Walking Down The Halbeath Road

[DAFC.]

11 hours ago, Poet of the Macabre said:

Probably half the league right now have lower wages than us but failure is widely accepted because "at least we still have a club though".

This is the feeling that reigns at EEP, I think. The fans are just sitting on their hands accepting mediocrity. We're turning in to a QoS: just happy to be floating about the second tier not being anything special. 

[DA Baracus]

12 minutes ago, DAFC. said:

This is the feeling that reigns at EEP, I think. The fans are just sitting on their hands accepting mediocrity. We're turning in to a QoS: just happy to be floating about the second tier not being anything special. 

What do you suggest the fans do about it? March on East End and physically remove the manager?

[DAFC.]

18 minutes ago, DA Baracus said:

What do you suggest the fans do about it? March on East End and physically remove the manager?

Don't be so ridiculous. 

There's many things fans can do to express their disdain. Surely McArthur would be all ears for quarterly fan conferences for us to put forward our concerns?

[DA Baracus]

6 minutes ago, DAFC. said:

Don't be so ridiculous. 

There's many things fans can do to express their disdain. Surely McArthur would be all ears for quarterly fan conferences for us to put forward our concerns?

There are events pretty regularly where folk can express such things, but from what I gather it's usually the same small number of people who go. 

What are the concerns anyway? That the manager isn't good enough? I would agree with that but are there funds available to punt him and bring someone else in? 

[DAFC.]

4 minutes ago, DA Baracus said:

What are the concerns anyway? That the manager isn't good enough? I would agree with that but are there funds available to punt him and bring someone else in? 

A) Manager is way out his depth

B) The club is showing no ambition whatsoever, and we are regressing to the same level as the Wee Team

I sincerely hope so. 

[Chubbychops]

I would say where we are as a team at this precise moment is around Morton, QOS, Alloa etc. What differs is that our squad is full of younger players than those sides. They have spent their budget on a squad of players that are probably not going to improve much. We have guys like Edwards, Turner, Comrie, McCann etc playing in a championship first eleven for the first time. Getting game time will improve them. There is raw talent there. It's experience they need. I know from my working life that making mistakes in the early days is how you learn. That's what we are going through just now. These things don't happen over night. 

In terms of time scales I would be looking for improvement as we head towards Christmas. I also would say being stuck at the bottom Falkirk style would be unacceptable.  Let's see what happens, but it's still too early to judge if this project is a success or not.

[DA Baracus]

2 minutes ago, DAFC. said:

A) Manager is way out his depth

B) The club is showing no ambition whatsoever, and we are regressing to the same level as the Wee Team

I sincerely hope so. 

Showing no ambition? How so? I totally disagree with that.

[Stellaboz]

A lazy cliche when things aren't going well.

[D.A.F.C]

I have serious concerns about a fan financed club. It's great until the results turn and theres not the same finances.
Money good players poor form
sack manager less money worse players worse crowds worse form sack manager less money worse players part time worse crowds worse players

Pessimistic but it could happen

[Stellaboz]

You know, I'm sure there's room for absolutely anyone wanting to invest in the team.

[Poet of the Macabre]

I totally get people talking about how young the team is - Saturday's starting line-up had an average age of under 22 FFS! - but it's not a high-quality league whatsoever. With two part-time sides involved and very average to poor sides in Queen of the South, Thistle and Morton, we should be nowhere near the drop zone IMO.

I like a lot of the players Crawford brought in this summer but feel we should be doing a bit better than we are. If we could start picking up a few wins at home that would go a long way to sorting things out.

[Salvo Montalbano]

I totally get people talking about how young the team is - Saturday's starting line-up had an average age of under 22 FFS! - but it's not a high-quality league whatsoever. With two part-time sides involved and very average to poor sides in Queen of the South, Thistle and Morton, we should be nowhere near the drop zone IMO.
I like a lot of the players Crawford brought in this summer but feel we should be doing a bit better than we are. If we could start picking up a few wins at home that would go a long way to sorting things out.

Absolutely. Dundee United should run away with it, Dundee and Inverness should probably be up there but after that the league is pretty much full of meh. One of Ayr (now without McCall), Partick, Morton, Queen of the South or one of the part time teams will make 4th of we don't. I don't think it's unreasonable to think we should be challenging for that 4th place given those opponents, rather than jobbing about at the bottom hoping we don't do a total Falkirk.

[DA Baracus]

Results and ambition are different things.

We are definitely underperforming and I think the manager is the reason for this. I think he isn't up to it and will need replaced.

The club backed him as much as they could in the summer in terms of a budget. I think that we have some good players and I'm more than willing to be patient and would have settled for a decent season and finishing 5th if it meant that the team gelled and we could push on next season. We need patience and that's lacking in some folk. On the other hand loads of folk have shown loads of patience regarding Crawford. As others have said, if we wasn't a club legend then he'd be getting all kinds of abuse at games and various chants asking to resign post haste and asking the club to please terminate his contact immediately (although put in slightly less polite terms).

We can't go back to big money backers. For one, who would actually do that now anyway? Which rich person would want to sink a load of cash in to our club? It's not an investment and they'd likely lose it all. Absolutely no one is queuing up to give millions to the club.

Secondly it's just not a viable model long term. Presumably anyone wanting a big backer wants them to finance signings we can't afford just now. What happens if said backer suddenly stops throwing cash at the club for whatever reason? What if they get bored with it, or they die or their cash dries up?

Folk are grasping for easy solutions and saying that other clubs like Livingston and Ayr are doing better. True, they are, but there's no special formula here, nothing unique. They simply had the right manager at the right time(s). They had guys who could get the best out of their players at their club at the time, complemented by a couple of excellent players (Halkett etc for Livingston, Shankland for Ayr) and put together runs that saw them challenge at the top of the table. Hopkin is now doing poorly at Morton. McCall got Ayr relegated then took 2 seasons before being able to challenge at the top of the league. 

There's no easy fix, although replacing the manager is a good start. But can the club afford it? I have no idea.

[Poet of the Macabre]

Did someone actually suggest getting a "big money backer"? I never saw posts even hinting at that.

[DAFC.]

7 minutes ago, Poet of the Macabre said:

Did someone actually suggest getting a "big money backer"? I never saw posts even hinting at that.

No-one suggested it. 

Club our size struggling in the Championship is not acceptable. Look at teams like Hamilton, St. Johnstone, Ross County, Livingston. We're a bigger team than all of them and they are miles ahead of us.

[D.A.F.C]

Ross county and st j are being artificially propped up with cash they cant afford by the gates.
Livvy and accies are really well run.

[smpar]

This is the feeling that reigns at EEP, I think. The fans are just sitting on their hands accepting mediocrity. We're turning in to a QoS: just happy to be floating about the second tier not being anything special. 

A) Manager is way out his depth
B) The club is showing no ambition whatsoever, and we are regressing to the same level as the Wee Team
I sincerely hope so. 

Sorry, I disagree with you here. I certainly don’t think anyone is “accepting mediocrity”, the impression I get from the games, highlights and reactions (posts etc) is that there’s a fair bit of frustration at our form, given the squad Crawford and Shields have assembled. I also think there’s (still) a fair bit of optimism about this squad; the players we signed in the summer seemed well thought out and carefully considered, as opposed to the usual carousel signings. For that reason, the players and/or management have been shown a bit more patience than previous seasons.

For me, that’s certainly where the frustration (and perhaps confusion?) comes from - Crawford seems to have signed all the right players, with a good blend and balance of skills and qualities, but he’s been very poor at actually setting them up well. My instinct now is that Crawford has the potential to be a great coach, but he needs a manager above him to be setting them up and motivating them better.

As for the club lacking ambition, I don’t see how that could be the case. As DA Baracus said, it looks like the board really backed Crawford by letting him build his own squad, spending a good few quid in the process where we wouldn’t normally. It looks like the club have a more long term plan for aiming for promotion, whereas it’s been the immediate aim every season since we came back up, and it hasn’t worked yet, in fact we actually regressed. Aiming for a solid, mid table finish this season and looking at playoffs or promotion in the following season or two doesn’t, in my opinion, show a lack of ambition.

The gist of it is that Crawford is out of his depth as a manager, but clearly has an eye for a decent, promising player and I’d like to see SC and GS work with a more experienced manager. I doubt it, but whether or not the budget would allow for those two AND a manager is another question.

[Chubbychops]

25 minutes ago, DAFC. said:

Look at teams like Hamilton, St. Johnstone, Ross County, Livingston

It took these teams time to build their success though. We have only embarked on this young team project for 7 league games. Livi got relegated before Hopkin turned it round. Hamilton took a few years before the youth approach worked. St Johnstone were in the second tier for 7 years. County are bank rolled and really isn't a fair comparison.

[Stellaboz]

Nisbit buries one of those chances seen in the highlights and 3 points would have been likely. There's still positive signs.

Morton away is winnable as f**k, a Shite team who I hope we go and take the game to. We've got some great players, hopefully it'll all start to really click.

[DA Baracus]

D.A.F.C. certainly hinted at the big money backer thing, unless he's suggesting a different alternative to a fan backed club.

Also there's no way we're a bigger club than St Johnstone. They're an established Premiership club, often finishing top six, who not long ago were in Europe quite a few times and who won the Scottish Cup. We were in League 1 for three seasons. Unless folk are talking about crowds, but we lie about our attendances and the actual difference in home attendances is fairly small.

It doesn't matter anyway who the 'bigger club' is. You don't get points for that. I take the point though that we are similar clubs and they've massively out achieved us for years.