boulderdomb Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 Is this good or bad news for the club? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IainMorton Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 Just now, boulderdomb said: Is this good or bad news for the club? Will have to wait and see with Crawford Rae taking over. Will he make his own decisions or will Daddy be having a word in his ear telling him what to do? I'd rather the Rae family stepped away altogether so we have fresh ideas. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dunning1874 Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 Fucking hell, today's eventful. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkoRaj Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 36 minutes ago, Dunning1874 said: Great post. Can't argue with a single word 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vikingTON Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 You'd assume that this transition has been planned for some time, but the nature of our latest, rudderless end to the campaign has certainly made major change at the club critical. Few are prepared to sign up for another season of 'sustainability' and Duffyball and so the club needed to act. Crawford's statement of intent will be very interesting to read; whether he intends to see it through is highly doubtful though. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkoRaj Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 The most annoying thing about what you've just outlined is that it's not hindsight. Every single week every single person in the stands could see it and he couldn't. If he'd just played to our strengths and stuck to a winning formation and personnel we wouldn't be in this position. One of the most frustrating seasons I've ever experienced. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colkitto Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 The dauphaun puts on the big pants at last. Where will it end? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie_M Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 In honour of Rafa, some facts about our collapse this season and Jim Duffy's contribution to it. On February 25th, after a run of six wins and one draw in seven games (four wins out of five in the league), we had played 25 games. We were one point ahead of Dundee United, although they had two games in hand. Six points clear of Dunfermline and Queen of the South having played the same number of games. Eleven points clear of Inverness Caledonian Thistle with them having one game in hand. These are facts. Over the course of ten games since we've seen a five point swing to Queen of the South, a nine point swing to Dundee United, a twelve point swing to Dunfermline and a fifteen point swing to ICT. These are facts. In the entirely likely event that Queen of the South beat Brechin & ICT beat Morton today both sides will finish above Morton, who will finish the season in seventh place. All of those sides who were trailing in our wake merely two months ago will finish above us, one of them with an eighteen point swing over that period. How did we find ourselves in this position? We can go back to the beginning of that run of six wins in seven, a 2-1 win at Dunfermline in the Scottish Cup. On that day the team set up in a 4-4-1-1 formation as follows: Gaston Doyle - O'Ware - Gasparotto - Iredale Tidser - Murdoch - Harkins - Ross Tiffoney Oliver We had the same starting XI and system for the next three games, 3-0 v Dundee Utd & 2-1 v Dunfermline in the league and 3-0 v Dumbarton in the Scottish Cup. We had found a system and starting eleven that was working. These are facts. We then kept the same shape but made two changes to the starting eleven for the 1-1 draw with Queen of the South, Russell in for Tidser and McHugh in for Tiffoney. 1-0 v Dumbarton again saw two changes, Tidser for Harkins and Lamie for Gasparotto, but the shape remained unchanged. The 2-0 win at Inverness, the seventh of those games, saw the return of the XI which started the run at Dunfermline with the exception of Lamie being in place of Gasparotto at centre back. We had won six out of seven games, we had created a decent gap between ourselves and fifth place, and this winning run had taken us five points from second placed Livingston with three games remaining against them. In doing so we'd used the same system for all of those games and only had minor changes in personnel throughout that time. These are facts. The logical thing to do then, if you're Jim Duffy, is to completely abandon that system and shoehorn players who had nothing to do with it into the team. The run came to an end with a 1-0 midweek defeat at home to Livingston. We could speculate about Duffy's reasons for changing the team with a weekend cup tie approaching against Celtic which could earn him plaudits from his mates on Radio Clyde if plucky little Morton could put up a plucky little performance, but I'm not interested in speculation, I'm focusing on facts. So for this massive game which could put us in two points of second place, three players who had been ever present in the winning run were dropped. Jack Iredale was replaced by youngster Lewis Strapp, making his first Morton appearance since August after being on loan at Elgin, Frank Ross was replaced on the left of midfield by natural left back Mark Russell, and Gary Oliver was replaced by new signing John Baird. Scott Tiffoney also dropped out for Bob McHugh as we played a flat 4-4-2. These are facts. To the surprise of no one, we were absolutely shite, Baird and McHugh as a partnership didn't work and we lost all the intelligent movement and pressing of Oliver & Tiffoney, while we had no attacking width in the absence of the Iredale-Ross partnership on the left. We obviously lost to Celtic despite the players being rested for our biggest game of the season at that point, as everyone knew we would. Our next game was away to Falkirk, where you'd think we'd move beyond resting players for inevitable defeats in the cup and get the best team back on the pitch. No! Still no Iredale, still no Ross, still no Oliver. Still the McHugh & Baird partnership up front. 3-0 down after 30 minutes, we finally pulled one back in stoppage time. We made no substitutions in this game, with Duffy saying that he didn't change it because he "didn't want to give the players who'd put us in that position an easy way out". Clearly Jim doesn't understand the purpose of substitutions. These are facts. Away to Livingston. The return of the 4-4-1-1 with Iredale, Ross, Oliver and Tiffoney all playing. Finally. For the first time, in our fourth meeting, we actually compete with Livingston rather than them comfortably being the better team. They go down to 10 men, we go 1-0 up in the 88th minute. The return of the 4-4-1-1 with all of our best players in it is just about delivering. Then in stoppage time, while 1-0 up, Jim Duffy takes off central midfielder Andy Murdoch and replaces him with centre forward John Baird. Livingston score in the 94th minute after a picking up a loose ball in central midfield, obviously. The 4-4-1-1 continues v Dunfermline as we hold on for a 0-0, this time without a centre forward replacing a central midfielder as our opponents laid siege to our goal. John Baird then comes into the team for Frank Ross against Brechin and scores twice. Because he's scored against Brechin, he is now UNDROPPABLE. He must start games. So he does. Against Dundee United we don't just have John Baird in the team, we have the return of the fucking 4-3--3 formation which Duffy started the season with and eventually had to chuck, accepting it was just too shite. We are devoid of creativity throughout, but scramble a 1-1 draw with a stoppage time own goal from a corner to equalise. A corner put in by Frank Ross coming off the bench, no less. Every game that mattered after was 4-3-fucking-3. Another defeat to Livingston, scraping a win v Dumbarton, the defeat to Queen of the South that ended the season. The collapse is entirely, 100% down to Jim Duffy deviating from a winning team. Six wins in seven turned into two wins in eleven purely because he decided to tinker. These are facts. That's nothing to do with the board, nothing to do with the mentality of the players, it's just a manager who doesn't know what he's doing. His position is untenable. Fact. Very concise. Good account for all the 'outside looking in' commentators that Duffy is doing a good job.You 100% sure on the 1-0 Dumbarton game? Did he not pluck a 3-5-2 from nowhere with both Lamie and Luca playing? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Demented Zebra Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 John Sutton on his way to Greenock next season I'm hearing. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coventry Saint Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 1 minute ago, Demented Zebra said: John Sutton on his way to Greenock next season I'm hearing. Decent signing if true. Certainly couldn't see them going down if that's the case. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie_M Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 John Sutton on his way to Greenock next season I'm hearing. Don't think Ayr will get through the playoffs so unlikely unless we draw them in the cup. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 Duffy out, Rae out. Easdales in? Fat Sally in?! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rudolph Hucker Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 15 minutes ago, djchapsticks said: Duffy out, Rae out. Easdales in? Fat Sally in?! In. Out. Shake it all about. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RossC93 Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 Alex Rae and Ally McCoist. -1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimmy boo Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 Don't think Ayr will get through the playoffs so unlikely unless we draw them in the cup. At Somerset....hope I'm not a jinx! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie_M Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 At Somerset....hope I'm not a jinx! Well... that made sense. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coventry Saint Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 Snatching 7th from the jaws of 3rd is some fucking effort. Nobody does late season bottle crashes like Morton do late season bottle crashes. 9 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dunning1874 Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 10 minutes ago, Coventry Saint said: Snatching 7th from the jaws of 3rd is some fucking effort. Nobody does late season bottle crashes like Morton do late season bottle crashes. As ever, I understand the wind up value in saying this and I'd do the same in your position, but in all seriousness this is nothing to do with bottle and everything to do with having a shite manager. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shahid khan Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 As someone mentioned earlier. John Sutton signed up for next season I believe. Alarming McCoist/Ferguson rumour also but think it’s just that, a rumour. Clear out needed. f**k off Morton. Another season ruined! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JessieField Posted April 28, 2018 Share Posted April 28, 2018 DUFFY MUST STAY! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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