The St. Mirren FC 2023/24 thread

[NorthBank]

Connolly looks like a right maverick who can cause damage yet Morais who is useless starts ahead of him. Goody is losing it with his team selections as we generally have a decent squad which is being messed about.

[aldo_j]

Can’t believe Goodwin’s interview. How can you put the second half down to fatigue with the number of changes made?

[Coventry Saint]

The subs were baffling. Of course playing with Obika, Dennis and Erwin in the same team is going to make us go long and completely ruin any shape we had.

Foley looks ready for the glue factory and he's nowhere near my first XI now. Connolly looks dangerous and can't get a game. We still don't actually create many chances.

Goodwin looks like he's settling on a 3-5-2 which would get picked apart by better teams and, as much as I love Tait, it's a bit weird that he's our main attacking outlet.

I have to agree with what's been said above... Tommy Wright's potential availability has to be a factor here.

[scam75]

He gave McAllister a chance and he played well. Morias managed to do nothing except be elbowed by a team mate yet he hooks McAllister at HT. Also Erhahon goes off who was playing well. We go from a team that should be 5 up at half time to a team that hung on for a draw. Not a clue with his subs and not for the first time. Shapeless and hopeless 2nd half. His time for me has run out. As others have said, decent squad if a bit light up front. On his shoulders

[geo87]

Few things that has me worried;

He has never been able to get the balance right between defence and attack, as someone else has already alluded to he struggles to set up for a team that won’t always be on the back foot

This is now his squad, I think he has signed / promoted just about every player in the squad, yet he said during our lay off he had time to start with a blank piece of paper to find a system that suited all our players. This really concerns me as surely you should be signing players that fit in to the way he wants to play and the basis of your signing strategy (which I genuinely thought he had - on the face of it he did anyway)

Jim is clearly a smart guy, and would like to think he learns from his mistakes. But I’m getting to the point where I don’t actually think he has the ability to progress us. He clearly loves the club and is a great communicator / man manager, several players have mentioned they have chose us after speaking to JG despite other more lucrative offers elsewhere,
but tactically I think he is falling short, and has been more apparent than ever this season. St Johnston’s and Dundee Utd away spring to mind is where he completely fucked it with his lineup

This guy is a legend, and I’m in a really bad mood, so I hope he can turn it around, unfortunately I think he needs at least 4 points from our next 3 league games which won’t be easy

[Ralstonite]

Ach, we're shite. I can live with that. I just want to get back in the ground now, regardless of whether we win, lose or draw.

I realise how much of my commitment to the club is based on the match day experience. Travelling to the game, seeing the line up, singing the songs, drinking a shit Bovril. It's just part of my life, and something I really miss. Whilst I obviously want us to stay up, part of me doesn't want another season struggling to stay up.

[Coventry Saint]

12 hours ago, djchapsticks said:

Sad to say, he's not cut out for it unfortunately. Think we've seen quite extensively that he just doesn't have a clue in terms of an attacking sense. I'm completely convinced a better manager could pull performances out of that squad, which on paper, isn't at all weak.

I hate to say it (again), but that 2nd-half striking combo of Erwin, Obika and Dennis was utterly mystifying. I wouldn't expect anybody who's ever seen more than a few games of football to be playing those three together. They're totally non-complementary as a three. Absolute dogshit. Obviously Morias isn't a striker in any of the normal measures, but at least he has other qualities. Watching us resorting to lumping it forward, over and over again, against opposition that we had totally bossed in the first half, for literally no reason, was heartbreaking. 

I'm not even sure you can entirely blame the Erhahon decision, because he and Doyle-HARRIS are pretty much like-for-like in terms of style. 

[DumbartonBud]

Thought Erahahon was a stand out last night sweeping everything up in front on the defence and pinning Morton back, every time Nesbit got the ball he was shut down by him. 
 

Taking him off at HT changed the game. At one point I thought it must have been very windy and that was stopping us getting up the park but no it was just that we stopped passing the ball to each other and resorted to booting the ball as hard as we could in whatever direction the player happened to be facing. 

[ZingaliMan]

I'm not saying I'm right ( woops )  here just trying to cut Jim sum slack. Dont you think rightly or wrongly he is trying to build his squads fitness up ? The Livie game for me is the game he has to get the team right that game will determine whether he understands his best 11. 

Edited November 12, 2020 by ZingaliMan

[buddie06smfc]

He could rightly blame lack of games and fitness had this been the first occasion it happened. 4-1 up away to Motherwell and we stopped doing what was working for us to sit on our own 18-yard line and wait for the inevitable goals to fly in. I understand when you have a lead you are less likely to take risks however there is no excuse for the wing backs playing mid-way through the Morton half to sitting on their own 18-yard line. Erhahon was a huge miss last night once he went off, he ran the game first half everything went through him. We can’t rely on one player to pull us through and make things happen.
I don’t think Goodwin should be sacked just yet, he’s built a decent squad. He needs to start having a go at teams. He said he would in the summer, I’ve yet to see him do so.

[sergie's no1 fan]

The squad have only had a handful of training sessions in the last month.

I am willing to cut him a bit of slack but the form is in the red danger zone, we should still have enough to win on Saturday.

After Queens Park we have Livi, Aberdeen, Motherwell and the Fakes.

If we are still floundering after they games I'd expect a change in management.

[AllyM]

10 minutes ago, sergie's no1 fan said:

The squad have only had a handful of training sessions in the last month.

I am willing to cut him a bit of slack but the form is in the red danger zone.

I think this is right. There must have been a good reason to take Erhahon off at half time as he was our best player in the first half. Either he is still building back his fitness or the plan was to give 45 mins each to him and Doyle-Harris. Presumably it was also the intention to use all 5 sub opportunities, given the long lay off, to give game time to as many as possible.  That all contributed to the loss of shape and focus. 

More worryingly though, I'm not sure JG knows our best starting 11 and/or formation. Neither are right at the moment. I don't understand why Cammy and Connolly aren't getting more game time. And where is Durmus? is he injured? recovering from Covid? or out of our plans?

With 22 fit players in the squad to choose from (the 20 listed last night plus Sheron and Durmus), a settled formation and improved performances must start to come over the next month, or his position will become untenable.

[Coventry Saint]

32 minutes ago, sergie's no1 fan said:

After Queens Park we have Livi, Aberdeen, Motherwell and the Fakes.

If we are still floundering after they games I'd expect a change in management.

I'd say that's about spot-on. I'm not even necessarily saying we need to win them all, but the performances have got to be significantly better. 

[ZingaliMan]

Have wrote this before.  I would be astonished if Jim got sacked. This squad is Jim's team, like it or not he is a young manager learning his trade.  We can see there is a decent team there I'm sure it will all click together. 

[Ric]

If I have concerns it's two fold:

1) Goodwin was "getting a better tune" out of a (on paper) worse team last season.
2) He shouldn't still be at the stage of trying out different things in order to find out what works, he's been a manager for several years now.

That said, there are obvious caveats to this season that while maybe paper over the cracks a little are justified in being applied.

One slight concern that is unrelated to Goodwin himself is the spectre of Wright. Don't get me wrong, if we were to be successful (however you may wish to judge that) then I'd prefer it be done under Goodwin than Wright, but we would all expect Wright to take either us or Accies and get an improvement out of the team in the short term. With Rice suffering a far greater fate than us just now, the worry would be he'd end up there and manage to turn it around before Goodwin gets his team working the way he (and all of us) feel it could - and certainly on paper it's not a weak team by any means.

[Spam_Valley]

Jim Goodwin is not a good manager, It's apparent back the lack of results & the absence of any form of style of play. Long, aimless punts up the park hoping something will happen is proof of that.

He appears to be unable to form an XI that have any type of attacking threat what so ever, despite having been given the funds to strengthen the squad however he wanted for this season. He's recruited Obika & Morias last season, Dennis & Erwin for this season - All four are strikers who just cannot score goals on a regular basis and when off their game are worse than a man short. Yes, Obika scored last night but that was his first in god knows how long.

I appreciate there are folk out there that are always positive about the management and St.Mirren in general but even they have got to see that this is just not good enough and we need change. My worry is that Hamilton pull the trigger on Rice soon and if they employ a manager with any decent ability, we could be looking at being rooted to the bottom of the table before the start of next year due to Accies being able to score goals. If their new manager sorts out that defence then I can see them getting important results.

Gordon Scott and/or The Kibble need to have a serious think about our next step because we are in the mire without a doubt.

[Spam_Valley]

Also, as a side note; Has Connolly done something wrong? Our most energetic and dynamic threat in the whole squad and he cant ever seem to get a start. If it's fitness then I sort of understand but i'd much rather start him and take him off - Like McAllister - than throw him on to chase a game.

[geo87]

Also, as a side note; Has Connolly done something wrong? Our most energetic and dynamic threat in the whole squad and he cant ever seem to get a start. If it's fitness then I sort of understand but i'd much rather start him and take him off - Like McAllister - than throw him on to chase a game.

This, this and fucking this!!

Utterly baffling

[NorthBank]

The thing is we played well at Aberdeen, against Utd and 45mins against the soapdodgers. The problem is scoring from the many chances we create. Obika scores most but it is still a poor return for the chances created and he lacks some basic skills. Morias is simply hopeless and should never be near the team. Erwin is not a goalscorer but a target man. Dennis has only played about 90 mins in a Saints shirt so he may be the answer.

To his credit Goody has changed the formation to a 3-4-2-1 which gets us more players around the penalty box. But we lack creativity and shooting.  I do not want to make Connolly out to be the new Messi but surely his cameo appearances should give him the opportunity to start a match as other players like Morais have clearly shown they have no creativity. Mason and Tait have at least got crosses coming into the box however they are just lumps of crosses. We need to pass more often than cross into the box and pick out a black and white shirt instead of just hope one gets on the end of the cross. All things can be be worked on.

Goody said before last night's game that he wanted to give as many players as possible some match time which was fair enough and wise. However he did not swap like for like which meant we had an unbalanced team where the shape disintegrated quickly.

Bringing on Doyle-Hayes was a good move but it would have been better for him to replace Foley who had been poor instead of Ethan. But the biggest mistake was further forward. McAllister and Morais were playing as inside forwards supporting the one striker in Obika. Dennis probably needed the most game time so I would have taken off Obika and put Dennis in that position. For the inside forwards of McAllister and Morais he had Flynn, Connolly, McGrath and McPherson to chose from.

I would have given Connolly most of the second half and Fylnn the last 15 mins. That way we keep our shape and everyone knows what they are doing. Instead the two inside forwards are replaced by no 9s who are all staying up top leaving a big gap between them and the two sitting midfielders in Foley and DH. Consequently the two wings backs sit deep to protect the midfield leaving acres of space between the midfield and forward line allowing Morton to at last start passing the ball. And we resort to simply lumping high balls forward.

I hope Goody has learned from last night. Morais should be out the squad. Foley on current form should not start. McPherson should as should Connolly and the wing backs have to improve and vary their crossing and keep it on the deck as much as possible. We still have a decent team if used properly.

[Ric]

58 minutes ago, NorthBank said:

I hope Goody has learned from last night.

I mean you'd hope so, it's becoming a bit of a broken record at this point though.

58 minutes ago, NorthBank said:

Foley on current form should not start.

Yeah, got to say, for all the revelation Foley was in his first season, he's undoing that this one. I'm loathe to blame him alone, he's just not having a great season so far and those around him are not picking up the slack. The problem is when someone in his position, both physical on the pitch and as team captain, isn't at the top of his game it really affects the team overall.

58 minutes ago, NorthBank said:

We still have a decent team if used properly.

I'd say the back four is very solid, we have options all over the park and players like Connolly, Doyle-Hayes and even McAllister when he's on his game, should provide enough creativity for our strikers to make a dent into the GD column. Obika will never be prolific, Erwin I'm still not sold on and it's a bit of a worry that Dennis hasn't really hit the ground running.

We clearly have a team that is, on paper, better than the results.