Another St Johnstone European Tour!

[PauloPerth]

11 minutes ago, mizfit said:

I’m presuming the empty seats were Turkish fans who’d been caught and turned away.

I saw 2 or 3 wee groups of Galatasary fans walking back up through the car park as I was heading in.  You've got to question the intelligence of going to a match in which no away fans were permitted wearing away team colours.

Probably would have got in without the Gala scarves or tops.

[Radford]

The absence of Wotherspoon was a huge blow, added to by the fact it isn't an injury. Without him and Middleton, we had no creativity in that danger zone in front of their defence. 

Absolutely no faulting the effort but we have to strive to use the ball better. We passed it well on Sunday but, not always under pressure, it was sloppy tonight. 

Definitely something to focus on ahead of LASK. 

It was a different sport watching Galatasaray's midfielders and forwards zip it about. The chances were that they'd always make it count at some stage, which meant, over the two legs, not conceding cheap goals but we did that too unfortunately. 

I want Saints to be better than we showed tonight and I think the manager will as well. The exception to that is obviously Ali McCann, who I'm just going to enjoy watching in what is surely his final few appearances for the club.

Rest some legs on Sunday, stay in the tie in Austria then another big Thursday to come in a fortnight. 

[The Real Saints]

Due to the angle of where I was seated behind the goal, I’m aware that there are maybe things I’ve missed or misjudged. I’ll just say it as I saw it.

I thought that Callum got it tactically wrong tonight. The absence of Spoony instantly put a dampener on my pre-match excitement. We’re evidently reliant on him for the majority of our attacking intent. Rather than just sticking with the same ‘three up front’ system which worked last week, directly replacing him with Stevie May on the left, Callum tried to combat the lack of Spoony by playing a three-man midfield with O’Halloran supporting Kane up front. Therefore we lacked width in attacking areas and were more reliant on our wing-backs to provide offensive runs. This is possibly a fair enough way to go… if you’re selecting Rooney as your RWB. For me, it made no sense to go with James Brown whose strengths don’t lie in getting forward. He had little support on the right. Booth had slightly more support from McCann (who was our best player) on the left, but Ali’s not a natural wide forward so our progression was limited. We struggled to advance up the pitch and Galatasaray found it easy to control the flow of the game and keep us pegged back for long spells. 

As always, we were disciplined and difficult to break down (up to a certain point), but struggled to implement our usual passing game to the same extent. The equaliser was a great moment, particularly because I was sitting behind that goal, but it wasn’t a moment which filled me with too much optimism as I felt we’d still lose unless Callum changed the shape ASAP.

Galatasaray deserved their win and the scoreline was probably fair. I don’t think they were particularly special and they lacked a bit of intensity in the first half, but their class shone through as the match wore on.

Having said everything I’ve said, losing 5-3 to Galatasaray on aggregate is a remarkable achievement and the players should be proud of their efforts over the past week. They were outclassed tonight but they weren’t outfought. With a couple of attacking additions, tonight may have been considerably more uncomfortable for the Turks. As for the referee, I thought he was remarkably lenient towards them and not so lenient towards us when we did similar things. It was quite frustrating.

Back in March 2020, I'd never have believed that the next match I'd be able to attend would be a sell-out European clash against Galatasaray. It was a great occasion. I’ll be making the trip up north again in two weeks to watch us play LASK, who I fear might be a more cohesive team than Galatasaray even if they don’t possess their star names. 

Great effort, Saints. We go again.

 

 

Edited August 12, 2021 by The Real Saints

[Shaggy Jenkins]

Proud of the effort tonight and in places some really good play. The goals aside, which a couple were just good play we limited them to very little.

The refereeing killed it somewhat for us, having practically our entire midfield booked for very little. Also the complete bottle job not sending the boy off for the tackle on Kano.

It's just a shame we missed wotherspoon and have not had the option of Gilmour and Bryson.

What strikes me though, from our multiple forays now in Europe  is in general at every level the ability these teams have to get the ball fully under control compaired to that of the average Scottish player. This is something that is surely not just natural talent and can be coached?

[mizfit]

Anyone else laugh at Patrick Van Aanholt getting absolutely rattled throughout the Match? Thought he was a stickler to lose his head at one point and get a daft red.

[TheScarf]

Who is it you play in the EC qualifiers now? They mentioned it but can't mind.

[Aufc]

Whilst the Turks were clearly a better side, I can’t help but feel that the farmers will see that as a lost opportunity. They showed them too much respect with their full backs whereas they should have had big Rooney on and stuck balls to the back post for him to attack. Their keeper was shite

[tree house tam]

38 minutes ago, TheScarf said:

Who is it you play in the EC qualifiers now? They mentioned it but can't mind.

Read the last few posts. 

[RandomGuy.]

7 hours ago, The Real Saints said:

Therefore we lacked width in attacking areas and were more reliant on our wing-backs to provide offensive runs. This is possibly a fair enough way to go… if you’re selecting Rooney as your RWB. For me, it made no sense to go with James Brown whose strengths don’t lie in getting forward. He had little support on the right. Booth had slightly more support from McCann (who was our best player) on the left, but Ali’s not a natural wide forward so our progression was limited. 

Yeah, this really. If you're being harsh then you have to say neither Booth or Brown are ever going to beat a man and carry the ball upfield. With no Wotherspoon to link with Booth couldn't progress in the same way. While Brown had Muzz next to him who, let's be honest, is incredibly limited on the ball. Be interested to see how many touches Brown actually had up the park. Craig has never been one to really keep the ball, 7/10 times he's just sling it over the head of a full back for a striker to chase.

Still think CM is the area we need to improve if we want to regularly perform at this level. McCann will be gone soon then we'll by coming up against dynamic possession oriented sides with Davidson, Craig, and probably Bryson in there.

[Meldrew]

57 minutes ago, TheScarf said:

Who is it you play in the EC qualifiers now? They mentioned it but can't mind.

LASK of Austria, they got to the last 16 in 19/20 before gttting smashed 7-1 by a jekyll & hyde Man United lost 0-5 at home, iirc United scored a last minute winner at Old Trafford 2-1

got 3-3 draw with Spurs last season, i would say they're a better team than the Turks

[TheScarf]

10 minutes ago, Meldrew said:

LASK of Austria, they got to the last 16 in 19/20 before gttting smashed 7-1 by a jekyll & hyde Man United lost 0-5 at home, iirc United scored a last minute winner at Old Trafford 2-1

got 3-3 draw with Spurs last season, i would say they're a better team than the Turks

Thank you brother. 

[tree house tam]

40 minutes ago, RandomGuy. said:

Yeah, this really. If you're being harsh then you have to say neither Booth or Brown are ever going to beat a man and carry the ball upfield. With no Wotherspoon to link with Booth couldn't progress in the same way. While Brown had Muzz next to him who, let's be honest, is incredibly limited on the ball. Be interested to see how many touches Brown actually had up the park. Craig has never been one to really keep the ball, 7/10 times he's just sling it over the head of a full back for a striker to chase.

Still think CM is the area we need to improve if we want to regularly perform at this level. McCann will be gone soon then we'll by coming up against dynamic possession oriented sides with Davidson, Craig, and probably Bryson in there.

Or Gilmour.....

[RandomGuy.]

2 minutes ago, tree house tam said:

Or Gilmour.....

He's not played nearly enough football in his career for us to know either way with him yet.

[The Real Saints]

Posting a tactical analysis and being validated by RandomGuy quite honestly ranks amongst my top moments of 2021 so far.

[tree house tam]

19 minutes ago, RandomGuy. said:

He's not played nearly enough football in his career for us to know either way with him yet.

So that's enough reason to not even mention him, aye?

I know for a fact Callum wanted him for the very reason that we may lose McCann. That's good enough for me. 

[RandomGuy.]

1 minute ago, tree house tam said:

So that's enough reason to not even mention him, aye?

I know for a fact Callum wanted him for the very reason that we may lose McCann. That's good enough for me. 

I just didn't think he'd be going straight into the line up v LASK with Gilmour starting, as he's got so few games under his belt to know how he'd react.

If McCann goes before next Thursday then I'd guess any CM set up that didn't include Wotherspoon would be Craig, Davidson, and Bryson. 

Ideally Gilmour gets an hour or so v Arbroath, then half an hour away to LASK, then we can start thinking about him being a starter from that point on if he performs, but I've no idea where he's at in terms of recovering from injury.

[Dons_1988]

19 minutes ago, The Real Saints said:

Posting a tactical analysis and being validated by RandomGuy quite honestly ranks amongst my top moments of 2021 so far.

There’s always 2022 I suppose 

[Johnstoun]

So annoying that Randers would likely have been an easier tie than LASK… whole thing is an absolute cartel.

[tree house tam]

Linz are unbeaten so far this season, have quite a few Austrian internationals, as well as an Australian international and while not having the individual stars of Galatasaray are probably a better team. If Middleton and Vertainen are available I think we could give them a proper game.

 

 

Edit: on the subject of McCann I think he'll be here after the window. Anything below 3M should be roundly laughed at and I'd like the Saints board to record themselves laughing at the offer as its passed around the boardroom, then posted on the clubs twitter obviously. 

Edited August 13, 2021 by tree house tam

[Radford]

Gilmour can't have done much pre-season. I think he's missed the boat for these first few months and they'll try and loan him out now until January. 

We have players that aren't good enough for this level. I don't mean Galatasaray, just progressing in Europe against any decent opposition. Craig, Davidson, Booth (without Wotherspoon) and Kane and O'Halloran as a pair. 

It shows there is still room to improve from last season though. We always need to be striving to do that and hopefully getting a few more of the folk that were there last night along more regularly can help that.