Mr November
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Posts posted by Mr November
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Bit of a reality check there. A shame to go out obviously but I thought we played quite well overall, even in the opening 20 minutes, just up against a much better team. You can see why Hearts are by far the third best team (second on form) in the country at the moment, they moved the ball so well and so quickly. We’ve got a lot of technically good young players and I think that was a great lesson for them in what they need to make it at a higher level.
I thought we struggled out wide, Hearts full backs were always in loads of space, but that’s a natural drawback with playing a diamond. No real complaints from me, just outclassed by a better team and plenty to learn from. The main thing now is we keep our focus for some very important league games over the next few weeks.
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14 minutes ago, Fuctifano said:
Spot on and interesting to hear it from a non Thistle fan.
Felt sorry for Diack, he's an 18 year old target man type CF and looked a complete fish out of water on the wing from when he came on until we went 2 up front in extra time and he moved more centrally. I presumed the only logic in getting him on out wide was his height for set pieces at both ends as Livi had far more big guys than us.
I also don't think Stanway is quite up to starting every week at this moment in time and not quite sure why he's getting picked there ahead of MacKenzie who seems to offer more albeit sometimes easier to look better coming off the bench.
I note Doolan has taken responsibility for making the subs too early, almost the opposite of the playoff final.
Yeah, when Diack came on and again when Ngwenya came on I just assumed it would be a change of shape to be a bit more compact and double up on Nouble and Brandon.
Stanway was fine at Airdrie last season when he played but I have been surprised at him becoming a regular starter in a better team. I suppose a lot of it is not really having a proper Docherty replacement? No harm to him but I knew Thistle were done when Stanway was taking the set-pieces.
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Quite enjoyed that. I didn’t think there was too much between the teams until Livingston scored, Thistle probably edged it but not enough to be two goals ahead. Hard to argue with Livingston going through, after they scored they controlled the game but I did think the game was heading for penalties, didn’t see the late winner coming.
Thistle have a really good starting 11 but there’s not much depth and when it’s McMillan, McInroy, Graham, Fitzpatrick and Lawless off, Williams, Alston, Adeloye, Diack and Ngwenya on, you can see why the game fell away from them. I was expecting Doolan to go with two up front near the end when Thistle couldn’t hold the ball up at all and was surprised it took until into extra-time for that to happen, not that it made too much difference anyway.
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1 hour ago, Diamonds are Forever said:
If we put McCabe back in midfield I think we'd have to change system a bit and go with 2 sitters. Neither McCabe or McMaster can really play the role that McStravick plays so one would need to drop out if we keep the same system. Would mean going back to 4231, which then reveals the problem of our lack of wide players again.
Against a better side it might be worth it, however I think we'll struggle to score anyway so going even more defensive in midfield will just make it less likely. I've barely seen Lyall so it's hard to say with certainty it's what I'd do but on paper a straight swap with him for McStravick would be my pick.
Yeah I agree, that’s why I’d keep McMaster in there as someone who can recycle possession and use the ball well, with McCabe behind him for long range passing if needed. Certainly wouldn’t want to change the shape away from having four in the middle. Donnell or Lyall seem the more obvious choices.
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1 hour ago, Kenny_m said:
I'm a big Ballantyne fan but will depend on how fit he is and he might be better suited playing against Forrest than Watson, but do we really want to change the back 4? At least we have options and could Lyall replace McStravick?
Definitely options yeah. Gavin Gallagher is another, different kind of player to McStravick but he’d work hard and get around the park. I’d be reluctant to change a settled defence too and while I’d like McCabe in midfield, having someone like McMaster to keep things calm and recycle the ball might be ideal in a game where we might not control possession as much as we’re used to.
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Looks like McStravick is out for Sunday. Presumably Donnell in from the start in his place? A bit of extra physicality might not be a bad thing. I suppose the alternative would be Ballantyne starting with Watson moving inside and McCabe moving into midfield.
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Really excited for Sunday. The less said about the game a few years ago the better but that penalty win at Tynecastle in 2008 was an all timer. I can’t say I’m confident we’ll win, it’s a real step up from St. Johnstone, but it should be a good occasion and there’s certainly a slight chance of an upset.
It’s great having so many big games just now. I’ve said it before but at the end of 2019 I tried to think of the best Airdrie games/moments of that decade and it was grim. Depressing stuff when David Hutton saving a penalty at Parkhead was more fun than most games. The last few years have been so much more enjoyable. There’s still been a few disappointments in there but going back to around January 2021, it would be hard to argue many other SPFL teams have been more fun to support than Airdrie over that time.
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2 minutes ago, AJ77 said:
Cup final confirmed Sunday 24th March at Falkirk.
Quite happy with that. Not too far away and a stadium we have a very good record at (not that that counts for much here).
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1 hour ago, ShineOnYouCrazyDiamonds said:
While we’re all on a high - who would you consider your POTY so far? I imagine there could be varied responses because we’ve had different standouts at different times. Megwa certainly a standout but at the club for too short a time to be considered. Aiken was a standout early on but has obviously been injured for a long spell. Todorov certainly on form now and if he keeps that up he could be considered. I’d imagine Fordyce and Telfer would be popular shouts but I’d go for Rae personally. Could see how much we improved last season when he came back in and he’s maybe not always had lots to do but I feel so confident watching him deal with balls into the box and playing with the ball at his feet (and he’s had a lot less dodgy moments so far than last season and hasn’t even been sent off yet). I’d probably go for Hancock as YPOTY so far.
I think I’d go with Telfer. It’s a strange one as you say, as some of our better performers (Megwa, Aiken, Hancock) have had spells out the team and even Telfer was in and out for the first couple of months. Fordyce has been immense over the last month or so and while not a POTY candidate, Watson deserves a mention for being a somewhat surprisingly consistently good performer at this level.
Rae is a fair shout too. As you say, there are times when he doesn’t have much to do but even then, the defence seem so confident with him behind them. I think he’s improved his decision making in one on ones too. Earlier this season we conceded quite a few goals where a player was through on goal and the way Rae used to rush out without actually blocking the goal didn’t exactly prevent them scoring, he’s had a fair number of decent saves from similar positions over the last few months though. It’s easy to forget how young he is too, I think he’ll go on to have a very good career. Hopefully any scouts just watch him against Dunfermline.
I suppose it’s a good sign that there isn’t really a consensus choice in what has so far been a very successful season.
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Hoping for a TNS win tomorrow purely on the basis that I do not want to read an Airdrie v Falkirk cup final thread.
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What a difference after years of being rubbish in the cups. The only team in the country to win all four League Cup games and then a good comeback against Ross County, only to fall short in extra time. Making it to the Challenge Cup final for the first time in 15 seasons, without playing a home game on the way and whatever happens next week, a great cup victory over St. Johnstone and a big game against Hearts on BBC One.
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1 minute ago, CALDERON said:
Airdrie, again, were absolutely miles better than us tonight.
Its fairly obvious we were in a false position. To be 5 points clear at Xmas was very, very generous. There had been some fairly clear warning signs throughout the season that the form wasnt sustainable playing the way we were.
The management shown since the game at Tannadice has been incredibly naive. The way we fall out of games and lose any momentum or cohesion as the game goes on is absolutely staggering.
I know that we still have the loan window to go, but losing O'Reilly, not replacing him, and bringing in another midfielder we don't need (and who looks frankly miles off it) is about as a bad as we could have possible hoped in terms of January business. Theres more to it than simply blaming the defence, but that defence tonight was probably the worst I've seen this season - and that's our first choice.
Its important not to overact and all that - but 5 defeats on the bounce is awful form at the best of times - and the sheer lack of game management and intelligence seen in the past month is pretty terrifying. It's very, very difficult to see where the next win is coming from.
I’m not fully an xG/xPoints nerd but did find the difference between Raith’s actual points and expected points startling. I know a lot of that probably comes from all the late goals edging tight games but I, and I think most others, assumed that happened far too many times for it to just be luck.
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Fair play to Ian Murray. His team have struggled recently, partially down to having a very exposed and wide open midfield. What does he do against a team who have done very well playing a diamond for the last six weeks? Continues to play with at times one midfielder.
Another brilliant win for Airdrie. We just look so calm, composed and organised recently. Considering where we were even at this time last season it’s a remarkable turnaround defensively, while still having plenty of quality on the ball.
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Interesting game that I’ll miss unfortunately. We’re on a good run just now but have plenty of important players injured just now. Our bench was very weak yesterday and will possibly be even weaker for this with Lyall cup-tied, so hopefully some good news on the injury front this week or maybe even a signing.
Intrigued to see what Raith do. They’ve yet to get the better of us and are on a poor run. Seems like they’ve been trying to play Murrayball from the start recently, with barely any defenders playing, but he should know by now it doesn’t work like that, you need the chaos factor changing to that mid-game brings. Interesting to see if Raith go back to basics as a result or if Murray completely overthinks his lineup.
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47 minutes ago, ShineOnYouCrazyDiamonds said:
Watson motm for me yesterday, think it was possibly his best performance in an Airdrie shirt.
Agreed on this. I thought Watson was outstanding yesterday. Fitzpatrick tore us apart down that side at Firhill but Watson kept him very quiet and was a threat in both boxes. It was the perfect game for him really, a real mix of two teams showing bits of quality in between lots of physicality and aggression.
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9 hours ago, Diamonds are Forever said:
Been a very enjoyable few weeks playing some good sides at home and getting good results against all of them. It's clear that at home we are a match for anyone.
Looking ahead, the next challenge for this team is to improve our away form. We are 2nd in the league on home form, but 10th on away form. We only have 6 home games left compared to 9 away and our next league game is also a home game to Ayr - so 9 of our last 14 games are away from home. Therefore it's going to be a long slog to May if we don't improve on our away form, which so far has been dreadful. I'm confident that we'll continue to win or draw our home games which alone should be enough to avoid 9th or 10th. But if we want to look any higher we'll need to start beating teams around us away from home.
This is definitely true but I’m intrigued to see how we get on away from home now that our style is a bit more direct and we’re more keen on crossing. Obviously a lot of our goals have been set-pieces recently, which is great but we do still need to start scoring from open play more often, and there is still that doubt of what do we do when we concede first.
Looking at the away games so far, Arbroath was the only major disaster, though the two goals at the end and the manner of them perhaps make that one seem worse. The first half at Raith was one of our best performances this season, while the second half at Queen’s Park was great and we did fine at Morton. Dunfermline away was ok in spells but everything else has been lots of sideways possession after conceding an early goal without actually doing much (Dundee United, Inverness, Ayr, Partick Thistle). I suppose it all comes back to getting the first goal, which seems to be very important for this team.
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Really enjoyed that. I think Doolan is the closest comparison to McCabe in this league in terms of style of play, so always interesting to watch these games. The game itself lost its way a bit in the second half thanks to the referee but I thought was two fairly well matched teams trying to play decent stuff with a good atmosphere too. Makes such a difference having home games with a bit of needle rather than playing (no offence to them) Kelty or Peterhead every week.
Thistle started really well but Airdrie came back into it and had the better of the last 15-20 minutes of the first half. We’re still struggling to score from open play but our record at set-pieces has been excellent recently, helped of course by Jamie Sneddon who must be the worst keeper at dealing with crossballs in the league. I didn’t think there was too much in the second half, not a lot happened other than that chaotic 10 minute spell where the ref completely lost control.
Mentioned it on our thread but Fordyce’s tackle near the end deserves another mention. Timed to perfection.
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A really impressive performance today given we were without Ballantyne, Aiken, Gallagher, McGill and even Megwa. Generally very solid defensively, Hancock had a poor game compared to his usual standards but it’s a tough role with no winger to protect him, played some decent stuff in midfield and McGregor and Todorov worked hard up front.
Special mention to Fordyce for saving us in the first half when Adeloye was through on goal and then that tackle at the end. World class.
Hopefully we get one of the forwards back for next week and maybe even a new signing, as Lyall will be cup-tied which will leave us even shorter.
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Airdrie 1-1 Partick Thistle
Dundee United 2-0 Dunfermline
Morton 3-1 Arbroath
Queen’s Park 1-1 Ayr
Raith Rovers 2-1 Inverness0 -
41 minutes ago, Ian Mcleod said:
Dean Lyness signs until the end of the season. Can remember Airdrie fans slating him last season. So I don't expect him to play often just cover for Jamie Smith a bit of a waste of a wage imo.
I think Dean Lyness summed himself up when he was asked in an interview at Airdrie which football from history he’d like to play with and he chose Peter Schemichel. A goalie would keep you out the team!
If he’s just there as backup then fair enough but yeah, he was particularly poor for us and we looked much more solid at the back, and had a much more confident defence, once Josh Rae was back. For every decent game he had he’d go and do something chaotic the next week. Seemed like a lovely man and he was oddly popular in Ireland but yeah, wouldn’t want him playing regularly.
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1 hour ago, airdrieman said:
Planning to be there too.
Looking forward to this. Always enjoy games v Thistle and this one should have a bit of an extra edge to it with both teams coming into the game in good form. I fancy us to give anyone a game at home but, if Gabby McGill and Gal both miss this one then I do fancy us a lot less. Will, presumably, necessitate a formation change which isn't ideal.If they’re both out I’d probably stick McGregor up beside Todorov and keep the shape as it is. Having a more compact midfield and two guys up front to press teams has worked really well and while McGregor isn’t a natural striker, I think he’s got the pace and energy to play beside Todorov and do the running that McGill offers.
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21 minutes ago, Jack Reed said:
Big step up,and maybe to early for him ,best of luck though
Yep, up against a much better team than he faced with us but I’m sure he’ll improve and be fine. It does seem very unlikely he ends up back here so hope he kicks on and does well.
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Admittedly they’re playing Rangers but sounds like Megwa’s having a tough night for Hibs. Bring him home!
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Hearts game confirmed for 5pm on the Sunday. A strange kick off time but probably a better crowd than we’d get on a Monday night.
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Airdrieonians 23/24 Championship Thread♦️
in Scottish Championship General Chatter
Posted
Can’t believe I forgot the most important thing - we don’t need to go to Cappielow for a fifth time.