Londonwell Posted March 17, 2022 Share Posted March 17, 2022 30 minutes ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said: We've had 21 different combinations used in defence. That's absolutely mental 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Handsome_Devil Posted March 17, 2022 Share Posted March 17, 2022 1 hour ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said: I think having a settled defence is massively important in any team and I think that's been one of our downfalls this season. Having looked at it, we've made at least one change to our defence in 24 / 38 competitive games this season. We've had 21 different combinations used in defence. The longest we've gone without a change to personnel or shape is three games. Dare I ask how many midfield combinations we've tried? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capt_oats Posted March 17, 2022 Share Posted March 17, 2022 (edited) 2 hours ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said: I think having a settled defence is massively important in any team and I think that's been one of our downfalls this season. Having looked at it, we've made at least one change to our defence in 24 / 38 competitive games this season. We've had 21 different combinations used in defence. The longest we've gone without a change to personnel or shape is three games. Genuinely, 100% LOL'd when I read that about the different combinations. Sensational. Of our 7 league clean sheets this season these have been the starting back 4s: 28/08/21 - Dundee (h) (1-0) - Mugabi, Ojala, Lamie, Carroll (sent off) 11/09/21 - Aberdeen (h) (2-0) - Mugabi, Johansen, Ojala, McGinley 06/11/21 - Aberdeen (a) (0-2) - Mugabi, Johansen, Ojala, McGinley 20/11/21 - Hearts (h) (2-0) - Mugabi, Johansen, Lamie, McGinley 30/11/21 - Dundee United (h) (1-0) - Mugabi, Johansen, Lamie, McGinley 18/12/21 - St Johnstone (h) (2-0) - O'Donnell, Mugabi, Johansen, McGinley 26/01/22 - Hibs (h) (0-0) - O'Donnell, Johansen, Carroll, McGinley Edited March 17, 2022 by capt_oats 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stu92 Posted March 17, 2022 Share Posted March 17, 2022 3 hours ago, capt_oats said: I mean, I don't know enough about how he managed Fleetwood, Scunthorpe or Salford to know what mistakes he made. 2 hours ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said: We've had 21 different combinations used in defence. I don't normally subscribe to resources like transfermarkt nor do I know how much weight you should put in it, but one thing that I remember standing out to me when GA first came to us was that he seemed to change his team a lot. Looking at his last season at Salford he played 8 different formations (how much a 4-4-2 varies from a 4-4-2 double 6, who knows), but it just felt like quite a lot at the time. Fast forward a year and it makes a bit more sense. Oddly enough if you look at his stats as Motherwell manager it looks like he's played a fairly consistent 4-3-3 the majority of the time, yet half the time I struggle to understand who's meant to be where. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crazylegsjoe_mfc Posted March 17, 2022 Share Posted March 17, 2022 (edited) 4 hours ago, Handsome_Devil said: Dare I ask how many midfield combinations we've tried? I make it 20 I think. However, chopping and changing is fairly recent in midfield. The first half of the season we played the same midfield 6 games in a row. I guess it’s a lot easier to get a combination of 3 in midfield than it is a 4 or 5 at the back. Edited March 17, 2022 by crazylegsjoe_mfc 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Handsome_Devil Posted March 17, 2022 Share Posted March 17, 2022 51 minutes ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said: I make it 20 I think. However, chopping and changing is fairly recent in midfield. The first half of the season we played the same midfield 6 games in a row. I guess it’s a lot easier to get a combination of 3 in midfield than it is a 4 or 5 at the back. Thanks for that. Yes, you'd think so but as said the back is where you look to be solid, build the base etc and - ideally - you would think there's less tinkering there than further up the park even with the man or two more. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capt_oats Posted March 18, 2022 Share Posted March 18, 2022 (edited) 14 hours ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said: I make it 20 I think. However, chopping and changing is fairly recent in midfield. The first half of the season we played the same midfield 6 games in a row. I guess it’s a lot easier to get a combination of 3 in midfield than it is a 4 or 5 at the back. Was that the Grimshaw, Slattery, O'Hara combination? Interesting that we won 4 of them and drew 1. Livingston (a) - 1-2 Dundee (h) - 1-0 Aberdeen (h) - 2-0 Rangers (a) - 1-1 County (h) - 2-1 Hearts (a) - 2-0 It changed to Grimshaw, Slattery, Goss for the next games against Celtic (0-2), United (2-1), St Mirren (2-2) before changing to O'Hara, Slattery, Goss for the 1-6 against Rangers. Then to O'Hara, Goss, Maguire for the 0-2 win against Aberdeen and Slattery, Maguire, Goss for the 2-0 win against Hearts then Slattery, Maguire, Grimshaw for the 3-0 loss at Dens...Goss, Maguire (), Goss in the 1-0 against United at FP and Slattery, Cornelius, Goss for the 1-1 against Hibs at Easter Road... I mean I'm obviously tempted to go through the entire season now but just looking at that selection it's interesting that there was a degree of consistency in that run of games. It's really after the Rangers game that there seems to have been a change week on week (forced in the case of Maguire's red card) and O'Hara picked up his injury after the 0-2 win at Pittodrie. Spoiler f**k it...here's the rest of the season to date. (L) Celtic (1-0) - Goss, Maguire, Slattery (W) St Johnstone (2-0) - Cornelius, Donnelly, Goss (W) Livingston (2-1) - Donnelly, Maguire, Goss -----------Winter Break---------------- (L) County (3-1) - Goss, Maguire, Donnelly (X) Hibs (0-0) - Goss, Maguire, Donnelly (L) Hearts (2-0) - Slattery, Maguire, Shaw (X) St Mirren ( 1-1) - Donnelly, Shaw, Slattery, Goss (5221) (L) Celtic (0-4) - Cornelius, Donnelly, Goss, Slattery (5221) (L) United (2-0) - Slattery, Donnelly, Goss (X) Aberdeen (1-1) - O'Hara, Donnelly, Goss (X) Rangers (2-2) - Donnelly, Cornelius (4231) (L) County (0-1) - O'Hara, Donnelly, Goss (X) Dundee (1-1) - O'Hara, Donnely, Goss Edited March 18, 2022 by capt_oats 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crazylegsjoe_mfc Posted March 18, 2022 Share Posted March 18, 2022 (edited) 1 hour ago, capt_oats said: Was that the Grimshaw, Slattery, O'Hara combination? Interesting that we won 4 of them and drew 1. Livingston (a) - 1-2 Dundee (h) - 1-0 Aberdeen (h) - 2-0 Rangers (a) - 1-1 County (h) - 2-1 Hearts (a) - 2-0 That's the one. In this run of form Watt, Woolery, Ojala and Kelly started all six matches and Mugabi started 5. That also uncoincidentally is our best run of six games all season - 13 points from 18. I'm not for a minute suggesting that we all of a sudden start Grimmy again, I know that Ojala didn't look as slow and cumbersome then as he does now and I know that we no longer have Watt and we're quite evidently missing him - but I think this does show at that moment in time, Alexander knew what his best team was and relationships were forming on the park. The problem now is that the side has been tinkered within an inch of its life and is in terrible form, which makes it very hard to settle. If we go out tomorrow and don't get a good result in Perth, there will be calls and temptations to change it again for St. Mirren. Looking back on that six game spell, I think replacing the departing Watt with Roberts and probably Cornelius for Grimmy, that wouldn't be a million miles off a settled team that could compete. Edited March 18, 2022 by crazylegsjoe_mfc 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capt_oats Posted March 18, 2022 Share Posted March 18, 2022 1 hour ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said: That's the one. In this run of form Watt, Woolery, Ojala and Kelly started all six matches and Mugabi started 5. That's also uncoincidentally is our best run of six games all season - 13 points from 18. I'm not for a minute suggesting that we all of a sudden start Grimmy again, I know that Ojala didn't look as slow and cumbersome then as he does now and I know that we no longer have Watt and we're quite evidently missing him - but I think this does show at that moment in time, Alexander knew what his best team was and relationships were forming on the park. The problem now is that the side has been tinkered within an inch of its life and is in terrible form, which makes it very hard to settle. If we go out tomorrow and don't get a good result in Perth, there will be calls and temptations to change it again for St. Mirren. Looking back on that six game spell, I think replacing the departing Watt with Roberts and probably Cornelius for Grimmy, that wouldn't be a million miles off a settled team that could compete. This isn't in any way a surprise. I'll be honest, my assumption was that we'd just stick Roberts in the position vacated by Watt and that we'd largely proceed as we had done up to that point. The whole thing about Alexander tinkering with the team is interesting because having done a bit of digging I checked back on last season and his team selections were almost entirely consistent - save a couple of games where we were missing players due to guns to their head or having chucked their toys out the pram on the pitch (along with the actually massive list of genuine injuries). We also only saw changes in shape post-split (and after we were safe). Spoiler (X) St Mirren - 1-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Gallagher, Carroll; Campbell, O'Hara, Polworth; Hastie, Cole, Watt (X) Rangers - 1-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Gallagher, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Polworth; Seedorf, Cole, Watt (L) Aberdeen - 2-0; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Gallagher, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Polworth (); Seedorf, Cole, Watt (W) Ross County - 1-2; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Gallagher, Carroll; Maguire, Campbell, Crawford; Long, Cole, Watt (W) Dundee United - 2-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Long, Cole, Watt (L) Celtic - 2-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Long, Cole, Watt (W) Kilmarnock - 0-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Long, Cole, Watt (L) Accies - 1-4; Kelly; O'Donnell (), Mugabi, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, O'Hara, Maguire; Long, Watt, Cole (L) St Johnstone - 0-3; Kelly; Johnstone, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Maguire, Crawford, Polworth; Long, Cole, Watt (X) St Mirren - 0-0; Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Maguire, Crawford, Campbell; Roberts, Cole, Watt (W) Hibs - 0-2 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Roberts, Cole, Watt (W) Livingston - 3-0 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Roberts, Cole, Watt (L) Kilmarnock - 4-1 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Roberts, Cole, Watt (W) St Mirren - 1-0 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Gallagher, Lamie, McGinley; Crawford, Campbell, Lawless; Cole, Long, Roberts (W) Accies - 0-1 - Kelly; Magloire, Gallagher, Lamie; O'Donnell, Campbell, Crawford, O'Hara, McGinley; Cole, Long (352) (W) Kilmarnock - 2-0 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Gallagher, Lamie, McGinley; Campbell, Lawless, Foley; Hastie, Cole, Long (X) Dundee United - 2-2 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, McGinley; Campbell, Foley; Hastie, Lawless, Long; Cole (4231) (L) Ross County - 1-2 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, McGinley; O'Hara, Crawford, Foley; Hastie, Long; Cole (4321) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Handsome_Devil Posted March 18, 2022 Share Posted March 18, 2022 MOH training today and a couple of knocks who haven't trained through the week apparently - so the tombola machine might be a couple of numbers light, if you believe it. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crazylegsjoe_mfc Posted March 18, 2022 Share Posted March 18, 2022 9 hours ago, capt_oats said: This isn't in any way a surprise. I'll be honest, my assumption was that we'd just stick Roberts in the position vacated by Watt and that we'd largely proceed as we had done up to that point. The whole thing about Alexander tinkering with the team is interesting because having done a bit of digging I checked back on last season and his team selections were almost entirely consistent - save a couple of games where we were missing players due to guns to their head or having chucked their toys out the pram on the pitch (along with the actually massive list of genuine injuries). We also only saw changes in shape post-split (and after we were safe). Reveal hidden contents (X) St Mirren - 1-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Gallagher, Carroll; Campbell, O'Hara, Polworth; Hastie, Cole, Watt (X) Rangers - 1-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Gallagher, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Polworth; Seedorf, Cole, Watt (L) Aberdeen - 2-0; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Gallagher, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Polworth (); Seedorf, Cole, Watt (W) Ross County - 1-2; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Gallagher, Carroll; Maguire, Campbell, Crawford; Long, Cole, Watt (W) Dundee United - 2-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Long, Cole, Watt (L) Celtic - 2-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Long, Cole, Watt (W) Kilmarnock - 0-1; Kelly; O'Donnell, Mugabi, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Long, Cole, Watt (L) Accies - 1-4; Kelly; O'Donnell (), Mugabi, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, O'Hara, Maguire; Long, Watt, Cole (L) St Johnstone - 0-3; Kelly; Johnstone, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Maguire, Crawford, Polworth; Long, Cole, Watt (X) St Mirren - 0-0; Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Maguire, Crawford, Campbell; Roberts, Cole, Watt (W) Hibs - 0-2 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Roberts, Cole, Watt (W) Livingston - 3-0 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Roberts, Cole, Watt (L) Kilmarnock - 4-1 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, Carroll; Campbell, Crawford, Maguire; Roberts, Cole, Watt (W) St Mirren - 1-0 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Gallagher, Lamie, McGinley; Crawford, Campbell, Lawless; Cole, Long, Roberts (W) Accies - 0-1 - Kelly; Magloire, Gallagher, Lamie; O'Donnell, Campbell, Crawford, O'Hara, McGinley; Cole, Long (352) (W) Kilmarnock - 2-0 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Gallagher, Lamie, McGinley; Campbell, Lawless, Foley; Hastie, Cole, Long (X) Dundee United - 2-2 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, McGinley; Campbell, Foley; Hastie, Lawless, Long; Cole (4231) (L) Ross County - 1-2 - Kelly; O'Donnell, Magloire, Lamie, McGinley; O'Hara, Crawford, Foley; Hastie, Long; Cole (4321) The thing I’ve always found peculiar about all this tinkering that he’s doing is that in any interview you hear from him, he talks about demanding and wanting to play every game. The guy got to quadruple figures in career games and played 61 games in a season aged 37. He’s either got a totally different mindset now or he doesn’t think players far younger than that, playing at what you’d probably call a lower level, aren’t capable of that. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YassinMoutaouakil Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 I honesty still think he's probably an alright manager but just fundamentally a really weird guy, and that's half the reason why I want shot TBH. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoF Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 13 hours ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said: The thing I’ve always found peculiar about all this tinkering that he’s doing is that in any interview you hear from him, he talks about demanding and wanting to play every game. The guy got to quadruple figures in career games and played 61 games in a season aged 37. He’s either got a totally different mindset now or he doesn’t think players far younger than that, playing at what you’d probably call a lower level, aren’t capable of that. This, and all the stats above, is what I think is completely baffling the fans just now. I still think he's a decent / potentially good manager for us however we're all rapidly losing faith in him and I think part of that comes down to communication. His communication with the fans just isn't worth listening to - I barely tune into his pre-match press conferences these days. For all the 10 minutes of waffle during press conferences and about effort, honesty, mindset, margins and desire (I could go on), we actually find out f**k all about the team. He doesn't give the fans anything that's of pragmatic value - why are players dropped and picked, why are certain formations and tactics chosen. Instead of meaningful detail, we get, as we did yesterday, a few minutes on him telling players not listening to outside noise (I assume he means the fans), a lot of other live laugh love shite and nothing much about the decision making on and off the pitch. He does himself absolutely no favours with this cloak of secrecy every week. Instead, we're all left wondering why he changes 30-50% of the outfield almost every week, drops players after great performances and hitting the tail end of the season without recognisable partnership anywhere on the pitch. Frustrating as f**k and could be easily remedied with a bit of transparency and detail in press conferences - not exactly helped by the pointless line of questioning from the Scottish / club media but if he knows what the "noise" is (i.e. the questions have) then he could address it. Just listen to the 10 minute St Johnstone pre-match - a token 20 second update on players at the end and that's it. A complete waste of time. 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allroy for Prez Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 1 hour ago, CoF said: This, and all the stats above, is what I think is completely baffling the fans just now. I still think he's a decent / potentially good manager for us however we're all rapidly losing faith in him and I think part of that comes down to communication. His communication with the fans just isn't worth listening to - I barely tune into his pre-match press conferences these days. For all the 10 minutes of waffle during press conferences and about effort, honesty, mindset, margins and desire (I could go on), we actually find out f**k all about the team. He doesn't give the fans anything that's of pragmatic value - why are players dropped and picked, why are certain formations and tactics chosen. Instead of meaningful detail, we get, as we did yesterday, a few minutes on him telling players not listening to outside noise (I assume he means the fans), a lot of other live laugh love shite and nothing much about the decision making on and off the pitch. He does himself absolutely no favours with this cloak of secrecy every week. Instead, we're all left wondering why he changes 30-50% of the outfield almost every week, drops players after great performances and hitting the tail end of the season without recognisable partnership anywhere on the pitch. Frustrating as f**k and could be easily remedied with a bit of transparency and detail in press conferences - not exactly helped by the pointless line of questioning from the Scottish / club media but if he knows what the "noise" is (i.e. the questions have) then he could address it. Just listen to the 10 minute St Johnstone pre-match - a token 20 second update on players at the end and that's it. A complete waste of time. Agree with all of that. The warning signs were there when he thought we were excellent after the 2-1 defeat at Tannadice earlier in the season. Also worth remembering his justifiable seethe after individuals have cost us goals again and be again only for them to feature the following game(s) 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ropy Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 I am clinging to my belief that this is a transition year, next season he will know his squad inside out and we will hit the road running? Will we? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phillips455 Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 (edited) 2 minutes ago, ropy said: I am clinging to my belief that this is a transition year, next season he will know his squad inside out and we will hit the road running? Will we? Atleast we will have another 4 warm up games (*cough* League Cup Group stage *cough*) just to make sure. Edited March 19, 2022 by Phillips455 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZX1886 Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 Mrs Polworth was right 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allroy for Prez Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 Alexander needs absolutely launched now. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ron Aldo Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 Pay whatever it takes to get rid of him. That new contract looking like one of the worst bits of business we've ever done. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMighty Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 He has to go 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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