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The only reason I feel Farrell shouldn't be immediately sacked is that he had a horrific job in the summer to build a squad and I don't doubt he signed a few boys in a rush to get a squad together. I am slightly encouraged that he's already been in the paper saying he needs to fix the squad but ultimately what he can do in January is limited. 

That said, this run of form would have any other manager answering questions about their suitability for the role going forward. The only team we've beat at home was an East Fife side who had thrown the towel in under Young, and aside from a good display on the opening day and a couple of dogged displays away from home, it's been difficult to identify what our style of play is. The defence is a shambles and we don't have a striker who is used to/good at playing up front on his own. We haven't built the team around guys like Joe McKee and we're not getting the best of them. 

I don't expect our board to do anything here, mainly because there is barely a board to speak of and our "football person" at the club is the office manager, but we're on a dangerous path right now. No idea where our next points come from. 

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Looking at the recent performances and results it will be a brave soul who comes on here and tries to repeat tropes about us having a decent squad, suffering at the hands of dodgy officials, being unlucky, we just need a few tweaks, etc.,

We are rank, without a shape and without belief, prone to repeated individual errors and wanting in several positions.  And without change we are going down like a brick.

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Wouldn’t be calling for Faz’s head just yet. He needs to rectify things in January (either in the transfer market or a change of fortunes on the park). 

Pretty clear that we’ve lost our way. I thought we looked decent at the start of the season. Chopping and changing the team every week isn’t helping.

We need a centre back, a left back, a right back and a striker out of necessity. I’d also like to see us move some bodies on and free up space for a centre mid and a keeper. If Faz can do some half decent business and find us a settled team for the remainder of the season, I have faith we can push on.

If we trod on as we are, we’re relegation fodder.

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We've got players who shouldn't be at the club. Either they're long past their best (Geggan, Boyle), are permanently injured (the norwegian kid) or simply aren't good enough (McKnight and a few others). Add to that we've had performances from the likes of McKee (although he was better today), Buchanan and McGeever (before his injury) that are nowhere near good enough. We've had  Carswell living on past reputation whilst offering diminishing returns. Ramsbottom will always be good for  a mistake every game - its just luck if it doesnt cost us.

This is Farrell's squad and its his job to get more from them. Performances havent been acceptable for some time now. That said, there are players in that squad who are short changing the manager in terms of their performance. Should there be pressure on Faz? Absolutely. Its impossible to suggest otherwise and he should be  worried  for his future.. Is there a candidate out there who would be an obvious choice to replace him? I'm not sure that there is. There are guys out there. They're currently without jobs for a reason. You could look to the pyramid set-up and try going for a manager with ambition, but there's no guarantee that he'd make the step up. You could do something really out there and go after the likes of Shelly Kerr. It would be interesting to see how a respected female coach/manager would do in the men's game. Ultimately there's a risk in sticking with Farrell, but there's an equally big risk in replacing him given the lack of obvious options.

The only thing for certain is that we need to make changes in January. Centre half and striker should be priority, but I'd also be looking at a midfielder too. Then there's the fullback positions. I think it's worth giving Muir a longer run in the side because the alternative at left back is Paddy Boyle and he's had more than enough chances to prove that he still has it at this level of the game. Carlo could move to right back, but that leaves a hole in midfield. We need to see things get significantly better and there's a danger in anything we do. We give Faz a chance to improve things that he's unable to do or we replace him with somebody who isnt able to do any better with this group of players. Either way  we need strong leadership from the club and thats pretty much the one thing we can guarantee that we don't have. Whether we stick with Farrell or twist, there's absolutely no sign of anything decisive from the club and you wonder exactly who would be willing and able to make that decision?

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If we have such a lack of football knowledge on the board and they are unable to make decisions then it begs the question… Why aren’t they looking to rectify that? Do they not have anyone they can draft in to help with footballing matters? I mean it’s a fairly important aspect of running, y’know, a football club. 

Who interviewed the candidates in the summer? Who decided that Farrell was more suitable than the others that applied for the position? 

I really don’t like the direction we are heading at all but at least having someone in and around the boardroom with a bit of experience in football would allow the board to get some of the basic decisions right.

 

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In response to the last two posts, Colin Hosie is the Board member responsible for football matters but presumably the full Board will have an input on the major decisions.  Colin has long experience as a Director and will have many contacts in Scottish football, but having a Board with only three local Directors and only one conversant with the club's raison d'etre is very far from ideal.

Secondly, my understanding is that when Stevie Farrell was appointed a direct approach was made to Stranraer and there were no other interviewees, but I'm happy to put hands up if that's incorrect.

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On 12/12/2021 at 12:32, 1870ToonBlue said:

Felt like this at Stair Park but we kept going with him and ended up in League 2 was happy to see him leave. 
i can remember saying this and a few of the Dumbarton fans slating me as they felt he would do a job for yous. How wrong the guy is tactically inept, yous will be down by May if there is no change. Or he will spend spend spend in January money thats prob not there

Perhaps the person who gave you a red dot for this post might now feel obliged to remove it, based on growing evidence.

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49 minutes ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

 

Secondly, my understanding is that when Stevie Farrell was appointed a direct approach was made to Stranraer and there were no other interviewees, but I'm happy to put hands up if that's incorrect.

Surely not. 

40 minutes ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

Perhaps the person who gave you a red dot for this post might now feel obliged to remove it, based on growing evidence.

I gave him the red dot as I don't recall any Sons fan slating him about anything. Most folk were happy with Farrell at the time but it was still quite reserved. Nobody was hailing it as a certain success anyway.

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1 hour ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

Secondly, my understanding is that when Stevie Farrell was appointed a direct approach was made to Stranraer and there were no other interviewees, but I'm happy to put hands up if that's incorrect.

That’s a bit of a strange one. I assumed Farrell had applied and had been interviewed along with other candidates. His CV alone was hardly worthy of being head hunted for the job.

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10 minutes ago, The Moonster said:

Surely not. 

I gave him the red dot as I don't recall any Sons fan slating him about anything. Most folk were happy with Farrell at the time but it was still quite reserved. Nobody was hailing it as a certain success anyway.

On the first point, and as I said, I'm more than willing to rescind my remark if it proves to be erroneous.

Secondly, the Stranraer poster is entitled to his opinion, but maybe he felt that some responses to his original post were suggesting sour grapes on his part, hence his 'I told you so follow-up'.  Trouble is, he may well have a point.

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9 minutes ago, Bring Back Paddy Flannery said:

That’s a bit of a strange one. I assumed Farrell had applied and had been interviewed along with other candidates. His CV alone was hardly worthy of being head hunted for the job.

He did have experience here and his Stranraer team were denied promotion by Dumbarton who retained their higher division.  Viewed like that there could have been the prospect of a 'win/win' for both parties.  Only my assessment.

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It certainly appears like the squad (or majority of it) had themselves a night out in Newcastle last night. I appreciate they aren't technical breaking any rules but surely that kind of thing is unnecessary. Can you imagine if we have a COVID outbreak by the middle of the week and have to call off next weekends game?

 

I know all my family decided not to go to Christmas nights out because they'd rather have Christmas day with family etc. I've had party nights (gigs) cancelled and Hogmanay has also been pulled and I haven't had any nights out arranged at all this year.

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The form over the last 10 looks even worse when you look at the goal columns. Conceding an average of 2.6 a game. Deary me.

As for the night out to Newcastle… I’m not one of these folk who think the players shouldn’t be allowed to have fun in their spare time because they are doing terribly on the park, but with the current covid risk I’m astounded the manager has allowed that to go ahead. Work places across the country are ravaged with positive covid tests and I know that in my work a large number of them have come after Christmas nights out. 

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1 minute ago, pleslie99 said:

With regards to the night out. Maybe secretly Faz is hoping they catch it, get an outbreak, games postponed until Jan, new recruits, games restart, start winning........

 

And you all thought he was daft 😜

My fear is we end up with an outbreak that wipes out say 5 or 6 but isn’t enough to get a game postponed. We are bad enough with everyone fit, can you even begin to imagine how bad we’ll be with 5 or 6 missing!?

Setting themselves up for absolute pelters if this turns into an issue, especially if the above scenario plays out.

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24 minutes ago, Bring Back Paddy Flannery said:

My fear is we end up with an outbreak that wipes out say 5 or 6 but isn’t enough to get a game postponed. We are bad enough with everyone fit, can you even begin to imagine how bad we’ll be with 5 or 6 missing!?

Setting themselves up for absolute pelters if this turns into an issue, especially if the above scenario plays out.

I totally agree, was just making light of a pretty grim situation! Seems daft to let it go ahead however the argument will be its not breaking any rules. My works Christmas night out got cancelled and I'm sure many others in here will have too. Would be amazed if we don't lose a couple at least to covid over the next week or so.

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Yep the Christmas night out to Newcastle should never have happened. It’s nothing to do with performance, nights out can sometimes help a team but considering the current covid situation going to Newcastle seems crazy. Simple question to the players is what happens if their is an outbreak due to their actions, who picks up the bill if we have to postpone games? 

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What is going on over there, a Dumbarton home game then a Rangers game on it 22 hours later at this time of year. Whoever is in charge of the football side of the board is going to kill the club. There is no way that park can survive that amount of abuse at this time of year. Its going to be a long 2nd half to the season [emoji50]

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