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Scottish Premiership Motherwell V Dundee Sat 27 Aug 15:00


Yabba's Turd
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Still early days, so a point would not be a bad result, though I could accept a defeat if we saw an improved performance. We should though, be capable of taking something from this match.

 

Sorry I think to be aiming for a point against Dundee is well below the standard we should be aiming for. As far as I am concerned Dundee are a similar sized club to ourselves, we should definitely be aiming to take three points at home against them especially in times like this when the club have got off to a poor start.

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Depends which Dundee turns up really. The one that took Ross County apart in Dingwall or the one that struggled against Accies at Dens. There's no reason why we can't win this one though. It does depend on us actually turning up.

 

O'Hara is in tremendous form for Dundee so it'll be interesting to see how we deal with him.

 

I'd hope Brill might get a shot here, assuming he plays for the 20s during the week and gets through it OK. For all the result at Ibrox yesterday wasn't the monstering some were predicting Samson should probably have done better with their equaliser. If he smothers the ball and gathers it in to his body we don't concede, instead he tries to tackle Miller from the looks of things and knocks it straight to Forrester unmarked in the middle of the box. It's hardly on par with his efforts vs St Johnstone but it's yet another instance where you look at him and think "he should have done better there" IMO.

 

If we're not scoring many then we need to not be conceding, as it stands with Samson in goal over 11 games (friendlies & competitive) we've managed 2 clean sheets vs East Stirlingshire and Stranraer. Brill has said himself that he's at the club to play, Samson has had a fair run and thus far he's been unconvincing at best.

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When the fixtures came out I thought we should be looking to take a minimum of 4 points from the first 4 games so we really need at least a point from this lest it could be considered a bad start.

 

We really should be looking to beat our peers at Fir Park though and Dundee are one of them.

 

It's too early for it to be "must win" but we also have to be learning from our mistakes from previous games and the (possible) inability to pick up points will worry me if we're still on 3 points come 5pm on Saturday.

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EL BAKHTAOUI INCOMING!!

 

I think Dundee are significantly weaker than they were last season and we finished above them so we should hold no fears over them. Except maybe El Bakhtaoui getting his debut goal!

 

Apparently they were lucky to get a point from Hamilton and didn't perform well against Rangers, they also failed to get out of their League Cup group, so they are hardly coming at us as a juggernaut of good form.

 

They were missing McGowan and Duffy yesterday, I'm not sure what there availability will be next week but otherwise I think they look like a fairly mediocre team on paper and I suspect the loss of Hemmings and Stewart are going to be big blows.

 

I think we will have enough to get at least a point and hopefully do better than that. Some teams in this league have better players than us, but Dundee aren't one of them anymore.

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Dundee were poor in the first half against Rangers but came on strong in the second half. Compare that to our two games vs Sevco (and factor in the final 30 mins against St Johnstone) and it's not hard to see the writing on the wall here.

 

Dundee were abject in the first half and got a bit better in the second, I'd hardly say they 'came on strong'. I've only seen highlights of both matches but I'd say ours compared favorably with theirs.

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Dundee were abject in the first half and got a bit better in the second, I'd hardly say they 'came on strong'. I've only seen highlights of both matches but I'd say ours compared favorably with theirs.

 

I was at the League Cup match and watched the other two live on TV.

 

We fell out the game as badly against Rangers as we did against St Johnstone in the final 30 with players constantly isolated in defence and attack. Dundee looked strong in the second half against Rangers but lacked quality to create chances. They were also very unfortunate that Forrester wasn't sent off while we were lucky not to give away a penalty.

 

We are not a team who can play for 90 minutes (or even 75) and the manager has had already said he won't be willing to use subs next Saturday.

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We are not a team who can play for 90 minutes (or even 75) and the manager has had already said he won't be willing to use subs next Saturday.

If players are tiring he needs to bring on replacements. I would rather see fresh legs for the final 15 than praying that we don’t concede by persevering with a player who is dead on his feet. There is no point in having subs if you are not willing to use them when players are tiring.

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If players are tiring he needs to bring on replacements. I would rather see fresh legs for the final 15 than praying that we don’t concede by persevering with a player who is dead on his feet. There is no point in having subs if you are not willing to use them when players are tiring.

 

The frustrating thing is we have got results against far, far superior Old Firm teams with big contributions from our youth players who eventually weren't good enough for the top league.

 

Winners against Celtic by Fagan, Ross and Fitzpatrick. Darren Smith getting a 90th minute equaliser against Celtic. Kinniburgh with a goal in the 4-4 each game and MotM the last time we beat Rangers in the league. When you have a small squad you need to squeeze every drop out of it.

 

McGhee's lack of subs at Ibrox and especially Celtic Park is very, very strange.

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The frustrating thing is we have got results against far, far superior Old Firm teams with big contributions from our youth players who eventually weren't good enough for the top league.

 

Winners against Celtic by Fagan, Ross and Fitzpatrick. Darren Smith getting a 90th minute equaliser against Celtic. Kinniburgh with a goal in the 4-4 each game and MotM the last time we beat Rangers in the league. When you have a small squad you need to squeeze every drop out of it.

 

McGhee's lack of subs at Ibrox and especially Celtic Park is very, very strange.

 

It continually annoys me as well.

 

On one hand, you could say he does not want to put young players on at Ibrox and Celtic Park to be overwhelmed etc. But, as you say...it can often work.

 

Also, every time he says "I look to the bench and have no options" must make all the folk on the bench feel super.

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Is that not just a message for the Board?

The more I thought about it the more that seemed to be the case. Sure the bench was maybe a bit light but he had McFadden there with what? 48 caps to his name. Thomas was viewed as being worth 20 mins off the bench in the LC game against them, Lucas is an actual midfielder. In that respect McGhee's statement seemed if not disingenuous then at the very least pointed.

 

I took it as being one of two things; 1. an attempt to excuse away the failure to make subs or 2. a point to the board about needing a couple more bodies. In fact it could easily have been both.

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We surely aren't in a position where the manger is sending messages to the board via team decisions?

 

 

Of course not. The Directors will be well aware of Mark McGhee's views and vice versa. No need to play silly games by proxy. It may be that Mark McGhee knows his strongest team, taking account of injuries, and wants them to get 90 minutes under their belt for fitness reasons. Also possible, although unlikely, that he doesn't like playing subs because it means paying them appearance money - remember the Terry Butcher era? There could be any number of reasons for his decision.

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I think we should all take what McGhee says with a massive pinch of salt and judge him on results, performances and signings also I suppose.

 

The fact is we lost a last minute goal and several players were apparently visibly exhausted and he chose not to substitute them. Had he made the subs it's entirely possible we would've held on or maybe we would've lost a goal anyway.

 

We'll never know I suppose but it surely can't be preferential tactic to recognise players are running on empty but *hope* we can just hang on?!??

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