R.R.FC

Is Gregory Tade still a free agent? I’d happily fill the team with part time jobbers/people from the crowd to watch a front 3 of him, Nisbet and Vaughan.

I would agree with that. For most of the season we have had a lot of players that turn up when they want to, shown most clearly by our form away from home where we’ve been regularly out worked and out fought. After the last few years a return to the McGlynn teams that fought for everything and gave 100% every week would be a welcome change. Obviously you don’t want to empty the squad of quality just to fill it with workers, you need the right balance and players that can do both. Nathan Flanagan is almost the epitome of our squad. He clearly has a bit of ability and when he is at his best can be very good but he has a heart the size of a pea. Can’t rely on him consistently throughout a long season. In saying that, can’t fault the players for effort last night, it was a lack of quality in both boxes which undone us. Absolute scenes if we line up for our first game next season with proper full backs and a competent keeper. There’s still a game to go so I won’t do a full list just now but I’d genuinely only be disappointed to lose Vaughan and Nisbet from the current squad. There are other players I’d keep but if they left I wouldn’t be too downhearted.

Congrats to QOTS, tie over now. We needed that 2nd goal to stand a chance going into Saturday. We’re definitely capable of scoring a couple in Dumfries but there is no chance we can keep a clean sheet. Not unexpected, we are not good enough as shown through the season. I genuinely think if McGlynn had got this lot promoted it would be up there with anything he has achieved as a Rovers manager. Only 3 or 4 players I’d be really disappointed to lose. Didn’t think there was much in the game in overall play but Queens took their chances and deserved to win because of that. Dobbie is a class act but I actually thought Dykes was even better tonight, he bullied our defence all night and pulled them all over the place. Thought Duggan was excellent when he came on, would like to see him start on Saturday. I’ll still be heading to Dumfries, we won’t come back but on the 0.00001% chance we did, I’d never forgive myself for not going.

The big man strolled it today, nae luck.

It’s like a shortlist for ‘Who is Frank conner?’

I would agree with this. Watching the game I didn’t think the formation was working and I actually thought we played better against Forfar in the 1-1 draw at Starks earlier this season. However, as you say, we did limit Forfar and they didn’t really have any clear cut chances until the last 5 minutes and we obviously got the win so a strong argument could be made that it did actually work. Given McGlynn’s unwilling to change a winning team I would assume it’ll be the same again on Saturday. It certainly got the best out of Crane, his two best games for us have been when he’s not playing left back.

Was going to write something on the game but this pretty much matches my thoughts. Not much between the teams, definitely all to play for on Saturday.

Hasn’t thought of that, good shout. Probably had his best game for us there.

Big fan of JM but he’ll take a bit of stick if things don’t work out with that team. Seems a strange choice, looks like 3 at the back?

We’ve not lost a League One match by two clear goals since...yep you’ve guessed it...the play off semi final first leg against Alloa last season. We must take a lead to Forfar to have any sort of chance. Our away form is bad enough on it’s own but Station Park seems to have been a particular bogey ground in recent times. In saying that, we seem to have developed a knack of drawing games away from home recently. 1 defeat in 7 on the road now (only 1 win in 7 also right enough). Not exactly enough to build a huge amount of confidence but it gives some hope if we can get a narrow advantage tonight.

With you on this. I think we’d need a more defensively sound option if we went up but if we stayed in League One he would be a good signing IMO. Would be nice to see a natural right back with the ability to overlap again.

The ‘two Premiership clubs’ thing is laughable as if we don’t know who they will be. Why should we bend over backwards to help and develop the old firms youngsters? If playing in League Two is suddenly going to help the Old Firm and produce great young players for Scotland then why didn’t Rangers take that approach when they were down there? Nope, instead they decided to chuck money at diddies like Kevin Kyle, Fran Sandaza, Faure and Cribari. It shows how backwards the people in charge are that they think colt teams are the solution because they do it in Spain, Netherlands, Germany etc. There are a hundred other things these countries have in place which aid the production of youngsters. The number of pitches, coaches and the set up of even local sides in the Netherlands is light years away from what we have. I’d rather we set those things up first and gave them a chance before going straight in with colt teams which is putting the cart before the horse.

Barjonas has played on the left a few times for us hasn’t he? I agree that those 6 will be certain starters in McGlynn’s eyes along with, you would assume, Lyness, Crane, Buchanan and Nisbet. The last place could go to anyone of Matthews, Flanagan, McGuffie or Gullan. Will be interesting to see if we go with a flat 4 with a winger on the the right with Barjonas on the left. Or if we will go back to the diamond in midfield with Gullan or Flanagan in front of the midfield three previously mentioned. My preference would be the diamond with Gullan behind Nisbet and Buchanan.

There is no way you would have kept up your form prior to the Rovers game at Gayfield for the full season. Regardless of who you played up front. Your run to that point was spectacular and won you the league but in a relatively evenly matched league that level of consistency could never be maintained. Look at East Fife from the first half of the season to now. You had 45 points after 17 games, if you kept that going all season you would have reached almost 100 points which would give you more than the Dunfermline side that romped the league and on par with QOS and Rangers. Without being disrespectful to the current Arbroath side, they aren’t on that level. As I said previously, the current points total is a fair reflection on Arbroath and how they compare to the rest of the league and previous champions.

Just because you keep saying that doesn’t make it true. Ahead of the game in Kirkcaldy you had won 2 out of your last 6 (against Brechin and Stenny). The drop off in form started before that game in Kirkcaldy. I don’t see why you need to keep trying to peddle the myth that your form has only dropped off after that game. Arbroath are absolutely worthy winners of the league but were never going to be able to keep up the level of consistency shown in the first half of the season. The current points tally is a fair reflection on the quality of the Arbroath side both in respect of their dominance over the rest of the league and how they compare to previous winners.

I notice we never played any players returning from injury in the Fife Cup last night. Therefore, I would imagine the likes of Duggan, Wedderburn, Murray and Gillespie will get 90 minutes under their belts on Saturday. I would like to see some key players rested but it could be argued aside from Nisbet all our key players are either injured or returning from injury and needing minutes. The line up is anyone’s guess but you could really say the same for the play off against Forfar. I’ve mentioned it before but due to the disruption with injuries I have no idea what our first choice side is. I would say McGlynn’s first choice defence, rightly or wrongly, is Murray, Davo, Bene and Crane with Buchanan and Nisbet the choices upfront. However, the midfield is a bit of a lottery in terms of personnel and formation.

I would rest some players. Particularly given it isn’t in our hands to finish 2nd. No point playing a full strength team, risking injuries and still finishing 3rd. However, with the players we have coming back from injury and needing minutes it would still be a pretty strong side. Aside from the financial side I don’t see a huge benefit to finishing 2nd over 3rd. If we finish 3rd, we should take a big travelling support up to Forfar on the Saturday if we are in still in the tie after the first leg which could help. First leg away runs the risk of the tie being dead before the second leg as per last year which ruins any home advantage. I would play something like this to give players returning from injury minutes and rest some others: Lyness Watson Bene McKay Murray McGuffie Wedderburn Gillespie Flanagan (if he’s fit) Smith/Bowie Duggan That gives Bene, Murray, Gillespie, Wedderburn, Flanagan and Duggan much needed minutes under their belts. Also gives Crane, Davo, Barjonas, Gullan, Matthews, Buchanan and Nisbet a rest. There isn’t many from that list that should be guaranteed starters but we know most of them are so keep them fresh.

McCallum Thomson O’Brien Little Ballantyne Thomas Turner Reilly Linn Nisbet Hilson That would be my team. Toss up between McCallum/Long/Jamieson in goals from what I’ve seen. The other choice was between Hilson/Baird and McGuigan. The rest of the team is pretty straight forward. Armstrong wasn’t with us long enough to justify a place. His form began to drop his last few appearances as well. Terrific first 7 games though. Nisbet is the only Raith player who deserves a place and he has to be in. Can’t believe some people have left him out. He’s scored almost double the amount of the next highest scoring striker in the league and his all round game is very good for this level. Hate to think where we’d be without him. Obviously these teams are always picked with the views of other supporters factored in rather than solely on performances that I’ve seen. Joao Vitoria has probably been the best opposition player against the Rovers this season. Caused us all sorts of bother at Airdrie and Stranraer. However, judging by the fact he was loaned out by Airdrie I’m assuming he’s not near that standard every week.

That’s not true at all tbh. Attacking players and ones who can control a game and retain possession like Hendry and Vaughan can obviously effect the defensive side of things. We would also be able to implement a totally different shape with them. Some facts regarding us ‘shipping goals all season even when they were fit’ erm...no actually. With Hendry we conceded on average a goal every 82 minutes which is a clear improvement. However, the really interesting comparison is with Vaughan which highlights his obvious impact to us. Without him, we have played (roughly) 2400 minutes, conceding 41 goals. In the 672 minutes he has played we have conceded 5 goals. Meaning the averages are as follows: Without Vaughan - A goal conceded every 58 minutes With Vaughan - A goal conceded every 135 minutes. Actually an even more impressive every 151 minutes if we’re only counting games since JM took over. I’d say that’s fairly conclusive.

I think it’s undeniable we would have been much closer without injuries. In particular the injuries to Vaughan and Hendry killed us. Those two play all season we obviously pick up more points. Vaughan pretty much singlehandedly dragged us to a title challenge for large parts of last season. We’ve barely had him available since McGlynn came back. Add that to the injury for Hendry as well as pretty much every player in our squad missing games with injury, several being lengthy I think it’s a fair assumption to say we would be a good few points better off with a fully fit squad all season. However, we struggle away from home, are defensively poor and seem to pick and choose the games we want to turn up for. I’m not sure how much of that would have changed with a fully fit squad considering it’s predominantly forward thinking players we’ve had out. As Paco has mentioned previously if we didn’t have all those injuries that need covering for who is to say McGlynn wouldn’t have addressed the defensive side with his signings in January. We will never know. It’s all ifs buts and maybes. It does come across as a deflection tactic though. Arbroath have been the most consistent team over the season and are deserving champions bit unfair to say that’s solely down to our injury record.

From being in the Championship play offs beating Hibs and stopping Rangers winning the title on our patch to being fearful of sharing a league with Edinburgh City and Peterhead in 4 seasons? Impressive stuff even for us. Next season is a concern but more due teams coming down from the other direction. The possibility of sharing a league with the likes of Falkirk and Partick is a nightmare. There’s enough to panic about without making absolute nonsense claims. Edinburgh City FFS...

Not entirely unexpected and I actually don’t think it’s the worst news in the world. Out of the players signed up for next season the only ones I’d be overly disappointed to see leave are Vaughan, Nisbet and Murray. If we have to cut our cloth and go part time to secure the future of the club then so be it. I’m glad we’ve been smart enough to include clauses rather than being tied a potentially unsustainable full time model for next season due to contracts handed out 6-12 months previous.

To keep the feel good factor going and build excitement towards the play offs, how would everyone rank our play off disappointments. 1-5, 1 being the most gutting at the time, 5 being the least hard to take. For me it would be: 1. Brechin City (3-3 aggregate) - We absolutely deserved to be relegated that season. However, I remember being pretty sure it would be Alloa that would do it and thought we’d have enough about us to see off Brechin. Our away form was terrible (shock!) so after a draw at Glebe Park most of us thought we’d get the job done at Starks (given our form under Hughes was very good there) but that didn’t factor in the M’Voto horror show. 2. Airdrie (4-2 aggregate) - Davo and Fahey with another play off defensive horror show. 2 identical goals at Starks to kill the tie off in the first half. Put this second as going in I genuinely thought we had a good chance. We had beaten Airdrie in 3 of the 4 games and we finished only 6 points behind them. The terrible and entirely preventable goals killed off that hope within 40 minutes. Made worse by the fact Airdrie were beaten in the play off final but were still promoted due to Gretna (I think?) going bust. 3. Stirling Albion (3-1 aggregate) - This is a tough one. When McGlynn arrived in October we were 9th in League One and any play offs hopes seemed far fetched. However, we improved massively. The form since JM arriving through to the end of the season was actually the best in the league. Stirling were a very good side that year and were definitely better than us but we went into with a great deal of hope due to our turnaround in form. We went 1-0 up in the second leg at Forthbank but lost the lead straight away and Stirling ran out deserved winners. It was disappointing but not particularly unexpected. 4. Hibernian (2-1 aggregate) - Our one play off tie win!!! A midweek 1-0 win at Stark’s amongst building speculation about McKinnon’s future. Our form since our January signings was the best in the league I’m sure? However, I still travelled in more hope than expectation. Two quick fire early goals by Hibs put them infront and a great season kind of petered as we failed to put Hibs under sustained pressure. Made worse by Dundee United approaching McKinnon about 5 minutes after full time. Ranks slightly lower because I never seen us navigating the required 6 games to gain promotion. 5. Alloa (4-1 aggregate) Might seem strange to some that this would be the least disappointing considering we lost to a team that finished 15 points behind us. However, after the losing the title by failing to beat Alloa on the last day I don’t think there were any Rovers fans who expected us to beat them over 2 legs just days later. The inevitability of what followed lessened the disappointment.

Obviously we have the following under contract for next season: Thomson, Murray, Bene, Watson, Dingwall, Gillespie, Vaughan, Nisbet, Flanagan However, I will base my list on a rose tinted ideal scenario where those under contract can be moved on easily. Keep: Thomson, Murray, Gillespie, Dingwall, Vaughan, Nisbet Punt: Lyness, Davo, Bene, Watson, Crane, Barjonas, McGuffie, Flanagan, Duggan, Gullan Undecided: McKay - Not as convinced as everyone else, easily dominated in the air for a centre back. Still young and has potential but that’s an area he must improve Wedderburn - Physically strong and excellent on the ball, painfully slow though. I don’t think he can play in a midfield two. Punt if that’s how we’ll be playing. Matthews - I can’t make my mind up. He’ll be ineffectual for a few games and you’ll wonder why he’s still here but then he’ll put in a good performance and you start to think he has the potential to be really good. Probably gets more leeway because he’s a youth product but he’s 23 now. Next season will be huge for him. Buchanan - I think he’s been much better this season. Vastly improved on last year although that wasn’t hard. Advancing years makes me think punt but wouldn’t be disappointed if he got another year.

It was in agreement with someone who had said ‘any of the league 1 teams are more than capable of beating the 9th placed championship side.’ Which is exactly my point. There is no notable advantage or trend of the Championship team being stronger. The play offs at this level are a fairly level playing field. However, every single year people tend to claim that the Championship side will be too strong for the League One sides. When I’m actual fact that is rarely the case.