Zanatta - Last start February

Connolly - Last start December 2020

So it’s unrealistic to expect any of these players to be at their best after 2 pre season games, it’ll take a while to get up to speed. Don’t get me wrong, I still have my reservations about Berra and Zanatta in particular but it’s fair to give them time to get up to speed first before making any definitive judgements. We have never progressed from the League Cup groups so I don’t see it being a priority. As long as we’re up to speed and firing for the first league game, that is all that matters.

We absolutely need another 3/4 signings though. Centre mid, winger and striker as a minimum. If Matthews is going to be out for months we need a replacement in a similar style to him because his role is key for us. I am pretty confident we’ll see another couple of permanent signings and then a couple of loans to take us to where we need to be.

[renton]

24 minutes ago, Wardy said:

Have you seen some of the other teams signings? Lower mid table yes. Relegation? Hmmm. But we all know how easy it is to get trapped down there with useless pish for players and managers. Can’t see that under McGlynn. 

The difference between lower mid table and relegation is about two bad results in a row in this league. Not exactly blue water between the two situations.

And currently we'd be about one hamstring injury away from not being able to get anything out of games.

I'm not trying to be deliberately negative or provocative. I do think we are badly short of players.

[Michael W]

Adam King signs. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For Alloa. 

[renton]

4 minutes ago, Michael W said:

Adam King signs. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For Alloa. 

Tx will be raging.

[Guest Peter LaFleur]

4 minutes ago, Michael W said:

Adam King signs. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For Alloa. 

I expected him to rock up to Falkirk for his last FT pay day. What a relief.

[R.R.FC]

1 hour ago, renton said:

I'm not trying to be deliberately negative or provocative. I do think we are badly short of players.

There’s not a side in the league who isn’t short of players at this stage though. We’re in a better place than most. I certainly wouldn’t be swapping squads with Ayr, Arbroath, Morton or Queen of the South at this stage and the others are also at least a few signings away like ourselves. We’re still 31 days from our first league game, McGlynn will definitely be making additions, there is no need to panic.

I’d say it’s a safe bet that after getting pumped 6-2 by Falkirk last pre season and McGlynn pinning our defensive and striking hopes on unknowns from England, nobody was predicting we’d go into the last game of the season in 2nd place.

Tougher league this season and the additions we make do need to be good quality but it would be unheard of for a Scottish lower league side to have their entire squad complete almost 5 weeks before their first league game, it just doesn’t happen. We’re not a million miles away, 3 good quality signings and a few injuries back and the squad looks totally different.

Edited June 30, 2021 by R.R.FC

[TheScarf]

Clubs always seem to sign players in 2 or 3 waves in the summer.  The Caley always seem to do it, we've had our first wave and I seriously doubt we won't sign 2/3 more before the window closes.  I'm sure you will be the same.

[Raithie]

It's easy to get sucked into the 'lets panic after a couple of friendlies' but at the moment this is all we have to gauge how the team are looking. Last night was absolutely mince with only really Dick from our newbies getting pass marks - I've not liked what I've seen thus far from Connolly and Keatings if I'm honest. Fingers crossed when the league campaign gets underway the team have a bit more bite about them. 

 

[FFC 1876]

Surely Berra and Benedictus aren't going to be Mcglynn's preferred pairing? I watched a bit of the Stanraer game the other night and anything over the top will kill them two together. 

Fans on our thread were asking for Berra to be signed last summer and he looked past it then. Never mind a year on. Obviously completely different ball game if he's got someone with pace in beside him and he doesn't have to worry about the ball over the top.

[baillieinleeds]

What happened with the Ethan Ross rumours? A player we should really have went above and beyond to sign. Kennedy will most likely sign for Partick as it’s really close to where he lives. McCall moaning about not being able to match Raith Rovers for signings is insane. They’ve done really well recently. We’ve signed injury prone players. So we’ll struggle big time. The list of players from someone up above that haven’t featured much really worries me. Either injured or haven’t shown enough desire. Zanatta is a prime example of a bad signing. We have an athletic team that like to pass the ball, Dario Zanatta won’t or can’t do that. Really hope McGlynn has an Ace up his sleeve, as this has the potential of a really hard slog. 

[TheScarf]

Let me put it this way, I don't think a single The Caley fan was bothered when Keatings left.  Injured most of the time and when he did play, you barely noticed him.