Motherwell FC - A Thread For All Seasons

[Swello]

8 hours ago, YassinMoutaouakil said:

See as an aside, where did the "welcome to our great wee club" patter to every new signing originate from? Swear I'd never seen it at all until a few seasons ago and can't say I'm a fan.

Edit- it's surprisingly difficult to find photos of our man Mich'el where he doesn't have at least one foot off the ground, I approve.

I'm annoyed that my "No Glove Wearers" signing policy that I sent to Alexander has been totally ignored. What's the point of being a part-owner when we don't get a say in the big stuff?

[RandomGuy.]

Have you hired Stephen Robinson again?

Reeks of you lot taking a punt on a kid with the physical ability, and seeing what comes out of focused training and game time.

[capt_oats]

2 hours ago, RandomGuy. said:

Have you hired Stephen Robinson again?

Reeks of you lot taking a punt on a kid with the physical ability, and seeing what comes out of focused training and game time.

Nah if it was Robinson he'd have signed him on a 1 or 2 year deal.

As others have said the news story that accompanied the signing is pretty much an expectations management job:

Quote

“Mich’el has been training with us for a while now and shown a gradual improvement,”

“He’s a young player who has been at Liverpool and West Ham but lost his way a little.

“He’s now got an opportunity here to show he can build a successful football career.

“He has some work to do but he has the ability and there’s a will from him to take this chance. We look forward to helping him achieve that.”

I mean, it's a nice day, I'm not going to sit at my MacBook dunking on a young guy trying to make his way in the game etc. but it is what it is.

I got the impression that the goalposts were shifting a wee bit for Alexander when he was talking in his press conference on Wednesday: "I think we have to prepare to lose players through the season to isolation and stuff so we have to prepare ourselves to have enough players to cover those absentees...I do believe that the squad possibly has to be bigger than I would usually like it to be because of those circumstances but like you say it has an impact on your budget."

Up until now the line has been that we're "waiting to get the *right* players in" and Kelly was/is a good example of us doing that and a week ago the messaging was "I'd still expect us to be able to put teams out in the next few games to be the favourites, which we should be and be able to win those games" but as it stands Mugabi's still coming back from his shoulder surgery, McGinley's not been seen since the bounce game against Dumbarton 3 weeks ago, nor has O'Hara and Donnelly hasn't kicked a ball in a year. I think the game against Queens Park on Wednesday was maybe an eye-opener for Alexander in terms of where we are short term.

Parker's someone who's been around the club for months but we've only had 2 bounce games and one of those featured 7 trialists and 4 literal school kids in our teams (where previously we'd have had 4 games, had a training camp and signed 10 players by now). The fact he's got a 6 month deal means we can at least play him in these games Lee Lucas style and while I'm sure we have other targets (I fucking hope we do) it means that we're not looking at 3 games in a week with literally only 3 fit midfielders because on the face of it, it seems that's where we were this time yesterday.

Edited July 17, 2021 by capt_oats

[Ron Aldo]

Can understand some of the views on this signing but it's clearly a punt and nothing more.

If he's shite then we say goodbye in 6 months after probably paying him buttons during that time. If he's good then he plays in a position that, as it stands, we're currently lacking in.

I don't imagine he'll have taken up a massive chunk of our budget and we'll (hopefully) still have our eye on more established/experienced players.

[crazylegsjoe_mfc]

9 hours ago, capt_oats said:

To that point, for all I'm having a wee moan the approach this summer has generally been that we're waiting for the "right" players. That's something I'm broadly advocating.

I don't think anyone has a problem with the Kelly signing (if you do then make yourself known you massive weirdo), I for one am on the Budget Bergkamp hype-train, Swindon paid £325k for Woolery a couple of seasons ago and he's off a double figures season with Tranmere and Shields was a Championship Team Of The Year player last season and also in double figures.

To give the club the benefit of the doubt I'd imagine that our targets for the centre back and midfield positions are of a similar profile to those players and we're not pinning our hopes on an extremely Irish re-gen from Leicester's Academy and someone who's quite possibly an Ali Dia clone. I mean, I hope we're not because we're absolutely fucked if these signings are part of a grand plan.

However the hand we've been dealt at 23:50 on a Friday night is that as yet we haven't actually signed those replacements and if Mugabi, McGinley and O'Hara  aren't fit and we don't want to re-break Donnelly we're extremely light on numbers unless we want to play some actual school weans (and who knows maybe the weans are good).

Going by the interview Alexander did on Tuesday it sounds like he's been focusing on having the squad in place with a view to the first game of the season rather than the LC groups so the Queen's Park game may have very much been a live action "life comes at you fast" meme as he watched his midfield get dismantled by a League 1 side.

I agree with you that I’m happy with recruitment in goals and the forward area - if I was being extremely picky I’d say I’d maybe want one more up top, someone who plays out wide and is right-footed, but largely that’s good.

I missed the game the other night and as the general perception is that our midfield wasn’t up to it, I can see why we’ve maybe signed him short term - I just wish it was on the three week deal we initially gave Clay and Lucas and not for six months. I just see us in November time being lumbered with loads of average midfielders on the payroll. We never seem to give someone a short term deal then not extend it either. 

I’m happy enough with us signing O’Connor as he was playing for Leicester’s reserves last season but this lad appears to have fallen off the face of the earth for a few years. If you think of him as the same age as Maguire roughly, I don’t think of Maguire as someone who has played much football for his age, yet he’s closing in on 70 professional games.

Don’t get me wrong in January I was praising us for bringing Eddie Nolan and Lawless in, but slating us for bringing Jordan Roberts in and we all know how that went. Hopefully my instinct is totally wrong again!

[one m in Motherwell]

Ah, Eddie.  GBNF

[Al B]

On the "welcome to our great wee club" patter, whatever happened to the "What a signing!!! Can't believe we got him!!!" guy? Is that still happening for every single player in the door regardless of whether anyone's heard of them or not?

Edited July 17, 2021 by Al B

[steelman1991]

Buzzing to get back to Fir Park this afternoon - COYW

[capt_oats]

1 hour ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said:

I agree with you that I’m happy with recruitment in goals and the forward area - if I was being extremely picky I’d say I’d maybe want one more up top, someone who plays out wide and is right-footed, but largely that’s good.

I missed the game the other night and as the general perception is that our midfield wasn’t up to it, I can see why we’ve maybe signed him short term - I just wish it was on the three week deal we initially gave Clay and Lucas and not for six months. I just see us in November time being lumbered with loads of average midfielders on the payroll. We never seem to give someone a short term deal then not extend it either. 

I’m happy enough with us signing O’Connor as he was playing for Leicester’s reserves last season but this lad appears to have fallen off the face of the earth for a few years. If you think of him as the same age as Maguire roughly, I don’t think of Maguire as someone who has played much football for his age, yet he’s closing in on 70 professional games.

Don’t get me wrong in January I was praising us for bringing Eddie Nolan and Lawless in, but slating us for bringing Jordan Roberts in and we all know how that went. Hopefully my instinct is totally wrong again!

Aye, I agree with that. What I was getting at was that I'd be surprised if we've just decided to ditch the same approach we had for the keeper and forwards when it comes to centre backs and central midfield. I could be in for a shock though.

On Parker, and being fair to him, I'd imagine that 2020 was a pretty tough year for a Free Agent former EPL academy player with no senior experience and generally speaking EPL Academies throw up these players who fall through the cracks. I'd imagine that Liverpool is going to be a difficult place to break through similarly Arsenal (where he started out) and West Ham (where he was on trial and seems to have been sort of on their books but there's zero mention of him every having signed or having been released on their OS).

He definitely had a deal with Millwall as this is from their OS:

Quote

Furthermore, Michel Parker has extended his contract with The Lions in a deal that will run until the end of the 2018/19 season. The 20-year-old centre-back has also featured in the midfield for the Under 23s since joining from Liverpool, and has scored once since his arrival at the club.

Link

For 19/20 he just seems to have been bouncing around on trial (West Ham and MK Dons). As I said last night the last mention I can find before he pitched up here was playing for MK Dons against Arsenal in August 2020.

It's just so weird in modern football culture to see a player who seems to have ended up completely off the grid in the way he has. No YouTube hype videos, no footage of him playing, nothing. Even a Google image search just throws up photos of him at Liverpool 3 or 4 years ago.

Something that occurred to me earlier was we had Jamie Ness involved in the bounce match against Dumbarton but nothing has been mentioned since. On the face of it given his relative experience compared to Parker (186 senior games vs 0) he'd probably have been a more palatable short term option. Although who knows maybe he wouldn't have fancied a 6 month deal or the renumeration that a contract like that would probably involve. There could be a pile of reasons I guess - it's not even clear if he's still around the club.

We had 5 trialists in the squad against Millwall, we know O'Connor was one, Parker another and there was some dispute over on SO as to who the 2nd centre back was but that leaves two unnamed - it'd be interesting to know what the background of those guys eg: what positions etc.

Edited July 17, 2021 by capt_oats

[Swello]

Have to say lads - have had a massive dose of FOMO this morning - doesn't feel right missing the first game back at Fir Park....

[Ric]

No idea if he's any good or not, but surely the name Mich'el is taking the piss, right?

[ropy]

If anyone gets seat 112 in the Davie Cooper stand next week then I would buy a TV subscription 

[YassinMoutaouakil]

Anybody else only going to Annan? Have you got your tickets yet?

[Geedub-MFC]

12 minutes ago, ropy said:

If anyone gets seat 112 in the Davie Cooper stand next week then I would buy a TV subscription 

Me rn

[beesher]

Am I the only one that's not arsed about going back to games until social distancing has been binned?

Turns out I was talking utter shite, can hear the crowd noise and am so jealous of the people that got tickets.

Was that a solid round of boos at half time? Normal service resumed then [emoji23]

[well fan for life]

I mean I thought we were bad the other night but this is a big oof.

[MP_MFC]

Nothing between keeper and attack. Midfield missing, we must have had about 70% possession but doing nothing with it.

Booed aff, nature is healed.


Also, where’s Speedie and why have we got some radio DJ doing the tannoy?

[Gianfranco]

Cutty looks like he’ll do.

[ZX1886]

How much drink had the boys in Cooper Suite had to pick Van Veen man of the match

Either Lawless or Woolery for me.

Edited July 17, 2021 by ZX1886

[Guest superward]

I fair enjoyed that. 

First half I thought we moved it very well and was quite impressed with out attacking play down the wings. But it was a little pedestrian at times.  But night and day compared to mid week. Different tactic was clear to see and Donnelly/VanVeen coming in really helped. Was quite happy until they scored. Couldn't see the goals really as I was up the top deck of the south. 

Second half the intensity was up a bit and a wee bit more penetrating in attack. The change made to bring Woolery on and move Lawless to central midfield behind the striker really worked.

Big Van Veen is going to be box office by the way. He missed a couple he should have scored but all round he was excellent I thought. Shout outs to most but impressed by Lawless, Watt and Cornelius had a great game showing what he can do moving things forward. 

Edited July 17, 2021 by superward