Swello

We'll sign a striker of some description - but it will be someone that even Kettlewell didn't know we were linked with.

I see that the English windar closes at 11pm - I wonder if there will be a rush of "f**k it, I'll go to Scotland" in that last half hour for players that didn't get a move they actually wanted.

I'm hoping it's that fullback from Sheffield to complete the set

I'm actually pathetically pleased for him - even getting a wee POTM award for a relegation haunted team must be some buzz after where he was at St Johnstone.

I would love to seen KVV here - but I was only pointing out that offering a certain amount doesn't necessarily mean it's within budget or affordable. We've probably spunked way more money than we're talking about on paying off Graham Alexander, Hammell and 2 busloads of supermarket sweep signings in the past 2 years. The fact that Fir Park in Burrows' latter days was the house of bad decisions is probably the root cause of the fact that we are now restricted in what we can do.

Maybe the board were thinking of the returning hero we signed precisely a year ago and were thinking the same.

Or they could be overspending betting on a high league finish given Aberdeen's problems and Hibs being very mediocre. Look what Utd did a couple of windows back with Tony Watt- they completely blew us out the water there but did so in the midst of a huge operating loss which their owner was presumably underwriting. In Scottish football, it's been seen countless times (with us being a great example under Boyle) that what's spent is no guide to what is actually affordable.

That's that then - the only thing that can repair this is if Theo Bair outscores him. Anyway - Announce English U23 Academy Loan Placeholder.

The difference between top flight and relegation is in a different magnitude to Top 6 or even Euro qualifiers - and without knowing who is coming in, it's not really possible to quantify if it would be worth it or not. If we were getting someone of Jack Vale's profile, I would argue that it very much be worth it - but if we can really get someone of the quality of KVV, who could be effective now for the half the price, we'll take two please.

There's no point trying to polish it for any gleeful Saints or Killie supporters looking in - it would be a huge kick in the baws (number 354 of the season in fact) if he went to similar size club in Scotland. We could all live with it if he went to Aberdeen or Hearts or anywhere abroad - but it would be pretty hard to take as it stands.

I never thought I see myself willing Kevin Van Veen to sign for Hearts.

Don't know anything about Vale - so I'll wait until 10 minutes into his debut to make my final judgement on him.

I'm pre-emptively feeling sorry for us all - and for whatever clean-shaven out of favour English lower division striker arrives tomorrow night at 10pm.

Been thinking the same. Unless another EPL team are chucking loans about - it would be pretty much impossible to get near the quality of Biereth at the short notice we've had - so I'm assuming standard jobbers and hoping to be surprised.

Downsides: Motherwell player wearing gloves Upsides: Dougie Imrie's coupon in the background

If we sign anyone with that sort of injury record after what we've been through the last couple of years, it won't be folk hanging about the main entrance to take blurry photos that they'll need to worry about.

I think we've gone about our business pretty well in this window as far as we would have been able to plan. If Mika was still here as expected, I think we would be pretty relaxed and looking forward to seeing what we could pull out the hat in the late night madness this week. As it stands, we've had an injury to one of the signings and Arsenal fucked us around - so it is legitimately difficult for the club to deal with that quickly given that we are not many players' first choice destination (and never have been). The biggest worry is that we get a Wilkinson level replacement forward instead of a Biereth level one (or close to it).

Regardless of the fact that we are trying to live within our means from an operating point of view - we are far from skint and could quite easily push the boat out to 100k for the right player. In short, I think there is club strategy of making us sound more skint than we really are - successive managers have been 100% on the same message about this regardless of the fact that they have all paid fees of some sort. The fact is that every player has a cost of ownership - if an upfront fee is part of that, it doesn't necessarily mean that we are bursting our wage structure/budget as their wage may be lower than some "free" transfers. I'm sure the board understand the concept of risk - and right now the biggest risk to the business is not spending money on strikers.

Although Kettlewell has played him out of position - I also think it wasn't until he came in that we saw the best of Spittal. If he does leave at the end of the 2 year contract for more money, we can't have any complaints and I don't even see it as a particularly negative story (much as I'd love him to hang about longer) - getting a productive shift off someone for 2 years is actually pretty good these days and if he keeps up his current levels, there's not much to say about it.

Just so I know what level of stress I need to have - does the Window close at 11.59 on the 31st or is it the 1st of Feb? In any case, feels like quite an important couple of days ..

Courtesy of @The Real Saints on their thread - Eric Nicolson on his usual form. Is there a bigger lickspittle of a journalist anywhere in Scottish fitba?

Halliday had done his hour - it made sense to take him off at that point given how little he's been playing and Kettlewell looked like he was explaining to Davor why he took him off, so it's pretty plausible that the yellow card/pish referee combo came into his thinking.

Davor has unquestionably added some solidity in the midfield and looks like a mid-table midfielder in our league - so it really does seem weird that he was so far out of contention that a jobbing striker that had never played in there before in his life was chosen ahead of him. Must be something more to that. With Gent, I really see why we want to use him as an attacker as 80% of the good stuff he does is going forward. Positionally, he is a bit ropy and yesterday he was pretty sloppy at times in truth. I'm 100% wanting him to stay in the team as he's the best crosser in the squad and an actual penalty box striker will love that type of service - but we need to work out how to cover him (and McGinn and Butcher did a great job with that yesterday).

In Scotland, there would just be one endlessly replayed Old Firm game - a real life version of a Sky Sports subscription.

Gutted we only got a point as we were in complete control for the 2nd half and were playing quite well in places. Our habit of giving every team a soft goal could still be the thing that puts us in the playoffs. Our lack of wins is still a huge concern but we aren't losing many (and it was important that we didn't lose today at a minimum). On the positive side, we are playing better than we were in the depths of our bad run - that's a low bar but we are looking a bit more confident. I thought Butcher looked a lot more like last season's version, I thought McGinn strolled it over the 90 mins and I thought our midfield looked quite solid throughout. Bair getting another goal and doing it for a 3rd successive league game is excellent and it's just as well he's become a functional striker as we don't have much else. The late cameo from Nicholson was intriguing as he showed some good skill and he might be a good signing. We've got 2 homes games coming up against Killie and County - surely we can win one of those?