squeezeboxson

East end park is one of the few grounds I've not been too (despite us playing there quite a few times over the last few years). That's my birthday also, so I look forward to that opening fixture regardless of the result I guess. It does look tough, but I actually don't think it looks any tougher than last season when I seen that. I just think we have to look to compete with most teams at home, as we have done this season. Then we have to look at picking up our points vs Ayr, Morton, Queens and Dunfermline. It remains to be seen whether Raith can kick on from last season or if they may fall back into the mid table territory again with so many 'bigger' sides this year.

Fair point but I'm sure Megginson has left and moved back to Aberdeen. Fully expect him to sign for Peterhead or another team up that way.

'The Cheaper Stadium'

To be honest, half of the rumours clearly come from forums like this one.

Imagine having 2 actual wingers?? Seems so long since we had them. Started last season with only Gibson and finished it with only Walsh. Definitely be a positive move for us if it came off. See Ryan Conroy still doesn't have a club. Would he make the move to PT?

Harsh to single him out when the whole team was terrible away from home?

Would be fine, but for the fact we only have half the players signed.

I'm hoping we can sign someone to play the attacking midfield role to be honest. But we also (assuming we are going to play him anywhere near his position) have Gall and Fleming as possible CDMs though. I do reckon Fraz will play less this year so possibly Barr and Buchanan could be our 1st choice CB pairing.

Agree about Barr, he had some pretty dreadful games. But then, all the players did. I reckon him as a CB/CM is a pretty decent option to have. But please don't play him and another CDM in the same role as it just stifled our attack completely.

I think I may be one of few, but at Christmas, I wasn't yet convinced by Buchanan. I agree he finished the season as our strongest defender (strongest player outwith Nade). I still stand by that our best defensive period last year was actually the time we had Barr and Wright paired in the CB position's too. Buchanan wasn't unfortunate to be dropped as he had some pretty awful performances in the first few months of the season. But he seemed to improve most out of all of our players and I'd be delighted to see him at the rock again next season. Would also like to see Barr signed up too, think he got quite a hard time of it from a lot of sons fans, but was still a pretty important player for us.

Reads a little bit like the full time offer may be from the league below to me. Possibly Airdrie or Livi fancy taking him? As solid as Sparky is, I didn't expect him to get a move to a team like Raith, St Mirren etc...

Likewise! Thought he could have been a decent player dropping down a league. Ross did seem to be a fan, imo. Wasn't really up to Championship level football though.

Just hoping he turns out better than Gibson did. Feels like a very similar signing for me, but we all know how it turned out last year. Not being pessimistic just cautious. Every player will be judged by what they do when in a sons shirt.

2 year deal? Airdrie splashing the cash then...

That sounds like a decent swap for me actually... Gall can go off to Morton and we can sign Brown as a squad player. As meh as he was, we could do much worse.

Not sure about news etc as I'm away on holiday just now. But if Aggy has signed for Stranraer then I'm more than glad they didn't make it up. Not sure why but also glad to see Gibson stay down at what I think is his level. Actually slightly happier for the likes of Andy Graham and Nicky Devlin on making it up. Just hope they fall miserably short next season now

Hearing that John 'The Beast' Gemmell is just waiting til the play offs are won for Clyde before he signs up for next season. Stevie wanted to sign him in January but they had difficulty agreeing personal terms, so we ended up with his second choice Nade.

I did give that a slight thought actually Moonster! It was when I read somewhere (on here I'm sure) that Aitken was on a list of possible candidates for the Utd job, that I thought to myself surely McKinnon would be a better man for that job. But did have think that possibly Stevie could be McKinnon's replacement at Raith.

Nathan Blockley scoring for Peterhead. Didn't he used to play the holding CM back in his Airdrie days? Or am I just making that up... always thought he was a decent enough player back then.

This was generally my point in my initial post

I just don't buy it. Playing out of position doesn't excuse doing the basics wrong. Positioning is dreadful and his passing awful. His ball retention is second worst for this season, only to Kevin Cawley I'd say. I would love to be proven wrong if/when he signs up for this season.

You can pretty much guarantee the first one to sign will be Gall or someone like that... unless he is daft he will sign the deal offered to him because he shouldn't really be playing at this level.

Well, I was sure I heard he was desperate to play Rangers. Maybe it was for other reasons (as you mention above). I don't buy that travel time from Airdrie to Dumbarton makes that much of a difference. 50 mins between the two. We train in Glasgow which is much closer again. Anyway, he had the option of staying at this level and chose not too. Which was a shame but was ultimately his own choice.

Thing is, iirc, Jim could have had at least another season at this level and chose to go down a level to play vs his beloved Rangers. Whatever his reasons were for dropping a level he had every chance to play in the championship if he had wanted to.

I'll be in Florida this time next week. I'll have a word with him...