The New Raith Rovers Thread

[Laid Back Maverick]

In the first half of last season especially, the players had confidence in the team. Aye, lose a goal but keep playing to the final whistle and might nick a late winner or equaliser. 

That confidence has been gone for a while and I think it was truly buried at Dingwall. I don't think the manner of Murray's sacking helped either.

It's the mental side we need to focus on. Bring in a sports psychologist for a while.

[McGuigan1978]

17 minutes ago, raith1974 said:

We need to judge Neill Collins when we get our spine to the team back.

Rumours are we are getting a right back in at the start of the week. We need Fordyce back and fit. This allows Hanlon to play left CB his favoured position. Straight away our defence will be more balanced.

Get Broonie back next week adds a defensive element and a drive in midfield and allow NC to also bring in a striker to compete with Hamilton or play alongside should Vaughan be missing for a few weeks.

When Stantons back our midfield with him, Broonie and Pollock will be a formidable 3, I'm sorry I just don't think Byrne has a fight in him and Matthews is the standard we need.

If results are still going against us, if we are still mentally weak then Collins needs to show what he's got.

A new manager should also be getting more out of the players available, otherwise, what was the point of getting rid of the last guy? 

[Ding Dang Doo]

30 minutes ago, McGuigan1978 said:

I think the last 15 minutes summed up the squad and potentially the manager, although the jury is still out with the latter. 

We were absolutely miles better than Accies, although that doesn't really matter if you can't hold out, but every single substitution Neill Collins made after the injury induced one with Lewis Vaughan, made us so much weaker. 

See if you want to bring off Aidan Connolly, why not bring on the right sided player who has been arguably our best player in Lewis Gibson? 

To bring on Lewis Jamieson and Callum Smith at the same time, two players who absolutely cannot keep the ball in the opponents final third, which we'd been exceptional at up until that point was infuriating., and to be honest, was pretty obvious we'd concede possession at that point.  

Then Mullin came on and offered much of the same, very little. He's supposed to be the experienced head who can help us in those situations. In all honesty, what is he bringing to the table?

There is absolutely nothing so far that suggests huckling Ian Murray out the door was the best decision, and it's impossible not to think the issue was with the squad rather than who the manager was. 

By all accounts Murray has mentioned that he was asking the board for players and wasn't getting them. He knew we needed more options up top.

I said before I didn't blame Collins but I think he was almost forced to make some subs and the one that didn't work was Jamieson for Connolly. The squad is very unbalanced and perhaps keeping the same players on, bar Hamilton, might have been the right call. 

I think the board are under pressure. We've signed 2 loanees since mid June and that doesn't stack up with Barrowman saying we have plenty money left. They need to back the manager now. Yes getting some injuries back would obviously help but there are areas that we need to improve in regardless including having a proper option to Hamilton.

Next week will be the big one. If we lose badly to a team with our ex manager and 4 ex players in the starting XI, 3 of whom most would not have had near the club at the start of the season, then I fear for the full time reaction. 

 

Edited 2 hours ago by Ding Dang Doo

[McGuigan1978]

8 minutes ago, Ding Dang Doo said:

By all accounts Murray has mentioned that he was asking the board for players and wasn't getting them. He knew we needed more options up top.

I said before I didn't blame Collins but I think he was almost forced to make some subs and the one that didn't work was Jamieson for Connolly. The squad is very unbalanced and perhaps keeping the same players on, bar Hamilton, might have been the right call. 

I think the board are under pressure. We've signed 2 loanees since mid June and that doesn't stack up with Barrowman saying we have plenty money left. They need to back the manager now. Yes getting some injuries back would obviously help but there are areas that we need to improve in regardless including having a proper option to Hamilton.

Next week will be the big one. If we lose badly to a team with our ex manager and 4 ex players in the starting XI, 3 of whom most would not have had near the club at the start of the season, then I fear for the full time reaction. 

 

He wasn't forced to bring on a guy like Jamieson, who has done very little right for us, instead of a boy who was dropped after providing two assists against Ayr and one of our few bright sparks all season. It was baffling. 

[Claudia Gentile]

2 minutes ago, McGuigan1978 said:

He wasn't forced to bring on a guy like Jamieson, who has done very little right for us, instead of a boy who was dropped after providing two assists against Ayr and one of our few bright sparks all season. It was baffling. 

Lee Bullen's name will just not go away.

[Ding Dang Doo]

4 minutes ago, McGuigan1978 said:

He wasn't forced to bring on a guy like Jamieson, who has done very little right for us, instead of a boy who was dropped after providing two assists against Ayr and one of our few bright sparks all season. It was baffling. 

Completely agree. Connolly didn't look tired and really not sure what Jamieson offers. That was the one sub which I didn't understand and think that no change was probably the better option. As I said before is it possible to end Jamieson's loan now?

Edited 1 hour ago by Ding Dang Doo

[raith1974]

11 minutes ago, McGuigan1978 said:

A new manager should also be getting more out of the players available, otherwise, what was the point of getting rid of the last guy? 

I don't disagree and last week he got nothing out of the players. For the most part today we were far better then Hamilton. 

Maybe he needs to get Dabrowski to stop sorting his hair and believing his hype and get back to keeping the ball out of the net.

Personally although Freeman played well today I don't think him, Matthews, Connolly or Mullen are at the standard we need. 

Bryne needs to step up and put in some fight to his game. 

We still have to remember we are missing 2 CBs and playing Hanlon on his wrong side. Playing a LB at CH and playing a RB who is just back from injury. We are missing our captain and Stanton from the middle and have Vaughan and Hamilton just back from injury with Vaughan out again.

As said a new RB, hopefully a new CF and add Fordyce, Broonie and Stanton and we instantly become better with better options from the bench.

[McGuigan1978]

3 minutes ago, raith1974 said:

I don't disagree and last week he got nothing out of the players. For the most part today we were far better then Hamilton. 

Maybe he needs to get Dabrowski to stop sorting his hair and believing his hype and get back to keeping the ball out of the net.

Personally although Freeman played well today I don't think him, Matthews, Connolly or Mullen are at the standard we need. 

Bryne needs to step up and put in some fight to his game. 

We still have to remember we are missing 2 CBs and playing Hanlon on his wrong side. Playing a LB at CH and playing a RB who is just back from injury. We are missing our captain and Stanton from the middle and have Vaughan and Hamilton just back from injury with Vaughan out again.

As said a new RB, hopefully a new CF and add Fordyce, Broonie and Stanton and we instantly become better with better options from the bench.

Do you think we'd get better if Dabrowski changed his hair? I've not noticed him tending to it during a game, but maybe you know better than myself?

[Ding Dang Doo]

6 minutes ago, raith1974 said:

I don't disagree and last week he got nothing out of the players. For the most part today we were far better then Hamilton. 

Maybe he needs to get Dabrowski to stop sorting his hair and believing his hype and get back to keeping the ball out of the net.

Personally although Freeman played well today I don't think him, Matthews, Connolly or Mullen are at the standard we need. 

Bryne needs to step up and put in some fight to his game. 

We still have to remember we are missing 2 CBs and playing Hanlon on his wrong side. Playing a LB at CH and playing a RB who is just back from injury. We are missing our captain and Stanton from the middle and have Vaughan and Hamilton just back from injury with Vaughan out again.

As said a new RB, hopefully a new CF and add Fordyce, Broonie and Stanton and we instantly become better with better options from the bench.

I think that's unfair on Freeman and Matthews. Both played really well today. Freeman isn't the greatest right back but will give you 100% every match and he did that today.

Getting a centre back in and getting a partnership is massive for us. It makes me even more annoyed for Murray's decision last week and what it left us with. The amount of times Dick should have been heading the ball but let it bounce was ridiculous. It's not his position ultimately and so I'm not sure we can be overly harsh on him.

As soon as it was 3-1 and 15 mins we should have shut up shop. I don't think we have the personnel on the bench to do it but good teams teams find a way to adapt. 

I'm more confident about the season post match than pre match but things needs to improve on and off the pitch. I know the board look at these forums as well as twitter etc so surely they can see what we think. Nobody can watch that today and think that Smith and Jamieson coming on improved us and if that's the case they need to back Collins now.

[McGuigan1978]

Just now, Ding Dang Doo said:

I think that's unfair on Freeman and Matthews. Both played really well today. Freeman isn't the greatest right back but will give you 100% every match and he did that today.

Getting a centre back in and getting a partnership is massive for us. It makes me even more annoyed for Murray's decision last week and what it left us with. The amount of times Dick should have been heading the ball but let it bounce was ridiculous. It's not his position ultimately and so I'm not sure we can be overly harsh on him.

As soon as it was 3-1 and 15 mins we should have shut up shop. I don't think we have the personnel on the bench to do it but good teams teams find a way to adapt. 

I'm more confident about the season post match than pre match but things needs to improve on and off the pitch. I know the board look at these forums as well as twitter etc so surely they can see what we think. Nobody can watch that today and think that Smith and Jamieson coming on improved us and if that's the case they need to back Collins now.

I thought Matthews, and others to be fair, really struggled with their distribution. 

[CALDERON]

53 minutes ago, McGuigan1978 said:

I think the last 15 minutes summed up the squad and potentially the manager, although the jury is still out with the latter. 

We were absolutely miles better than Accies, although that doesn't really matter if you can't hold out, but every single substitution Neill Collins made after the injury induced one with Lewis Vaughan, made us so much weaker. 

See if you want to bring off Aidan Connolly, why not bring on the right sided player who has been arguably our best player in Lewis Gibson? 

To bring on Lewis Jamieson and Callum Smith at the same time, two players who absolutely cannot keep the ball in the opponents final third, which we'd been exceptional at up until that point was infuriating., and to be honest, was pretty obvious we'd concede possession at that point.  

Then Mullin came on and offered much of the same, very little. He's supposed to be the experienced head who can help us in those situations. In all honesty, what is he bringing to the table?

There is absolutely nothing so far that suggests huckling Ian Murray out the door was the best decision, and it's impossible not to think the issue was with the squad rather than who the manager was. 

If the glaring issue is the squad that Ian Murray assembled (at least partly) it doesn't exactly suggest keeping him around would be any better of a shout.

For 80 minutes, today was miles above anything we'd seen for months.  And if we had anyone else in the squad who could even pretend to be a striker to call upon then we would have at least been able to have a genuine out ball.

The problem is the squad, which was largely or at least partly influenced by the previous manager.  I'm going to reserve judgment on Collins until hes been able to recruit more, as what he has inherited isn't good enough.

[RaithRovers1883]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/live/c1d5pz4710lt#Report

Doolan singing the praises of Megwa. Such a shame we were unable to secure his loan signing. 

[Ding Dang Doo]

2 minutes ago, McGuigan1978 said:

I thought Matthews, and others to be fair, really struggled with their distribution. 

I thought it was fine until the subs came on. And then they had very little out ball plus seemed to favour going right to Jamieson instead of left to Pollock. After that they will seemed to struggle to know what to do

[Been going too long]

1 hour ago, McGuigan1978 said:

I think the last 15 minutes summed up the squad and potentially the manager, although the jury is still out with the latter. 

We were absolutely miles better than Accies, although that doesn't really matter if you can't hold out, but every single substitution Neill Collins made after the injury induced one with Lewis Vaughan, made us so much weaker. 

See if you want to bring off Aidan Connolly, why not bring on the right sided player who has been arguably our best player in Lewis Gibson? 

To bring on Lewis Jamieson and Callum Smith at the same time, two players who absolutely cannot keep the ball in the opponents final third, which we'd been exceptional at up until that point was infuriating., and to be honest, was pretty obvious we'd concede possession at that point.  

Then Mullin came on and offered much of the same, very little. He's supposed to be the experienced head who can help us in those situations. In all honesty, what is he bringing to the table?

There is absolutely nothing so far that suggests huckling Ian Murray out the door was the best decision, and it's impossible not to think the issue was with the squad rather than who the manager was. 

You could be right but the squad that Murray put together, sang there praises last season , that squad. Jamieson was a daft substitution today and offers us little tbh but Collins deserves our support not harping back to Murray all the time, decision is made time to move on 

[McGuigan1978]

3 minutes ago, CALDERON said:

If the glaring issue is the squad that Ian Murray assembled (at least partly) it doesn't exactly suggest keeping him around would be any better of a shout.

For 80 minutes, today was miles above anything we'd seen for months.  And if we had anyone else in the squad who could even pretend to be a striker to call upon then we would have at least been able to have a genuine out ball.

The problem is the squad, which was largely or at least partly influenced by the previous manager.  I'm going to reserve judgment on Collins until hes been able to recruit more, as what he has inherited isn't good enough.

The fact Murray was being critical of recruitment after the game versus Airdrie would suggest to me he wasn’t very happy of the signing policy up until that point 

That was roughly six weeks ago, and the squad still isn’t good enough. 

When your manager is bringing on players who are making you weaker, who should we be blaming? 

[CALDERON]

1 minute ago, McGuigan1978 said:

The fact Murray was being critical of recruitment after the game versus Airdrie would suggest to me he wasn’t very happy of the signing policy up until that point 

That was roughly six weeks ago, and the squad still isn’t good enough. 

When your manager is bringing on players who are making you weaker, who should we be blaming? 

The same Ian Murray was also on a BBC podcast this week saying he believed this squad was good enough to win the league, to be fair.  He's also been on record several times noting how keen he is on signing midfielders - and our squad is f**king full of them.

 

Collins didn't get the Mullin change right today, but the one that really harmed us was the Smith for Hamilton change - and I'm not sure what else he could have done given the limited options up top.

[Been going too long]

1 minute ago, McGuigan1978 said:

The fact Murray was being critical of recruitment after the game versus Airdrie would suggest to me he wasn’t very happy of the signing policy up until that point 

That was roughly six weeks ago, and the squad still isn’t good enough. 

When your manager is bringing on players who are making you weaker, who should we be blaming? 

But Murray put that squad together unless he is going to say different now, Collins very naive to not bring on Gibson instead of jamieson today. Although pissed off with the ending that performance was so much better than the league cup match v accies,  don’t get your constant digs at Collins tbh

[McGuigan1978]

3 minutes ago, CALDERON said:

The same Ian Murray was also on a BBC podcast this week saying he believed this squad was good enough to win the league, to be fair.  He's also been on record several times noting how keen he is on signing midfielders - and our squad is f**king full of them.

 

Collins didn't get the Mullin change right today, but the one that really harmed us was the Smith for Hamilton change - and I'm not sure what else he could have done given the limited options up top.

He could have brought on a player who seems a good bit better than Lewis Jamieson? 

[CALDERON]

2 minutes ago, McGuigan1978 said:

He could have brought on a player who seems a good bit better than Lewis Jamieson? 

When replacing Hamilton with Smith? 

[McGuigan1978]

Just now, CALDERON said:

When replacing Hamilton with Smith? 

I’d have probably suggested when he was replacing Aidan Connolly, so no.