DC92
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Posts posted by DC92
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2 minutes ago, Munoz said:
I seem to remember the last time Hearts got off to a great start in the Premiership, Graham Rix was in charge.
What ever happened to him ?
The last time we got off to a great start in the Premiership was 2018 when we won 8 of the first 10 games. The last time before that was 2015 when we won our first 5.
Also, Graham Rix has never been in charge of Hearts for the start of a season.
Apart from that, great banter!
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1 minute ago, Munoz said:
How will you do against Rangers though?
Better team lost today.
Well done on your 1st win in Paisley in over a decade (league)
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9 hours ago, Coventry Saint said:
Piece in the Edinburgh News about Hearts' poor away form. Not won at our place since 2010, apparently. Crazy stat. I always find trends like that interesting, because the churn of staff and players involved means it's not down to any of the personnel, training methods, matchday prep, or any actual tangible factors.
Obviously that spell has been lengthened because of five years spent in different divisions in that time (Hearts went down, then passed us on the way back up, we spent 3 yrs in the Champ then Hearts were down last year).
It shouldn't make any sense, but I was far more confident of beating Celtic at home last week than I am of winning tomorrow.
Our record in Paisley since our last win in 2012 probably hasn't been helped by the fact the 4 seasons we've played there have featured the worst 3 Hearts teams since the early 80s, but we're usually complete shite away from home regardless of overall league performance anyway.
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8 hours ago, Lex said:
It’s not a crunch game, so Hearts will probably win.
You can be 100% sure St Mirren fans will find a way to retcon it into a crunch game if they win.
The match that was crucial in stopping Hearts winning a century of points this season, perhaps.
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On 30/07/2021 at 20:09, DC92 said:
Heart: Celtic's defensive problems and chaotic summer make this a great opportunity if we're proactive and try to play on the front foot.
Head: our manager is Robert Neilson.
Turns out we only had to do this for about 20 minutes and play glorious Neilsonball ball for the other 70 to take the points. Lovely stuff!
I might even get over the ignominy of Anthony Ralston slicing through our defence like a hot knife through butter.
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Heart: Celtic's defensive problems and chaotic summer make this a great opportunity if we're proactive and try to play on the front foot.
Head: our manager is Robert Neilson.
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On 26/07/2021 at 10:34, RandomGuy. said:
Almost like you've got a moron manager who seen us win the double, then Italy win the Euros, playing it, and decided to use it as it must be the formation that's brought success.
On 26/07/2021 at 11:11, the jambo-rocker said:I'll give you the moron manager and I shall even allow the Euros, but I am absolutely not giving you St Johnstone.
Can't really allow the Euros either considering we've been playing it since the last 5/6 games of last season.
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On 14/07/2021 at 12:39, Northboy said:
One positive I see in having 24 teams is that almost all teams go into their final group match with a chance of qualifying which can create some exciting games. In this tournament we saw Denmark scoring against Russia to sneak through on goal difference after losing their first two matches and the Germany/France/Portugal/Hungary group going to the wire.
I don't really think the format added to the excitement. In the examples you cite, Denmark went through because they finished 2nd and Group F would still have at least as exciting had the World Cup format been used. Different combinations of France, Portugal, Germany and Hungary were in the top two at various points in the evening.
In other cases, the format probably reduced the excitement. In Group A, Italy v Wales was basically a dead rubber because Wales already had 4 points, despite the fact Switzerland were racking up the goals against Turkey in the other game. The same was true of England v the Czech Republic in Group D. In Group C, you had a scenario where Austria and Ukraine could play out a draw to ensure near-certain qualification. That's not what happened ultimately, but Ukraine still ended up going through despite losing to both of their only decent opponents.
I can see the argument for going back to a 16-team Euros in preference to the 32, but I don't really see much of an advantage in sticking with 24 teams. The format is clearly better with 32, and I think the weaker teams this time around are probably much of a muchness with the next 8 teams in line. Those teams are still capable of competing on their day and producing entertaining games (see Hungary for example). I'm also unashamedly selfish and like the idea of Scotland being near-guaranteed a qualifying spot, so I'm quite keen on the idea.
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On 09/11/2013 at 17:09, DC92 said:
Ryan Gauld is the best prospect I've seen in my time watching football in Scotland by some distance, and that's not just a reaction to his goals today. We've had plenty of young players who can ping a goal into the top corner or beat a man, but I've not seen any young players with the same level of intelligence and close-control as him. That's without mentioning that he's regularly scoring great goals and playing killer passes in the SPL at 17 years old.
You can never be sure a young player will fulfill their potential, but I'm very confident with Gauld.
On 17/07/2021 at 14:30, 2426255 said:
Thanks for reminding me of this post, 2426255.
I actually agree with my past self in that no teenagers I'd seen in Scottish football looked as good as Gauld did at that time, and very few (if any) have since. Despite rating his chances highly (something that was vindicated by Sporting paying £3m for him a few months later), I did also acknowledge that you can never be sure a young player will fulfil their potential. Therefore I see very little wrong with my post in hindsight.
On top of that, I'm not a dweeb who's been dredging up ancient posts I'd probably have agreed with at the time, so all in all I feel pretty good about myself.
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1 hour ago, Monkey Tennis said:
100% this.
A mythology has developed that would have a casual visitor imagining we must have constantly been rattling woodwork, while being confronted by goalkeepers having the game of their lives.
The reality is that we forced a handful of decent chances. We missed virtually all of them due to the absence of class evident in our front players.
However, it was only a handful and they generally weren't absolute sitters. Better forwards would have buried a couple though.
1 hour ago, BFTD said:Other than the number of unforced errors we started with against the Czechs, surely our biggest problem at this tournament was the inability to create clear-cut chances.
But absolutely nobody should have been surprised by that at all, and I'm not sure what can be done about it in the short term.
We're very reliant on crosses, especially from the left (for obvious reasons). A lot of those were deep crosses, which I'd imagine don't have a high conversion rate even when they do find their man.
None of them are world-beaters and it might have made no difference anyway, but I'd have liked to have seen a bit more of Turnbull and Fraser, or even Christie and Forrest, just to give us something a bit different. Two up front with McGinn as the most advanced midfielder maybe gives us more scoring options from crosses but there's minimal creativity there.
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10 hours ago, GordonS said:
No, I don't buy any of that. He set up a team to create chances and to limit the opposition's chances and he succeded. He can't kick the ball into the net and he can't stop centre halves from hitting ridiculous shots when there's no cover behind them. We made enough decent chances to beat the Czechs and England, and to at least draw with Croatia.
Adams was shite at his main job. He showed no composure at all in the box and combined bad execution with bad decisions. The team gave him and Dykes enough supply and they squandered it. That's the truth of the games and there's no denying it.
We did create a few chances over the games, but I think the volume and quality of those chances is in danger of being overstated. The Czechs also missed chances and the chance Gvardiol had early in the second half was a better than any of the chances we missed against Croatia.
I only brought up Adams in response to the idea that Lafferty is a goalscorer who fired Northern Ireland to the second round. The point being that you don't have to have Lewandowski up front or score loads of goals to get out of a group stage. I don't think he had an amazing tournament, but the guy who had a half-chance blocked against England and maybe could have done better trying to reach a cross against Croatia was "shit" while the man in charge for the three games was entirely blameless? I'll have to disagree.
10 hours ago, GordonS said:The idea that Croatia were anything less than they were because we beat them 11 years ago is irrelevant. They were World Cup runners-up three years ago, they were second seeds in the group, they're ranked 7th in Europe. The game was winnable but they're clearly better than us. When the chips were down Modric pulled out a classic performance befitting a guy who has been the first choice midfielder for a decade in a team that's won 4 Champions Leagues in that time. The idea that a defeat in that game somehow proves there was some defect in the management is risible.
Again, the root of my argument isn't "we didn't win one winnable game", it's that we had two winnable games, won neither, and were beaten by comfortable margins in both.
The reason I included the stats about our record against those teams and our competitive Hampden record over the last 20-odd years is because these results are evidently below-par, even for a period where we qualified for f**k all.
What's risible is the suggestion that the manager who achieved these results did so with flawless tactics, team selection and game management.
10 hours ago, GordonS said:I don't agree at all that we achieved more with less over the past 20 years. I think the 2006-07 team was obviously much stronger. It was better in defence and it was better in attack. In fact, I think this is the worst choices Scotland have ever had up front and at centre half. Hanley, McKenna, Hendry, Gallagher, Cooper, Considine - none of them are in the same category even as Gary Caldwell, never mind a David Weir, a Colin Hendry, an Alex McLeish or a Willie Miller.
That's a two-year period, I'm talking about games since the turn of the century.
Weir, who missed the Vogts years and was initially dropped by Burley, is clearly better than what we have now in defence, but Pressley, Wilkie, Webster, the Caldwells, McManus, Berra, Martin, Mulgrew, Wilson, or the younger Hanley? Hardly.
Various combinations of those jobbers have made up our central defence over the last couple of decades, and managed to keep Hampden defeats rare and two-goal Hampden defeats exceptionally rare.
10 hours ago, GordonS said:I'm absolutely certain that if Clarke had picked the team that you say he should have in those games and lost, you'd have been saying he got it wrong.
That's a weird thing to be "absolutely certain" about, given that i) you don't know me, ii) I had a lot of faith in Clarke before and during the tournament and iii) I still want him in charge.
Our team has looked at its best under Clarke when we've had two midfielders who can take the ball off the defence and pass it, with another midfielder (McGinn) in front. Like most, I wanted Gilmour to start against the Czech Republic but I understood that Clarke would probably go with the more experienced McGregor. To start with neither was a big surprise to me, especially since a midfield three featuring both McGinn and Armstrong changes the shape of the team to one which has never looked as functional. As it turned out, the Czechs sat on McTominay, limiting us to long balls from the back.
Starting McGregor and Gilmour in midfield against England gave us a set-up similar to the Serbia game. We looked more secure at the back and were more able to play through midfield than in the other games, while also having the option of going direct.
Losing Gilmour for the Croatia game, while the probable replacements in Jack and McLean were injured, was a huge blow and I'm not sure exactly what the answer was to that. I did think Armstrong coming back in, meaning our midfield resembled the midfield from the Czech game more than the England game, was an odd choice. Maybe Clarke thought we needed a different approach at home, and I'm not sure what condition Fleck was in after having COVID, but he might have been a less disruptive choice.
In any case, we'd fallen out of the game by the time McGregor equalised and, aside from the McGinn chance, we were well out of things early in the second half. With several players tiring, something needed to change, whether that was bolstering the midfield or just getting fresher legs on. It was up to Clarke to come up with that change. If he'd attempted something earlier and we'd lost anyway I'd be more sympathetic, but he waited until after the game was already gone.
Luck played a part, lack of quality played a part, and tactics and team selection played a part.
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8 minutes ago, dysartrovers said:7 hours ago, DC92 said:Since the turn of the century, we've lost two competitive games at Hampden by more than one goal - both against Belgium (2-0 in 2013 and 4-0 in 2019).
Before the tournament, we'd never lost at home to the Czech Republic and we'd never lost at all to Croatia, despite them both having better teams than us for as long as I can remember.
Taking 0 points and a -4 GD from those games, when even 2 points from 6 would have taken us through, is a massive disappointment and a huge missed opportunity.Would 3 points have taken us through?
As long as we finished at least third and kept our goal difference to -2 at worst, yes. If we'd drawn all the games and the other results remained the same, we'd actually have finished 2nd, not that it matters.
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On 22/06/2021 at 23:57, GordonS said:
You need to score goals to win football games. Northern Ireland had a goalscorer. We don't.
You can have the 700 best left-backs in the world but if you can't put the ball in the net you can't win.
And there's really not much more to it than that.
On 23/06/2021 at 00:01, GordonS said:Thanks for the heads up, I wasn't sure whether to start reading the threads so I'll give them a bodyswerve.
The management was very good, the tactics got the best out of our lumpy resources, we created loads of chances in all three games but the bottom line is all three of our opponents were better than us, two of them considerably so, and if better teams than you get their own game right then they'll beat you.
Criticism of a youth football system that has led to Kevin Nisbet being the best current striker produced in Scotland is plenty fair enough. Anyone having a go at the squad or the management can get right in the coldest, darkest patch of sea they can find.
I'm going to assume the goalscorer you're talking about Kyle Lafferty, who has a 1 in 4 record at international level, didn't score for them at the Euros, and was less prolific than John McGinn was for us during the preceding qualifying campaign. Che Adams is also clearly a much better goalscorer at club level, and a better player overall.
As for Northern Ireland, they scored two goals at the tournament - one by Gareth McAuley and one by Niall McGinn. They got through the group because, despite having the worst squad, they won their most winnable game and kept the score down in the other two.
To be fair, NI probably had an easier group than us, but the Republic were also able to advance through a harder section without an international standard goalscorer - also scoring two goals.
We faced two teams at Hampden, both of whom had never beaten us there in their histories, despite having stronger squads than us throughout this period. In order to qualify, our challenging (but achievable) task was to win one of these games (two draws would actually have seen us through, with the England result). We emerged from those games with a -4 goal difference, enduring as many 2+ goal defeats as we'd had in the previous 21 years of competitive fixtures at Hampden.
The England game was nice, and a very good performance, but in the games that really mattered for our progression, we didn't even get near an achievable target. Blaming that on "we don't have the players", when we've achieved more with less in these types of fixtures for the last 20 years, lets Clarke off too easily. Maybe it'd have been different if we'd had a full Hampden, or if Tierney and Gilmour had been available for both games, or if we'd scored one or two of the half-chances we created, but a big factor is that Clarke got the selection wrong in the first game, then did the same thing against Croatia, then didn't change anything after we got out of jail at half time, and then didn't change anything in the15 minutes before the inevitable killer goal.
It was never going to be easy, and I don't want him to go, but Clarke is absolutely due some criticism for the nature of our exit.
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50 minutes ago, JamesM82 said:
On the other hand, the 0-0 at Wembley was the first time we hadn't been pumped off a top team away from home since what, Croatia in 2014 qualifying? And that was in a dead match, as we were already out before we played either game against them. Probably going back to Paris 2007 for as good or better result in a live away match. Same is probably true of the Serbia game.
I agree, that was a really encouraging performance and one of the reasons I'm nowhere near calling for Clarke to go just now.
Unfortunately, getting creditable draws away from home isn't quite as critical as making sure we win our home games against second or third tier European teams when it comes to qualifying for tournaments (or getting through this particular group). There's not much evidence so far that Clarke is better than his predecessors in that regard so far, and that's a bit of a concern for me.
He's got enough credit in the bank that, even if we don't make the World Cup play-offs, I'd be very surprised if he doesn't see the start of the Nations League campaign. That said, if we don't improve in certain areas then people will rightly ask whether he's able to take us forward: namely, we need to look like we have a coherent gameplan in home matches, win the remaining games against Israel and Moldova, and at least get a point against Denmark. If we still aren't capable of getting the necessary results at home after 2.5 years in charge then we aren't going to get anywhere soon.
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1 hour ago, 2426255 said:
But we did perform, exactly to expectations - which is failure ultimately. Why can't you accept that? We entered via the playoffs, we're building the team over time and hopefully we can do better next time. How can you be let down, if you expected us to fail?
Since the turn of the century, we've lost two competitive games at Hampden by more than one goal - both against Belgium (2-0 in 2013 and 4-0 in 2019).
Before the tournament, we'd never lost at home to the Czech Republic and we'd never lost at all to Croatia, despite them both having better teams than us for as long as I can remember.
Taking 0 points and a -4 GD from those games, when even 2 points from 6 would have taken us through, is a massive disappointment and a huge missed opportunity.
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The first game was too frantic, the balance of the midfield was wrong and not starting our best striker was a mistake. Arguably we were slightly unfortunate to lose by a couple of goals, but tactical errors and a lack of quality at both ends cost us.
The second game was a composed, mature performance, largely due to the fact we had two footballers in the middle in McGregor and Gilmour, and two players in the back three who could step out and play. It looked like we'd learned our lessons, settled into the tournament and were a team worthy of being there.
With Gilmour unavailable against Croatia, we went back to looking like a team that qualified through the backdoor. Not having Jack or even Kenny McLean to replace him was also a blow, but a midfield three featuring McGinn and Armstrong really doesn't work, something which we already knew. We were given a brilliant opportunity to change things at half-time when we fortunately went in level and Clarke failed to do so. Not doing so when we were getting dominated even more in the second half was bizarre to me - it was as if we were just waiting for them to score.
I think Hampden actually ended up being a hindrance rather than a help overall. In hindsight, that shouldn't really be surprising because we've had (at best) one or two good performances there under Clarke. Our best performances - Serbia and England - were both away games where we had McTominay and Tierney in defence and a double-pivot of players who can build up attacks through midfield. Effectively being the home team encouraged us to take a more frantic, direct approach which doesn't suit the system we use. If we've got any chance in the WCQs then that's something Clarke really needs to address.
In the end, we got a memorable performance and result at Wembley and finally scored a goal, so it could have been worse, but failing to win either home game when just winning one of them would have taken us through makes this a huge missed opportunity and a big disappointment. Of course this is a step up from qualification football and we were definitely the fourth strongest team in the group, but if we played Croatia or the Czech Republic at home in a qualifying group I would see them as winnable games. That can be justified by the fact that Croatia have failed to beat us at all in five previous attempts and the Czechs (and Czechoslovakians) had never previously won at Hampden, despite these teams being better than us for pretty much the entirety of their existences. Losing both games by comfortable margins is a poor effort and a real sore point for me.
Overall, a 4 or 5 out of 10 seems about right.
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2 minutes ago, RandomGuy. said:
Fucked if I know who I've confused with Souttar in that game then
"Could barely move" doesn't really narrow it down unfortunately
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16 hours ago, RandomGuy. said:
John Souttar is comfortably worse than any CB selected by Scotland in the past 5 years,
I doubt he'd get in to many top 6 defences in Scotland, never mind the English Championship.
A horrendously over rated player based entirely on a myth built up that hes "good on the ball", that grows every season he misses because his chocolate legs are broken again.
I'm nowhere near giving Souttar a shout for Scotland, but he was a very good player in what was comfortably the 2nd or 3rd best defence in Scotland throughout 2017/18 and the early part of 2018/19 when he was fit. This coincided with the time he had his longest period of uninterrupted fitness. He wasn't as good when he returned from injury that season, but still easily good enough for anyone outside the Old Firm.
He's barely played since the end of that season, aside from a handful of games in Stendel's mental 2-at-the-back formation and a handful of games this season, in which he improved our defence immeasurably. From where he was at 21/22, it's not unreasonable to think he'd have gone on to be a decent option for Scotland by now. It's maybe a bit weird to yearn for that, though, given it's quite unlikely he'd be significantly better than what we have.
And he doesn't have chocolate legs, he has papier-mâché achilles tendons.
6 hours ago, RandomGuy. said:He looked absolutely finished when he played in their loss to Brora m8, could barely move.
Says it all about this that you've got the option of an older player who's missed the last 2 season with multiple injuries, and who has been relegated and lost to Brora in the last 12 months, or a younger player who captains a top 6 side, has won multiple trophies, and plays the exact same system as Scotland every week, and you're banging the drum for the old cripple.
Presumably you either play FM and are sucked in by Souttars potential, or.youre forgetting its been about 8 years since he was breaking through and that mad United side were getting a ridiculous amount of hype.
He didn't even get on the pitch against Brora "m8", but it's quite telling that you've formed an opinion of his performance based entirely on your own imagination. We didn't concede a goal (or look like conceding a goal) in the 4 games he played at the end of the season, and it'd be extremely daft to put any blame on him for relegation.
As for people rating him on his Dundee United potential, there are also people on the opposite side of that spectrum. His Dundee United form dipped in their relegation season and he made a few mistakes in the early part of his Hearts career as well, leading to him becoming a bit of a figure of fun, despite his age. People decided then he was a myth, and weren't able to recognise the clear improvements in his game from 2017 onwards.
Unfortunately he is a crock now and there's a big question mark over whether he'll be able to get back to his previous level at Hearts (a very good Scottish Premiership defender), let alone establish himself as an international player.
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15 minutes ago, TheJTS98 said:
Complaining about our shite team makes us entitled. We should really just react to every bad result by saying 'It's only a game! Happy just to be here!' and smiling anyway.
Any other response is entitled and bad. We are bad. We are entitled. We are bad.
A 5th place finish in isolation would be decent enough from where we are just now, but how can you predict we will continue to play eye-bleeding, incoherent Neilsonball and continue to do nothing in the cups - two things the manager is criticised for by Hearts and non-Hearts fans alike - and expect people to be happy about it?
Stendel's brief spell aside, we've been managed by some combination of Levein and his pals for 7 years now. We've already seen that this brand of management brings diminishing returns, stagnation and then decline. 3rd, 5th, 6th, 6th, 12th.
If we finish 5th next season, but show genuine signs of building some sort of team identity and ability to produce big performances then I'll be very happy. If we sign a heap of dross this summer, bumble along and scrape 5th, then bomb half the squad out then replace them with another heap of dross the following summer, then I will be far less so. Unfortunately the latter is far likelier than the former under this manager.
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1 hour ago, afc_blockhead said:
Hearts surely will compete for this title.
A struggle to win a poor division and cup defeats to Brora and Alloa has been followed by looking like you will compete with pretty much the same squad next season.
Another relegation completed by Dundee on the final day maybe?
We won by 12 points in a 27-game season, and then the 2nd placed team easily dispatched the 11th placed Premiership team.
There is also no basis for saying we'll have the same squad. We'll probably make loads of signings like we do every summer.
1 hour ago, RandomGuy. said:Hearts having Boring Bobbie in charge. Means they'll likely grind their way to 5th, get knocked out both Cups in the Quarters, having someone (Boyce) score 10+ goals, yet their fans will still all be absolutely seething.
Can't believe the fans won't be happy because Liam Boyce scored 11 goals in a shite and boring season.
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15 hours ago, PauloPerth said:
Okay, so that leaves the honours table looking like;
2020-21 Celtic
2019-20 Hearts
2018-19 Falkirk/ Dundee
2017-18 Brechin City ?
2016-17 Dundee United/ Inverness CT
2015-16 Rangers
2014-15 Rangers
2013-14 Hibs
2012-13 Rangers
2011-12 Rangers
- Sacking our manager in August after the ignominy of losing a meaningless penalty shootout to Dunfermline at Tynecastle, having already had our exit from the League Cup confirmed.
- Going on a weeks-long manager search - interviewing Steve McClaren - before we discovered that "the right man was just along the corridor", and Craig Levein hired Craig Levein.
- Forgetting to order seats for our new stand, delaying the opening by several weeks.
- "Regrets? No, it's a good laugh isn't it?"
Things quietened down a bit towards the end of the season, but the healthy (unassailable?) lead built in August and September makes Heart of Midlothian a worthy nomination for Banter Kings 2017/18.
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14 minutes ago, HalfCutNinja said:
Aberdeen when they got a draw with Bayern that year.
Apart from that every other year every single Scottish team outside the OF has gone out in the qualifiers. We have lost to teams from every diddy country in Europe, from Skonto Riga to Bohemians. Our teams are the very definition of European cannon fodder, every single year for decades.
I didn't realise you were also counting the UEFA Cup. In that case, it's twice because Hearts qualified in 2004/05, comfortably knocking out Braga on the way, funnily enough.
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27 minutes ago, HalfCutNinja said:
Only once has any Scottish team outside the Old Firm even qualified for the EL group stages. Only once, ever.
Hang on, when did that happen?
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3 hours ago, Crawford Bridge said:
Hearts will throw a big wage at him.
Hearts have had plenty of opportunities to re-sign him since he left Rangers and haven't done so, so I'm pretty sure something (unsurprisingly) went on behind the scenes there. Plus he'll be 34 in September and Neilson has made a point of getting the average age of the squad down.
That said, I wouldn't mind being wrong because his strengths and weaknesses are pretty much the opposite of Boyce's and whoever we sign instead will probably be shite.
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St Mirren v Hearts
in Scottish Premiership General Chatter
Posted
In that case, thank you for highlighting the ethical implications of a managerial appointment made by a different regime in 2006 on this thread about St Mirren v Hearts in 2021.
Some might think it's a laughable attempt to deflect from your team's defeat today but that would be very unfair.