stu2910

I think you're right on the balance - based on limited viewing we've done a decent enough job of replacing McCowan's technical ability. The bigger challenge IMO is replacing the overall impact on the midfield. All of our midfielders including Sylla are technically good, but with McCowan you had a midfield containing a small young Scot, a big older foreigner and mid-sized, mid-aged Scot. The balance as you say was really good and I think McCowan contributed a lot to the organisation, communication and defensive work rate that he didn't necessarily get the credit for. The closest physical replacement we have is Mulligan but he is nowhere near the mental level of McCowan, not yet at least. The only other native English speakers are Braybrooke who is much more similar to Cameron, or Robertson who hasn't had a sniff in midfield. Adewumi sounds promising but he and Vetro don't seem like natural replacements for McCowan and I don't know about their language levels. Add to that a defense that is missing 2 of the 3 experienced Scots, giving you 1 Scot, a whole bunch of youngsters and a Mexican and it's no wonder we are struggling defensively, despite the fact that I rate the individual abilities of all of them. I don't know what the solution is but tomorrow we either have to go all guns blazing or Mourinho level park the bus. I fear anything in the middle ground could be a disaster.

I could kind of understand it in Dundee’s position, where you could buy part of the pitch, or anything else for that matter, and actually receive it when the ground closes. If you were replacing the pitch and the owners got their piece (no idea how you’d verify that) then it would be a bit cringy but fine. To roll that out purely to try to make a relatively small amount of cash seems a bit bizarre. Also, just to be pedantic, if you’re paying money for a year for the piece of pitch and have to renew it next year, you don’t own it, you’re renting.

As much as it's often seen, quite reasonably, as a joke, would Simon Murray really be that bad of an option for Scotland? After Adams, Dykes, Conway and Shankland, the only other one in contention is surely Nisbet. Murray is certainly no world beater and has only managed to step up from joke figure in the last 12 months, but he's quick, a physical nuisance and a goalscorer and I'm not sure any of our other options meet all of those criteria.

Undoubtably a quality prospect. Whether he makes the step up who knows, but he certainly has talent. He reminds me of Billy Gilmour, quality dropping deep and playing the pass that gets moves started, but risks a nosebleed when near the goal.

Seems like it. Simultaneously gutted at the lost potential of a good youth coming through, and not giving two hoots cause I've never seen him play so we might as well be selling the kit man.

I think people have spent far too long looking at the number of loans we had last year, rather than the impact they actually had. The loss of many of those loans has only really impacted squad depth. McCracken has been replaced with, well, himself. Bakayoko is replaced and arguably upgraded with Murray. Boateng has today possibly been replaced by Braybrooke, though he was really already replaced by Sylla towards the end of last season. Costelloe, Dodgson, Lamie, Lewis, Mellon and Robinson were all varying levels of meh and not that hard to replace. The only players where we are unsure if we've replaced them would be Donnelly, though there is certainly promise in Robertson, Koumetio and Graham, and Beck who was never going to be replaced but Larkeche at least doesn't look bad. With the intensity we are playing at, I get the feeling that we will almost certainly beat at least one of the OF at some point this year and will rack up several big wins, while also potentially conceding more goals than whoever finishes 11th.

Can never understand this logic. I would much rather have 12000 seats filled on big occasions only than 7000 seats and lots of people locked out of big games. At Dens in recent years we have sold out easily for a league winning game. Derbies are always 11000+. 12500 is hardly outlandish, if anything it’s a little conservative.

Can't afford it, need a break every couple of seasons to save up.

Out of curiosity I thought I'd have a look back at the 2018/19 season as a marker for the level of improvement. That season we played 44 matches and won 8, scoring 40 goals. So far this season it's played 8, won 6, scored 31. There's a good chance we can beat that seasons win and goal tally during October. Imagine where we'd be if we could defend! Other random thought, anyone any idea when we last went this long unbeaten to start a season, including pre-season? Usually there's a random loss to Rotherham or something in there but not this time.

Sportscene giving us a real lack of credit for the equaliser. Trying to say it’s poor defending when it’s just a fantastic passing move. Outside of the foot first time pass from McCowan to Portales, then first time pass in an awkward body position into Murray to slide under the keeper. It’s the usual trope but if that’s De Bruyne > Foden > Haaland no one is calling it poor defending.

Think part of the problem with the defence is that Ingram, Koumetio and Larkeche are all just boys getting their first consistent run of games at this level. Think they are all capable of being good and may all be key players by the end of the season, but until they settle in it’s going to be a bumpy ride Our attack on the other hand is fantastic and scoring 31 goals in 8 games is ridiculous. Even the OF don’t tend to do that. Interesting that every team we face is saying that their defence is a shambles. Either we are getting fortunate to play them right now or they’re seriously underestimating how effective our attackers are. If you’d told me we’d be unbeaten after an away derby, Hearts at home and Hibs away I’d have never believed it.

Pubs are of course a major concern, with Dens being surrounded by so many naturally occurring ones. These things can’t just be created somewhere else.

Don’t know if it was the low crowd or what but that was somehow an underwhelming 6-1 win. This what it’s like supporting the OF?

The benches seem likely to win this game. Our starting 11 will cause problems I’ve no doubt about that. But a real lack of options on the bench while Hearts’ bench would beat most sides in this league - quite the impressive squad you’ve got yourselves there.

So something like: McCracken Ingram Portales An of the other 3 CBs Larkeche Sylla Mulligan SPH McCowan Tiffoney Murray Not sure it gives us the same impact from the bench, but I like it.

Refuse to slate the defence as we all knew that was going to be the problem area. For me, Portales and McGhee were fine but can be better, though I'd rather McGhee wasn't at CB. Graham and Larkeche weren't quite good enough but both understandably so and I think both have more than enough potential to be good enough in time. Ingram was a bit disappointing as he's had a bit more time to bed in but didn't really assert himself at either end, but I'm still confident he can come good eventually. For the latter 3, we will need to wait until October to know how they're actually going to be, but considering it wasn't that long ago that our back line was something like Kerr/Meekings/Kusunga/O'Dea/Ralph, I'm more than content with what we have. Main frustration for me was that for the first hour, the midfield seemed to never be deep enough to pick up the ball and play through them, but also never high enough to pick up the loose balls being knocked down. It's no surprise that we started to dominate as Utd tired as it allowed us to do what we are actually good at, plus seeing Main, Tiffoney and Mulligan coming off the bench for the opposition when you've already been running for an hour will be terrifying for many this season. Think SPH deserves more attention on here and from the media. He does everything Bakayoko did but with an added level of chaos and goal scoring know-how. Reckon he could become a star as the season progresses and if he could improve in the air and his first touch he'd be unplayable. Long story short, we went away to a likely mid-table rival where we've had horrendous results in recent years, with a back 5 containing 2 players at 21 and another at 20 playing their first game in the league, played well within ourselves and still came away with a deserved point. If this is what's considered bad these days then bring it on.

Above.

Would find both a bit weird. Mulligan seems possible, but I’d imagine neither fan base would be particularly excited by those signings, as much as I love them both at Dens.

Maybe when Rangers came up, can’t remember, but it does seem bizarre. The opinions on both sides and from neutrals seem to swing from a comfortable away win all the way to a narrow home win, but the odds would have you believe the opposite. Unless there are a huge number of compensation bets being placed from our side, or an awful lot of total randoms from around the world knowing that Utd have been better in recent years with no current context, I don’t get it.

Harsh, wouldn't wish that on anyone. I'll take Cupar Hearts instead.

Depends what you're looking for in the game, there was plenty of quality at the Euros but unless Spain were playing it was generally like watching paint dry. Given the blood and thunder nature of a derby, and the fact both teams are good going forward and questionable defensively, I'd suggest we have a chance of seeing more goals than the 6-2s and could even trouble our 7-3, which I believe is the record. Narrator: "This is exactly what did not happen".

Both probably debatable enough that you can claim them, maybe depends whether they were released or chose to leave as if they were released they didn't exactly "graduate". On a side note, I'd fancy that team to put in a more than decent title challenge.

Finlay Allan (winger) as peebles_Dee said and probably Jamie Richardson (striker). If Luke Graham goes out again it'll be Championship you'd imagine and no one else near your standard that I'm aware of. Maybe Rayan Mohammad (striker)?

Stolen from the Championship forum - what kind of team can you build from your club's academy graduates? The player can have started somewhere else as long as they spent time in your youth team before playing for the first team and they must still be playing now. For Dundee, it probably highlights both how bad we've been at this over the years and how much we're improving: Harry Sharp (Dundee) Cammy Kerr (Queen's Park) Kerr Waddell (Montrose) Luke Graham (Dundee) Craig Forsyth (Derby County) Finlay Robertson (Dundee) Kevin McDonald (Bradford City) Josh Mulligan (Dundee) Lyall Cameron (Dundee) Max Anderson (Crawley Town) Jamie Richardson (Dundee) Think beyond that I'm struggling to even name a player that's playing senior football, bar Kyle Gourlay at Kelty.

Classy defensive mid, similar to Glen Kamara and could easily go just as far.