DC92
-
Posts
2,530 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
2
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Events
Store
Posts posted by DC92
-
-
25 minutes ago, Stylish Kid said:
Just on the last point, whilst we have been relegated, Aberdeen only missed out on it because of Falkirk not having a big enough stadium.....
21 minutes ago, Dons_1988 said:Missed out on a playoff*
Pretty sure we'd save everyone a lot of time by just having ChatGPT generate all these recycled talking points and retorts. We could pin it to the top of the forum.
3 -
3 minutes ago, AJF said:
That's fair. I got the impression from that article that Emre had been appointed as manager rather than a technical director as well
I'd assume that's just because nobody really knows the official job title most of the time. I think since Budge came in we've had two Head Coaches, two Managers and one "Football Manager" (lol), but ultimately the guy who picks the team and does the post-match interviews is going to be referred to as the manager by most people.
2 -
20 minutes ago, AJF said:
It's appointing Naismith as Technical Director part that's weird. If (assuming) there are no such restrictions in the SPFL, why wouldn't Hearts just appoint him as manager and then let McAvoy manage the European games like Basaksehir done?
I didn't understand that part either, but I just had a look at the Basaksehir website and...
The statement does also explicitly mention that it's to comply with the regulations for playing in European competition.
2 -
21 hours ago, DC92 said:
On the Pro Licence stuff, my impression was that you needed one to be a permanent manager in the top flight, but the club statement only mentions it being a requirement for "European competition", which I take to mean the Conference League. Is that right?
If it's just a Europe requirement and McAvoy has to be nominally in charge for those (let's be honest, two) games, then I'm not that bothered. If it's a requirement for the league and we have McAvoy nominally in charge, but Naismith de facto in charge, then it's an issue imo. Firstly because it would be an obvious circumvention of the regulations which leaves us open to penalties and secondly because it creates the potential for confused leadership if the club has to outwardly act as if one person is calling the shots while internally acting differently.
McKinlay is an ex-SFA COO and was a member of the UEFA Legal Committee for 3 years so you'd assume he'll be on top of this but... this is Hearts.
Looking into it a bit more, it seems Emre Belozoglu (who manages Istanbul Basaksehir) also doesn't have his Pro Licence. He was banned from the dugout for our home game with them last season after he was found guilty of "shadow coaching" in the previous round by UEFA. Basaksehir were also fined 10k.
The article below also states there are no such restrictions in the Turkish League, so I'm assuming it's the same here.
Based on this it seems Naismith is ok to act as manager in domestic games but McAvoy will have to visibly be in charge for the Conference League games. If that is the case it's basically a non-issue.
Steven MacLean also doesn't have a Pro Licence going by the fact he's just enrolled on the SFA course.
0 -
7 hours ago, the jambo-rocker said:
The announcement team just felt off. I'm still haunted by the Cathro/Levein picks the team days and now this. Technical Director. Fine, but urgh.
Naismith improved us but it wasn't exactly hard to. I could have us, you could have improved us. He did that as a player when he joined on loan but he dropped off a cliff six months into his permanent time after his injury and spent the rest of his time shouting at players in a Snodgrass-lite fashion. Instead of using the full three months to really try and push the boat out and I'd heard in spite of not being big enough, Anderson was willing to open his checkbook for the right one and we still couldn't do that, settling for someone that might be a good manager.
I truly hope it works out but I'm absolutely underwhelmed with nothing to go on but tiny signs of encouragement from a small sample size with lots of conditions and whole of chat to appeal to your Heart's da. For all this talk from Hearts wanting to go beyond third, this absolutely not the appointment that follows through with it.
Maybe I'm fatigued but I think we're doomed to appoint nearly-men/mediocre managers for the rest of my puff.
I wasn't massively down on appointing Naismith because my expectations were low, but I agree the announcement had extremely bad vibes. Unfortunately I can very easily picture it featuring in the first tweet of a viral Twitter thread entitled "Hearts 23/24: The Banter Season".
A couple of early signings might help get things back on track.
1 -
2 minutes ago, Squonk said:
the ludicrous claim that two of Hearts league titles were somehow devalued because they were won before Aberdeen were formed.
Given Aberdeen are such a relentless trophy-winning machine you'd have to assume they'd have hoovered those up if they'd been around.
Luckily for them the same logic apparently doesn't apply to Livi or Caley Thistle.
0 -
1 hour ago, afc_blockhead said:
So Aberdeen fans "live in the past" for celebrating the 1980s but 2 pre 1900 titles (when Aberdeen didnt exist) are hearts fans argument to make themselves relevant?
For the record weve also won a major trophy more recently than you. Weve also finished above you 10 years in 11.
You did almost finish third last season and almost win the scottish cup on pens against Celtic though .. guess thats a win for Hearts
You're absolutely right mate, you've proven to everyone here that Aberdeen are a massive, famous club and Hearts are irrelevant and small.
Some people could have been confused, but thankfully you were here to enter this discussion about our new Technical Director - which some might have thought had nothing at all to do with Aberdeen - to put us right.
2 -
21 minutes ago, afc_blockhead said:
The 80s has Hearts greatest (almost) achievement though doesnt it!
Just remember 2 financially doped scottish cups aside Hearts have 1 trophy since the 60s. With 5 relegations
If you would like to bring it more up to date. Remember when you almost finished 3rd this past season?
Almost ...
See, I thought Hearts had won the league the same number of times as Aberdeen, but I forgot trophies from 60 years ago don't count and ones from 40 years ago count double.
1 -
On the Pro Licence stuff, my impression was that you needed one to be a permanent manager in the top flight, but the club statement only mentions it being a requirement for "European competition", which I take to mean the Conference League. Is that right?
If it's just a Europe requirement and McAvoy has to be nominally in charge for those (let's be honest, two) games, then I'm not that bothered. If it's a requirement for the league and we have McAvoy nominally in charge, but Naismith de facto in charge, then it's an issue imo. Firstly because it would be an obvious circumvention of the regulations which leaves us open to penalties and secondly because it creates the potential for confused leadership if the club has to outwardly act as if one person is calling the shots while internally acting differently.
McKinlay is an ex-SFA COO and was a member of the UEFA Legal Committee for 3 years so you'd assume he'll be on top of this but... this is Hearts.
0 -
13 minutes ago, kingjoey said:
It's all pretty funny though. Rivalling our Darvel result for amusement.
"You're saying they gave him a different job title for administrative reasons? This is just like the time I enormously shat myself."
0 -
46 minutes ago, kingjoey said:
So should Mr McKinlay not be referring to him as "an outstanding young technical director"?
The technical director is a coach who picks the team and sets the tactics but isn't the manager.
Not sure what's difficult to understand tbqh.
0 -
Unfortunately the Hearts, Hibs and Aberdeen jobs just aren't as attractive as they should be. The pay isn't great and the minimum criteria for success (finishing 3rd) also happens to be a ceiling. If you look at their appointments over the last couple of decades (with the exception of the Romanov years at Hearts) it's near enough 100% rookies, rejects from England, and guys who did alright at smaller Scottish clubs, because that's all they can get.
Naismith doesn't excite me but none of the other realistic candidates did either. "2 wins in 7" is fair enough, but he also had 1 defeat in his last 6 (against Celtic, with 10 men) in a tough run of fixtures and the performances in the home games (with 11 men) were probably a step up from anything we'd seen under Neilson all season. That improvement could be new technical director bounce, or it could be because he has something about him. f**k knows.
It'll be interesting how the coaching structure works in practice. What happens when some journo starts asking awkward questions about it at press conferences?
2 -
7 minutes ago, kingjoey said:
He'd best keep that quiet from UEFA then.
Why? There's nothing stopping him being a coach.
We'd have pay a healthy premium for him to be head coach, but thankfully technical director carries no such penalties.
0 -
Steven Naismith has led Hearts to a 4-game unbeaten run in the Scottish Premiership. At 36 years old, he's the youngest
managertechnical director in the league.Hearts won't pay a £22,000 fine each time they play because he's the technical director and you can't prove otherwise.
1 -
If it's Naismith or Cifuentes then it isn't an inspiring choice but that's the risk you take when you punt a manager without having a standout candidate lined up. It's why (despite his obvious flaws) I was never that enthusiastic about ditching Neilson until his last couple of weeks.
As for choosing between them, Cifuentes obviously has more experience than Naismith, but imo his CV looks worse than Neilson's and no better than someone like Jack Ross, so I don't get the appeal.
His only notable achievement seems to be finishing 3rd once with a team that finished 4th, 3rd, 8th and 5th in the seasons prior to his arrival and now he has them sitting in 10th. They also got to a cup final which they lost to 7th-place Malmö.
If it's a choice between taking a punt on a rookie who's shown some glimpses of promise and demonstrated he can get a bit more out of the current squad in his admittedly short time in charge, or taking a punt on the Scandi-based Stephen Robinson, then the former punt seems a bit more sensible to me.
0 -
15 minutes ago, Leith Green said:
Probably the right result. Shite defending for hearts goal, excellent fk to equalise.
We don't have enough quality to open up teams who are not interested in attacking.
Mckirdy, Henderson, Cabraja all utterly dugshit.
I assume we will make Europe anyway, but the win would have been excellent.
Celebrating a draw is minter stuff, but I can understand why it was so important after blowing 3rd spot.........
Hibs doing what they needed to do to finish 4th would have been excellent but Hearts fans politely applauding their team for actually doing so is a minter. Levels.
0 -
Thoroughly unmoved by the idea of avoiding the further embarrassment of finishing below that dogshit and playing a couple of qualifiers.
Thoroughly enjoying at the seethe from the Hibees here. Complaints about the other team "overcelebrating" are justified about 1% of the time and pathetic, tear-sodden rage the other 99%. The fact is you had an enormous opportunity for a huge GIRUY here and fucked it. The lukewarm "celebrations" reflected that.
Over to you, Inverness Caledonian Thistle.
2 -
On 25/04/2023 at 11:06, Tony Wonder said:
Those split fixtures make 3rd look a tall order now. Aberdeen getting St Mirren at home a 3rd time means they likely just need to win their 2 home games as there's not much chance of us taking anything off Celtic or Rangers.
When you consider it could've been us with the extra home game against St Mirren and playing Celtic when they're on holiday rather than aiming to wrap up the title, I don't think the fixtures could have been any worse.
That result for Aberdeen on Sunday has probably sealed it anyway. The psychological boost of keeping the winning run going while also maintaining that margin for error should see them through. A 2 or 3 point gap with worse goal difference might have provoked a wobble.
The game I go back to in my head is the Rangers game at Tynecastle when Neilson treated it as a free hit to trial his mental tactics instead of just playing a normal, solid team and seeing if we could get a result. It was an unbelievably stupid act of hubris which ended a long unbeaten run and dented confidence. The team selection at Pittodrie when a point would have kept them 7 behind was almost as bad.
Anyway, I'm finding it hard to feel too hard done by at not finishing third this season. There's no question we'd have more points without the injuries but those were known about early on and performances have ranged between dreadful and mediocre for the most part. Even when we had a bit of a gap in February I never felt 100% confident because the tactics blatantly were not working by that point (admittedly I didn't think Aberdeen were the most likely candidates to overtake us).
The only glimmer of positivity to this shit show is that Aberdeen will probably be forced to hire Robson now. Okay, he might end up being a brilliant manager for all we know, but there isn't much to go on at the moment. This winning run started when expectations were zero and they've pretty much ridden the crest of a wave since. Our results in December/January are proof of the power of momentum in football and how that can distract from the bigger picture.
2 -
Don't know if it's legit/final but this is pretty much the worst possible outcome for us.
Playing Celtic rather than St Mirren at home, and on the weekend they'll be aiming to confirm the title.
Aberdeen at home to St Mirren for a third time which gives them an extra home game against a non-OF team compared to us (16 v 15). Their home game against Celtic which they'd probably have lost anyway gets switched to Celtic Park after they'll have won the league.
0 -
In 14/15 we were moving into a new era after years of financial uncertainty, we had a bunch of exciting young players with a strong team bond and competing for the title felt like a genuine achievement given the circumstances. We also got big wins in the first two games and rode the crest of a wave for the rest of the season. As pointed out above, performances weren't particularly good in the big games after that, especially in the derbies.
In 20/21 we started with a bloated, unbalanced and unhappy squad, there were no fans in the stadiums and we were probably more unattractive to prospective players because we were playing a shorter season which started months later than the Premiership. After we lost the cup final and basically wrapped up the league in January we were just playing pointless games in empty stadiums against defensive teams with a fairly shite squad. In sharp contrast to 14/15, that's a recipe for dire viewing. I think the answer lies there rather than a major change in philosophy from Neilson.
0 -
18 minutes ago, Tony Wonder said:
No sure what the confusion is? Very opening line is "Snoddy is not going to be involved ". He means going forward, not for the weekend.
So it's easier to let him go early and focus on the players there rather than have him part of the group and having to answer questions about his future going forward.
I think you're right about the point he's trying to make, but it is a bit of a waffle and the repetition of "the decision's been made" introduces some ambiguity as to who actually made the decision.
I think it's pretty obvious that there are non-football reasons at play that Naismith doesn't want to get into.
1 -
1 hour ago, Tony Wonder said:
Why would you want Hearts to remain, at worst, 2 points behind you with Ross County at home before the split when you have to play Rangers? Surely you aren't torn at all.
Also, there's no chance we don't make top 6. We are 6 ahead of Livingston with a GD that is 22 goals better off than them. Even we aren't having that bad a time.
We also have an extra home game after the split. If we win on Saturday it'll be more than a glimmer.
That feels like a remote possibility at the moment though. Just too many dysfunctional parts of the team to fix in a few days.
0 -
13 minutes ago, Dons_1988 said:
Slightly concerned hearts might be doing sensible things again.
It might help the atmosphere in the dressing room but it won't fix the fact most of the rest of our midfield is shite, unfit or crocked.
0 -
27 minutes ago, Thenorthernlight said:
The revisionism of some Hesrts fans regarding Snodgrass is hilarious
*beep beep* vehicle reversing
It isn't revisionism.
He was good to begin with (the Motherwell game we won with 10 men springs to mind). Then team performances suffered when teams started targeting him in Jan/Feb. The fact Neilson wouldn't change the gameplan despite this meant he became an active hindrance on the pitch.
All of that will be reflected in opinions expressed at the time. Revisionism would be to say he's been shite all along (unless you thought that all along, obviously).
1
OFFICIAL HEARTS JUGGERNAUT THREAD 2020-
in Scottish Premiership General Chatter
Posted
I'd imagine you'd know a lot about Kickback if you set up an account there pretending to be a Hearts fan who just happens to post a weird amount about Aberdeen. Not that that describes anyone in this interaction.
As for McKinlay, clearly he chose his words poorly given the way the resulting headlines, but considering that Aberdeen were 4 points ahead of us at the time, does anyone honestly think he was giving it the big one in that interview? Or was he actually just answering a question about Aberdeen and Hibs improving that season in the only reasonable way? Apart from your clown chairman, obviously.