Mr November

Hutton was a very good keeper for us, despite fans from his previous clubs not really rating him. He came in as second choice behind Scott Gallacher who had a shaky start and then got a season ending injury a few games in. Hutton was excellent when he came in that season though, I think he ended up winning player of the year, rarely making any mistakes and making several big saves at key moments. He did alright in his second season too, though he did begin to make more mistakes throughout the season and his inability to come off his line seemed to really annoy Ian Murray and particularly Colin Cameron. He was dropped after a poor run of form in January of that season and never really played much again after that, save for Max Currie isolating for a couple of weeks. Some Airdrie fans overrate him, mainly because of a good penalty save at Parkhead, but he was a good keeper for us and did well at this level just a couple of years ago. I don’t think he’ll be a big upgrade on Parry if he is at all, I think both are declining, but he’s still a decent keeper. I’m sure he’ll quite like being managed by Barry Ferguson too.

We haven’t announced anything but given we sold 700 tickets to Motherwell fans I’d be surprised if we didn’t allow a much smaller number of Montrose fans in. I guess they’ll just do what usually happens and have the away fans at the end of the stand and home fans across the rest of it.

Fair play to Rhys McCabe and Scott McGill, Airdrie heroes already, McGill after only 5 minutes. Shout out to Matthew McDonald, only his third senior game and he was outstanding, never stopped running and caused Motherwell lots of problems all night. Certainly had a point to prove and he showed up a lot of their big names. What a night! It’s games like this that make it all worth it. The only Motherwell game I remember and have been to was the 2007 cup game, so tonight was really special. Right up there with Dunfermline and Hearts in the cup in 2006 and 2008. I’d been making other plans for Saturday but that’s certainly changed things.

Robbie Neilson talks a bit about Scott McGill here. Certainly sounds like someone who they rate quite highly so I’m pretty happy with that signing. We’ve seen already that we do need extra cover in midfield if at least one of Easton, McCabe or Agnew or out. Gabby McGill doesn’t seem like our first choice given he played a few weeks ago and has only just signed but he’ll offer something different to Allan and he’ll surely contribute more than Pyott, so I’m happy enough with that.

I enjoyed Fordyce being put up front towards the end. Between a forward starting in midfield, a centre back being sent up front for the last few minutes and everyone being played out of position ahead of Dean Ritchie (not that I’m complaining), there was some real classic Murrayball today.

Only three really, no idea where McCabe is but he’s certainly not sitting with the subs and wasn’t warming up before the game. Walker seemed to pick up an injury over the two friendly games, despite not being involved, as he was on the bench for the first game and in the stand for the second. McCabe and Easton being injured early on is unfortunate. Frizzell does seem to be quite injury prone which is a bit concerning, while Pyott is permanently injured and was a bizarre signing. We definitely still need a couple of players but I’d rather we went with a smaller squad, knowing the risk of a few injuries leaves us in this situation, than waste money on four or five young guys who will barely be involved and will only make the bench in an emergency like we had with Moore, Hughes, Burke etc last season. Anyway, much better performance today. A draw was probably fair overall but I felt we had the better chances, Currie made more saves but most of them were shots from outside the box. Defensively we were pretty solid, Lyons was much more comfortable in the middle and Watson was excellent. Same issues in midfield as usual, no real attacking threat from the wing backs and we struggled to control the game. Agnew was ok but McDonald struggled positionally and Allan clearly isn’t a midfielder. We were far too open in midfield in the second half, Agnew and McDonald sat very deep with Allan staying quite far forward, on another day that could have cost us. It doesn’t say much for Dean Ritchie that Allan and Kerr were played out of their natural positions ahead of him. Gallagher and Kouider-Aissa struggled up front, not much service and the latter doesn’t look match fit yet, but early days for them. Both teams still have players to come in but that felt like a good test for us today, I doubt there will be too many points between the teams at the end of the season.

Yeah our games have been quite relaxed in terms of seating so far so I wouldn’t worry about it. Some seats have a sticker for where you can sit distanced from others, as long as you’re generally near one and not taking the piss no one is too bothered. Even our play-off game in May was a sit where you want deal. They don’t seem too fussed if you sit with people either, as long as you’re generally distanced from other groups.

Tickets for the Motherwell game go on sale to last year's season ticket holders and Club 1924 members tomorrow, general sale on Monday. Interestingly we can buy two tickets this time. Motherwell also have 700 tickets for sale, so looks like there should be a good crowd in for it.

It’s strange, as Murray commented on Dumbarton’s strong defensive unit when we signed them, so I had assumed we’d be going with a back four until the subsequent signings made it pretty clear we’re signing players with a 3-5-2 in mind. We looked alright going forward when Easton was playing yesterday but seemed to run out of ideas worryingly quickly once he went off. Gallagher thrives on balls into the box and being in the right place at the right time, while Kouider-Aissa is strong in the air. Having two wings backs who aren’t the best going forward and don’t offer too much creativity isn’t ideal for getting them good service.

Yeah based on the three games so far the lack of attacking threat from the wing backs is our biggest issue. As you day, it’s not for a lack of effort, Wardrop and Quitongo do get up and down the park and look to support defence and attack but you can tell both are full backs rather than wing backs. I think you can get away with one of them but both leaves you a bit blunt in the final third. I think my biggest concern yesterday was the lack of options to change it. I felt we’d have been better moving to a back four during the second half with some outright wingers coming on but we just don’t have anybody like that. I can’t say I was too fussed to see him go but someone like Thomson was a good option from the bench to bring on to try and add some pace and directness to our attack. We‘re not going to get anyone particularly great if we’re not starting wingers every week but someone in that mould from the bench is definitely needed.

1-0 down to a League Two team at home in the cup and we’ve just taken a long throw. Football is certainly back!

Other than Clyde and Cove, it seems like every team in this league could do with a quality striker. I’m both surprised and impressed that we’ve managed to sign someone who surely would have had interest from other clubs at this level. He seemed to struggle a bit at Thistle last season, I don’t think he played that often for whatever reason, but on paper this is certainly a much better signing than I expected for a striker.

Two year deal!

Not sure if anyone else watched this, just your standard new players content but I guess it’s a nice extra to have. The highlight is Ian Murray scoring two free kicks in the background and running off doing an aeroplane.

I was ready to complain about them asking for more money but looks like this is just a bonus for season ticket holders/Club 1924 members. I’m not sure they’ll make much money out of this, surely anyone bothered enough to pay £5.99 a month for this already has a season ticket or is in Club 1924? I suppose it might be good for people living outside Scotland to be able to watch games.

Finally!

We seem to be going with a back three this season so we did need some cover. All of our centre backs are predominantly right sided too so having someone who seems to be more naturally left sided is probably good too. Not convinced by him from what I saw on Sunday but I doubt he’ll start too often.

That makes sense, I did think he looked a bit like Greg Taylor I thought we played ok on Saturday. Kerr was quite rash defensively but Watson and Fordyce strolled it. Wardrop and Quitongo did well defensively and got up and down the park but their final ball was lacking. Agnew and McCabe were pretty composed in midfield, McCabe had a few dodgy moments but was mostly fine. Easton had some good moments too but the strikers never really got going until Allan came on. We seemed to be making an effort to build from the back, certainly much more than last season, and while we lacked any cutting edge I felt we generally controlled the game. Yesterday was pretty different though. McDonald struggled to get into the game and Ritchie was just all over the place, never seemed to know where he should be playing. That led to Currie and the defence resorting to long punts up the park to two small forwards who were never going to win a header. As I said yesterday, it’s good to get these issues out the way before competitive games start, as it’s now clear that a midfield with Ritchie and McDonald as the two attacking midfielders just won’t work. Ritchie is a strange one, as from what I could make out last season he seemed to be a very budget version of Kieran Millar, an energetic midfielder who will run about and win tackles but not really offer much in the opposition half. I don’t know where he fits into the current system really, as he’s not good enough to be the holding player and doesn’t offer enough going forward to play as one of the attacking midfielders. Overall I’m not too concerned, barring an injury crisis we won’t be playing a team like yesterday’s again anytime soon. We’ll see where we are after the cup games as that’s probably a better test of how the team will do this season.

Yeah we’ve had Harris O’Connor and Luke Lyons at centre back today, with Lyons also coming on yesterday. O’Connor played on the right, Lyons on the left. Matthew McDonald started in midfield today with another midfielder coming on as a sub. We had a trialist striker yesterday who came on again today, as well as Daniel Scally who played the first half and a second half sub (who I think was called Cammy). McDonald did fine when he wasn’t alongside Ritchie, the others didn’t really do too much though. It makes sense we have players in for all these positions, if we’re playing a back three we need another centre back as cover, we definitely need another striker and I’m not against us signing another midfielder either, though I’d prefer someone who can play out wide to give us another option. Scally is an interesting one. Turned down a new deal at Forfar so he obviously fancies his chances of a deal somewhere. He had some decent touches but I don’t think he’s a striker nevermind someone suited to dealing with long punts up the park. Could be a decent option for a wide player/attacking midfielder in place of Robert but not the striker we need.

O’Connor’s done ok building play from the back but poor defensively, he’s needed a lot of talking to from Currie and Fordyce. As you say, the other centre back was at fault for the first goal, he stopped paying attention to the game as he was waiting for the referee to make a decision which never came. Clyde are strolling this so far, Gomis has been outstanding. Our midfield is non-existant, Agnew’s done ok but Ritchie is all over the place and McDonald hasn’t got into the game yet. Not too bothered as I’d like to think we wouldn’t be playing that midfield three too often but good to get these issues out the way early on. The midfield being so poor has led to Currie launching a lot of long balls which he didn’t really do yesterday. Allan’s worked hard and created one good chance for himself but he’s never going to win high balls. The other striker has had some decent touches but he hasn’t had much to work with. Patiently waiting for the first Murray out shout now.

Yeah number 2 is Harris O’Connor.

Not sure it was Willison, think it might have been Reece Murdoch from last season but could be wrong. I certainly didn’t recognise him at the time which would explain it being Murdoch given we could barely make out who was playing on the Pixellot streams nevermind the backup keeper. The number 5 was Craig Watson. Not sure why he had a different squad number, maybe just going with 1-11 kits for today.

Yeah that’s him. I thought he looked decent, very energetic and good at driving forward, not so good around the box but I guess that makes sense if he was a full-back before this. Jordan Allan looked very lively when he came on and made a big difference. It was a brilliant finish for his goal, I’m still not convinced he’s good enough to start every week but I can see why Murray signed him. I wasn’t convinced by the trialist striker at all. Seemed to struggle with simple passes and controlling the ball and when he did get through on goal he didn’t do much with it. The centre back who came on was fine, didn’t really have too much to do but worth another look tomorrow.

Pretty much my thoughts too. I try not to read too much into friendlies but I think we'll know a bit more after this weekend's games in terms of how we'll set up this season. Murray made a comment about going for quality over quantity in the Dylan Easton signing news so I think we'll be going with a smaller 20/21 man squad. It makes sense, as you say we wasted for too many wages on players who contributed very little last season and even more the previous season with the full reserve team. Defensively we look almost there, could do with another centre back in as cover but you'd imagine the three currently signed will be the ones who start. Quite happy with the wing back options assuming McDonald can cover on the left, possibly our weakest position in terms of quality but good to have options when we finished the season with Walker and McCann as our only full backs. Given we tried to sign Paton I guess we'll still be looking for a holding midfielder. I think we'll be looking at Agnew and McCabe as the main two midfielders, possibly with someone behind them. From what we've seen of Ritchie he strikes me as more of a Kieran Millar ball-winning player rather than an outright holding midfielder, so someone like Paton who can keep things steady and solid would be ideal. It looks like we've recruited for a 3-5-2 given the lack of wide players but it would be nice to have that option too. Easton and Frizzell can play out wide but we lack a proper winger and a bit of pace to change things up if needed. Doesn't need to be someone to start every game, especially if we go with a back three, just someone to make an impact from the bench like Thomson did last season. We definitely need another striker as we all know. I think Easton might end up playing as a forward sometimes but we definitely need a bit more than Allan and Pyott at the very least. Unless we're lucky with a loan signing then I think it's unlikely we'll be able to bring in anyone better than Gallagher, so someone to compliment him and who can perhaps offer something slightly different would be good.

From the Motherwell thread. It's not a particularly exciting signing but the last young player we signed from Motherwell did pretty well for us, so hopefully the same here. We do need cover at left back so hopefully he can provide that as well as competition in midfield.