VictorOnopko

I think he was our joint worst player last season (based on the games I managed to get to, anyway), along with Devine. His attitude stank and he was one of the main reasons we were overrun game after game by poor teams; he looked absolutely clueless and afraid of getting involved. He might be better this season in a lower league if no one else will take him, or if he stays, he might continue to dial in his halfarsed performances (on premiership wages), as he clearly thinks he's better than he is. Is he worth keeping on and throwing money at in the hope that he suddenly finds focus, determination and motivation again? In my opinion - no.

Because he went from POTY to an absolute liability, and we got relegated?

I wouldn't mind if he did, as his limited "running fast in a straight line" shtick may work better in this division if he is played regularly through the middle, having been played on the wing, and sporadically, last year in one of Archibald's many baffling selection patterns. Obviously he has to be motivated too, but that's another matter. Barton is probably the priority offload from the three high-earners, as his "strolling around and not winning challenges while the game passes by" shtick definitely won't work, and he wasn't trying last season.

1. ICT 2. Ross C 3. Falkirk 4. Jags 5. Dundee U 6. Dunfermline 7. Ayr 8. Morton 9. QOS 10. Alloa Basically the above would be a best-case scenario for Thistle, given our massive clear out followed by early excuses from the unsackable Arsene Archibald about lack of money, scraping around for loans, etc. Much might hinge on whether we can offload the 3 players on Prem wages (great overconfident planning there by the club) or whether they'll still be hanging around when the season starts. Dundee United will probably finish higher given their latest windfall from the Mcnamara selloffs which got them relegated... but it'd be funny if they didn't.

Gabriel Rojo de la Vega Piccolo as 1st team modelling consultant.

"Just... Law". I suppose we're no longer Lawless...

Fantastic home kit - hoops are so much better than verticals in our colours. Hooped socks look good too. Blue away strip is a bit random, but will put up with it as the home one is such a pleasant surprise.

I was surprised when Cerny appeared to be willing to hang around and play lower league football with us. He's better than that, so it's not a shock at all to hear he's off. It's obviously bad news though. Still, at least we don't have Scott Fox or Ryan Scully anymore. Hopefully someone better than those two will come in.

Or a realist? Yes, that sounds like a good guess at what we have in place. Milan Nitriansky probably looked pretty useful too.

What are the chances we get a few inadequate signings in at the last minute, as AA often likes to do, which leave us short in one or several areas of the pitch? I hope he's off at an intensive learning course somewhere on how to spot good football players.

I agree with both those statements. My original point was that both us and your team were pish, having amassed identical points totals - so it was odd for your fellow accie to come along and call us pish as though that was a distinguishing factor and there was miles of difference between the two teams. One game - our comedy 4-0 pumping in Dingwall (which absolutely demonstrated that we deserved to go down) accounted for almost half of the GD which saved you...

Did you miss my statement that we are pish, and deservedly going down? If you think your GD advantage having finished equal on points with our worst side in the past 7 years (ft. D. Devine in "defence" and a makeshift midfield all season) makes you anything other than utterly pish too, then who am I to argue? A hypothetical result in a play off game which you avoided on said GD isn't much of an argument though. We're pish - and I'm fairly certain you are too. I quite like Accies and your resilience in staying up, which enrages the "big teams only in the top league" roasters. However, you apparently have a minority of absolute spanners in your support, playing the big baws card based on a shambles of a season and deleting an entire match thread (even though it was full of tributes to J Lambie) when you lost to our pish team not long ago. Bit more self-awareness might be an idea.

Indeed we are pish. Completely pish, and deservedly doon. However, when I look at the table I see your mob amassed a whole 0 (zero) more points over 38 games. That's not very good, is it?

The Keep list is fine, except for Spittal. Arsene Archibald loves him, but it's far from clear why. Pretty obvious he'll be a passenger once again next season when we're scrapping in various games. Can I be the 437th person to say thank f*ck Danny Devine is gone.

Joking about players from 6 years ago aside, what we desperately need is two solid centre backs* and two tough, fearless, tackling, ball-winning, tempo-controlling midfielders who don't hide. I hope we've seen the last of Osman, Woods and Barton who between them had none of these features. *Cargill and/or Keown may do OK in the 1st division alongside someone much, much, much more competent than Danny Devine.

Edwards ran about a lot; that's it. He wouldn't be missed, and Hearts can have him (be amazed if they wanted him though given that he's rubbish at football and played a big part in a disastrous relegation season). Bring back Balatoni, Muirhead, ATS and O'Donnell. Lyle Taylor up front. I hear Sean Welsh will be fit in 6 weeks too.

Maybe he's offered to work for free next season, given that relegation has cost us about a million quid?

Pretty dismal (and entirely predictable) decision, but here's hoping Arsene Archibald can build a balanced squad and organise a defence - because that's what we're going to need next season.

Completely agree that our only 'good' season in the top flight was last season's Top 6 - driven by suddenly having Liam Lindsay in the team. The others were pretty much interchangeable - in trouble in the bottom 3 places; extricated ourselves (usually with some Doolan goals just when needed), except this season when we didn't, and couldn't climb above an Accies team who had lost (I think) eight matches in a row. Baffling how Archibald and Paterson can be quite as bad as they are at building a capable, solid, non-panicky back line, given that they were both decent defenders. We were often without wing backs due to loaning out a great young player in Penrice, and very poor recruitment (Nitriansky et al.), and had Barton hiding in midfield for far too long. If this past season was a player, it would be "Danny Devine". New management team, please.

Fair dos. Had had a couple of Laphroaigs when I wrote that. Should have been: embarrassed by our season, and very embarrassed by, and angry about, our play off "performance".

Archie has deserved support during the season - but has had that whole season to rectify some situation, change up his ideas, and make sure there is some fight in the team. He has failed to do that, and I don't think it is too strong to say that the play off performances were a disgrace to the club. It is not "negative and frankly uneducated" to say that a man who has presided over a slump which has left us back in the first division (due to crap signings, crap team selection and a trademark of losing late goals) is done. I agree with you that he stepped in and did brilliantly at first, but that was a long time ago now, as was the "great possession football pleasing on the eye". It's been attritional for several seasons (that's understandable, but it's nonsense to claim we have been good to watch in the past few years). You might consider being less insulting towards fellow fans who want a fresh direction after this omnishambles of a season.

True, it could always be worse, but as many are pointing out here the core of players on our books who are any good is extremely small (and ageing). We have a lottery winners-funded youth set up which may give us some decent youngsters in years to come, but first-team wise, we're back where we started in the generally good recent years from McCall onwards, and we need a huge overhaul. We have a tactically inflexible, defensively naive coaching team who are out of ideas but may stick around to try to do it. That's the big worry.

Archibald (perhaps it's time to retire the cuddly "Archie" nickname) should have the decency to walk (he won't be sacked). I think he will stay though, and we're not coming back up anytime soon if he does. We'll be midtable in the championship at best, and may even be in worse trouble than that if he can't bring in several players with some fight. He's shown for months now that he is unable to motivate his team to dig in and win midfield battles - having apparently forgotten to sign enough midfielders - or, as a defender himself, to coach a defence to work as a solid unit which doesn't ship dozens of last minute goals. He has persisted with bang out of form players (Osman, Barton, Devine) having nightmares week after week, when we had young, competent options (Penrice, McCarthy), in some positions at least, not getting a chance. At no point this season has he been praised by anyone for effective tactics or subsitutions. His team are unwatchable; his bland interviews and "we need to try harder" excuses are unlistenable. Another season of his stagnant reign is a very depressing prospect. He won the1st division last time with someone else's team. This team is his (apart from the best players - Erskine, Lawless and Doolan) and they are, almost to a man, utter shite, with no dig or determination. The promotion year team would beat this bunch 4 or 5-0. OK, maybe 5-2, with Balatoni and Fox involved... Embarrassed to be a Jags fan at the moment.

Happy enough with a point today - edges us a wee bit further away from County. An absolute must-win up next against them. Here's hoping we don't contrive to lose 2-3 like that game a few years back at our place. At least this time we don't have Mexican model and occasional footballer Gabriel Piccolo playing 'for' us. Archie - please keep B Spittal on the bench (or better still, completely outside the matchday squad) for the rest of these games. Thanks.

I know it's all been said before, but listening to Chick "Chick" Young wittering and interrupting in his wee helium voice (and being factually corrected today as usual by Richard Gordon) is excruciating stuff. The BBC should have changed the locks when his much-vaunted retirement (which I think involved him swanning around at Euro 16?) was mysteriously rescinded and he just showed up again at the start of the following season. Is that Costanza over there???