renton

Wasn't him who wrote it.

Maybe, but he made a rod for his own back,or at least the board did by communicating how our freefall through the back half of last season was due to a lack of depth in the squad - or at least was a major part of that. Now, if he is trying and failing to bring guys in, then say so. When he comes out and says he might sign one more guy, if he's the right guy when our squad is virtually the same size it was last year and is lacking in a couple of positions, and with a strike force that folk have doubts over.... it just looks like a lack of awareness.

It's not panic, merely incredulous that the board can equate "Strength in depth" to "I'd like 1 or 2 more players" last week, which would at best give us a squad only very slightly bigger than what started last year to "content with the squad" This week when we haven't even signed those 1 or 2 players. We have no left sided midfielder, no cover for full backs and look very one paced, far more so than last year.

Completely agree.

Fox, certainly in the back half of the season struggled. Which at least had something to do with an injury that he was carrying (at one point they wouldn't let him train, so short on players were we and so scared he'd break down in training) Still, even when fit they are different types of players. I'm not sure Moon and Callachan provide the right mix in midfield, both want to push on a fair bit and neither naturally sits in. Fox, for all his shite tackling, is happy to sit in and distributes the ball really well. I think Callachan and Fox would be a good combination - not so sure about Moon with Callachan, even if both are better players than Fox.

I'm not sure he's over rated, apart from Dundee fans no one rates him at all. Him and Stewart certainly feel like gambles. I do think we will miss Cardle more than anyone else. His cuts inside were predictable, but he did so much in terms of holding up play and linking in other players.

That or 4-2-3-1, I think that might suit us well if you imagine having Stewart and Anderson in support of Elliot/Nade.

Looking at the squad built to date, we'd be bloody mad to go 4-4-2

Oh. Goodie. Any chance of someone sticking up the back page? It usually takes them hours to update it.

If kelly can come up with credible reasons why he disagrees, then he should be paid some attention to, regardless of agenda.

So you are accepting Kellner's description of what he's doing uncritically and think he is right?

Eh, he has.

Can we take this to our own thread, guys?

.... on the subjec tof Archie Campbell, wouldn't mind him signing. has pace to burn, has proven it at this level previously. As I said on the Dumbarton threa dwhen his name came up - did most of his good work prior to an injury ina 4-4-2 I think. Not really cut out as the 1 in a 4-5-1. Given the mess they wer ein last year, the numbe rof opportunities he had, then I don't think it's fair to judge him from that. Wouldn't mind him signing for us.

No we really signed Mark Stewart. Someone had to.

i seem to recall Morton fans thinking he couldn't play in that lone striker position, which was the formation they were then favouring. Think Campbell did most of his good work playing in a 4-4-2 off of Wetherston for them, and as you say, with the mess they were in last year? Campbell has pace to burn, wouldn't mind him at the Rovers.

Yeah, but you'd be har dpushed to describe Labour's economic policies as anything other than centre right as well - not cutting corporation tax as much as the next guy does not a socialist make.

No, they have one macro-economic fiscal policy to the left of the SNP - namely a higher level of corporation tax. That does not consititute having economic policies (collective) "much to the left".

1) They are at least partly responsible for these turn of events 2) Any future Labour government - going by the utterings of the party to date - would continue with the same welfare policies as the current coalition.

Well no, in so much as you can make opinion polls lead, rather than reflect public opinion, it's by presenting one outcome as being wildy more popular than the other. That way, any waverers may be more likely to simply side with the majority (after all, everyone can't be wrong) while marginalising the other side in people's heads. Still, I don't think this is happening here. On the one hand it assumes a level of malice that I'm not willing to subscribe to this pollster (even with historical tory ties) while at the same time, I don't think the polls are useful for that kind of work anyway. Tipping opinion is more likely to happen in conversations at work, or in the pub - it's a question of critical mass. In any group of ten, 7 Nos 1 Yes and 2 undecideds, then the 2 undecideds are more likely to end up siding with no through the sheer weight of opinion on that side, in any group where it is 4/4/2? And I think there are probably enough Yes votes out there now that the argument does get a fair hearing. YouGov are interesting though, quite apart from the two SNP group weighting, they show the highest number of SNP voters voting No and the lowest number of Labour voters boting Yes. Clearly there is cause to assume these guys are outliers. That doesn't mean they are wrong, they will have their reasons for these weightings, but against two other internet pollsters (and one phone pollster) showing much closer races? They might be right, but at the moment ther eis no reason to assume they have got something more right than the others.

Well within margin of error for the last yougov poll. Simply confirms what I said a few pages back: there are two distinct polling camps. One clustered around a swing of 2-4.5 points, the other around 7 to 10 points. They can't both be right. The first group weights by recalled 2011 vote, the second either has a recalled 2011 with variations and tweaks, or doesn't weight by recalled vote at all. SOMEONE has the wrong methodology.

Spence signed for Alloa, still wiating on Anderson.

Not wanting to derail your thread, but it's easy to be dismissive of Rovers approach - but there is some logic in it going back through McGlynn's day. We don't really have a wide scouting network, and more importantly, we don't have the money to help folk re-settle. Ever since Anelka, we've tried to minimise the number of players coming in from leagues outside Scotland, and even within that, we've tried to make the group of players more local to minimise travel costs for the squad, and to better keep them together. Looking at our team now, there are even very few west coast based players in there (one of the main reasons we lost Baird to QoS was travel times). Falkirk have a fantastic youth set up, which is helped by your central location to some extent, but it's something you can be proud of and will furnish you with a ready built squad. We are quickly becoming the not good enough for Dundee, can offer more money than Livi or Cowden club. It might be unimaginative but it's not quite as scattershot as is made out. As I said on our own thread, a lot of the guys within our budget are pretty much of a muchness in terms of ability. Every so often we'll find someone witha bit of wow factor, like Tade or Cardle - but for the most part we're a journeyman team. Murray at least has us playing less of a percentage based game than McGlynn did (although McGlynn was trapped by the players he could bring in - with Dunferlmine in the league, Dundee and Livi all paying more than us at the time, we were much farther down the food chain for east coast based players)

I don't really read the papers for Scottish football beyond the FFP, so can't say I'm terribly influenced by them. I'm just aware of the fact that he does talk to a lot of people and has previously put contracts on the table for guys, and then dragged his heels over it, before finding someone better in that position. To be honest, it makes a lot of sense - most of the players at this level ARE much of a muchness.

Undoubtedly we have held talks with Campbell, whether or no the interest is alive is another thing. Murray does not 'go about his busniess' as it were, by carefully selecting his prime targets, I think he's pretty much decided that at our levels, so players are in that middle 70% of skill/ability that they are much of a muchness, barring upsurges in form. Last year he must have talked to, or offered contracts to three quarters of all the out of contract players. This year, I'm fairly sure he's offered contracts to folk and already not followed up his interest in them, before signing someone else in their position. His signing strategy, blunt and mercenary as it is, seems to be to offer as many contracts as possible, and see who the best guy who says yes is.