Shadwell Dog

I think I'd like to see what the long term results are like for the fan buy out model before I'd go down that route. Will be interesting to see how long some fans are prepared to keep paying their monthly DD's , buy season tickets etc if they dont see great results on the pitch. Only time will tell.

The standard ain't great which makes it even more disappointing that we're stuck down in the championship when there's top 6 places up for grabs in the top flight.

No but we should be building on last seasons success instead of being lucky to scrape into a playoff spot. Having a pop at the playoffs and then selling your best players and replacing them with diddies isnt going to get us promoted any time soon. Its pretty obvious that there is no serious plan to get us up and that the bod are quite happy for us to toddle along in the 2nd tier with the odd playoff match flung in to keep people interested. We were a settled top flight side not that long ago till the bod made an utter hash of it and they are now making an utter mess of getting us back up.

I've yet to meet a fan whose at all bothered about a 4th stand to be honest. I'd much rather we got promoted and then worried about it. The only bonus any of us would get out of it would be the recurring 3 stand slagging ending and frankly I can put up with that for a bit longer.

Whilst I feel strongly about the fact the money from vaulks sale hasn't been reinvested in the team ,Houston needs to get pelters for replacing vaulks with another midget slowcoach in rankin. If that was the last bit of cash available then what the hell was he doing signing him. Utterly ludicrous decision.

I bet houstons glad the fans forum is on the 29th and not this Monday. Gives him the chance to scrape a result against Dumbarton and then everything in the garden will be Rosie again.

I know it wasn't knicker wetting but the usual suspects will be on with that tonight if anyone so much dares to be less than optimistic. This year should've been easier to do well with no sevco and a settled team.

How many more shit results before any complaints are no longer knicker wetting?

We've only strengthened up front if Baird hits the same form as last season. I'd hope we didnt go over budget signing Rogers as surely there are other keepers out there that couldve done a job on less cash if that is the case. Craigen has what 12 goals to find this season to replace Alston. I dont think hes ever hit double figures before but you never know. Problem is we got away with playing alston out wide but Craigen looks far more suited to playing through the middle. Rankin will never replace Vaulks. Can you see him playing rb or centreback and he doesn't have the energy or powerful shot Vaulks had. If we don't loosen the purse strings we're going to struggle.

Harkins signs for ayr i see. A decent signing for them.

I'd take one decent pacy winger to be honest never mind two.

He's been highlighted from the Kilmarnock game because at 1-0 the longer we managed to keep it at that the better. First time their up the park he lets mcgennis run past him and set up a goal. That gave them confidence straight away and got their fans going. We had to be on it from the 1st minute in that match and unfortunately he wasnt . At the end of the day though if he was a top defender with pace too he wouldn't be playing with us. I do think that playing Sibbald in front of him highlights his defence frailties too. Sibbs isnt much of a defender either and also lacks pace. I'd always hoped that Hippo with his pace would prove a better foil for him.

The young guys who might have been appearing in the first team now o'hara apart have been flogged before they got the chance. Biabi and blair wouldve been in the squad especially blair who would be good for a starting place in our midfield this season. The latest batch all look very young and raw and at least a season away from breaking through.

Leahy does a job but hes still really a makeshift left back. Hes excellent going forward and can score the odd blinder but defensively he lacks positional sense back there and he can struggle for pace. He also goes to ground far too easily. However,hes currently the best weve got and certainly not our weakest link.

You obviously didnae read my post properly. I asked if they were actually left sided? ie favour their left foot? Whilst playing left centre half if your right footed in a back 4 is one thing its a lot more difficult playing left sided centreback in a back 3 if your right footed.

McCracken is finished. Just because he was the best performer when the whole defence had a bad day doesnt mean hes any good and going by the highlights he was still culpable in at least one of the goals . Someone needs to ask Houston why he actually paid money for Hippolyte if hes never going to play him. A club our size cant afford to be paying transfer fees for players who end up playing with the under 20's. Baird looks like he's hit the wall and the extra years extension in hindsight now looks like a mistake. I don't think dropping him will see him regain his form and we cant afford to keep playing him till he gets back in the goals. Perhaps the option of a loan deal to another club till jan would see him get game time and the opportunity to get back into some kind of form. We could then use his wage to bring in a loan player whether it be another striker or someone with a bit of a goal threat in midfield. Excuse my ignorance as I was working on Saturday but out of McCracken, Watson and Gasparotto are any of them actually left sided and if so were they playing on the left side of the back 3? Whilst playing in a 4 on the wrong side is one thing its a whole different ball game in a back 3 especially if your not used to it. Kerr, Rankin, Taiwo only Houston knows why we've ended up with these 3 when we're clearly needing other options in the midfield.

With the likes of Henderson and McGeough in the side and a relatively small front line Hibs concentrated on a lot of short passing quick moving football last season. On saturday with Holt up front and a different midfield they could afford to play the long ball more often. I always felt the way hibs played last season suited us and was why we had a decent record against them. On the other hand a team full of big units like Killie we struggled badly against. Unfortunately despite his comments Houston has failed miserably to overcome this issue.

Rogers Gasparotto Watson Muirhead Leahy Kerr Sibbald Craigen Kidd Austin McHugh is what I'd go with . You've also got Hippo who could play left wingback if necessary and Taiwo could cover Kidd. Still no idea why we brought Rankin in though. Complete panic buy and waste of money.

You don't need much more than 5 mins to work out that the players brought in to replace the two major players we have lost aren't as good.

Could be a season too far for Baird unfortunately. McHugh always seems to be a better option off the bench and certainly him up front with Baird will never work. Miller is used sparingly and Austin isn't ready to play every week at this level. We might rue giving Baird that extra year on his deal as signing up a shankland or a hardie ,may have been a better option. The main problem though is goals from midfield. Sibbald will get 3 or 4 if your lucky but whose going to replace the near 20 we lost from Vaulks and Alston? Certainly not Rankin, Kerr or Taiwo and you've got to question Houstons judgement on paying money for Hippo and then him not even getting a sniff of a game. More money wasted it would seem. God knows why Houston played Muirhead at RWB yesterday. Hes not really a RB never mind an RWB. Kidd looks far better suited to that role than RB so why did we sign him in the first place if your not going to give him a game in that role? If we were signing a RB we should've made sure he was better than Muirhead whose always looked like a make shift one and a decent centrehalf. Its pretty obvious that Rankin was a panic buy from Houston on seeing his captain flogged from underneath him on the eve of the new season. He adds absolutely nothing that we don't have already and the wage would've been far better used on another option.

Cant help gasparotto that just when hes settling in to playing a 4 4 2 with watson as his partner hes suddenly flung into a 3 at the back. Get a settled defence and stick with it till grants back.

Titles there for the taking if we had an ambitious forward thinking bod. I certainly dont think our side from lazt season wouldve lost today.

Why were we not trialing this formation in preseason to see who fitted where. I still think its feckin ludicrous to suddenly change things totally after having played a number of games where we couldve used it.

Luck is involved to a certain extent but if it was all about luck you wouldn't get teams like Germany consistently winning at penalties and teams like England consistently losing. Best penalty taker at Falkirk in my time was Derek McWilliams. Used to smash it into the top corner every time giving the keeper absolutely no chance. One of the worst was Simon Stainrod.

No read it again. There is always the chance that a keeper can bring off a fantastic save. The bromby keeper could've had a cup of tea and then saved mcginns weak effort. It was an utterly crap penalty.