The New Raith Rovers Thread

[grumswall]

4 minutes ago, Scary Bear said:

 

You got the hairline more accurate at least... 

[foreverarover]

We had poplatnik who started scoring once he was given a run in a two just sat on the bench and getting the last 15/20 for months. The blame for that falls at mcglynns feet this season. 

If we had played Poplatnik earlier in the season I'd think the signing of Gullen wouldn't have happened. I'd have moved to secure Poplatnik on a pre contract and find a player to create things for him to finish.

[SirJimmyofNic]

12 minutes ago, foreverarover said:

5 hours ago, grumswall said:

We had poplatnik who started scoring once he was given a run in a two just sat on the bench and getting the last 15/20 for months. The blame for that falls at mcglynns feet this season. 

If we had played Poplatnik earlier in the season I'd think the signing of Gullen wouldn't have happened. I'd gave moved to secure Poplatnik on a pre contract and find a player to create things for him to finish.

I'll take that a step further and add you know who to that as well, there was no need for any of it 

[grumswall]

8 minutes ago, foreverarover said:

5 hours ago, grumswall said:

We had poplatnik who started scoring once he was given a run in a two just sat on the bench and getting the last 15/20 for months. The blame for that falls at mcglynns feet this season. 

If we had played Poplatnik earlier in the season I'd think the signing of Gullen wouldn't have happened. I'd gave moved to secure Poplatnik on a pre contract and find a player to create things for him to finish.

Poplatnik doesn't work as well in a 1 up front system. That's, imo at least, why mcglynn didn't play him for so long. Mcglynn wanted to persist with tactics that worked last season without the personnel to do so this season. We got away with that for the first quarter because the likes of dario was stepping up and banging the goals in.

I honestly don't rate gullan as highly as most do. He seems the type of player who is decent enough but doesn't have a single position that he is best played in. 

 

My pick for poty was Connolly and I think its fantastic to see that he's got a couple of awards for that tonight. Macdonald was a close second for me. 

[baillieinleeds]

2 minutes ago, grumswall said:

Poplatnik doesn't work as well in a 1 up front system. That's, imo at least, why mcglynn didn't play him for so long. Mcglynn wanted to persist with tactics that worked last season without the personnel to do so this season. We got away with that for the first quarter because the likes of dario was stepping up and banging the goals in.

I honestly don't rate gullan as highly as most do. He seems the type of player who is decent enough but doesn't have a single position that he is best played in. 

 

My pick for poty was Connolly and I think its fantastic to see that he's got a couple of awards for that tonight. Macdonald was a close second for me. 

I knew Connolly would get awards. What were they for??

[grumswall]

1 minute ago, baillieinleeds said:

I knew Connolly would get awards. What were they for??

Gaffers and players player 

[SirJimmyofNic]

Arnott with young player of the year and McDonald supporters player of the year

[SirJimmyofNic]

btw whats John McGlynn done to his face , has he had a fall

[grumswall]

3 minutes ago, SirJimmyofNic said:

btw whats John McGlynn done to his face , has he had a fall

Aye he's went from 3rd to 5th in 12 months

[SirJimmyofNic]

6 minutes ago, grumswall said:

Aye he's went from 3rd to 5th in 12 months

I asked fur that richt enough

[Specky Ginger]

2 hours ago, grumswall said:

Anyone at the poty doo? Haven't seen anything said about it on the rovers twitter etc tonight. 

Not sure how many people were going.

Everyone I spoke to at Hamilton today was giving it a miss.

MacDonald was Supporters' POTY,

Connolly the Players' and Manager's POTY.

Matthews v Killie was Goal of the season.

My son reeled this off. There were other awards which I can't recall.

[foreverarover]

A few things concerm me with McGlynn. 1:- unless Poplatnik has been hopeless in training for the most part why has it taken so long for him to get his chance. 2:- the failure in most occasions to make substitutions at the right time. 3:-To actually make a substitution that changes the game or changes the shape of the team for the better. 4:- Today's game highlighted the next issue. Hamilton had a corner kick, They had two players at the half way line and a further 2 players outside the 18 yard box. We continually have 11 men in the 6 yard box. A header out led to not a fucking soul out there to try to get on the end of it or to even cause havoc to stop it coming straight back into the box. For me it's time for him to go.

[grumswall]

5 minutes ago, Specky Ginger said:

Not sure how many people were going.

Everyone I spoke to at Hamilton today was giving it a miss.

MacDonald was Supporters' POTY,

Connolly the Players' and Manager's POTY.

Matthews v Killie was Goal of the season.

My son reeled this off. There were other awards which I can't recall.

All available on the rovers twitter page now. 

[Raith_Raver]

4 hours ago, buchan30 said:

If we keep defending the way we do, we will. I think if Mcglynn stays, we could possibly start next season with a bit of a hangover from this one and we could find ourselves up against it. It’s been good to get a few back to back wins, but I think it papers over the cracks. Getting Lang back would be a boost, as long as it’s not bene in there beside him. I thought we would finish 6th this year and would have been happy at that, but after being where we were 5th feels like a bit of a disappointment.

We've an average goals loss of 1.23 per game this league campaign despite missing key defenders and DMs for long periods. According to you that could be enough for us to nose dive next season...

Back to back away wins, without conceeding is "papering over the cracks".  What cracks?

You would have been happy with 6th but feel disappointed with 5th. Another of your DA Baracus type contradictions.

And no credit given to McGlynn for the period for "where we were", instead it'll likely be a hangover if he stays. LIke several other McGlynn knockers on here you're irrational and one sided, but that post is a speciman.

[CALDERON]

I wouldn't have taken 5th if offered at the start of the season, and it's frankly shocking given where we were at one stage. Expectations can be relative, and when you are sitting a few points clear of Kilmarnock on mid December,  sitting 20 points behind them before you've had your Easter Eggs is pretty horrendous.  Thats not to say 5th by default is a disaster, but to have went on such a dreadful run and still be within touching distance is incredibly frustrating.  The season has been an absolutely massive missed opportunity.  This has been a poor league, and for a decent amount of time this season we were one of the poorest sides in it.  Regardless of injuries etc that wasn't good enough.

The decision to retain Mcglynn or not is only as good as his replacement.  It's slim pickings out there so it's a big call.  Has Mcglynn turned into a bad manager all of a sudden? Of course not.  But there are lessons that absolutely need to be learned this season.

Unfortunately,  the Goodwillie thing is the obvious elephant in the room that this season will be remembered for.  A mistake of epic proportions.  However, the harsh reality is that its happened, it can't be reversed, and it's hard to see a situation where those at the top of thr club can be removed.  Those are the facts and it's a case of either moving on or letting go,, for the time being anyway.

I have sympathy over the injuries,  to a degree.  It was heart breaking to see Vaughan succumb to that injury again.  However, we all knew deep down it was inevitable and it will always be in the back of everyone's mind.  I'm delighted for Vaughan to be at Raith Rovers as long as he wants, but he has to been seen as a luxury or a nice to have.  Building a team around him is not feasible.

Some injuries have been rotten luck (Spencer etc) however Lang is one that is frustrating, given his injured status when signing.  

I can't help but wonder if it can all be down to luck however. 

I'm glad the season is over as there are a few clouds that need to clear.  But with Partick getting their business started for next year,  it highlights the size of the job needing done - whilst we are no clearer as to who the management team will be.

Edited April 24, 2022 by CALDERON

[buchan30]

We've an average goals loss of 1.23 per game this league campaign despite missing key defenders and DMs for long periods. According to you that could be enough for us to nose dive next season...

Back to back away wins, without conceeding is "papering over the cracks".  What cracks?
You would have been happy with 6th but feel disappointed with 5th. Another of your DA Baracus type contradictions.
And no credit given to McGlynn for the period for "where we were", instead it'll likely be a hangover if he stays. LIke several other McGlynn knockers on here you're irrational and one sided, but that post is a speciman.

The defending i have seen and 3 wins in 18 (the paper over the cracks) is enough to make me a little worried for next year. Especially if we are going into next season on the back of that run of form against the same sides, with the same team. But as i said if we get lang back that may change, just like things do in football. I thought him and Berra were a good partnership. And things do change in football, especially expectations. I don’t think it is unfair to be disappointed with a 5th place finish, when we were joint top at one point this season. Just because we finished a place above where i thought we would be, you seem to think i should be grateful. And as for praising Mcglynn, yeah he deserves credit for where we are, but by that same logic it is his doing that has us where we are since December.

[Raith_Raver]

1 hour ago, buchan30 said:

The defending i have seen and 3 wins in 18 (the paper over the cracks) is enough to make me a little worried for next year. Especially if we are going into next season on the back of that run of form against the same sides, with the same team.

But it won't be the same team -  McGlynn can't be judged on the performance of teams he has had to scramble together and next season he should have a fit squad. OK three wins in 18 is an empirical fact, but it doesnt tell the whole story; we were the better team in most of these games and hardly got a break - the matches against Arbroath and ICT for example, and several others.

[Scary Bear]

Just the TV dead rubber against Killie to go, then the season is over for us.

We’re eternally shite in the play-offs, so I wasn’t that fussed about missing out on them. Especially when we would have been starting the play-offs from 4th place.

I am disappointed that we couldn’t maintain a league title challenge, given our strong first half of the season. The Goodwillie signing, and subsequent furore and resignations, and the cup win will be what the season is remembered for.

I also think there will be a hangover, as the Goodwillie situation has not been fully resolved as he’s still an employee and it’ll take a while for this all to completely blow over. A stupid and short-sighted decision causing long-lasting distrust and bad feeling.

Anyway, next season will be here before we know it. Those League Cup group stages where we get to see next seasons crop. Just need to see what happens in the interim.

Edited April 24, 2022 by Scary Bear

[Michael W]

The back to back wins are ultimately too late. We've managed three league wins since mid-December and, frankly, don't deserve a playoff place for that run of form. It is incredible we can actually still make them, albeit we'd have to thump Killie and Ayr would have to thump Partick. That's not going to happen. 

It has been an exceptionally frustrating season: that horrible run of form, *that* signing, throwing away a four goal lead against Hamilton in the first game and indeed the amount of points that have been dropped from winning positions this season generally. 

Make no mistake - we have thrown away an absolutely wonderful opportunity here. All of the teams on the playoff positions have had their issues, with both Caley and Partick joining us on extended bad runs. Arbroath have had quite a lot of draws and Killie have not been runaway leaders either. Indeed, we've beaten them three times this season. Given where we were we ought to have had a better challenge at the title, and at the very least we should have managed to secure a playoff position. Failing to do so is piss poor. 

Investment was made in the team. We brought players in in January and we signed Ethan Ross, who was a free agent. You can't say McGlynn wasn't backed. Yes there have been a lot of injuries too, but we weren't in crisis mode throughout the whole of the bad run. Failing to play the only available striker that is capable of scoring a handful of goals until late on in the season and dreadful game management seeing a procession of points dropped due to late equalisers or winners conceded are management failings. 

A promising season has been thrown away and it is a hugely missed opportunity. It will be quite ironic if we can string three wins together for the first time in forever and it doesn't do anything for us unless we manage an eight or potentially nine goal GD reversal. 

Time for change. 

[R.R.FC]

Looking at it purely from an on the pitch point of view, I can definitely see both sides of the argument in terms of McGlynn. I have chopped and changed my mind several times in recent months. The recent wins, although ultimately too little too late have at least given me hope that McGlynn has stopped the decline and we won’t be going into next season on the back of 1 win in 19 league games which it seemed we were on course for.

We’ve won 4 out of our last 8 games in all competitions and should probably have taken more from the Inverness and Morton home games so there is at least something positive to build on. However, we have still thrown in some horrendous performances in recent months (Killie away, Ayr at home, Pars away).

Ultimately, this season has been a massive missed opportunity but I don’t think it can be called a disaster (on the field anyway!!). We have finished 5th, won the diddy cup and the only cup games we have lost were at Parkhead to the best team in the country. We have only had 3 better league finishes in the last 23 years.

McGlynn mentioned in his post match interview yesterday that we have perhaps been victims of our own success, in that if we hadn’t done so well as a newly promoted side last year, people wouldn’t have been expecting play offs again this year and 5th might have been viewed more positively but I don’t agree with that. It was McGlynn himself who constantly stated in interviews throughout the season that we were going for the title and it was a great opportunity. Injuries or not, if you say that halfway through the season and then finish 5th and 17 points off the champions you are going to be criticised. It’s a poor league and we were the worst team in it for good amount of time.

Looking at the points breakdown by quarters of the season, we accumulated the following:

Q1: 17      
Q2: 16     
Q3: 6    
Q4: 10 (so far)

If we had matched our Q1 and Q2 points totals we’d be level points with Killie after next week. So it’s not like any team has kicked on and pulled away from us, we didn’t have to improve from where we were the first 2 quarters, we just had to maintain it and that’s frustrating.

Obviously, injuries have played a part, the bottom half teams have improved resulting in less easy games but our record against the bottom teams in the first two quarters wasn’t perfect anyway so I don’t think it’s as simple as that. McGlynn has to take his fair share of blame for some poor player and formation choices. Confidence and momentum is obviously a huge thing in football too, once we lost that, it highlighted the shortcomings of the squad that weren’t obvious when we were riding the crest of the wave. 

The late collapses aren’t a fitness issue in my opinion, it is a result of the psychological damage caused by the opening day of the season. I think McGlynn deserves credit for lifting the team after that and having a strong start to the season but the mental impact when we have been defending leads is obvious. I am hopeful that will be sorted next year a few new faces and a fresh start.

Didn’t mean for this to be as long winded as it has turned out. If you had asked me 2 weeks ago, I’d have said McGlynn definitely had to go but there is evidence now he may have stopped the rot. With a few injuries back and some good summer additions I could be convinced he is the right man to take us forward. I don’t think he could have any major complaints if he was let go though given the collapse of the season for which he has definitely been culpable. As said elsewhere, I hope the decision is confirmed this week so that if he does go, he can get a good send off on Friday, and if he’s staying we can get planning the squad for next season as soon as possible.