Airdrieonians Off Season Thread 2016

[DestroyedByMadness]

Maybe Roadrunner will reappear on here and give us Fitzy's side of things.   

[waysider]

33 minutes ago, carlukediamond said:

According to a post on the Airdrie Facebook page, a fan approached Wilson and Fitzpatrick for an explanation on the performance and they both laughed at him and told the fan to f@#k off.

Depends how the question was asked. If it was asked aggressively with swear words I would give that kind of response.

[DestroyedByMadness]

Ok, a wee stat attack from me, mainly aimed at undermining Wilson.   These stats from league games only.

Wilson's points per game compared to McBride is a paltry 1.22 compared to 1.54.

We're scoring less goals under Wilson too.   1.5 per game average compared to 1.72 under McBride.

And as we've all seen, we're conceding a lot more, 2.05 under Wilson compared to 1.63 under McBride.

What has changed so much?

Under McBride we were trying to play a possession based passing game that, tbh, was a rather suicidal at times and needed tightened up on.

We also had a few players that had us scratching our heads at.   Boateng was a bombscare, Scullion was a bizarre signing, and least said about Schmidt the better.   Oh, and we simply couldnt defend set pieces.   After dropping Gorman he suffered a poor run with Boateng and Fitz in defence but brining Gorman back and moving Fitz back into midfield cured most of his ills.    We could all see what was needed to improve things, but the basis of a good team was there.  

Under Wilson we've made several major changes.   After a very easy honeymoon period where McBride's team and players eased through the first few games he lost Fitzpatrick and he's never recovered.   In has come zonal marking and a Bollanesque long ball game.   Set piece defending has gotten worse and younger players get dropped and isolated.   Gone is the plan for a production line.

A hand picked player stats to follow.

[Moon]

Whit!

[Moon]

Whit!

Aimed at the swearing at fans issue

[Chapelhall chap]

Put in my "brief" report on the Brechin thread and having left at the third goal I can't comment on any post match incidents. The body language of the managers on the side is quite poor but his record is now dreadful and any review into what has been done since MW came in  must be scathing. Mind you maybe GD will do it! Yet again a well organized team eventually worked out what to do to us and we lost. Brechin were at full strength as far as I could see with their important players doing their jobs whilst we run about like we have never seen each other all week. Loads of corners none of which produce the goal. Given that there were only about 60 Airdrie fans there I am surprised anyone stayed behind to berate them . The only players to be offered another contract are thin on the ground!  Hutton was a miss last night. Got back to Airdrie at 12.30!

[DestroyedByMadness]

So I've had a look at some player stats.

Although primative, on soccerbase you can filter out players stats from games they've started.

All games played Airdrie have won 40% of our games and lost 46%.

When either Boateng and Gorman have played we've won 45% but when they played together it was 57%wins.

We won 53% of the games Fitz appeared in.

We've only won 33% of games Hutton played in, 27% of games Mensing played.   So far, in a very small sample size, we've only won 1 of 4 so far in the full games McGregor and Mensing have been partnered.

Now a lot of that has been due to the whole team and tactics employed and is more of a reflection on the management than individuals.

As said before, after a dodgy start to the season our form picked up superbly when McBride made a key adjustment bringing back Gorman and moving Fitz back into midfield.

I wanted our goals against ratio reduced to 1 goal per game against or less.  With Fitz and Bo together we lost 2 goals per game, that was clearly unacceptable.

From then until the watershed game in our season (the 5-0 home thrashing v. Stenny) the goals against ratio with Bo and Gorman together and Fitz in midfield till his injury then Hutton's first few games we'd reduced the ratio to 1.25 against (10 in 8 games).  Compare that to the 2.05 agaimst under Wilson/Dalziel?

I know that I was very vocal about replacing Boateng as, IMO, he was the main reason we were still over 1 goal against per game.   

That was our only real issue at that time other than squad depth.

Of course Boateng melted down in that Stenny game and the rest is now history.

But it clearly shows how close we were back in October and how out of control things have become under Dalziel/Wilson.

 

[AFC1878]

I said just after McBride was sacked that in my opinion it was starting to come together. The players were playing for him and each other and were difficult to play against. This was evident in the 4 game winning run (and the first 2 games under Wilson.) Since then, we have gone from bad to worse. It is my view that we would be in a much better position at this stage if McBride was still in charge.

[Redandwhitearmy78]

Wilson is an arrogant p***k n should just resign or should be sacked I expect there to be less than 500 on Saturday to watch another gubbing fae stenny

 

[Kenny_m]

1 hour ago, DestroyedByMadness said:

So I've had a look at some player stats.

Although primative, on soccerbase you can filter out players stats from games they've started.

All games played Airdrie have won 40% of our games and lost 46%.

When either Boateng and Gorman have played we've won 45% but when they played together it was 57%wins.

We won 53% of the games Fitz appeared in.

We've only won 33% of games Hutton played in, 27% of games Mensing played.   So far, in a very small sample size, we've only won 1 of 4 so far in the full games McGregor and Mensing have been partnered.

Now a lot of that has been due to the whole team and tactics employed and is more of a reflection on the management than individuals.

As said before, after a dodgy start to the season our form picked up superbly when McBride made a key adjustment bringing back Gorman and moving Fitz back into midfield.

I wanted our goals against ratio reduced to 1 goal per game against or less.  With Fitz and Bo together we lost 2 goals per game, that was clearly unacceptable.

From then until the watershed game in our season (the 5-0 home thrashing v. Stenny) the goals against ratio with Bo and Gorman together and Fitz in midfield till his injury then Hutton's first few games we'd reduced the ratio to 1.25 against (10 in 8 games).  Compare that to the 2.05 agaimst under Wilson/Dalziel?

I know that I was very vocal about replacing Boateng as, IMO, he was the main reason we were still over 1 goal against per game.   

That was our only real issue at that time other than squad depth.

Of course Boateng melted down in that Stenny game and the rest is now history.

But it clearly shows how close we were back in October and how out of control things have become under Dalziel/Wilson.

 

Interesting stats which identify Mensing as the weakest link, but it is rarely that simple.

[waysider]

There is no doubt that the Dalziel/Wilson era is a total shambles and is dragging us down. However, there a lot of people coming on here now saying that they were opposed to McBride's sacking. With the benefit of hindsight it would probably have been better if he remained but I don't recall all that much mumbling from the fans at the time he was dispensed with.

For what's it's worth I don't think any of our managers/ Dof F have been any good. Surely by the law of averages someone decent will be appointed next year!

[DestroyedByMadness]

1 minute ago, Kenny_m said:

Interesting stats which identify Mensing as the weakest link, but it is rarely that simple.

I deliberately said it was too small a sample size but in fairness, it's been a very underwhelming 7 games with Mensing there.   Gut feeling is that he and McGregor look like better players but the whole team function and mindsets are a disaster.

And that's on the management

[DestroyedByMadness]

Just now, waysider said:

 I don't recall all that much mumbling from the fans at the time he was dispensed with.

Mr MaGoo strikes again

[thediamonddude]

To be honest, McBride was never the answer either. He came in under difficult circumstances and did the best that he could, for which I'm grateful, but I didn't see enough to convince me he could take us forward.

The mistake was replacing him with someone equally as inexperienced and an absent DoF. We should've had a manager with a proven track record in at that point.

I've got a horrible feeling we'll be stuck with Wilson and Dalziel until the end of the season as well.

[Nipper]

2 hours ago, waysider said:

Depends how the question was asked. If it was asked aggressively with swear words I would give that kind of response.

That doesn't make it right. In Wilson's position he can't afford to be swearing at fans, better to say nothing.

But I agree about last night where we had a midweek game where Brechin players who after a days work were struggling to get to the match on time yet were still able to win against a full time Airdrie.

[Diamond Oracle]

And that's on the management

Tbh this is what is all boils down to.

The squad of players we have aren't perfect, but they are definitely good enough to be challenging at the top of the league.

So while we all (myself included) have bemoaned the recruitment, the quality of players we have should have us in a much better position had they been properly managed.

[Nipper]

10 minutes ago, thediamonddude said:

To be honest, McBride was never the answer either. He came in under difficult circumstances and did the best that he could, for which I'm grateful, but I didn't see enough to convince me he could take us forward.

The mistake was replacing him with someone equally as inexperienced and an absent DoF. We should've had a manager with a proven track record in at that point.

I've got a horrible feeling we'll be stuck with Wilson and Dalziel until the end of the season as well.

Think your right, don't think they'll be any change till the end of the season so we're stuck with what we have. To be honest I don't think it matters now, it's been obvious for a while that we're going nowhere.

[DestroyedByMadness]

23 minutes ago, thediamonddude said:

To be honest, McBride was never the answer either. He came in under difficult circumstances and did the best that he could

He was not what we needed at the time but we had a talented young coach who was learning and moving in the right direction and just needed backing and proper support from his superiors.

Sometimes a rose will grow out of the shitheap.  Unfortunately TW pulled up and destroyed the sprouting rose,  turned the soil over and left it abandoned overgrowing with weeds.

[Tulloch Gorum]

34 minutes ago, Diamond Oracle said:

 

Tbh this is what is all boils down to.

The squad of players we have aren't perfect, but they are definitely good enough to be challenging at the top of the league.

So while we all (myself included) have bemoaned the recruitment, the quality of players we have should have us in a much better position had they been properly managed.

 

 

With the advantages of being full-time, a squad of worse players than we have now could be quite comfortably secure in second place.  Knock, say five goals off Ryan's tally for the season, and we could still do it.  A squad of mediocre players can at least be organised, fit, aware of what they and their teammates are supposed to be doing.    

[Hugh Jarss]

We have been a shambles all season apart from our winning run in October & November. Even during that run we didn't play great football but we managed to grind out results. I am probably in the minority going by posts on here in that I wanted McBride replaced as I didn't think he was up to the job. What I didn't want was another young coach with even less experience coming in. We were crying out for an experienced manager / coach to come in and sort out our defensive problems and we would have been able to push on and maybe even mount a challenge to Livi. 

However, our chairman thought differently and brought in Wilson and Dalziel who have managed to take us backwards. I think most now agree that the current management duo should be axed as soon as possible but this probably won't happen before the end of the season. Wotherspoon has to take the blame for the position we are in. You would think our full time training would at least see us fitter and better organised than the part time sides. There's not been any evidence of this being the case so feck knows what goes on at training. We've now conceded the most goals in the league and that is an embarrassing stat. We've lost more games than we've won. Another embarrassment.