CallumPar

We should have just installed one of those all weather pitches at East End. Would mean that we would avoid postponements like today. I’m sure Livingston, Kelty, Alloa, Falkirk etc won’t have games postponed because of a bit of snow.

Game is 100% off. Live 5 mins from the ground and there’s honestly not a chance this will be ok. Roads seem to be a nightmare too, so it’s not just a question of ‘will the pitch be playable?’

Dunfermline is very frosty this morning and it’s not supposed to get above freezing until well after the game is due to be played. Game will be off.

Good to get some official word from the club, that puts to bed all the reports/rumours from ‘in the know’ people, who apparently didn’t know anything. Pleased that work is underway and it’s nice to get an idea of the timeline as well.

Thats certainly what I thought. Good on the officials for finding a way to let the fans know what was happening. Obviously there were 2 lengthy delays for injuries before the 90th minute, so I was expecting a lot of added on time. But I thought it was decent of the officials to ask someone to put up a board.

After we scored the 3rd goal, the linesman approached our bench and we put up the board to indicate 10 mins being added on.

Yeah, play stopped for McKenna after we’d played 10 mins of stoppage time. Honestly assumed ref would just blow for time, seemed like the logical thing to do, particularly once it was clear he needed a stretcher. Waiting so long and then not restarting play didn’t make sense, but he was generally alright so don’t want to criticise him too much for that.

Todd injured himself in front of the dugouts at East End. But he was diving into a challenge, didn’t seem to be the pitch that caused it. Genuinely can’t think of any injuries that could be put down to the pitch.

Dislocated shoulder will be a lengthy one. Will be well into the new year before he can be back out on the pitch. He needs to be capable of putting his hands down to stop a fall etc. Sure NHS advice is about 12 weeks. I’ve done ligaments in my shoulder and was told I couldn’t play football for at least 12 weeks, can’t imagine a dislocation is much/any shorter.

McPake confirmed post-match that KRH has dislocated his shoulder and is off to hospital. Ankle injury for Fisher, that will be assessed.

Aside from the injuries, which were sad to see, that second half was excellent from a Pars perspective. O’Halloran, Wighton and Jakubiak all got on the ball and ran at Arbroath’s defence. They also got McCann doing the same and the pace we attacked at was great to watch. Hopefully Wighton can go on a wee goal scoring run now, which is what he seems to do. His positioning was excellent for both goals. He was unlucky not to score another 2 as well. Despite it only being half an hour, that was his best performance of the season by far. Wonder if having the work rate of McCann and Jakubiak beside him could be the way to go? Obviously Todd can play one of those wide/behind roles too. After a terrible first half, I was really pleased with the way we performed second half. Was really good to see the subs improve the team. I would say it’ll be a tough decision for McPake on Saturday, but we can only have about 11 fit outfield players?

On the football - Arbroath are going down and doesn’t even look like they’ll put up a fight. They were comically bad, particularly second half. We played some good stuff at times in the second half, but that doesn’t take anything away from how awful they were. The third goal was truly pathetic from them. O’Halloran, Wighton and Jakubiak all came off the bench and made a very positive difference for us. O’Halloran finally got us running at that defence with the ball and they couldn’t cope. McCann looked so much better with those guys around him too. edit - just looked at the league table and I got it wrong. Thought they were bottom. But they’re only 6 points behind us with a game in hand. I’ll assume that was a lot worse than usual from them.

Not sure we have 1 guy capable of playing CB in a back 4, never mind 2. So we’re stuck with the back 3 until natural defenders are back. Seriously hope none of tonight’s injuries are as bad as they looked. Players nearby seemed very concerned about all 3 of them. Also looked like Moffat did his hamstring. Hope he’s back soon-ish, but there were 3 guys that left the park in a lot more pain and I’m more concerned about them.

Never seen a game with 3 serious looking injuries like that. Genuinely hope it’s not as bad as it looked for KRH, Fisher and McKenna. Never nice seeing guys go off like that.

If you’re one of the Arbroath fans that was booing as Fisher got carried off, unable to put weight on his ankle, you’re a scumbag. No idea what that was all about.

Just seems to be keeping the ball for the sake of boosting possession stats, with no plan to break down their defence. That was what we watched every week under Hughes. I expected Todd, KRH, Edwards and Moffat to get the ball and run at them and it’s not happening at all.

Half time and this feels like most games in the relegation season. So slow and about 70% of the half was the back 3 and Chalmers passing it between them, with midfield and attacking players standing watching them.

Not if you’re coming via the motorway/Halbeath. It’s north of Dunfermline, back road from Kelty/Cowdenbeath kind of way.

Strange how these things work out. It’s our 4th home game, of 5 in a row!

Not the only ones with defensive issues, in fairness. We’ll have Chris Hamilton at CB, where he’s been playing for the last month or so. Hopefully Todd and KRH are fit enough to start, so we can run at the Arbroath defence and put them under pressure right from the start.

Wasn’t in response to Friday. We created nothing and improving strike options wouldn’t have made a difference to that result. It’s more that, when we have played well, we haven’t taken our chances. See the Inverness game. See the Morton away game, where it was a tense finish because we wasted chances. Last season, we wasted a lot of chances too. Took forever to get that goal some weeks. It wasn’t as costly, because we rarely conceded. However, if anything, we’re now weaker than last year (in terms of goal threat) as Todorov was one of our better goal scorers.

Not going to panic and start calling for anyone to be sacked yet. But the next week will be crucial, when it comes to deciding whether we’ll be in a relegation battle or not. If we get 2 points or less from these 2 games, we’re in for a long season. If we get 2 wins and build some confidence again, we are more than capable of competing for top 4. 3 or 4 points would be ok and suggest we’ll be mid-table. We’re certainly not a good championship squad right now. It’s frustrating to see the lack of leadership/experience in the side. It’s frustrating that we’re crying out for a goal scorer, but haven’t even been linked with anyone. Another Andy Kirk or Nicky Clark would see us into the top 4. Wighton is a player that will hit a purple patch at some point, but he’s barely kicked a ball this season. Jakubiak works hard and puts pressure on defenders, but he’s terrible in front of goal. We play some good stuff, but it means nothing when we don’t have anyone you can depend on to put the ball in the net. At the back, we needed some sort of cover for Bene, but didn’t bring it in. We have talented young players, but nobody with leadership skills/experience to help them out. We tried Euan Murray in January and he was apparently keen, then we decided to stick with youngsters. That would be fine if Bene stayed fit, but his recent injury history tells you that was unlikely to happen for 2 full seasons. The lack of experience shows when decisions go against us and everyone switches off for the set piece (as happened twice on Friday). That wouldn’t happen with Bene on the park and Raith wouldn’t have done the same either. The talented youngsters that we have won’t develop if they’re asked to go out and play with no leadership/support from experienced pros. It’s noticeable how much better everyone in defence looks with Bene there. We need the same in midfield and attack, in my opinion. Even to have as an option. Thats why Wotherspoon would have made a lot of sense. It’s disappointing to see him hit the ground running with Inverness, knowing that we’re the ones that got him fit and it doesn’t seem like we were willing to give him a deal that worked for him. In midfield, I really wanted to see us sign a more physical midfielder, a real grafter that will hassle any opponents. Hamilton can play that role, but is now needed at the back. Otoo can play there too and has made a difference when played there. But again, he’s been needed at the back recently. It seems obvious, but if we were planning to play a back 3, we should have more than 4 recognised CBs at the club. That should have been obvious to the recruitment team, particularly once we moved Otoo to midfield. January window is approaching and I hope some of our areas of need are addressed. Otherwise it’ll be a long second half of the season. Apologies for the long post. Just wanted to get my thoughts out there.

We have a very young squad. Don’t know enough about other clubs to back up the youngest in the league argument. Think Chalmers was our oldest outfield player tonight at 29. That’s the same in most games this season too, unless O’Halloran has played. Our key/best players are all quite young in the absence of Bene. Todd (22) KRH (21) Otoo (21) Fisher (22) McCann (22) Hamilton (22) Comrie and Edwards are two of our experienced players at 26 and 23. Lack of experience definitely an issue without Benedictus on the park.

Next 2 games are massive. Win them and we’ll be fine. Drop points and we’re heading towards the wrong end of the table. Definitely need a reaction from the players after that embarrassing performance.

Congrats Raith, thoroughly deserved that win. By far the better team on the night and we were lucky it wasn’t more. Even at 3-0, I thought they had a decent penalty shout, when Mehmet came charging out and took out the attacker, Collum somehow gave a goal kick. We just weren’t at the races at all. Big Hamilton bullied our defence all night. Stanton and Easton controlled the midfield. For us, I’m not sure anyone really hit the required standard. Everyone was poor.