Optimisim levels

[RossBFaeDundee]

5 minutes ago, Twinkle said:

Battle for a top 6 place and at least one good cup run. So similar to this year

And you were giving me the 'fucking hell'...

[Twinkle]

12 minutes ago, RossBFaeDundee said:

And you were giving me the 'fucking hell'...

We were a point away from a top 6 finish and made a cup semi at Hampden. Not really sure your point here given we havent lost any of our 4 most important players in Benji, Edwards, Fuchs and Shankland

[DukDukGoose]

It was only one game but I'm a lot more optimistic after watching it.

We have a DM who's legs are likely gone but he's still miles ahead of most players in the league up top screening the defence. A cracking young pair of full backs who have been brought up playing quick football in to feet. Probably more importantly we have a Ramirez who can hold the ball up, find pockets of space and pick a pass. We also have JET who's got lovely feet and can actually head the ball in the direction he wants it to go.

I'd still like to get a few more players in to fight for a spot in the first XI though.

[Ludo*1]

2 hours ago, Twinkle said:

We were a point away from a top 6 finish and made a cup semi at Hampden. Not really sure your point here given we havent lost any of our 4 most important players in Benji, Edwards, Fuchs and Shankland

Fucking hell.

[Guest TheJTS98]

9 hours ago, JamieThomas said:

Hubristic answer: HEARTS JUGGERNAUT ROLLS ON BABY

Kick the stool from under me answer: Our only signing is a wee dweeb on loan from Brighton, they'll no need the Covid to launch us this time

Nearest the mark answer: I'll be happy if I just see some effort in circa 50% of our games

 

Slight worry about this, as while our first eleven doesn't cause me panic (or excitement), if we carry on our recent injury record, we could find ourselves in trouble. The squad is pish beyond the immediate first team, so an injury run like we've had recently could be a problem.

[Dons_1988]

11 hours ago, Merkland Red said:

It was only one game but I'm a lot more optimistic after watching it.

We have a DM who's legs are likely gone but he's still miles ahead of most players in the league up top screening the defence. A cracking young pair of full backs who have been brought up playing quick football in to feet. Probably more importantly we have a Ramirez who can hold the ball up, find pockets of space and pick a pass. We also have JET who's got lovely feet and can actually head the ball in the direction he wants it to go.

I'd still like to get a few more players in to fight for a spot in the first XI though.

Thursday has given me a more relaxed cautious optimism for the season ahead. 

Im still mindful that Ferguson could/probably is away which changes the dynamic (albeit an opportunity to bring in more faces) and we’re still very light in defence. 

Not to mention domestic football can have a habit of bringing you back down to earth quite quickly after an encouraging European game. 

[dezz]

Our squad in its current form is bottom 4 I would say - central midfield and central defence is a shambles. I do think Alexander is a better manager than the majority of others likely to be in the bottom 6 though.
We brought in a CM over the weekend who should improve that area, and by all accounts we’re due to announce a Finnish international CB next week. We’ll likely add at least another CB and CM which, as long as they are not total flops, will alleviate a lot of my current concerns.
I think we’ll finish somewhere between 6th-8th and not do anything of note in the cups which I’d be fine with as long the entertainment factor is a lot higher than we saw last year.

[capt_oats]

As @dezz says, over the Betfred games we've looked genuine relegation shouts. Getting scudded by Airdrie is as much of a minter as you can get.

At the same time, not once in any of those games or the two bounce games we played have we started with what you'd consider to be our best XI. There are players who we've still not seen anything of (Mark O'Hara picked up an injury in the first BCD game vs Dumbarton, Connor Shields picked up a muscle injury the other week, Liam Grimshaw's still not right after his glandular fever from the start of the year and Bevis Mugabi is rehabbing from a shoulder injury).

On top of the injuries and mix and match teamlines we've still a pile of players to bring in to address the obvious deficiencies and we've clearly been using the LC groups as pre-season. So barring the 2nd half against QoTSA where we were 2 down and actually had to try we've pretty much been playing in 1st and 2nd gear. That's before you factor in doing stuff like playing a wacky 343 as we did yesterday.

So it's a massive ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ in terms of how things will pan out this season.

On the face of it Alexander seems a perfectly fine manager. He's sitting on a 48% win rate at the moment and took over when we were bottom of the league in January and had us finishing on the same points as the best St Mirren side in 30 years and from Alexander being appointed we had the 3rd best points total/form in the league behind Rangers and Celtic. So that's something.

Of the team with the good form we've lost Gallagher, Campbell, Polworth-ish (he fucked it and barely played under Alexander but we still miss that type of player) and Cole. But retained Kelly. Which is nice.

All things told this feels like a massively transitional season for us. We seem to be trying to address the frankly ludicrous turnover of players we've seen by dishing out 3 year contracts like sweeties and it appears we've taken a bit more time with recruitment and moved away from Robinson's approach of signing up anyone who might "do a job" on a 1 or 2 year deal and dealing with whether they're good or not after they've signed.

Like most years anywhere between 5th and 8th with the bonus of runs in both cups would be absolutely fine tbh.

Edited July 25, 2021 by capt_oats

[DukDukGoose]

1 hour ago, Dons_1988 said:

Thursday has given me a more relaxed cautious optimism for the season ahead. 

Im still mindful that Ferguson could/probably is away which changes the dynamic (albeit an opportunity to bring in more faces) and we’re still very light in defence. 

Not to mention domestic football can have a habit of bringing you back down to earth quite quickly after an encouraging European game. 

This is all true. 

What I can add is we have a manager who seems to be signing players to fit his system. We've turned out noses up at a few rumoured players but we're probably all still looking at things how they were under McInnes.

McInnes used to sign good players but so many of them didn't fit his style of football. The likes of Greg Stewart and McGeoch never really made sense at the time but we were happy because we knew they were good players.

[PauloPerth]

On 22/07/2021 at 23:20, BIG BEN said:

 

For Saints, the resl ones in black and white, top 6 is the holy grail. One Good cup run would be an added bonus

 

 

On 22/07/2021 at 23:51, Mvondo_the_great said:

I  can't see st Johnstone doing as well tbh.

 

I'll be happy if united make 7th.

 

On 23/07/2021 at 00:04, Illgresi said:

Ask me again after we play against St. Johnstone's patented 10 tractors behind the ball.

 

3 of the opening 5 posts on this thread from fans of various diddy clubs feature wee digs at St Johnstone.

Is this the price of success? Are we now the most important club in Scotland.. it's going to take a bit of getting used to.

Mid table and a cup run for us, unless a few of our key young players move just prior to the end of the transfer window and it's a bit of a struggle.

[Dons_1988]

1 hour ago, Merkland Red said:

This is all true. 

What I can add is we have a manager who seems to be signing players to fit his system. We've turned out noses up at a few rumoured players but we're probably all still looking at things how they were under McInnes.

McInnes used to sign good players but so many of them didn't fit his style of football. The likes of Greg Stewart and McGeoch never really made sense at the time but we were happy because we knew they were good players.

I think if I learned anything from last season it’s that it doesn’t take much for things to collapse like a house of cards. I still maintain that for 2 months up to and including beating hibs 2-0 at pittodrie we looked like a proper team. You can’t blame the rest of the season on injuries/suspensions but it really never recovered from various injuries and COVID going into that international break. 

So I think we definitely have something about us this season but the points I mentioned are ones I see as ‘potential’ weak spots if circumstances conspire against us. That and I don’t think we can necessarily expect Ramsay/Mckenzie to have the consistency yet and obviously f**k knows what COVID will throw at us. 

[DukDukGoose]

10 minutes ago, Dons_1988 said:

I think if I learned anything from last season it’s that it doesn’t take much for things to collapse like a house of cards. I still maintain that for 2 months up to and including beating hibs 2-0 at pittodrie we looked like a proper team. You can’t blame the rest of the season on injuries/suspensions but it really never recovered from various injuries and COVID going into that international break. 

So I think we definitely have something about us this season but the points I mentioned are ones I see as ‘potential’ weak spots if circumstances conspire against us. That and I don’t think we can necessarily expect Ramsay/Mckenzie to have the consistency yet and obviously f**k knows what COVID will throw at us. 

If you exclude the Motherwell game, we were brilliant from Livi up until that Hibs game. The main gripe for me was we fell in to the team selection due to covid/injuries. When we lost players to covid/injury again we persisted with it when it was clear to see it wasn't working. I can't see that being the case this time around.

[Dons_1988]

6 minutes ago, Merkland Red said:

If you exclude the Motherwell game, we were brilliant from Livi up until that Hibs game. The main gripe for me was we fell in to the team selection due to covid/injuries. When we lost players to covid/injury again we persisted with it when it was clear to see it wasn't working. I can't see that being the case this time around.

I always think it’s harsh to say we fell into the formation. 3-4-3 was fairly bold for Derek and paid off pretty well. 

However I 100% agree that he simply couldn’t find a solution/alternative when the personnel went missing. 

[sergie's no1 fan]

Safety guaranteed with roughly 10 games to go and another semi final would be great going for us.

Depends what our squad looks like come the transfer deadline but just now I think we have to be quietly optimistic.

[DukDukGoose]

1 hour ago, Dons_1988 said:

I always think it’s harsh to say we fell into the formation. 3-4-3 was fairly bold for Derek and paid off pretty well. 

However I 100% agree that he simply couldn’t find a solution/alternative when the personnel went missing. 

It was definitely bold but I don't see us playing that formation without the injuries etc.

[Dons_1988]

3 minutes ago, Merkland Red said:

It was definitely bold but I don't see us playing that formation without the injuries etc.

Leave the man alone min, he’s gone

[Dee Man]

19 hours ago, Twinkle said:

Battle for a top 6 place and at least one good cup run. So similar to this year

18 hours ago, Twinkle said:

We were a point away from a top 6 finish and made a cup semi at Hampden. Not really sure your point here given we havent lost any of our 4 most important players in Benji, Edwards, Fuchs and Shankland

The fact that you've lost your manager and replaced him with a recruitment consultant and that the stats for your last 2 games versus East Fife and Arbroath look like the games were pretty evenly matched would suggest that your optimism has no basis in reality. 

[mizfit]

Mid table and a decent cup run.
I wouldn’t mind another trip to Hampden anyway.

[Ya Bezzer!]

Based on the squad on paper and the performances in the League Cup we look like a bottom quarter team right now.

If you exclude  the Annan match we were 4-4 in 3 matches against a probably bottom half Championship team and a couple of League 1 sides.  And those results probably flattered us a bit.

We definitely need a few good quality signings before the window closes.

[Swello]

I genuinely find it hard to judge my levels of optimism at the moment as all the signings we've made are in various stages of fitness and familiarity with their team mates - and we've completely gutted the team from last season, which every 'Well fan wanted to see. We are the definition of a work in progress at the moment and the weaknesses that existed last season in defence and midfield are only just being (or attempting to be) rectified right now so are still present.

Before the LC groups became a thing, you'd play a few pre-season friendlies against lower division Scottish teams or maybe a mini-tour of grim Northern English towns, maybe with one big English team thrown in as the culmination of pre-season. (Apart from to the very worst knicker-wetters) the result of those games were *utterly* meaningless as to how the season would go and the accepted wisdom  was that you'd need to wait for a few games into the season for things to settle down. Now - a pretty harsh light is shone on teams' preparations as they are into competitive fixtures from the word go and I'm not sure it's helpful to be going mental before the league has even started. 

On paper, I'm very happy with the signings of Kelly, Slattery, Shields and (apparently soon) Ojala and I'm hopeful that Van Veen will be the player that we all hope - so that gives me a bit of optimism at this stage but we are still short of a full squad, so it remains to be seen.