Morton v Raith Rovers

[Colkitto]

We don't deserve to win games with defending like that! Two wee guys scoring from headers is just ridiculous .

Wilson was our best player tonight and I can only assume he had a niggle and had to come off. 

Gillespie - good grief! No idea what excuse you can use to explain that performance. 

We certainly had chances but didn't take them. Raith did and that is how you win games. 

The balance is not right in the team. Dougie tried 5 at the back then reverted to a 4, but we lacked width. 

Draw may have been a fair result but at the end of the day Raith took their chances so no complaints they went away with 3 points 

[Rovers_Lad]

13 minutes ago, #Gary said:

Grant Gillespie managed the single worst substitute appearance I've ever seen in my life. Other than that, I've got nothing to say. Both teams are brutal. One is somehow 2nd in the league and we are deservedly bottom of the table.

Played 10,won 7,drawn 2,lost 1 is the reason

[Hank Scorpio]

19 minutes ago, #Gary said:

Grant Gillespie managed the single worst substitute appearance I've ever seen in my life. Other than that, I've got nothing to say. Both teams are brutal. One is somehow 2nd in the league and we are deservedly bottom of the table.

Away and chase yersel

[Broken Algorithms]

34 minutes ago, #Gary said:

Grant Gillespie managed the single worst substitute appearance I've ever seen in my life. Other than that, I've got nothing to say. Both teams are brutal. One is somehow 2nd in the league and we are deservedly bottom of the table.

Winning games, despite an injury crisis, will do that for you. 7 points from our last 3 league games with a centre midfielder in central defence. Glorious stuff.

Edited October 31, 2023 by Broken Algorithms

[DaftTon74]

42 minutes ago, #Gary said:

Grant Gillespie managed the single worst substitute appearance I've ever seen in my life. Other than that, I've got nothing to say. Both teams are brutal. One is somehow 2nd in the league and we are deservedly bottom of the table.

Totally agree with the Gillespie point, he was and has been honking. He looks Miles off it.

However, pretty harsh on Raith that I’d say. There is a reason they are 2nd in the league. You only need to look at tonight to see the difference. We are toothless up front, far too passive in midfield and concede very cheap goals. In comparison to Raith who took their chances that came, looked like scoring every time they countered against us and when asked to dig in they had literal bodies on the line to clear anything we did throw at them. All attributes we have been missing since the season began in August.

[Raith Against The Machine]

2 hours ago, Chippyminton said:

IMO any team conceding headers to the smallest midget on the pitch deserves everything coming to them. Embarrassing. I turned down a "'100%-end-away-for-sure' date with a somewhat attractive lassie customer for this. I won't hesitate to say " Aye - OK then, the fitba can wait" next time.

Not enough attention being paid to this absolutely mental lie IMO. 

[San Starko Rover]

12 minutes ago, Raith Against The Machine said:

Not enough attention being paid to this absolutely mental lie IMO. 

Agreed, i’m not believing anyone is turning down a “100% end away for sure with a somewhat attractive lassie” to watch Morton v Raith on a Tuesday night  

[Craigus]

Vaughan gave absolutely everything there, what a performance. No wonder he was cramping up by the end.

Hopefully Millen injury isn't anything too serious. 

[Raith Against The Machine]

10 minutes ago, Craigus said:

Vaughan gave absolutely everything there, what a performance. No wonder he was cramping up by the end.

Hopefully Millen injury isn't anything too serious. 

Murray in his post-match saying that Millen had a tight calf beforehand and they reckon they've caught it early enough tonight to keep him in the mix for the weekend. 

He's had a fair few yellows, though. Anyone any idea what the rules are on that these days? Five and a suspension? 

[Zen Archer (Raconteur)]

22 minutes ago, Raith Against The Machine said:

Murray in his post-match saying that Millen had a tight calf beforehand and they reckon they've caught it early enough tonight to keep him in the mix for the weekend. 

He's had a fair few yellows, though. Anyone any idea what the rules are on that these days? Five and a suspension? 

[TxRover]

3 hours ago, Raith Against The Machine said:

Murray in his post-match saying that Millen had a tight calf beforehand and they reckon they've caught it early enough tonight to keep him in the mix for the weekend. 

He's had a fair few yellows, though. Anyone any idea what the rules are on that these days? Five and a suspension? 

 

2 hours ago, Zen Archer (Raconteur) said:

Six in the first 18 games, then 12 in the full 36, for the first suspension. Current status:

Yellow: Brown, Byrne 3, Dick 3, Easton 3, Gullan, Hamilton, McGill, Masson, Millen 5, E. Murray, I. Murray, Vaughan 3, Watson 2

So, by my maths, that’s Millen suspended for a match after his next yellow, if it happens within the first 18…suspension to happen for the first match 14 or more days after his sixth yellow in the League.

https://www.scottishfa.co.uk/media/1849/suspensions-for-players-in-mens-football-annex-c-section-4.pdf

[Mr.Blue]

6 hours ago, #Gary said:

Grant Gillespie managed the single worst substitute appearance I've ever seen in my life. Other than that, I've got nothing to say. Both teams are brutal. One is somehow 2nd in the league and we are deservedly bottom of the table.

Behave. Raith are a good side.  Play good football, are Competitive and score goals. They're 2nd in the league because they're currently a better team than us.

[AyrshireTon]

Can't give away goals like that and expect to take anything from a game. Connolly's first was poor marking and the second was non-existent marking.

Lots of huff and puff after we scored but endlessly launching long balls to Oakley and Muirhead was never going to cut it. Far too many mis-placed passes and Raith seemed to get the break of the loose balls more often than we did. 

Oh well, onto Friday night.

[CrossgatesCynic]

If I was Morton Football Club I would simply stop playing football like we’re a fucking gang.

[RRFC2711]

I thought some of our football was outstanding tonight..also due to the imperious heading ability of our number 7 do you think we have another possibility for cover at centre half ?

[Beastie Russell]

Happy with the win, been a long time since I’ve seen us win at there.

Josh Mullin could have been bagging a hatrick last night, hit the bar, delayed a shot from Vaughan cut back, and then ruining a breakaway by running off side.

lots of praise for Vaughan’s running and effort, but a fair few times his choice of option was poor, could have been fatigue, but if you’re taking the ball into the corner you have to get something out of it.

Shaun Byrne btw, different level

 

[Morton Supporter]

First of all, fair play to Raith.

On another day we might have forced a draw there - put them under some pressure in the second half but too often our final pass (or choice not to shoot) was wrong, and Raith stood up to it all well I thought.

The main annoyance is the first goal - not sure why our defender doesn’t win that header? There was a clear shout of ‘man on’ but that shouldn’t have meant him duck out the ball so am wondering if he lost sight of the ball in the floodlights? In any case, it should have been a routine clearance and who knows what happens the rest of the game then.

[Dunning1874]

The subs cost us that. Wilson had misplaced a couple of passes in the 5 minutes before being subbed, but he was running the midfield, was the only one winning second balls when we punted it or offering a pass out to the defence to give us an alternative to punting it, and had nearly scored a second. He was having a far better game than Power beside him or Blues in front of him, but Wilson goes off to give us a sitting two of Blues and Power then our momentum evaporates. From that point on all we had was the launch forward to a line of players gathered across the edge of the box, playing the last 30 minutes like it was stoppage time.

The further subs made it worse again. Power had been atrocious once again and should really have been off at half-time, but Gillespie somehow managed to be 10 times worse. I don't know if Crawford was carrying a knock from when he'd been down for treatment early on - the attention he got from Byrne throughout the game makes the claim that Raith were having to face an assault from opposition hatchet men a massive stretch to say the least - but if it wasn't due to injury taking him off was madness. Even though he'd had some sloppy moments, he's still our best creative player who can buy himself space in tight areas, which we really needed last night with a congested final third. Having Steven Boyd in that situation instead, a player who needs a minimum of four touches to trap a ball, just made it even harder for the ball to stick. It's no coincidence the Raith chances on the counter attack really started as soon as those subs were made.

There is an element to that performance where you have to acknowledge how good Raith were. On what I've seen of everyone so far they're pretty comfortably the second best team league and against a less clinical team, which most teams in this division are, we could easily have gone in at half-time still at 0-0. They were far more threatening from open play and scored two excellent goals but there wasn't the routine shambolic defending letting them in every 2 minutes we've seen several times before this season, we had just as many chances in the first half, but they were clinical when they got them and we weren't. Similarly not everyone in this division is going to be as solid defensively as they were in the second half and that's why only Dundee United have conceded fewer goals. A poorer goalkeeper than Dabrowski and Wilson's shot from the edge of the box goes in, a less organised defence and one of the four (!) cleared off the line goes in.

When you've been incompetent in front of goal in those circumstances that's not a hard luck story that you deserved a point, that's getting the defeat you deserved because the opposition were better than you at both ends of the park, but it was far less of a travesty than a lot of our performances this season.

That said, there were still a lot of individual failures and it should really be time up for some players who've had chance after chance in the starting XI and been consistently poor, with Power at the top of that list. The problem is it's impossible to select an XI without at least one of them keeping their place or a sub who's done nothing to merit a place coming in.

Edited November 1, 2023 by Dunning1874

[MarkoRaj]

Raith play some tidy stuff. Was impressed with Vaughan and Connolly, toyed with us at times.

Imrie will always have players run through brick walls for him but that has its limitations. Summer recruitment has been abysmal, not one signing has improved us

We also seem bereft of ideas, Oakley is a good target man but we don't play with wingers or anyone capable of running in behind or picking up second balls.

Fair play to Raith for grinding out a result but we didn't half simplify it for them

[Ferguson]

Brutal watch that, on another night one of the chances that were cleared off the line go in and we're happy to have stolen a point, but over the 90 we were really poor. Our success last year was built on the foundation of us simply working harder than the other team, but this means nothing if we're going to keep misplacing 5 yard passes for 90 minutes every week.

Raith played some really nice stuff at times, but we caused a lot of our own problems. Improvement needed once again.