capt_oats

Exactly this. You can flip it for Johansen as well. The fact that we're pairing the two together and are apparently like "Yeah, no problem with this...it's the forwards who are the problem" is genuinely fucking maddening. I mean the forwards are a problem anaw but fucking hell...

On top of that Lamie in all his fine-ness is also our recently minted vice-captain. I've been sceptical about Lamie since he signed. I mean, he's fine, he's a serviceable squad player but he seems to have Jedi mind-tricked folk at the club into thinking he's someone worth building our defence around. He's frequently given the impression that he thinks he deserves to be first pick for us. Think back to the whole PCA/extension episode. He pretty much said that he felt he should have been getting more game time and for some reason we seem to have gone along with that.

Tbf, I read it more as Flow pointing out to yer man that actually we have signed someone - contrary to bawjaws "we haven't made a move" assertion. Having said that I do have a worry that Hammell's entirely focussed on forwards from the POV that we're creating chances (or at least having plenty shots on goal) but not converting. The logic being that if we take more of our chances it takes the pressure off the defence. That said, Hammell's post-match today sounded a bit of a road to Damascus moment.

That's the spirit. Good lad.

This is broadly what I've been rolling my eyes at every time Hammell's stood up post-match talking about how we've been doing "good work" but need to improve defensively. Every.Fucking.Week. We're 6 months into the season. If we're still shipping cheap, soft goals this deep into things then it reflects as much on Hammell and Kerr as it does the players. If they can't drill a defence (apparently they can't) then get someone on board who fucking can. I said it the other week but unless someone actually takes some sort of fucking ownership of things then aye, we're fucked.

Burrows telling his reply guys what we already know but interesting to see we're looking at permanent and loans.

It's interesting (it's really not) that we've had both Burrows and Hammell saying we have irons in the fire and we're hoping to get players in sooner rather than later but there don't seem to have been any leaks of names to your Scott Burns or the like.

Fwiw: the story with Smith seems to be that Hull are looking at loaning him out as they've got their eye on signing another forward. Nixon re-upped the story a few days ago but I don't think we were one of the teams quoted - The72.co.uk lifted from Nixon's Patreon here. The last time we seem to have been mentioned is back in September.

They didn't hang around taking Moult off the First Team squad list on the official eh? As it stands: GK: Kelly, Oxborough, Connelly DF: O'Donnell, Lamie, Johansen, McGinn, Blaney, Johnston, Penney MF: Maguire, Spittal, Slattery, Cornelius, Tierney, Goss FW: Van Veen, McKinstry, Morris, Shields Injured: Carroll, Mugabi, McGinley, Efford We almost certainly need more than "a couple" lads: Aarons replacement, Moult replacement, Mugabi cover given he was cutting about on crutches in his December IG dump...? Genuinely quite curious as to who we've got in mind as a replacement for Moult. Like, someone who's not injured would be a good start but in terms of profile etc.

Unfortunate (if predictable) outcome for Moult. Given what we were looking for at the time ie: experienced cover/back-up for KVV then it was a gamble worth taking. When Hammell said that we brought him in expecting that we'd have to manage his game time that was fine IMO as by and large we were looking for cover and in that market it's a shallow pool in terms of the quality available. I see Hammell's implying it's the loan market we're looking at and also updating on Matty Penney:

"hopefully"... "a few..." Yes, I just had a dip into Steelmen and was alerted to this information.

Worse than that. We were actually top of the league.

Nah, as @Blink182 says Kettlewell took Kerr’s position. The Academy director role vacated by Hammell hasn’t been filled as yet.

Aye, I don’t disagree and to be clear I’m not sat here looking to absolve anyone. On the point about us being left b*****dless at the end of the window - we know we were interested in Robert Snodgrass because Hammell literally told the press “we’re interested in Robert Snodgrass”, by the end of window we didn’t sign anyone that plays the same position as him. Was that just an opportunity thing where it was Hammell looking at Transfermarkt and deciding we should pitch to him in which case it was Snodgrass or no one or was it the case that it was a position and profile we needed filled (it is) and we didn’t have an alternative (or was he the alternative to Steven Davis). @Swello made a good point earlier in the thread in terms of the squad having deteriorated- it has. Possibly through choice in that we’ve not replaced a lot of what went out the door but also in terms of the intangible stuff. Say what you like about Tony Watt, his badge kissing and his exit but he dragged us through games last season. The 1-0 against United at FP being a case in point. The irony there is that Alexander indicated publicly that he didn’t feel we needed to directly replace Watt and we haven’t - on several levels. I get the impression that having Moult around the place was an attempt to address the “culture” thing but ultimately if he can’t get on the park then his influence is clearly going to be limited.

The thing with recruitment is that presumably the department are working on the instruction of the manager in terms of what they actually want. Here are the players that have signed for the club on Daws' watch (it's up for debate whether Shields would have been his work given the timeline but I've included him anyway): 21/22 - Connor Shields (PCA), Justin Amaluzor, Kaiyne Woolery, Kevin Van Veen, Liam Kelly, Darragh O'Connor, Mich'el Parker, Callum Slattery, Juhani Ojala, Sean Goss, Sondre Johansen, Ross Tierney, Jordan Roberts, Victor Nirennold, Joseph Efford, Robbie Mahon, Liam Shaw (loan) = (18) 22/23 - Blair Spittal, Paul McGinn, Josh Morris, Aston Oxborough, Shane Blaney, Stuart McKinstry (loan), Matt Penney (loan), Rolando Aarons (loan), Louis Moult (loan) = (9) To me, the likes of Amaluzor, O'Connor and Parker were squad filler at a point at which we were trying to get other business done while big Vic Nirennold was clearly signed cover and nothing else. Those signings were very much a case of; it is what it is. Their role was simply to fill a jersey and I'd say it's pretty disingenuous to judge them as if they were brought in to be long term additions to the first team. It's your Woolery, Van Veen, Kelly, Slattery et al that you're judging the recruitment team on (IMO). I mean, KVV has a better goal scoring record for us (23 in 62) than ANY striker Robinson signed: Fisher (0 in 19) Newell (0 in 10) Main (14 in 58) Ciftci (3 in 15) Johnson (8 in 28) Sammon (3 in 21) McCormack (0 in 4) Long (17 in 66) Manzinga (1 in 7) MacIver (1 in 9) Watt (19 in 70) Devante Cole (16 in 52) Jordan White (0 in 20). I'd say that unlike Robinson/Foyle whose transfer business was hit or miss, the bulk of the 27 signings we've made have been fine and in a way that's kind of the problem. Where Robinson managed to pick up the likes of Kipré, Carson, Gillespie etc who obviously had a high upside and also inherited our 'golden generation' courtesy of Craigan's work with the dev squad and led to a generational player like Turnbull in our team alongside someone like Campbell our recruitment over the past 2 seasons has really been picking up a collection of players who have ranged from alright to quite good with a couple who haven't really worked out. A number of those players Alexander seemed to simply choose not to play (*waves at Liam Shaw*) while others clearly had/have the sort of potential to justify their signing and are probably viewed as projects (Tierney). In that respect it's not really the fault of the HoR if the manager loses his fucking mind? Or if the club decide they want to pivot their strategy to allow for more of a pathway and not bother replacing the established Premiership players they've let go? Equally, it doesn't seem like a massive leap to suggest that McKinstry, Aarons and Moult came straight from Hammell's phone book so putting the blame for the 2 busts that everyone saw coming at Daws' door seems unfair - not to mention the fact that the Cult of Louis have been lobbying for him to come back since he said his farewell when we were scudded by Accies. Don't get me wrong, I'm heavy sceptical as to whether we're equipped to bring in what we need or whether Hammell even knows what we need or even if Nick Daws is particularly suited to being a HoR but it's definitely a more nuanced conversation than just getting raging about "recruitment" as some sort of nebulous entity such is the way of social media

If we're talking priorities then a #9 and a centre half please. A holding midfielder and a winger fall into the "also extremely desirable" category for me. KVV's on 12 goals in 23 games. Yes it should be more given some of the chances he's had but still...good for him. He's absolutely doing us a turn this season but asking him to do it week in, week out for an entire season without any sort of (fit) alternative option to take some of the slack is fucking wild. His 9 league goals account for 39% of our league total at the moment but the drop off in terms of our team goals scored is telling when you look at the other teams with scorers in the Top 10. We're 10 off Aberdeen who are next highest. It's interesting to see we've popped our heads back into the Top 5 of WhoScored.com's 'Ratings' section and we've the 4th highest shots per game.

Yes. That's why I deleted the post. I was conflating yours with a post earlier in the thread that suggested Kelly was off his line for the 2nd one as well.

Tbh, this is why I'd imagine there was enthusiasm on The Thread when the Davis link broke in the summer and also when we were pitching to Snodgrass. I'm not as down on this squad as others. For me it's just very, very thin and we're wildly reliant on two or three players but I absolutely agree with the point that we're missing a couple of players who can raise the levels of those around them. Seeing how things are going for Snodgrass at Tynecastle just now it's hard not to think that we'd look a very different team if we'd been able to drop him into our starting XI. Genuinely difficult to think of similar options cutting about who'd be in our ballpark tbh.

Having fun trying to parse this from Hammell yesterday but either way it's a bit more encouraging than the "one or two" chat.

I mean, clearly it's not exactly rosy but again St Johnstone beat us in the first round of fixtures, Killie beat us in the game at Rugby Park we took draws in the reverse fixtures. As you say that's our last 4 we've only lost 1 - against Rangers. At Ibrox. No great surprise there. Drawing against Livi today means we're only a point down on our total from the same fixtures in the first round. If we were to match that 13 points in each round it'd leave us on 39 points at the split. 31/07 - St Mirren (W) - 3 pts 06/08 - St Johnstone (L) - 0 pts 13/08 - Aberdeen (W) - 3 pts 20/08 - Livingston (W) - 3 pts 27/08 - Kilmarnock (L) - 0 pts 03/09 - Dundee Utd (X) - 1 pt 01/10 - Celtic (L) - 0 pts 04/10 - Ross County (W) - 3 pts 08/10 - Hibs (L) - 0 pts 16/10 - Rangers (L) - 0 pts Total - 13 points 22/10 - Aberdeen (L) - 0 pts (-3) 29/10 - Dundee United (W) - 3 pts (+2) 06/11 - Hearts (L) - 0 pts (NC) 09/11 - Celtic (L) - 0 pts (NC) 12/11 - St Johnstone (X) - 1 pt (+1) 23/12 - Kilmarnock (X) - 1 pt (+1) 28/12 - Rangers (L) - 0 pts (NC) 02/01 - Livingston (X) - 1 pt (-2) Total - 6 points That puts us -1 from the same fixtures from the first round of games. Which obviously isn't great but it's still very much...could be worse. That doesn't change the could've, should've, would've element of say being 2 fucking goals up against a 10 man Killie with 20 to go but so far in this round of games we've largely taken points of the teams around us albeit without winning.

Oh... Also, not entirely unrelated...those test results on Moult's injury are taking fucking ages eh?

I kind of feel sorry for Shields in so much that his confidence is clearly shot but it feels like he's getting chucked out on to the park week in, week out because we have few other options rather than us expecting him to impact the game. When Hammell got the job he spoke about us needing to improve the quality in the attacking third and tbh it was pretty clear he was talking about players like Shields and Efford as not being up to it for starting spots - hence McKinstry and Aarons being brought in. With Aarons leg exploding we're pretty much back to square one. He's the sort of player you'd have hoped Hammell might have been able to free up and get a tune out of in the same way Alexander did with Cole and Watt but there seems to be absolutely zero sign of that being something that's likely to happen. It just seems like it's a case of him grafting his way through 90 mins now

We're at home to St Mirren

Fwiw here are the signings we've made in each January window in the past 5 years (including signings made post-window): January 2018 - Curtis Main (Portsmouth), Peter Hartley (Blackpool - loan made permanent), Nadir Ciftci (Celtic - loan), Tom Aldred (Bury - loan), Stephen Hendrie (Southend - loan) = 5 January 2019 - Ross McCormack (Aston Villa - loan), Gboly Ariyibi (Nottingham Forest - loan) = 2 January 2020 - Mikael Ndjoli (Brighton - loan), Rolando Aarons (Newcastle - loan) - Post window: Tony Watt (CSKA Sofia), Harry Robinson (Oldham Athletic) = 4 January 2021 - Steven Lawless (Burton Albion), Sam Foley (St Mirren), Robbie Crawford (Livingston - loan made permanent), Liam Kelly (QPR - loan), Harry Smith (Northampton - loan), Jordan Roberts (Hearts - loan), Eddie Nolan (Crewe Alexandra - loan), Tyler Magloire (Blackburn Rovers - loan) = 8 January 2022 - Ross Tierney (Bohemian), Jordan Roberts (Hearts - loan made permanent), Victor Nirennold (unattached), Joseph Efford (Waasland-Beveren), Liam Shaw (Celtic - loan) - Post-window: Robbie Mahon (Bohemian) = 6 So 25 signings in total. Average = 5 per window. Permanent signings = 9 Loans = 13 Loans made permanent = 3

It's really about context. Like, assuming we have a big board in someone's office at FP with a list of players who'd feasibly be available to us in January then would I be surprised to find GMS' name there? Absolutely not. Even if he's fit he's behind McKay, Ginnelly, Forrest and they've apparently signed yer boy Oda who's also a winger. He's squarely in that bracket of players that you'd label 'fringe'. You could look around most of the teams in the league and there are players where it's either not worked out or the manager doesn't fancy them. That's pretty much our market in January windows. We've already discussed St Mirren packing Joe Shaughnessy's bags for him, RG mentioned that Murphy's not sounding entirely happy about not getting games at St Johnstone. Michael O'Halloran's been in Saints squad 14 times this season in the league but only made 3 appearances - I've lost count of the number of times we've been linked with him in the past. Jimmy Scott’s apparently been told to find a new club by Hull. If we're looking at going full Baraclough trolley dash and filling out the squad then fair fucks. However it's absolutely fucking wild if Hammell, having spent the past 5 months or whatever talking about how light our squad is and having seen gambles on both Aarons and Moult fail spectacularly, is looking at GMS and thinking "we can only bring a couple of players in this window...let's go all in on the guy with the fucking broken foot."