Peterhead vs Dumbarton

[bluetoonscotty]

Bit of a scrappy first half but definitely made up for it in the second. Thought it might be another one of those games when Lyle skied the pen but we eventually got our goal and a much needed 3 pts.

Good to see Armour get himself a goal as he always puts in a shift. Hope his injury doesn’t keep him out for too long

[cedrick1]

A lot of negativity most justified but I’m not so sure Forfar or Stranraer will catch us so for time being drop the relegation panic .

next five days could be crucial re squad 

[George Parr]

Somebody send for a striker pronto.

[As Easterly as it gets!]

First half was a non event really. Two teams struggling for any kind of form/ consistency.

Second half saw Peterhead the better side.

The pen miss was a honker by Lyle. Thought the lob was over the line, but to be fair to the linesman he was where he should be.

In all it could have been a more comfortable win, but any win will do in the circumstances. 

[peternapper]

Nice to get through a Dumbarton  game without battering them & having nothing to show for it.. With a number of new faces in the team thought they did pretty well more so in the 2nd half. Be interesting to see the incident where the Dumbarton defender headed over the keeper, it looked over the line to me but the linesman was not up with play, we then missed a penalty but pushed on & eventually got the goal. A few folk mentioned that Steven Boyd was quite small for a centre forward but he looks pretty lively & good on the ball, mentioned to one of the lads standing near me Iain Stewart did not too bad for us some years ago without being a giant. Main objective was to get 3 points which was done & hopefully as the new lads settle in we can put a few results together.

Edited January 25, 2020 by peternapper

[The Moonster]

Another chance to involve ourselves in the promotion play-offs missed. Instead we're about 1 bad result away from being dragged into the relegation play-offs. Lets see if Duffy gives a shit this week, or if its another shrugg of the shoulders and on to next week. 

Edited January 25, 2020 by The Moonster

[lionel wickson]

2 hours ago, lorenzo71 said:

Noticed Scullion missing today and we played Tierney  ...both effectively transferlisted.It really does leave us down to the bare bones esp with Hutton missing.If we do not add anymore  it will be a relegation fight for sure.

According to Jan Vojacek, Duffy has confirmed he will be leaving shortly. Frankly, I'd have had Tierney, Zata and Crawford ahead of him in that queue. Perhaps McCluskey too. 

[O'Kelly Isley III]

6 minutes ago, lionel wickson said:

According to Jan Vojacek, Duffy has confirmed he will be leaving shortly. Frankly, I'd have had Tierney, Zata and Crawford ahead of him in that queue. Perhaps McCluskey too. 

Seconded, but you forgot Brennan.  We've not had a reliable goalkeeper since Alan Martin. 

[The Moonster]

52 minutes ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

Seconded, but you forgot Brennan.  We've not had a reliable goalkeeper since Alan Martin. 

And Martin wasn't reliable off the pitch. We need to find a Shay Grindlay MKII.

[lionel wickson]

Just to cheer you up further, Layne has tweeted it'll be another 3 weeks before he's likely to be back.

Seconded, but you forgot Brennan.  We've not had a reliable goalkeeper since Alan Martin. 

[Jan Vojáček]

1 hour ago, lionel wickson said:

According to Jan Vojacek, Duffy has confirmed he will be leaving shortly. Frankly, I'd have had Tierney, Zata and Crawford ahead of him in that queue. Perhaps McCluskey too. 

Yeah Scullion is away. Jim was really guarded about signing news though so I'm afraid nothing positive to report on that side.

We've still only won one of the 11 games McCluskey has started and seven of the 10 he hasn't. That's obviously not all down to him, far from it, but it's an interesting stat nonetheless. He looks a shadow of the player he was at Morton.

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

Jim was really guarded about signing news though

I'm not surprised... we're not Man City.

[DumbartonTheSons]

Long way to go for such a disappointment and such a weird line-up.

Peterhead deserved the win, fair play.

What’s blindingly obvious is that we need bodies, and quick. Which makes Scullion being on his way even weirder.

And tierney up front just won’t do. I’d have rather had scullion up there today. Tierney’s a trier but he just isn’t what’s required.

Big week ahead.

[lionel wickson]

14 minutes ago, Jan Vojáček said:

Yeah Scullion is away. Jim was really guarded about signing news though so I'm afraid nothing positive to report on that side.

We've still only won one of the 11 games McCluskey has started and seven of the 10 he hasn't. That's obviously not all down to him, far from it, but it's an interesting stat nonetheless. He looks a shadow of the player he was at Morton.

That stat is almost Patonesque. 

[sarti pooh]

Surely he has bodies lined up if he's quite happy releasing players.

[O'Kelly Isley III]

Panic is the key.

[Nowhereman]

We badly missed Hutton in the middle the of the park. Nothing in it in the first but over ran in the second. Both full backs struggled to stop Peterhead’s wide players too. And when you put McGeever up front you know we are in trouble

[Jan Vojáček]

First of all, there's no doubt in my mind that Peterhead deserved to win that game - and if we'd somehow escaped with a point it would've been a real travesty. It wasn't that the Blue Toon were fantastic, but they put plenty of balls into the area which they somehow managed to convert, blazed the penalty and had us constantly under the cosh in the second-half. Steven Boyd looked a real livewire (as per) and getting that sort of performance consistently from him could be huge between now and the end of the season.

On our part, aside from an early Joe McKee shot and a real nice move that opened up space for PJ Crossan, only for him to fluff his shot, we didn't ever really create chances. Add to that the concession of another late goal (82' minutes after 89' against Stranraer, 87' against Falkirk and 86' against Aberdeen) and it's clear that our depleted squad is causing huge, huge issues. Put simply, we will not win another game this season without additions.

Duffy lined up with what looked a bit like an asymmetrical 4-4-2. The back four picks itself, Joe McKee and Stuart Carswell were together in central-midfield, with Langan sort of to the right of them but not on the wing, and Crossan as a more conventional winger on the left. Stefan McCluskey and Ryan Tierney were together up front. 

Now a mixture between that formation and the lack of Kyle Hutton meant that we won next to nothing in the midfield and seriously struggled to keep the ball. Aside from when Joe McKee had possession we launched balls at the front two - and neither of them can play like that. Tierney's touch, link-up play and hold-up was fine, but he's slow and launching balls in behind for him was pointless. McCluskey has the pace to get to the balls and then, as happened a few times, takes three touches to try and control it and runs out of play or is challenged. I doubt the Peterhead defence will have an easier shift all season.

It says a lot that we hooked Tierney and pretty soon after launched McGeever up top. Layne might've scored a decent number of goals but we can't rely on his return to solve our issues either given he's injury prone, flicks in and out of form and has only this season shown his worth in front of goal. We need someone else...and if Tierney leaves then that should be two players. Starting the campaign with two out-and-out strikers in the squad was a disaster waiting to happen.

Brennan made a mistake for the goal, parrying the ball directly into his area, and that combined with a lack of cutting edge going forward is a big issue.

What do I think we need to do? Well I think we need a winger and a striker at the very minimum, then we need to hope we don't lose any big players to injury. Ideally we'd add a couple more, but that seems unlikely - and it's frustrating seeing the good work from August and December being undone by a woeful January.

Losing Scullion isn't a big blow, but he's a better option than Stefan McCluskey and I don't think Callum Wilson looks like a winger at all so we need someone out there. 

If we can end January able to name a team like this I think I'll be a wee bit more positive.

Conor Brennan

Sam Wardrop Ryan McGeever Morgyn Neill Rico Quitongo

Kyle Hutton Ruaridh Langan

PJ Crossan Joe McKee New Winger

Jai Quitongo/New Striker

If we add one reserve league player on loan from Morton this week then I really fear for the rest of the season.

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

Stefan McCluskey and Ryan Tierney were together up front. 

My thoughts are with anyone who travelled to witness this.

[cedrick1]

Can’t believe jan Lang an makes your team ahead of even an out of touch carsewell.

also too many putting faith in jai quotingo.

january we’ve lost 2 league games.nov we lost the first 2 and free the third. 
what’s the difference 

im not saying it’s good. It hasn’t been all season  but think we all need to calm down a bit. As I do in previous post next 5 days is important to bring some bodies in.