Coventry Saint

I was kidding...

Ooft. Lost the bonus point. Shite competition anyway.

Jim Kellermann on for McGinn there. I'm not at the game but is our captain struggling here? There could be some tough decisions ahead.

Do you guys still need him? I've not been keeping track.

Thought you guys looked excellent last night. Very promising. Morton clearly a work in progress, mind, so that's the only qualifier. Can see you getting a solid 6th/7th this season, and wouldn't be shocked to see you doing a Killie* based on that. * Finishing higher still, not being humiliated by some actual fucking farmers from North Wales.

I won't lie, I laughed at that.

Is it because you're using the app? I just use a browser, so I never see him. (I used to use the app but had to delete it after some clown Morton fan started stalking me round the forum and I was fed up of the endless notifications. I forget who it was. Proper loon.)

Replacing a good, popular manager can be tough, I've heard.

Don't expect it to be the end of...? Players getting chopped?

It's a win-win. Happy if they go through; hilarity if they don't.

After seeing him fail to saunter that league with that budget, and then witnessing some of his truly clueless tactical decision-making - not to mention his celebrations at getting to extra time/penalties - in the playoffs, I think we dodged a bullet. Edit: or, what @smellthepaw said started to type the post and left it open in my browser. Great minds, etc.

I know of at least one, who was lording it up in the St Mirren thread - apparently about the amount of time he spent booking the trip. Not sure why deciding to take the M74, M6, M56 and M53 took so much planning, mind - I've just done that in 30 seconds on Google maps.

He was so smug about spending an inexplicable amount of time booking that trip! I hope Ceefax holidays do refunds.

Oh f**k me.

Point taken, though how many of those ten years were comfortable? We were scrapping like crazy most years (aside from Gretna and the 8th place seasons, though the latter was slightly flattering IIRC). We even stayed up by goal difference one season. I mean, they all count, but it's not necessarily an enjoyable existence. We have just GOT to have some consistency at the top. We were unlucky Ross left,and I said on many occasions that I'd have been happy to have Oran still in charge no matter which league we were in this season. I hope Jim is here for at least the full three years. The longer the better.

I wonder if we'll ever really come to terms with the fact that we, as a club, got massively lucky that Thompson is a Saints fan. His arrival seemed to drag us right up; he was joined by other great (for us) players such as Gowser, Carey, Teale, Hasselbaink, Isma, the Newcastle loanees... While we had a strong youth department that was on the cusp of producing McLean, McGinn, et al. The real crime was failing to build on that squad, and that cup win, in any meaningful way. The demise that followed was pretty much us reverting to our natural position, namely competitive in the second tier, with an occasional promotion, but, when all's said and done, out of our depth and forced to scrabble around for scraps when in the top flight. We simply can't compete with anyone higher than 9th and stay solvent; our travails are just us coming to terms with facts of the modern game and the way business is done.

Its a shite state of affairs. The game of brinkmanship that agents play - which leaves the likes of Simeon Jackson, Adam Hammill and Anton Ferdinand without clubs after the window ends - is an absolute joke. Perhaps the players are partly to blame as well, but I sense not. I reckon they are fed line after line by agents desperate to increase their own share. We've 100% been played by Verheydt's agent - we should have guessed from the way the story came out via the Dutch press in the first instance. I'm still fairly confident we will still get a "bottom four competitive" squad together by the time the window shuts - perhaps a little bit afterwards - but no club should be going into competitive games with a part-finished squad.

You're right. I should have written "empathies".

Sympathies. These sly competitive games masquerading as friendlies when many clubs haven't got squads together can get in the sea. I give the format a couple more years, tops.

f**k it, I'm gonna join in.

Galling because you get the impression quite a lot of legwork has gone into this one. We really do seem to struggle to attract strikers, for some reason. Identical scenario to what played out last summer. I'd genuinely be on the phone to the Duck to see if he fancies another go at it

Just shows it's a game of opinions. Perhaps he needed more movement around him - you can only pull the strings if someone's holding the other end, after all. I actually thought Ryan Flynn was our best player on the day, but that's damning with faint praise.

Andreu was definitely disappointing on Sunday, but so were most. I'm not sure the diamond shape has a future, in all honesty - it seemed to somehow make lesser players of both Cooke and Mullen, while Andreu looked lost. I also worried slightly that MacKenzie is best suited to a back three, which we played in the playoffs. He turns like a yacht so it stands to reason that he'd benefit from extra cover. However, I'd really rather we weren't playing that formation...

I reckon we might be going with just the one winger this season, with one inside-out wide player on the other side. Oan or Magennis, probably. I agree with the rest - 6 or 7 players needed, without a doubt. On an unrelated note, does anyone know what's going on with Tansey? He's been putting videos on instagram of him training on his own on a rugby field. I hope we haven't bombed him out. I put commented to the effect of 'hope you'll be playing your part this season' and both he and his other half 'liked' it, so maybe he's just working to get back fit before he rejoins the squad properly.

He definitely looks good on the front foot. We are absolutely ruining him playing him out of position. We either need to give him a shot in his preferred position, or send him out on loan to develop because we'll end up with no player at all if he keeps getting hung out to dry at fullback.