Double Winning St Johnstone FC Thread

[mev]

It was a shame for the Saints players who gave their all.  Rooney was unlucky to be sent off but it did look like he pulled the guy back with his arm.  Wotherspoon can have no complaints, he clearly elbowed the other player in the face, yet walks off shaking his head.  He let himself and everyone else down.  What on earth was he thinking about?  

[Munoz]

[mizfit]

McCann was pretty much waving goodbye there wasn’t he?

[steviemay17]

Same old, absolutely no plan to actually win the game or score, Spoony's red was ridiculous but the game was dead at 1-0 anyway

[Saint Huck]

5 minutes ago, steviemay17 said:

Spoony's red was ridiculous but the game was dead at 1-0 anyway

I think we could possibly have rallied at 1-0 ...... but not with 10 men

[PauloPerth]

5 minutes ago, steviemay17 said:

Same old, absolutely no plan to actually win the game or score, Spoony's red was ridiculous but the game was dead at 1-0 anyway

Agree with the first bit, once more we wait far too long before making a change.  Take the upper hand Callum, it's become like as long as a game is 0-0 he's happy as we might make something happen despite the opposition looking more threatening.

But I don't agree the game was done.  If we were going more of a 5-3-2 where we've played our best football under Davidson, then I really fancied us to have a good go at an equaliser in the last 15 minutes.  But we'll never know.  Absolute idiocy by Wotherspoon who was raging from the moment he came on.

[steviemay17]

4 minutes ago, PauloPerth said:

Agree with the first bit, once more we wait far too long before making a change.  Take the upper hand Callum, it's become like as long as a game is 0-0 he's happy as we might make something happen despite the opposition looking more threatening.

But I don't agree the game was done.  If we were going more of a 5-3-2 where we've played our best football under Davidson, then I really fancied us to have a good go at an equaliser in the last 15 minutes.  But we'll never know.  Absolute idiocy by Wotherspoon who was raging from the moment he came on.

I guess it probably came down to having nothing at wing-back, Booth and Brown are both good defenders but so limited in posession, they just allowed us to work it out to them and then immediately pressed with three men, while Middleton and MOH didn't have the space to play so there was just nothing there for us in the attacking game at all.

 

You could see from the reaction of the players when the goal went in that it was over, few hands in the air, heads down and a look of resignation

[Fife Saint]

Squad limitations just hurt us too much. I still cant believe Spoony did it.

[PauloPerth]

1 minute ago, steviemay17 said:

I guess it probably came down to having nothing at wing-back, Booth and Brown are both good defenders but so limited in posession, they just allowed us to work it out to them and then immediately pressed with three men, while Middleton and MOH didn't have the space to play so there was just nothing there for us in the attacking game at all.

 

You could see from the reaction of the players when the goal went in that it was over, few hands in the air, heads down and a look of resignation

That 5-2-3 is great away from home, but we get so little football from it.  It got called murderball a few times last season for a reason it was so grim in possession.  Our battling qualities were incredible tonight, but we could barely pass it to a teammate at times it felt.  

That's why when Spoony did eventually come on I thought great, we'll get an extra player in midfield, and actually start to string some passes together and see if we can build an attack rather than just balls forward to chase and feed off scraps.

Need to watch the game back, but I felt Booth was a weak link tonight.  And had a few poor moments last week as well. That may end up being harsh, it's maybe I just noticed his errors a lot.

 

[steviemay17]

1 minute ago, PauloPerth said:

That 5-2-3 is great away from home, but we get so little football from it.  It got called murderball a few times last season for a reason it was so grim in possession.  Our battling qualities were incredible tonight, but we could barely pass it to a teammate at times it felt.  

That's why when Spoony did eventually come on I thought great, we'll get an extra player in midfield, and actually start to string some passes together and see if we can build an attack rather than just balls forward to chase and feed off scraps.

Need to watch the game back, but I felt Booth was a weak link tonight.  And had a few poor moments last week as well. That may end up being harsh, it's maybe I just noticed his errors a lot.

 

I think he probably was poor but also the way we set up hurt him, he had to run or play through 2/3 players every time and McCart didn't look overly confident on the ball either so knocking it back inside often led to the ball being given away

[Meeniedee]

i for 1 are happy as f**k you got knocked out...you just cant have a fellow mid-bottom half of the league team getting 3-4 million quid handed to them....and tbf to wotherspoon he didnt put a foot wrong during the 30 secs he was on the park 

[PauloPerth]

4 minutes ago, steviemay17 said:

I think he probably was poor but also the way we set up hurt him, he had to run or play through 2/3 players every time and McCart didn't look overly confident on the ball either so knocking it back inside often led to the ball being given away

Yes, we seemed to take a long time to come to terms with how quickly LASK players closed us down; it felt like so often  we underhit a pass, or waited on the ball to come to us and an opponent nipped in to pinch it.

 

[RandomGuy.]

Think Davidson held off on bringing Wotherspoon on too long, team were clearly tiring and they'd upped the tempo after their own subs, then a shame to see Wotherspoon had actually swung an elbow and probably deserved the red.

Both are allowed to make mistakes though, as by the end of the season they'll have won us games and they've plenty of credit in the bank, as long as both learn/are learning from these moments then theres no point over reacting to it, nobodies perfect after all.

No shame in that defeat, but probably not one where you celebrate "giving it a go" either. Just have to try again next year...

[steviemay17]

Just now, PauloPerth said:

Yes, we seemed to take a long time to come to terms with how quickly LASK players closed us down; it felt like so often  we underhit a pass, or waited on the ball to come to us and an opponent nipped in to pinch it.

 

Honestly think that yes they were a very average team who we could've beaten, but they also got their approach spot-on and figured us out in the first leg after an horu or so, they got their tactics right and we didn't

[TheRealNumber5]

Five days left to hold on to Ali McCann

[Radford]

Haven't read the match thread and doubt I ever will to be honest. 

Rational thoughts will come in time (and I don't disagree with what has been said in the posts I've scanned across above) but what a crushing disappointment. 

The squad wasn't strong enough for this challenge is the brutal truth. The performance tonight, with the exception of a couple, wasn't nearly good enough. Only Davidson and Clark came close to performing at the top of their game. 

We know the players give it maximum effort but you can't just keep praising that every week when we don't get any football going in a game. Such a letdown after the performance last week.

[steviemay17]

It does all come back to our squad depth and options, obviously the Eetu situation isn't our fault and time will tell if he would've made a difference, but extending both MOH and May was obviously our choice and it's hurting us as neither are good enough to consistently contribute.

There aren't many changes you can make to the startin line-up tonight, if Gordon was fit and Rooney could've played an attacking role then that makes a world of difference, while I do wonder about Reece Devine as well. The Galatasaray goal in Turkey goes down as his mistake but it was a cracking finish, while he also brings us pace and tenacity which is vital in Europe, so starting him over Booth makes sense when Brown is on the other side and he's also won us two penalties with his attacking play, but looks like he's lost CD's trust for the big occasion.

We need to add to out attack or this season is going to become beyond tedious to watch, but more fear the next week will be about finding replacements for McCann/Rooney/Kerr/McCart

[RandomGuy.]

18 minutes ago, Radford said:

Haven't read the match thread and doubt I ever will to be honest. 

Rational thoughts will come in time (and I don't disagree with what has been said in the posts I've scanned across above) but what a crushing disappointment. 

The squad wasn't strong enough for this challenge is the brutal truth. The performance tonight, with the exception of a couple, wasn't nearly good enough. Only Davidson and Clark came close to performing at the top of their game. 

We know the players give it maximum effort but you can't just keep praising that every week when we don't get any football going in a game. Such a letdown after the performance last week.

Felt it would be the case before we played them, and still do now, but I think they're the blueprint for where we want to be.

Same shape, same rough set up, but better. Can learn a lot from watching that game back and seeing what they do and how it all works, IMO.

Edited August 26, 2021 by RandomGuy.

[Saint Stevo]

It does all come back to our squad depth and options, obviously the Eetu situation isn't our fault and time will tell if he would've made a difference, but extending both MOH and May was obviously our choice and it's hurting us as neither are good enough to consistently contribute.
There aren't many changes you can make to the startin line-up tonight, if Gordon was fit and Rooney could've played an attacking role then that makes a world of difference, while I do wonder about Reece Devine as well. The Galatasaray goal in Turkey goes down as his mistake but it was a cracking finish, while he also brings us pace and tenacity which is vital in Europe, so starting him over Booth makes sense when Brown is on the other side and he's also won us two penalties with his attacking play, but looks like he's lost CD's trust for the big occasion.
We need to add to out attack or this season is going to become beyond tedious to watch, but more fear the next week will be about finding replacements for McCann/Rooney/Kerr/McCart

Totally agree on MOH and May.

Rooney down the right would have helped tonight too. Hopefully Gordon isn't far away from being fit.

Does adding to our attack make any difference if we consistently play the same style? I would just love us to start creating more opportunities. There aren't many goals in our team (Ali and Muzz dont score. Kane will get a few, MOH zilch and Middleton yet to be seen). I said tonight that we rarely play thru midfield. When we have someone as good as McCann maybe this would help us unlock teams? I don't know.....

The next few days are going to be interesting to say the least. I'm nervous and curious at the same time!!!

[steviemay17]

4 minutes ago, Saint Stevo said:

 

 

Totally agree on MOH and May.

Rooney down the right would have helped tonight too. Hopefully Gordon isn't far away from being fit.

Does adding to our attack make any difference if we consistently play the same style? I would just love us to start creating more opportunities. There aren't many goals in our team (Ali and Muzz dont score. Kane will get a few, MOH zilch and Middleton yet to be seen). I said tonight that we rarely play thru midfield. When we have someone as good as McCann maybe this would help us unlock teams? I don't know.....

The next few days are going to be interesting to say the least. I'm nervous and curious at the same time!!!

 

I find the attacking thing both frustrating and fascinating too, I honestly think it comes down to a total lack of conviction/belief/trust and probably quality in there too. Kane is great at what he does, but hope he can look a bit at what Karamoko did tonight and tries to emulate that. Yes his touch was honking at times and he wasn't perfect, but he was ultra positive and you can see that he understands he lacks the quality, but he plays the percentages and looked dangerous, particularly at the end of the first half he had a great moment where it was jsut head down and he fizzed a really dangerous ball across the face of the goal. We don't do that, we either try to win a corner or end up playing a weak cut back that is easily intercepted and leaves 3-5 players ahead of the ball and the defence exposed on the counter.

We need to find attacking players who play with confidence and conviction, and they aren't usually cheap or available for sides like us