Motherwell FC - A Thread For All Seasons

[For Your Pies Only]

Outside of the top 5 from last season, a cursory glance at squad lists for our competitors paint the same picture across the league - either they have like 14 contracted bodies or are bloated with fringe players just like us. Smelling salts can stay in the cupboard for now, I think.

Fully expect that, as with every recent season, we'll play a misfit 11 for the first few league cup games but have a much more settled squad by the time the league kicks off after a few late signings.

Edited June 28, 2023 by For Your Pies Only

[camer0n_mcd]

2 hours ago, wellboy1991 said:

Not far off how I feel tbh. Feel like a bit a bed wetter but I genuinely have very very limited hopes for this squad. It is utter dog shit.

Sad thing is, the majority of it is the squad that got both Alexander and Hammell sacked. Seeing the likes of Shields, Obika and Mugabi all front and centre in the videos gives me the fear. They just aren’t good enough. 
 

We cannot under estimate the losses of not only KVV but Max J, Casey, Furlong and to a lesser extent Goss and Cornelius. They all played a pivotal part in our ‘resurgence’ last year. 
 

To replace them with Shields, Maguire, Paton and backfill with youngsters like Wilson and Miller(who I rate incredibly highly but ffs he is 16).

I was hoping for at least 6 signings but the tweet Burns put out and the news I am hearing from Fir Park to essentially back that up is highly disconcerting. 

Shields, Paton, McGuire, Miller and Wilson will be in no way replacements for the OOC players. We're a fortnight into the transfer window that doesn't close till September. Think back to the January window where all our buissnes was done on the 31st of Jan/ 1st+2nd of Feb or back to last summer where almost all our incomings came within the last 3/4 week. That's without the worry of trying to get buissnes done early due to not being in Europe this season. Not even close to being at the point of needing to worry yet. 

[ropy]

When do the English academies send out their young wing backs to rampage across the Scottish game? 

[Neil86]

Does anyone have any idea how highly rated Luca Ross is? 

I seen a few of the u20s/reserve/B team games last season and he looked like a decent prospect. I accept though it is very hard to judge off that alone.

[crazylegsjoe_mfc]

This squad is currently lacking in quality and carrying deadwood, that's undeniable, but we are judging it based on the start of the season being against Elgin, rather than it being the first league game.

Generally there is no mad rush to assemble your squad for these games as you'd think for most Premiership sides, a fringe team should be good enough to win the group. A prem team flopping in the groups seems to happen now and again - probably for this reason - we are just lucky probably that it's never been us.

Other than signing players from other Scottish teams, our main targets will be from the lower leagues down south. Just because our season starts earlier now, doesn't mean that theirs does. Some of those players might still be on holiday.

Being away this week has probably put a halt on things too. Barry Maguire can't join Partick Thistle (speculative example of player and club) if he's out in the Netherlands. The same way we are unlikely to unveil a player when the rest of the squad is away. It must be really hard these days to plan when to go on one of those trips, when a lot of the players that reep the benefits of them won't be at the club come September.

I imagine there is room for us in our current budget to sign two or three players without anyone moving on, but after that Kettlewell has a balancing act to do. Say he wants to move on 5 or 6 players in the current squad, he will have to juggle the timing of that with actually putting a team on the park.

[thisGRAEME]

4 minutes ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said:

I imagine there is room for us in our current budget to sign two or three players without anyone moving on, but after that Kettlewell has a balancing act to do. Say he wants to move on 5 or 6 players in the current squad, he will have to juggle the timing of that with actually putting a team on the park.

Agreed. I wouldn't read too much into stuff like the Burns story talking about how we're skint; of course we're telling people we're skint, we're hardly telling people "Actually we've just taken in the best part of a mil". We're always a _bit_ skint, but I'd be surprised if it's any worse than the norm.

If he's not daft, and I don't think he is, Ketts will have approached pre-season with a clean slate approach. If you've been out, what have you got? The reality is probably that you've got nothing else to contribute than you did previously, but you never know, there's always the Steve McGarry/Jim Paterson comebacks to keep in mind of players turning it around in pre-season.

[Handsome_Devil]

20 minutes ago, thisGRAEME said:

If he's not daft, and I don't think he is, Ketts will have approached pre-season with a clean slate approach. If you've been out, what have you got? 

The other reality is that as a club we need a first team squad of 20+ players and given our status, we will never, ever be happy with all of them.

Getting some kind of tune out these guys obviously isn't as important as getting the main blocks in place but nonetheless, if for example Shields goes from being an empty jersey to the scorer of four goals off the bench - before we free him in 2024 anyway - it can make a huge difference to our season.

As much as we'd love to bin all the deadwood, 1) it's just not going to happen, and 2) we'd replace them with more deadwood anyway.

[ropy]

I’m not worried, I actually think that Kettlewell could form something out of this rag tag squad, it is essentially what he did when he came in, I am not suggesting we would be challenging.

We have a couple of months to bring in a couple of pieces of quality which will hopefully make a difference..

[Kapowzer]

I feel pretty confident that 2-3 first team starters in October will not be on the payroll on the 31st of August.

[crazylegsjoe_mfc]

34 minutes ago, Handsome_Devil said:

As much as we'd love to bin all the deadwood, 1) it's just not going to happen, and 2) we'd replace them with more deadwood anyway.

This is very true nowadays. I think we have to pad out the squad to a certain extent and the fringe players who get a bad press are more likely to be the ones we've had to use. If Shields had been a backup centre forward, rather than a first choice right winger, then we'd probably not be as frustrated by him. Robbie Crawford wouldn't have got as bad a press if we didn't have to play him every week for half a season. On the other hand, you don't ever hear anyone talk about Justin Amaluzor, because he came in and got the odd cameo off the bench and was able to remain a fringe player.

That said, I do still long for the days under McCall etc where we had 14 or so first team players and padded the squad out with youth. He did get exceptionally lucky with injuries right enough.

[well fan for life]

1 minute ago, crazylegsjoe_mfc said:

This is very true nowadays. I think we have to pad out the squad to a certain extent and the fringe players who get a bad press are more likely to be the ones we've had to use. If Shields had been a backup centre forward, rather than a first choice right winger, then we'd probably not be as frustrated by him. Robbie Crawford wouldn't have got as bad a press if we didn't have to play him every week for half a season. On the other hand, you don't ever hear anyone talk about Justin Amaluzor, because he came in and got the odd cameo off the bench and was able to remain a fringe player.

That said, I do still long for the days under McCall etc where we had 14 or so first team players and padded the squad out with youth. He did get exceptionally lucky with injuries right enough.

Aye. The fact we'd painted ourselves into the corner of having to have Crawford, Mugabi, Johansen, Lamie, McGinley etc all in the starting XI week in, week out is probably why they all tend to catch a lot of heat. All of them are *maybe* good enough to patch a gap on occasion (I'm being kind here) but having them all in the team is relegation material. 

[Marinello]

I see Adam Montgomery's loan at St Johnstone is ended.

Whenever I've seen him at SJ or with Scotland under 21 he has been impressive.

With Furlong seemingly not returning we could do worse than get Montgomery.

[well fan for life]

A real shut up & play the hits feel to Robinson's latest soundbite about the new St Mirren signing:

[YassinMoutaouakil]

Have a feeling that we'll be at home to Aberdeen first day of the season. In the 1 in 11 (?) chance that it actually happens I will be rebranding as an ITK.

[Handsome_Devil]

5 minutes ago, YassinMoutaouakil said:

Have a feeling that we'll be at home to Aberdeen first day of the season. In the 1 in 11 (?) chance that it actually happens I will be rebranding as an ITK.

Presumably the reversing of the OF means we've got two trips to Ibrox this season and only one visit to Celtic, so you can rule them out.

I don't know if they do the rest taking it in turns as well?

If you then say we're due a home start and will avoid a repeat of St Mirren, it leaves potentially Rangers, Aberdeen, Hibs, Ross County or Killie.

So I think you're down to a 1 in 5 chance of being right.

Who knows!

[camer0n_mcd]

3 minutes ago, Handsome_Devil said:

Presumably the reversing of the OF means we've got two trips to Ibrox this season and only one visit to Celtic, so you can rule them out.

I don't know if they do the rest taking it in turns as well?

If you then say we're due a home start and will avoid a repeat of St Mirren, it leaves potentially Rangers, Aberdeen, Hibs, Ross County or Killie.

So I think you're down to a 1 in 5 chance of being right.

Who knows!

Ross County at home is my guess 

[Handsome_Devil]

6 minutes ago, camer0n_mcd said:

Ross County at home is my guess 

Actually if we look at those five to see who's due an away start the only one is Killie, so I'll make them my guess.

[crazylegsjoe_mfc]

3 hours ago, well fan for life said:

Aye. The fact we'd painted ourselves into the corner of having to have Crawford, Mugabi, Johansen, Lamie, McGinley etc all in the starting XI week in, week out is probably why they all tend to catch a lot of heat. All of them are *maybe* good enough to patch a gap on occasion (I'm being kind here) but having them all in the team is relegation material. 

This might not be an opinion shared by many, but I think that Lamie would be fine under Kettlewell's shape / style / management.

We've already seen him get a different level out of Goss, Spittal and Van Veen to name a few.

He's been decent before in the right environment. Sadly I think Mugabi has a costly error in him regardless of formation or manager.

[YassinMoutaouakil]

Mugabi and Lamie have been ropey as a duo but I don't think the pair of them either side of Butcher in a 3 would necessarily be a disaster. 

[camer0n_mcd]

54 minutes ago, YassinMoutaouakil said:

Mugabi and Lamie have been ropey as a duo but I don't think the pair of them either side of Butcher in a 3 would necessarily be a disaster. 

Ropey is an understatement. Both were absolute bombscares and major factors in the last 2 managers losing their job. Wouldnt lose a second of sleep if neither played for us again. Desperately hoping we can get Casey back plus and another centre half along side him.