The Official Airdrieonians Thread - 2019/20 and beyond

[ShineOnYouCrazyDiamonds]

Not sure what we do from here. Can’t sack one of our better players in such a small squad but we’re definitely in trouble. Desperately need to bring in a coach to help out and some out of contract players as well, even if they’re shite. 

[Kenny_m]

2 minutes ago, ShineOnYouCrazyDiamonds said:

Not sure what we do from here. Can’t sack one of our better players in such a small squad but we’re definitely in trouble. Desperately need to bring in a coach to help out and some out of contract players as well, even if they’re shite. 

Even the Alloa commentators on the stream were suggesting that surely we must have a surplus in the budget given the amount of players we have. Something strange going on behind the scenes!

[Glenmavis Diamond]

Unpopular opinion maybe, but the blame for this current shambles sits more with the board than McCabe. They appointed him and have not put much of a visible support network in place. Every coach in place is pretty much inexperienced. They've allowed us to go past signing deadlines with too small a squad. 

Whatever happened to the other 2 Irish guys who were signing along with the keeper Henderson? 

There's not many options to fix the current mess so it looks like we will have to watch us continue to struggle for a while yet. And for those thinking McCabe should go..... He's hardly going to remain as a player so that'd be another payer down, not to mention Dycey too?? 

So yes, that also sits on the club for putting us in the position we are in. It's all turned sour pretty quickly. 

[Kenny_m]

5 minutes ago, Glenmavis Diamond said:

Unpopular opinion maybe, but the blame for this current shambles sits more with the board than McCabe. They appointed him and have not put much of a visible support network in place. Every coach in place is pretty much inexperienced. They've allowed us to go past signing deadlines with too small a squad. 

Whatever happened to the other 2 Irish guys who were signing along with the keeper Henderson? 

There's not many options to fix the current mess so it looks like we will have to watch us continue to struggle for a while yet. And for those thinking McCabe should go..... He's hardly going to remain as a player so that'd be another payer down, not to mention Dycey too?? 

So yes, that also sits on the club for putting us in the position we are in. It's all turned sour pretty quickly. 

I'll say again, this has all the signs of financial problems at the club.

[Passionate]

7 minutes ago, Kenny_m said:

Even the Alloa commentators on the stream were suggesting that surely we must have a surplus in the budget given the amount of players we have. Something strange going on behind the scenes!

Heard today that Wylie was recalled by Celtic due to lack of game time, which was one of t he terms of his loan.... Arguably not a great loss but this happened at the 11 th hour,     We could have a million pound to sign players, no use to you when you cannot sign anybody, this lies squarely at the door of McCabe and we really will need to get used to days like this, we have been found out,   January window could help would you trust him to sign players though....

 

Interesting interview with Callum Smith onDTV claiming he is only feeling match sharp now WTF have they been doing in training for the last 3 months (Smith is our most committed player)..I

 

I personally don't think PH will wait too long till our player manager becomes a player only....

 

 

[Glenmavis Diamond]

5 minutes ago, Passionate said:

Heard today that Wylie was recalled by Celtic due to lack of game time, which was one of t he terms of his loan.... Arguably not a great loss but this happened at the 11 th hour,     We could have a million pound to sign players, no use to you when you cannot sign anybody, this lies squarely at the door of McCabe and we really will need to get used to days like this, we have been found out,   January window could help would you trust him to sign players though....

 

Interesting interview with Callum Smith onDTV claiming he is only feeling match sharp now WTF have they been doing in training for the last 3 months (Smith is our most committed player)..I

 

I personally don't think PH will wait too long till our player manager becomes a player only....

 

 

Disagree with a couple of things you've said there. 

1. I don't think it's fair to say it lies squarely at McCabe's door. The club put him in as manager and let us get to the point where we have not signed enough players. They could have stepped in earlier. 

2. I doubt PH will do anything regarding McCabe being manager. Partly because I think he will be given more time but also who says McCabe would stay as just a player? So we'd potentially lose him AND Dycey? Cannot see that happening, not just yet anyway. 

[Kenny_m]

7 minutes ago, Passionate said:

I personally don't think PH will wait too long till our player manager becomes a player only....

Appointing a 29 year old as Manager and getting rid of him after a dozen games or so would be ridiculous. 

[Rhys McCabe Hype Train]

14 minutes ago, Kenny_m said:

Appointing a 29 year old as Manager and getting rid of him after a dozen games or so would be ridiculous. 

Not as ridiculous as appointing him in the first place and not assisting him with a suitable support structure.

Extremely deflated after today’s defeat. Notably the amount of 5-10 yard passes that weren’t completed by our shitbag midfield, and add to that Jamieson doing his level best to do absolutely nothing other than throw his hands up in the air.

McCabe’s spoken about making sure the signings are the right ones, well there were a good few wasted jerseys out there on that pitch today.

[Passionate]

9 minutes ago, Glenmavis Diamond said:

Disagree with a couple of things you've said there. 

1. I don't think it's fair to say it lies squarely at McCabe's door. The club put him in as manager and let us get to the point where we have not signed enough players. They could have stepped in earlier. 

2. I doubt PH will do anything regarding McCabe being manager. Partly because I think he will be given more time but also who says McCabe would stay as just a player? So we'd potentially lose him AND Dycey? Cannot see that happening, not just yet anyway. 

There seems to be a fair bit of ' board bashing'  on here and on the Facebook page,    I think we were all of the opinion when Murray went th at McCabe was worth a punt, but it could go pete tong pretty quick and it has,   could the club have given them a support structure as previously stated,  absolutely,  did McCabe and co want it after their decent start. ????

 

How now do we rectify the situation and target 4th place ( Full Time is that good enough ???). We're our expectations too high this season after failing miserably to get promoted in our best season and points total in many many years....

 

A lot of questions at the moment with not many answers,  and for the record I do not go with the theory of financial issues..

[Kenny_m]

4 minutes ago, Rhys McCabe Hype Train said:

Not as ridiculous as appointing him in the first place and not assisting him with a suitable support structure.

Extremely deflated after today’s defeat. Notably the amount of 5-10 yard passes that weren’t completed by our shitbag midfield, and add to that Jamieson doing his level best to do absolutely nothing other than throw his hands up in the air.

McCabe’s spoken about making sure the signings are the right ones, well there were a good few wasted jerseys out there on that pitch today.

I don't disagree that he's made poor signings but with the club making such a leftfield appointment then the least they can do is give him a chance but perhaps he's only peeing with what he was given.

[Kenny_m]

3 minutes ago, Passionate said:

A lot of questions at the moment with not many answers,  and for the record I do not go with the theory of financial issues..

So why do we have such a small squad? (I won't doubt the Wylie story)

Has Rhys spunked it all on what we have?

Or is he keeping a kitty for January?

 

[Mr November]

McCabe will get time. Our owner gave Stevie Findlay a permanent deal as manager and then allowed him to build an expensive part-time squad after a questionable end to the season and while Murray improved us every season, there were plenty of times when I'd say a majority of fans would happily have seen the back of him (the three defeats in a row after the restart in 20/21, early in 19/20 when he actually got a new deal). Appointing McCabe was a massive gamble and possibly even a panicked decision from the board but the evidence since they've been in charge suggests he'll get plenty of time. Indeed, getting rid of him early after ostensibly not backing him in the way they promised would look awful. 

We were outstanding last season but even if Murray was still here, we couldn't have expected to maintain quite as strong a run of form as last season. As others have alluded to before, having three other full-time teams in this league who can presumably offer better wages, as well as teams like Kelty and Edinburgh who have very experienced part-time players puts us in a tricky position. I think top four would be a relative success this season given our inexperienced management team and it should be achievable. We're still not far away but things are unravelling very quickly at the moment. 

We badly missed Frizzell today. I like Devenny but he's wasted as the advanced midfielder and while McMaster is ok, we badly miss his industriousness to get the ball and team up the park from a deeper position. Telfer has some nice touches but isn't anywhere near the level of player that Frizzell is. I thought that while we still had issues we looked a bit better defensively today, albeit with the side effect of having nothing up front. The first half was fairly even but as soon as Alloa scored you felt the game was done. Other than a ten minute spell when we went three at the back we really struggled to create any chances and even then we never looked like scoring on the rare occasions we did. I'd be tempted to go with a back three like that next week, given our lack of wingers it's probably the best way to fit in our best players at the moment and try to have two forwards to keep the ball up there.

[Mybitchunderprotest]

11 minutes ago, Mr November said:

McCabe will get time. Our owner gave Stevie Findlay a permanent deal as manager and then allowed him to build an expensive part-time squad after a questionable end to the season and while Murray improved us every season, there were plenty of times when I'd say a majority of fans would happily have seen the back of him (the three defeats in a row after the restart in 20/21, early in 19/20 when he actually got a new deal). Appointing McCabe was a massive gamble and possibly even a panicked decision from the board but the evidence since they've been in charge suggests he'll get plenty of time. Indeed, getting rid of him early after ostensibly not backing him in the way they promised would look awful. 

We were outstanding last season but even if Murray was still here, we couldn't have expected to maintain quite as strong a run of form as last season. As others have alluded to before, having three other full-time teams in this league who can presumably offer better wages, as well as teams like Kelty and Edinburgh who have very experienced part-time players puts us in a tricky position. I think top four would be a relative success this season given our inexperienced management team and it should be achievable. We're still not far away but things are unravelling very quickly at the moment. 

We badly missed Frizzell today. I like Devenny but he's wasted as the advanced midfielder and while McMaster is ok, we badly miss his industriousness to get the ball and team up the park from a deeper position. Telfer has some nice touches but isn't anywhere near the level of player that Frizzell is. I thought that while we still had issues we looked a bit better defensively today, albeit with the side effect of having nothing up front. The first half was fairly even but as soon as Alloa scored you felt the game was done. Other than a ten minute spell when we went three at the back we really struggled to create any chances and even then we never looked like scoring on the rare occasions we did. I'd be tempted to go with a back three like that next week, given our lack of wingers it's probably the best way to fit in our best players at the moment and try to have two forwards to keep the ball up there.

We are indeed missing Frizzell currently, however the next problem will be that as soon as he is ready to step back into the side it will be at the expense of the industrious Devenny and not at the expense of the waste of a fucking jersey that is Telfer. Since his inclusion in the side we've gone from high tempo to pedestrian. Him and McCabe together in midfield was a disaster and if our manager wants to get back to the middle of the park it can't be with Telfer. Equally there is no point in having the energy of Frizzell if everything is going to grind to a halt the minute Telfer gets on the ball. 

[Diamonds are Forever]

There are clearly bigger issues than this but it's been really irritating me, why on earth have we loaned out Salim to sit on Stranraer's bench when we only have 2 first team, outfield, subs? I know he was loaned out before Frizzell's injury and Ballantyne's suspension but surely it's assumed that at any one time you're going to have 2 or 3 players unavailable for whatever reason.

There was maybe some logic in it if there was some guarantee he'd get 90 minutes each week and he could come back flying in January, but if he's going to sit on someone's bench it might as well be ours. He's shown before he can come on as a sub and be a nuisance and get the odd goal. It makes no sense.

 

Edited October 15, 2022 by Diamonds are Forever

[moses1924]

Very poor today. Didnt think much of Telfer or Taylor-Sinclair, it felt like they slowed everything down and just of put a downer on things in some way. Really missed Frizzel, just never looked like scoring. The keeper looked ok though. Think we can forget winning the league or any sort of run of form but QP showed last year its possible to sneaak 4th and still go up. Ending up with such a small squad is really showing now, why did we send a player our on loan with such a small squad? I think McCabe should be given time, no point in taking the risk if he isnt going to be given time develop and get things right (would it be unreasonable to cite Alex Ferguson at Man U? Looks like we'll just need to try and keep things going and hopefully get players back from injury / loan deals in January.

[Reggie Perrin]

3 hours ago, moses1924 said:

Very poor today. Didnt think much of Telfer or Taylor-Sinclair, it felt like they slowed everything down and just of put a downer on things in some way. Really missed Frizzel, just never looked like scoring. The keeper looked ok though. Think we can forget winning the league or any sort of run of form but QP showed last year its possible to sneaak 4th and still go up. Ending up with such a small squad is really showing now, why did we send a player our on loan with such a small squad? I think McCabe should be given time, no point in taking the risk if he isnt going to be given time develop and get things right (would it be unreasonable to cite Alex Ferguson at Man U? Looks like we'll just need to try and keep things going and hopefully get players back from injury / loan deals in January.

Genuine question here, what made Airdrie think signing two players who were part of one of the worst Falkirk teams in our 146 year history would work out well?

[moses1924]

I was asking myself the exact same question this afternoon @Reggie Perrinand can only think that we were short of players and they were available and of "league one" standard, it was strange watching particulalry Taylor-Sinclair as he just seemed to suck the life out of everything, I dont like singling players out for criticism and there is definitly a lot wrong with the team at the moment but I would rather have had a teenager in the team who would at least have had a bit of enthusiasm

[David Fernández]

It doesn't look as if we are gonna turn around this poor form anytime soon. I might of got it wrong when I said I'd be confident we would in my previous post.

First of all, the interviews, not sure of the ins and outs, Brian seems a really nice guy, and not sure if he's a volunteer to help out or not, but I feel the post match interviews and previews are pointless in a way, as we don't get any information on injuries or a timescale, or there are any really challenging questions put towards the staff or management. We also get little communication on the clubs social media accounts too.

Second, where is the support structure in place that was mentioned for both Fordyce and McCabe? In what ways are they being supported? Does anyone know? What are the roles on the dugout for Hutts and Prunty?

Third, to go into this stage of the season with a squad as thin as this is very worrying, when things aren't going your way in a game, we have barley any options to change or to mix it up. I could accept having a thin squad for the Premier Sports cup games to hold out for more players to become available on loan but we are very light in terms of squad depth. I honestly thought we'd of signed at least another centre back before the September window shut. Is he being backed enough, or is it his decision to go with such a light squad?

Fourth, I really like Rhys McCabe, he was an excellent player for us last season and was a massive part how we performed so well. I really really want him and Dycey to succeed, but is this the start of the wheels coming off? I think to go from the highs of last season to the lows we are in just now is pretty depressing.

[David Fernández]

Genuine question here, what made Airdrie think signing two players who were part of one of the worst Falkirk teams in our 146 year history would work out well?

I think with Telfer, I was under the impression we could get the best out of him, as I thought he'd compliment the midfield we have well and seemed like a technically good footballer. There has been a few players that have left Falkirk that have went onto perform better than they did. I thought he'd be one of those, but maybe I was wrong.

With ATS, I didn't particularly rate him at all at Falkirk and thought he was honking when we played you last season, especially when Frizzell sent him on his backside. But we really did need defensive cover so accepted the signing as I thought he'd be more of a back up or cover for any injuries or suspensions.

Being honest I think ATS hasn't done an awful lot wrong since he came in, and so far Telfer has been more of a disappointment so far in comparison.

[Passionate]

44 minutes ago, David Fernández said:

I think with Telfer, I was under the impression we could get the best out of him, as I thought he'd compliment the midfield we have well and seemed like a technically good footballer. There has been a few players that have left Falkirk that have went onto perform better than they did. I thought he'd be one of those, but maybe I was wrong.

With ATS, I didn't particularly rate him at all at Falkirk and thought he was honking when we played you last season, especially when Frizzell sent him on his backside. But we really did need defensive cover so accepted the signing as I thought he'd be more of a back up or cover for any injuries or suspensions.

Being honest I think ATS hasn't done an awful lot wrong since he came in, and so far Telfer has been more of a disappointment so far in comparison.

It's easy to pick on scapegoats we always do,   the 2 players mentioned have not done much wrong IMO, personally I think teams defence is stronger with ATS in it,  Telfer on the other hand, has ability, not much went right today, did he hide no,  our midfield 3 with him and 2 rookies got  overrun, why,  McCabe is persisting with 3 ineffective forwards and due to there lack of work rate especially Jameson they give little or no cover defensively,  most opponents play 4 in midfield that's where we lose out,   4 4 2 is a typical League 1 formation and should make us harder to beat, don't think it's the McCabe way though,   

Also the strip looked better with the red shorts and socks combo....(least of our concerns)