crazylegsjoe_mfc

We've not been great at appointing captains since Las retired have we? First it was McHugh, who voluntarily chucked it. Then it was Hartley, who couldn't get a game for half his tenure. Then it was Gallagher, who had a gun to his head. Then it was O'Donnell, who fell out with the manager.

I’d say this squad is worse, comfortably. For starters, I don’t see anyone scoring the goals that Skippy and Richie Foran (before he went to Southend in January) scored for us that season.

I honestly think that the ability of the squad who were bottom in December 2020 made the job more attractive than the ability of the squad at the moment does. It’s easier to look like a hero coming in half way though a season when a team is bottom and keeping it up than it is taking a team who were 5th to a nice, safe, boring 7th or 8th or whatever a good season this year would look like. I’m pretty sure the job would look more attractive to an incoming manager then with Campbell, Watt and Cole (albeit the goals hadn’t started yet) than it does with the current lot.

That was a weird season, lots of highlights and lowlights. I think the improvement the following season in signing Craigan and Marshall probably tells you a lot of it was down to the fact we didn’t have a keeper and the 4th slot in defence was taken up by either a diddy or a youngster - Ramsay, Cowan, Kinniburgh, Vaughan or Sengewald.

I would be against Thomson anyway, but a further black mark for me is that he won league two at a canter and then resigned to pursue a better job. It seems to be like he was a bit afraid of tarnishing whatever reputation he had by going up a league and possibly facing challenges. I'd have more respect for him (but still not want him to get the Motherwell job) if he was still Kelty manager.

There’s not much that Kelly said that isn’t true really - fan toxicity did play a part in Alexander’s departure. It’s a weird one where that kind of atmosphere clearly doesn’t help the team, or anyone, but at the same time, you can’t imagine or expect fans to react in a different way. Those who travelled and those who’ve watched us since January 100% have the right to be raging. The full conference (to my knowledge) isn’t available anywhere. It could be that the media have jumped on a 30 second soundbite from a 5-10 minute video that will get them clicks. There may be more context. What I do think is that it’s unnecessary to come out and say. When a manager goes there are so many generic, neutral phrases that can be trotted out to get you through the first press conference without anyone being chucked under the bus. Anyone with half a brain could understand that when fitba fans are raging, they don’t need to be antagonised further.

Where goals are going to come from is a big concern for me. Van Veen has only scored twice in the league since Watt left (one penalty). I think only Lamie, Roberts and Efford have scored more than once from open play in that time.

Can’t add much to what’s been said already, he has to go now. Remember the chat last summer was that he was willing to let Watt go then? You wonder how quickly things would’ve gone downhill had we not had him scoring goals. I do wonder if another manager will be able to get a better tune out of these players or whether we have just been lumbered with a shite squad for the foreseeable.

I guess Alexander’s tactic for a lot of last season was let the opposition pump balls into our box and hope we could defend them, so him not leaving someone up isn’t that surprising. I’d always have at least one player up, maybe two. One of the peculiar things with defending corners I remember is us sending Scott McDonald back to defend and keeping 6’2” Lee Erwin up.

I think the thing is that all of those examples, they played in front twos. If Higdon was out, we could play Ojamaa and Murphy up top and still pose something of a threat. In Sutton’s early days we could have played Sheridan and Clarkson in his absence, then Anier and Faddy when he came back and by the end he himself was back up to Erwin and McDonald. I think the problem is now that we play one central striker, it’s not attractive for a centre forward to come and compete with Van Veen. Whereas back then, a second striker could come in and expect to play. If Van Veen is missing, which he often is, we just don’t have a striker.

Van Veen is the wrong side of 30, injury prone, booking prone, inconsistent and often uninterested. However, it says it all that despite all of this, I dread to think where we’d be without him.

Do we really need another keeper if we’ve extended Scott Fox’s deal?

I think Mugabi worked to at right back last season to an extent as he was out of harms road and lapses weren’t punished as easily. Right back in a Grezza system allows him to make the most of his good centre back attributes without exposing his bad ones. He’s absolutely got a moment like Thursday’s in him.

This is Alexander’s team now and should be judged as such. He’s now given every player he inherited who is still here a new contract. I had hoped that we would come back after summer with a freshness, but the team that limped over the line to the top six, then limped over the line to Europe have come back. There’s a bit of me that wonders if it would’ve been for the best had Lamie’s goals against Livi and Hearts not gone in. They’ve perhaps made us think everything’s alright when there clearly are issues to address. Statistics in football are a funny thing. As much as they’re facts and can’t be disputed, it’s funny quite how much a club can manipulate them to tailor to how they are doing. Last season it was hammered home what a calendar year we had in 2021, yet come the end of the season, Alexander was hitting out with “as far as I remember the season is played over 38 games”. Winning in football is very habitual and it seems that the same problems that have seen us win four games since January look set to continue. I wonder how we get ourselves out of this. I think we all expected to come back and see new systems, tactics and ideas, but everything seems the same. Obviously we need to change something, but if last season is anything to go by, Alexander will think wholesale changes each week is the answer and I’m not sure it is. I don’t think Thursday’s result (or indeed next Thursday’s result whatever it may be) will be the end for him, but I do think there’s so little goodwill left that it might be a contributing factor to a September-ish departure after a poor start to the league season.

Shields is one of those players who suits playing off a big striker in a front two. That kind of player is kind of redundant in the modern game where 4-4-2 and front twos in general are scarce. We’ve signed him knowing that he’s not a #9 and he’s not a winger and we play a front three. I think there’s a player in there somewhere with him. The thing I do find weird though is that even when KVV is out, we’d sooner play a winger through the middle than him.

There are few areas where I would consider us to be "light" on numbers. However, a number 9 is definitely one of them. Van Veen done well enough last season, but there were the injuries, suspensions and distinterested days in there. Am I right in saying against Partick that Efford was through the middle and Shields outwide for the most part? That would tell you he doesn't trust Shields even as a backup striker. I guess the problem might be that there are none who fit the bill in our price range at the moment. It's probably also still a touch on the early side for English clubs to have decided who is in their plans or not, if we are looking at the loan market down there.

I was frustrated by him ending up benched for Efford when he looked like he was hitting form, but his output over the course of the season doesn’t merit losing any sleep over him leaving - particularly if he won’t fit in to the shape we plan on playing this season.

I hate all this shite, releasing a goal every few hours. Why can’t they just give us good old fashioned highlights? Do people really have such a limited attention span that they can only watch one goal at a time?

It’s just being realistic - we’ve tried to sign countless left backs since Stevie Hammell retired and each has been as disappointing as the next. If the players we are scouting, that are in our price range, are of similar ability to the two we have, would you change for changes sake? If we were able to identify an upgrade then I’d be all for us going for him. What I’m hoping we avoid, in theory, is signing a left back of the same ability, leaving us no further forward, with us scrambling to get Carroll off the wage bill for not much gain. I’m not saying I don’t want, or we don’t need, a better left back, I’m saying we don’t need a third and I’m not convinced we’d be able to go out and sign a quality one for the first time in 14 years at the moment.

I actually think the rarest type of academy graduate we tend to see is “Motherwell level”. You could argue that out with our last three testimonial players, we rarely see the kind of player who looks capable of staying at Motherwell for say five seasons as a regular, without teams coming in for them, or failing to make the grade. We either get the kind of player who’s too destined for bigger things like Turnbull, Campbell, Murphy etc and you get players who get a bit of a run in the first team before not really cutting the mustard, like Forbes, Carswell, McHugh etc. I guess time will tell where Cornelius and Maguire fit it to that spectrum. As for this season’s recruitment, I’ve said a good few times that I think a smaller squad is better. In the year 2021, Alexander had an outstanding record without changing much. It’s only when he had lots of options he tripped himself up. I would say, with the exception of perhaps one midfielder and an alternative number 9 to Van Veen that we are totally fine for numbers in each position. Would I like an upgrade on McGinley or Carroll at left-back? of course. Would I go out on a limb to sign a player not necessarily better than either of them? I’m not so sure. If the incoming player isn’t a marked upgrade on the options we currently have then I’m happy with things being quiet on the transfer front. I see no point in bringing in also-rans to replace the ones we’ve just got rid of.

It almost seems like the kiss of death to me. I know we are now in the midst of the Information Age, where there’s more data and awareness available around younger players - but I honestly rack my brains to think of having heard of a player at the age of 14/15 who’s actually gone on to fulfill their potential.

That season we had the double denim and the hideous 91 watermark strip for the 3rd too. It makes me think we deserved Craig Samson and Zak Jules.

I hope that’s the case, but I kinda read it as Efford is considered first choice and Woolery isn’t, but I guess team selections reflected that also towards the end of last season. I still think last season that we waited months for Woolery to come good, then dropped him when he did.

Explains Alexander's tombola all in, that our two most used outfield players spent the season competing with each other for the same spot largely...

From what I could see there 3. Carroll 4. Lamie 6. Maguire 7. Spittal 8. Slattery (from 16) 9. Van Veen 11. Offord (from 20) 14. Ojala 15. Solholm (from 21) 16. McGinn 17. Woolery (from 7) 18. Cornelius 19. McGinley 22. Johnston (from 24) 25. Devine 28. Mahon (from 45) No sign of Kelly, SOD, Mugabi and Tierney (assuming extended international leave). Didn’t see Fox or Goss there and didn’t catch Shields’ number.