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Motherwell FC - A Thread For All Seasons


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3 hours ago, capt_oats said:

That's Tam Aldred being linked with a move to India in The Sun. Fair fucks with that one, if the money on offer is anything like Pearson was reported to be getting then it's a no brainer. It's a short season so he should be able to cash in then come back in January and pick up another decent paid gig. One of the teams reported to be interested is Kerala Blasters who Pearson was with and currently have Dheeraj on their books.

On Polworth, aside from the fact our recruitment from ICT in the past isn't exactly stellar with Fisher and erm...Dean Brill, looking through his goals and assists he definitely more attacking midfielder than 'forward' though interestingly (caveat: according to Transfermarkt) his most prolific season (6 goals) was 15/16 where he was apparently playing right midfield. 

Again, Transfermarkt play fast and loose with their stats for 'assists' but 19 this season and *cough* 25 (TWENTY FIVE) last season playing as an central/attacking mid is something we don't actually have. Using their metric Hastie has 1 assist for the season, Ariyibi has 2, Frear has 6, Cadden has 5 and Turnbull has 8. 

On the face of it he's probably more versatile than someone like Frear. Given we don't actually play with a '10' but tend to be using inside forwards and inverted wingers cutting in rather than wingers who will hit the bye-line it'd be interesting to see where we'd play him if we're interested as our midfield 3 has a good balance but as has often been said we've lacked creativity in the final third.

He can ping a ball from distance as well tbf (a selection of his goals in the spoiler).

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Having a dozen Liam Polworth goal gifs ready to post at the drop of a hat after we've been linked with him for a few hours might be the most on brand capt_oats post ever.

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5 hours ago, YassinMoutaouakil said:

Having a dozen Liam Polworth goal gifs ready to post at the drop of a hat after we've been linked with him for a few hours might be the most on brand capt_oats post ever.

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4 hours ago, Neil86 said:

Is Liam Brown injured, doesn't seem to have been in reserve squads?

When Robinson was talking about having pulled a loan deal for Brown at the end of the January window because he wanted to try and get him in the first team he mentioned he'd been carrying an injury. The last time he started was the Ross County game on March 11th, I don't think he's been involved since. 

Edit: That's the Reserves top of the league with a game to go. Given Craigan stepped down in December Mo Ross seems to be doing alright. By my count he's only lost 2 games and won 7 of 11.

Interesting to see we were playing Broque Watson as a centre forward and Rehman wide right. Any time I'd seen Rehman before he's been centre mid and Watson's always been a winger.

Some ball from McAlear for the opener btw. Tidy finish from the Leeds-bound McKinstry too.

 

Edited by capt_oats
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BBC gossip column today says that Hamilton are interested in Polworth, but are likely to lose to Motherwell for him. I don't know how much weight you can put behind the 'likely' word. Again, Scott Burns in the express was the source.

It also suggests that Rangers are set to re-open talks with Hastie, whilst mentioning a good few other teams including Derby, Hull etc. I guess most will be in this line of thinking, but I think there's close to zero chance of Hastie signing a new deal. He seems to be a big hit for himself.

I wonder if the signings of Gallacher and now the potential talk of Polworth mean that we might be going more down the route of domestic recruits than we have done in the past.

 

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Despite his words to the contrary a few months back, Hastie clearly has no intention of being at Fir Park next season. That’s pretty much where my interest in the matter ended.

Talented boy who it’ll be a shame to lose but based on his performances for the last month or so, you’d question whether his head/heart was really in it anymore anyway. Take the compensation money and move on. 

As for Polworth, it looks like we’re heading towards a big turnover of players this summer and presumably will have quite a young squad again next season. Perhaps signing a couple of experienced guys, with decent track records in Scottish football is part of our plan to make the transition a bit smoother.

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Polworth is a smashing player. The fact that a lot of his assists come from corners and free kicks shouldn’t detract from the fact that he is arguably one of the best players in the Championship with a keen eye for a pass and frequently picks holes through a defence to set up chances for his team mates. He grabbed another assist last night as well I think. 

Most of his time for us under Robbo has been spent playing behind the striker with occasional moves further back or out onto the right wing. This is where he got a lot of game time under Hughes and Foran and it clearly wasn’t his best position. At that time however he had a lot of competition to bag a spot in the centre so this was a way to get him in the team somehow. Since he started playing in the centre more frequently we have definitely seen the best of him. Maybe it’s in part due to the drop down to the Championship but the guy is clearly a talented player and deserves to be playing at a higher level.

Some of our fans don’t like him because he gets exasperated when something goes wrong and that he has an attitude problem. Whilst it is true that he can look quite disappointed if he misplaces a pass or a team mate does something wrong I think it’s a bit of a stretch to say he has an attitude problem. He works hard for the team and it’s only natural that he tires given that he is up and down the pitch for most of the game. But for whatever reason he became a target for the boo boys and earlier this season he had a shedload of abuse directed at him during a game referencing his sister which, as you can imagine, didn’t go down too well.

I am fully expecting him to leave in the summer and I will be really disappointed when he does. Despite the fact that I think he could easily play for an Aberdeen or Hearts a move to somewhere like a Motherwell or a Saint Johnstone would probably be best for him at this stage simply because there might be less pressure on him from the get go.

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On the topic of discussing players from other Scottish teams, I'm sorry @capt_oats but I'm going to step on your toes for one post only...

Recent signings from Scottish sides

Conor Sammon (18-19) - Posed for a funny picture, not very good at fitba.  

Alex Fisher (17-18) - Keen eye for goal.

Nadir Ciftci (17-18) - Bundles of potential, we only saw glimpses of that.

Dean Brill (16-17) - Sure he was a good lad, no idea how he was as a keeper.

Joe Chalmers (15-16) - Badly exposed on occasions, seems to have flourished at Inverness which is a surprise.

Morgaro Gomis (15-16) - Brutal

David Clarkson (15-16) - Wasn't a glorious return.

Dan Twardzik (14-15) - I thought he did ok at times, but it's not ideal having a goalkeeper who seems to be scraping five foot tall. 

Edited by AndyRoss
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Polworth has years of SPL/Prem experience.  As RIG says, I think he would enhance any team outwith the OF.

When we were finishing top 6, he had the cigars out for a lot of games.

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On the subject of ICT/Motherwell players, you can throw Tom Aldred (utter fucking shite for us) and Michael Fraser (decent enough for us) in there too.

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45 minutes ago, AndyRoss said:

On the topic of discussing players from other Scottish teams, I'm sorry @capt_oats but I'm going to step on your toes for one post only...

Recent signings from Scottish sides

Conor Sammon (18-19) - Posed for a funny picture, not very good at fitba.  

Alex Fisher (17-18) - Keen eye for goal.

Nadir Ciftci (17-18) - Bundles of potential, we only saw glimpses of that.

Dean Brill (16-17) - Sure he was a good lad, no idea how he was as a keeper.

Joe Chalmers (15-16) - Badly exposed on occasions, seems to have flourished at Inverness which is a surprise.

Morgaro Gomis (15-16) - Brutal

David Clarkson (15-16) - Wasn't a glorious return.

Dan Twardzik (14-15) - I thought he did ok at times, but it's not ideal having a goalkeeper who seems to be scraping five foot tall. 

In fairness to that list the only signing we made that i thought would deliver a spark was ciftci, and he delivered occasionally, Hamilton last day of the season for example he was unplayable. The rest I was very meh about from the get go. Twarzdik done okay, Fisher missed a good few chances pre season and one against rangers and was as good as done after that, seems to have kicked on at yeovil right enough, as for the rest they were only ever going to be squad players, nothing more.

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@AndyRoss no toes stepped on there. You can probably go back to McCall's time and raise the question re: Vigurs, Lawson and Based Craig Reid. I'm probably missing someone really obvious but Sutton and Higdon are probably the last stand out successes from other Scottish clubs?

As @Casagolda says, it looks like we're heading for a pretty substantial turnover of players. In itself I'm not actually sure that's a bad thing, we barely touched the first team last summer and suffered for it. Also, our requirements are slightly different now than when we were signing the likes of Frear and McHugh under McGhee so there's a natural shelf-life/cycle there.

The fact we seem to be turning to players based up here who are relatively speaking, quite well known is a bit of a shift.

Given the anticipated turnover there's bound to be an element of squad building here. It's interesting to see @RiG talking about Polworth in a creative sense in terms of picking holes in a defence as that fits quite neatly into what Robinson (and most of us on here) have been talking about in terms of our final third. In that respect it feels like we've identified an issue and are looking to add a player who might give us something we don't really have much of.

It's also an indication that we may not be abandoning #SexyMotherwell if we're looking at creative players. By extension, if we're in for Polworth and his best position is as a '10' then if we stick him in there or a bit wider cutting in either way we'll be looking to add a forward who can play as a lone striker.

Also, thinking back to his point after the Accies game about needing players who are physically capable of playing week in week out I notice Polworth's only missed one league game this season and one league game last season. According to his Transfermarkt Gallagher's played 100% of league minutes this season as well.

Given Polworth's age it suggests we've got a clear profile we're looking at.

Edited by capt_oats
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I've been impressed whenever I've seen him and would be happy enough if we manage to sign him. As for a trend of signing players from other Scottish clubs, I'd be a bit wary if that means bringing in a few Championship players. I've always thought if you bring in a stack of Championship players then that's where you end up.

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