Stenhousemuir FC - The Warriors - The 2023/24 Thread

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

1 hour ago, Neilly said:

Most readers will be aware but I've got a bus going to Berwick on Saturday for the friendly.

If anyone fancies it drop me a message.

Out of interest how big a bus is it and how much are you charging per skull? One of our supporters is running one for 25 quid to our friendly in Gretna which is absolutely wild to me, albeit I’m not particularly knowledgable on the pricing structure of buses to away games. 

[Neilly]

That doesn't seem too wild to me. If you were doing the journey in the car yourself then you would be maybe about that or more for fuel in the current climate I'd imagine.

Basically just charging bus price/bodies. Bus is 350 for a 29 seater and we have 14 confirmed just now so it's £25 a skull. That price will obviously come down accordingly when we get more people. So if bus was full would only be £12 odds.

This is really just a one off on my part though and I am not the usual bus convener. We were originally booked for the train which fell through with the strikes.

I think a lot of away buses, fans, supporters clubs etc. are really going to feel the pinch next season though as I imagine bus prices are going to be through the roof in general with the current state of fuel. I'd imagine the prices to Elgin and so on will be eye watering.

 

[Burnsythebinman]

could be worse. could have a butt plug as sponsor logo like FFC

[Francesc Fabregas]

The club have published a short interview with Stephen Swift in advance of tomorrow's match against Berwick Rangers. It's not terribly illuminating and the questions and their answers are broadly what you'd expect at this stage (why was he not asked about the signings of Craig Bryson or Will Sewell? Or how he saw us lining up? Or if anyone else was coming in?) but the manager does seem content to go into the new campaign with 19 players. I think that leaves us a little short and I hope we still have the capacity to bring in one more right-sided attacker.

He also spoke again about last summer's recruitment and how building a new squad was one of the defining factors in our poor season. That's certainly not the case this time around so he's going into this campaign under a greater degree of pressure. If we have a similar start to last term, I worry it could cost him. There are no excuses this time around!

I've also been watching some clips of Conor Brennan playing for East Kilbride last season and he looks really ropey; I don't think he's any better than Ryan Marshall or David Wilson and he'll cost us points. I do hope I'm wrong!

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

1 hour ago, Francesc Fabregas said:

I've also been watching some clips of Conor Brennan playing for East Kilbride last season and he looks really ropey; I don't think he's any better than Ryan Marshall or David Wilson and he'll cost us points. I do hope I'm wrong!

I thought Brennan was hopeless when he was with us, I didn’t rate him at all. He initially joined us as backup to another absolute stinker in Grant Adam and I think most of us were pretty shocked when he was retained and somehow found himself occupying the no1 slot. He was just one of those guys who never filled me with confidence and was prone to a clanger. Hopefully for your sake he’s improved since his time with us but I wouldn’t be holding my breath for anything spectacular. I think he’s quite highly rated as a coach, I’m sure he was working at Murray Park when he was with us but I’ve no idea if that’s still the case.

[Francesc Fabregas]

We kicked off our pre-season friendlies with an uninspiring 1-1 draw at Berwick Rangers. The home side took the lead through Lewis Baker midway through the second half before Tam Orr equalised shortly afterwards; a stalemate was the correct outcome. Stenny saw a lot of the ball but did little with it, while Berwick were mostly compact and scored with their only shot of the game. It was a low-stakes, low-tempo encounter, and we were quite sloppy, particularly in the first half. Things picked up with the introduction of Mikey Anderson and Scott Walker at the interval, two players who looked like they were taking things seriously - Anderson tried to drive us forward from midfield while Walker looked to get forward from right-back and clipped in a nice cross for Orr to head home.

It's hard to critique the match when it's our first time out after almost two months away and I'm aware that every concern must be framed around this but there wasn't a lot to like from today (Anderson and Walker aside). The 4-4-2 formation didn't seem to suit the personnel, with Adam Brown and then Ross Forbes fielded on the right of midfield, and we struggled to find any rhythm or create any chances. From Stephen Swift's post-match interview, it sounds as though this is a system the team have been working on but it doesn't really work without a specialist winger. This was a problem area last term and I'm disappointed it hasn't been properly addressed. Swift says we won't be bringing in any other players either and will be proceeding with a squad of 19. We seem overstocked in the middle of the park and don't have a proper right winger. One or two injuries and we look light.

As for the new players, no-one stood out. Conor Brennan played the first half and Jay Cantley the second; the former had nothing to do while the latter failed to react as Baker's shot hit the net. Craig Bryson played one nice pass with the outside of his foot but didn't do much beyond that before being removed at half time (and I'm still not sure about how we get him into the team with Nat Wedderburn and Mikey Miller). Matty Yates had no impact on the game and Niyah Joseph, a second-half substitute, couldn't find an opening on the left. From last season's players, Orr had a good second half but that was about it.

I don't want to read too much into the match. It was a fun day out and good to return to Shielfield Park with my friends. I'm looking forward to our next match!

[Spider Rico]

How is the ticketing/turnstyles set up  at Ochilview these days? QR Codes + patg etc? 

We’ve yet to hear any details from QP how match ticketing is going to work for our games there 

[Am Featha Taigh Nan Clach]

2 minutes ago, Spider Rico said:

How is the ticketing/turnstyles set up  at Ochilview these days? QR Codes + patg etc? 

We’ve yet to hear any details from QP how match ticketing is going to work for our games there 

Last season there was a guy with a 'scanner gun' scanning QR codes from people who had bought via the Fanbase app. Nothing built in to the turnsytles.

95% of people have a season ticket or paid cash (except for first few games where it was app purchases only). 

As far as I'm aware you can't pay by card at the turnstyles or pie shop.

 

[Cowdenleith]

6 hours ago, Am Featha *****h Nan Clach said:

Last season there was a guy with a 'scanner gun' scanning QR codes from people who had bought via the Fanbase app. Nothing built in to the turnsytles.

95% of people have a season ticket or paid cash (except for first few games where it was app purchases only). 

As far as I'm aware you can't pay by card at the turnstyles or pie shop.

 

We used the Fanbase app in January when through for the Cowden game, all very smooth and has worked well everywhere we used it.

 

[Francesc Fabregas]

Stenhousemuir lost a closed-doors friendly against Greenock Morton this evening, going down 1-0 courtesy of a trialist.

A source tells me that we "created several chances", so that's an improvement on Saturday's meeting with Berwick Rangers!

[Old Fashioned Stramash]

Going past Lessser Hampden... Looks like we may have Queens at Ochilview a while longer than thought? Not even a stand built. 

[Shandon Par]

Stenny v Pars closed doors game coming up on Saturday. Think our manager sees it as a chance to deploy some sort of plan B formation-wise. Plan A has gone okay so far with an 8-0 aggregate over away trips to Cove and Forfar. 

[Burnsythebinman]

Stenny Dunfermline friendly getting streamed for free today. good effort. Stenhousemuir Football Club (univtec.com)

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

1 hour ago, Burnsythebinman said:

Stenny Dunfermline friendly getting streamed for free today. good effort. Stenhousemuir Football Club (univtec.com)

Lovely. I wont be attending our friendly today and have a day off with the hoose to myself so I might give this a whirl. Expecting big things from Stenny after all the hype!

[Neilly]

1 hour ago, Burnsythebinman said:

Stenny Dunfermline friendly getting streamed for free today. good effort. Stenhousemuir Football Club (univtec.com)

A club like no other.

East Fife would charge £14 for the same service I'd imagine and a limb of your choosing.

[Crazy Days]

What a terrible goal to lose. Should have cleared it up the park, still lesson to be learned.

[Nigel Blackwell]

Typical pre season friendly fare. Clear what Swift wants the style to be which may not be to Nicky Jamieson’s liking. It’s nice on the eye but we created the square root of fcuk all. Anyone know who the trialist was?

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

I only managed to catch the first half but it was a decent enough half to watch for a pre season kick about. Stenny looked pretty good on the ball but I think Swift needs to strike a balance between your defenders playing out from the back and blootering it to f**k when necessary, some of them didn’t look particularly comfortable trying to pass it out every single time and it ultimately led to a pretty horrible mistake.  I thought your left back Yeats and the lad O’Reilly looked like a very good partnership on the left hand side and when the latter starting drifting over to the right (not sure if this is a normal thing or just experimental pre season stuff) he looked less effective. 

It was only a daft kick about but it was good to get a taste of what we’ll come up against in League 2 this year.

[Francesc Fabregas]

27 minutes ago, Nigel Blackwell said:

Typical pre season friendly fare. Clear what Swift wants the style to be which may not be to Nicky Jamieson’s liking. It’s nice on the eye but we created the square root of fcuk all. Anyone know who the trialist was?

We've been playing that like for most of Stephen Swift's time in charge of Stenhousemuir, with the centre-backs passing the ball out from the back and Nat Wedderburn dropping deep. It's broadly worked, but I agree that Sean Crighton and Nicky Jamieson are not fantastic at getting play going and a more "horses-for-courses" is necessary. In the two pre-season matches I've seen, Jamieson's errors in possession have directly led to two goals. He needs to sharpen up.

As for the rest of the game, we looked alright and moved the ball around well enough but I don't really remember us having a shot on goal. We didn't create much (anything?) and we rarely ventured into the final third. Wedderburn was solid and Mikey Anderson continues to impress me; that's about it. Still plenty to work on by the time we face Albion Rovers at the end of the month.

Any idea who the trialist was? He didn't contribute much but he did play wide on the right, so it's good to see we're looking to address the area.

[Neilly]

Only seen the first half but was reasonably content with what I seen. Some nice patterns of play, we controlled the game with the football and everyone looked a wee bit sharper again from last week. 

Another mistake from Nicky but nothing I'd overly worry about I think it's easy to lose concentration in these games as long as that's out of the system for the real stuff then it's of no concern.

Mikey Anderson looked really sharp again, massive credit to him he's in great nick for the new season. We have better midfielders on the ball than him but none of them can match him for tenacity and getting about the park. More minutes in the legs for Bryson as well, that'll be a gradual build after such a long time out.

Hopefully Corbett was just precautionary but Walker looks an able deputy. Sewell and Higgins sound as though they are there or thereabouts for Tuesday as well. I think we are all looking forward to seeing what Sewell can do.