Nelson

The people that said Sanders is a good solid centre back can stand in the corner and face the wall until further notice. I would also love to see the recruitment analysis that led us to sign Willoughby - he’s so bad I’m actually starting to believe we should have kept Rose. Any hope I had that Chalmers might respond the right way to his recent kick up the backside were well and truly dashed today. Would much rather we’d thrown on Amartey or Tomlinson than McGeady right enough - at least there’s a possibility of him being pacey and direct. Been impressed with Brown, but there’s only so much you can do with such a chronically poor group of players. I really hope we don’t pay the price for not strengthening in January.

Things are just so incredibly marginal that I would like to have seen us add a bit of quality especially given the rangers windfall. Look at last weeks game - Airdrie threw away 2 goals trying to pass out from the back and our third was a generous decision from the referee/naive play from the Airdrie keeper. We got the 3 points but we were poor for large spells with Tomlinson out his depth defensively and Bryden and McKenzie total passengers. Last weeks team minus Murphy and Dowds is pretty honking.

The worry for me is that we’re so dependent on Dowds and Murphy. Lose one or both of them and I think we’ll go down.

I doubt Celtic would send him out on loan to us so he can sit on the bench to the end of the season. Albinson has been a liability this season and picked the wrong time to chuck another 2 in the net against Dundee Utd with a new manager just coming in the door. Wouldn’t be at all surprised to see him go straight in the team.

I won’t lie, I was hoping for something a bit more exciting. Really surprised we haven’t strengthened more in this window - the 3 players we’ve signed have really made no impact at all, though I think Sanders should give us more options. The other 2 just seem to be making up the numbers. I guess we’re gambling on the current squad being good enough to stay up, which is to say the least, a huge gamble.

It’s always been a bit of a grey area to me. When does the referee allow a quick free kick and when not? Given the keeper was out of position, I can’t blame the Airdrie players for trying to stop a quick one. I would generally expect players to wait for the referee’s whistle when it’s on the edge of the box right enough. If it’s a break for us, then I’ll take it!

Bit surprised that we were allowed to get away with a quick free kick on the edge of their box, particularly as the keeper hadn’t had a chance to get back into position after being booked. Happy to take it, but I doubt we’d have been happy if that happened at the other end.

I see. Please stop worrying me like that.

Is he only on loan? I thought we’d punted him altogether.

Wonder what points total will be needed to finish 8th? The league is so crazy tight that it could be quite high this season. Worry about it when we hit 40 points I suppose. At least if we have to play Hamilton in the playoffs we can always force them to play Rose….,

Didn’t seem that strange at the time. Burley had run out of ideas and had very obviously lost the dressing room (see the 6 nil defeat prior to his sacking). Stainrod definitely gave the club a lift and kept us up the year 5 teams were relegated. Unfortunately his mouth then ran away from him at a time when the club clearly weren’t going to give him the financial resources to back up the daft talk. It’s strange to think that half a dozen players from the team he ultimately got relegated made it into Duncan Carmichael’s greatest players book. Probably says something about Stainrod that he couldn’t build a team even with the likes of Frank Rolling, Duncan George, Cammy Duncan and John Traynor to call on (though I’m pretty sure Traynor missed most of that season through injury). The fedora hat thing was a cringe fest from the outset, so I’ve no real sympathy for anyone who bought one!

It’s a shame things didn’t work out with Bullen, and I don’t think there is any serious argument that it was the wrong decision, but he’s obviously a decent enough guy who still wants the young guys in particular to do well. There doesn’t seem to be any ill feeling between him and the club which is definitely good to hear (I still wonder if he might have been intending to step down at the end of the season anyway, given the travelling involved and there being no talk at all of a contract extension) - it was sad to hear Mark Roberts say that he’s never been back to Somerset because he doesn’t feel welcome or that he would get a bad reception.

Just not interested in a fanboy argument. If Brown can work out how to get the best out of Chalmers then great. But he hasn’t kicked a ball for Dundee Utd in 2 seasons and sank without trace on loan at Tranmere. Perhaps there are issues there which need to be addressed if he is to fulfil his potential.

Don’t talk to me, talk to Scott Brown. He’s the one that hooked Chalmers after an hour in favour of a 19 year old centre forward when we were still were in the game.

If he doesn’t learn to add more defensive work to his game, I think he’ll struggle under Brown. Lack of consistency and poor work rate were the reservations Dundee Utd had about him, and it’s difficult not to recognise those reservations.

Chalmers was poor for me. Didn’t track back, distribution all over the place, generally powder puff. If it was a one off performance against quality opposition, I’d say fine, but it’s where he’s been for weeks now. Getting hooked in favour of Bryden is hopefully a wake up call.

Fanboy alert…. I like Chalmers and he is capable of moments of real quality, but he’s been miles off it for weeks now. Dundee Utd threw in the towel with him, and it’s easy to see why. Hopefully Brown can get a reaction out of him.

My gut feeling at the moment is that Chalmers won’t have the consistency or work rate to satisfy Brown. But he has enough games to prove me wrong. We’ll probably get outbid for him anyway come the summer.

We were beginning to look really disjointed towards the end under Bullen, so good to see us at least look organised. Also good to see us go 2 up front, as Dowds was being left very isolated. A lack of goals is still going to be an issue for us going forward, unless Willoughy turns out to be a lot better than his CV suggests. Not sure where we are with Chalmers - needs to get the finger out pretty quickly if he wants a contract offer from us as I don’t think Brown will stand for that level of effort from him. Seems like he will be quite ruthless (ask Albinson), so Chalmers needs to recognise quick that we’ve departed from Bullen’s enthusiastic dad style of management.

Albinson has been an absolute liability of late, but I don’t think anyone believes Mutch is any better.

We’ve already conceded a penalty, I believe.

Main was absolutely done when he came to Ayr. I only recall him playing a couple of games before moving on. Samson wasn’t great, but putting him below Knudsen is clearly just trolling that clown General Wotsit. Pretty sure he only played a couple of games before him and his bobble hat headed back to the Faroes.

Sad to think that Brexit means we won’t see nearly as many Jeromes or Djaffos coming our way. How the hell David Bangala ever got a work permit is beyond me.

Always puzzled by what happened to Castilla. I think he basically retired from football after leaving Ayr despite only being in his early 20s. The Dalziel effect maybe. Will always remember him running the length of the park to celebrate one of the goals in the relegation decider against Partick in 98.

He had a nightmare in the 7 nil semi final that we don’t talk about. Not sure where Nelson was that day. I’m sure he was a nice guy, but Rovde was a rotten goalkeeper.