PauloPerth Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 An exciting match in prospect with comfortably the best of the rest in the league this season visiting Perth against a much improved St Johnstone side. Motherwell and Livi are probably the only two sides in the league this season who are exceeding expectations. I'm not convinced Well are that great, just a good well organised team who work hard and have been far less shite than all the rest of us. Is that harsh? A fairly nondescript game during our dreadful run at the start of the season finished 1-0 to Well, then at Fir Park Saints were well on top without creating anything until losing a goal, and Motherwell went onto hammer us 4-0 as we crumbled. Gallagher destroyed us in the air that day when Duffy and Kerr were centre backs and Murray Davidson was also out. Hopefully we'll be far stronger defending crosses and set pieces with Kerr, Gordon, McCart and Booth to choose from. Will we go 3 at the back? Motherwell play at a really high tempo, so getting a hold of the ball in midfield up against their pressure will be key. McCann and Craig dem boys. Looking forward to it, we've been playing well since the winter break and started to bag quite a few goals, so hopefully a few extra folk are tempted out to the glorious spectacle of a McDiarmid Park bathed in floodlights. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandomGuy. Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 Gallagher, Polworth and Watt to have stormers. Motherwell fans to copy every song we sang yesterday. Twas always thus. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capt_oats Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 (edited) 1 hour ago, PauloPerth said: Motherwell and Livi are probably the only two sides in the league this season who are exceeding expectations. I'm not convinced Well are that great, just a good well organised team who work hard and have been far less shite than all the rest of us. Is that harsh? I'm not sure it's harsh as I think most of us are yet to be convinced on whether we're actually good or not. You can only beat what's in front of you though - and in that respect we've been fine if still very much a side in transition. Where you're maybe slightly off is the "well organised team", I mean we have been in certain respects but if you look at some of the goals we've been conceding then defensively we've looked anything but organised and the game against Livi at Almondvale was a shitshow for the ages - we had absolutely no fucking idea what we were doing on any level. I'm maybe overstating this but it feels like the fact we're trying to evolve a bit from a %s sort of side to something a bit more expansive has been pushing the players out their comfort zone a bit which has been resulting in mistakes. I suppose the whole "being brave on the ball" mantra is how you get players to improve rather than just launching it but there's very obvious risk involved there. I think Robinson kind of summed it up the other day when he was talking about the team generally - the gist was that back to middle the team almost picks itself (bar the occasional rotation) but up front we've not really had any of our front 3 nail down a spot and we've not really had much consistency. Hopefully the addition of Watt (this game will probably come a bit early for him) and Aarons can sort that out for the run in. We've lost 2 of our regular front 3 from the first half of the season (one at the last minute - though for decent money) so there's definitely an unknown element in terms of where we are now. We might be good, we might not. Edited February 9, 2020 by capt_oats 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandomGuy. Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 Just looked at the other fixtures this midweek, and this could be a huge game for us. Hamilton have Aberdeen, St Mirren away to Livingston. County away to Hibs, Hearts away to Celtic, and Kilmarnock face Rangers. A genuine chance none of the other bottom half sides pick up 3 points, or even 1. Would like us to try and keep two up front. Midfield gets over run a bit sometimes but it gives us a chance of getting goals. McCann is capable of playing for two as it is. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Radford Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 I'm pretty sure that, one way or another, he'll play two up front at home. Which two then becomes the question. There is no doubt Hendry can score goals but the manager has been very open that he thinks the other two offer more in general play. Situation we are now in, every point is a decent one as it keeps us on target for safety. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandomGuy. Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 12 minutes ago, Radford said: I'm pretty sure that, one way or another, he'll play two up front at home. Which two then becomes the question. There is no doubt Hendry can score goals but the manager has been very open that he thinks the other two offer more in general play. Situation we are now in, every point is a decent one as it keeps us on target for safety. Who would you choose? I still have zero idea who the best two are. Hendry and May feels the most dangerous to me, but theyve still not really played together. Yesterdays game was hard to take anything from. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Radford Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 8 minutes ago, RandomGuy. said: Who would you choose? I still have zero idea who the best two are. That's my reply. Horses for courses, as long as the manager doesn't think we're headed for Newmarket one day, when it's actually Aintree. I'd maybe be more inclined to play Hendry against County than Motherwell. Maybe. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Valentino Bolognese Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 (edited) 3/5 at the back to bulk up defence of crosses and set pieces. Speed and guile up front, equal parts holding and scoring midfield. 1-0 Saints, McCann. Hendry if MOH not fit. Edited February 9, 2020 by Valentino Bolognese 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 I’d probably go with Valentino’s team for this, other than Hendry for MOH. I think Hendry earned another start after having such a big influence yesterday. We probably need his height for defending set pieces too. Its nice to be looking forward to going to the football again. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Valentino Bolognese Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 5 minutes ago, Kyle said: I’d probably go with Valentino’s team for this, other than Hendry for MOH. I think Hendry earned another start after having such a big influence yesterday. We probably need his height for defending set pieces too. Its nice to be looking forward to going to the football again. I agree that Hendry was excellent yesterday, so much committment, flashes of skills here and there, great engine, superb header of the ball. He gets better and better. Would be more than happy to see him start. No signs recently of the composure issues he's shown previously. Taking the longer view, this has been year 2 of the great transformation to try to get the average age of the squad down. Possibly went too far too soon with that and we're relying a bit more on Spoony, May and Craig now but it's a good balance of experience and youth when you consider the age of Hendry, McCann, Gordon, McCart and Kerr. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 (edited) Indeed. It seems to be bearing fruit for us now. No doubt there will be more bad times ahead but it does feel like the hard yards have been done now. Looking at the starting 11 yesterday, Ralston, Kerr, McCart, McCann, Hendry all 23 or under and Clark and May came through our youth set up. Add in the fact we signed Craig and Davidson as teenagers, the club really doesn’t get the credit it deserves for developing our own (and Celtic’s in the case of Ralston) players. That’s not including Gordon and Kane who were both parked on the bench. Edited February 10, 2020 by Kyle 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swello Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 I said in the 'Well thread a couple of weeks back that the 2nd half of the season will be tougher than the first because most teams have improved and this game sums up why. St Johnstone are a fair way back in terms of points but their form is probably better than ours at the moment and I'd be very surprised if we win this. When we do what we are set up to do - ie - play a high tempo attacking game and press teams all over the place, we can be very good at times - but if we're even a little bit off the pace, we are very easy to get at. If we aren't carrying knocks from Saturday, I'd like to see the same team (I think O'Hara more than earned another start) and especially trying to keep the front 3 the same to try to get them on the same wavelength... Going to head up for this but I can't imagine many will TBH... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Valentino Bolognese Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 7 minutes ago, Swello said: I said in the 'Well thread a couple of weeks back that the 2nd half of the season will be tougher than the first because most teams have improved and this game sums up why. St Johnstone are a fair way back in terms of points but their form is probably better than ours at the moment and I'd be very surprised if we win this. When we do what we are set up to do - ie - play a high tempo attacking game and press teams all over the place, we can be very good at times - but if we're even a little bit off the pace, we are very easy to get at. If we aren't carrying knocks from Saturday, I'd like to see the same team (I think O'Hara more than earned another start) and especially trying to keep the front 3 the same to try to get them on the same wavelength... Going to head up for this but I can't imagine many will TBH... Did Tony Watt make any impression with his 10 minutes? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swello Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 38 minutes ago, Valentino Bolognese said: Did Tony Watt make any impression with his 10 minutes? Nah - but the football had long since stopped by that point. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gianfranco Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 I know we won earlier in the season but our record in Perth is pretty abysmal. I suspect our crowd will be poor as well. I’m not making the trip and saving my money for the cup replay, never mind the expected pishy weather.Probably 2-1 St Johnstone with Watt scoring a late consolation. The only question is what minute will St Johnstone miss their penalty against us? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ropy Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 ..and who will dive for it? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandomGuy. Posted February 9, 2020 Share Posted February 9, 2020 14 minutes ago, ropy said: ..and who will dive for it? Izzy Jones! Jones! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YassinMoutaouakil Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 We don't win 3 in a row very often against teams not named Dundee. 1-1. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Widge Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 I can’t actually believe Motherwell have lost more league games than us this season. [emoji23]Makes me think there will definitely be a winner in this game. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Casagolda Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 (edited) I’d probably take a draw to be honest. We’re struggling a bit at the minute, for goals especially. We’ve only scored more than a single goal once in our last 9 league games(1-2 away to Ross County). So if Saints can score, they’ll take something here. Wouldn’t think we’d change too much but with us now having 3 games in 6 days, I imagine that a certain amount of rotation will be necessary. Can see the likes of Tait, Watt and Campbell all coming in at some point over the next week. Edited February 10, 2020 by Casagolda 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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