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I think we could play 4-2-3-1 Ox Johnny K SOD Casey Seddon Miller Halliday Sparrow Slattery Maswanhise Armstrong

Data analysis is obviously important. But it should only be part of the picture. We should still be having a scout getting eyes on anyone identified to see how they actually perform in the flesh. Maybe thats too labour intensive for the the world we now live in, but it doesnt feel right to be signing players we have never actually seen play. Obviously, we arent flying anyone out to Australia, but we should be using contacts to do some of our business for us. There was a reason that managers signed players they knew. They trusted them to be able to do a job. Can you really trust data?

They pay a lot more than half the teams above them. Casemiro is apparently on £350k a week. Dont imagine there are many at Bournemouth on that money!

They are supposed to compliment each other

Do they pay the highest wages in that league? I don't follow english football

We always seemed more successful with recruitment when the manager himself had a list of players he wanted. Jim Gannon is possibly the most obvious example of this. Baraclough also brought with him a portfolio of players he wanted to sign that included Louis Moult. I thought MW's interview was very interesting today. He admitted that he does not have the players to play the style he wants. Does he have a list of players that he does want to sign to play his style or does he ask Dawes to find him players with a certain skill set? I wonder sometimes if the obsession with data analysis comes at the expense of a managers natural feel for the game and for a good player.

Aye without having any decent wide players that rules out going with a traditional 4-4-2,I would like to see us try 4 at the back though with a diamond in midfield which is probably the best we could go with.i really hope we have been working on something different since the hearts game as even with all the problems st johnstone have in defence,we will play right into there hands if we continue how we have been of late.

The problem is that I don't think we have the midfielders to play in a 4-4-2 , or similar, formation.

Balmer also out with a hamstring injury. That probably means the end of his season. Ordinarily wouldnt be that bothered, but with Gordon, Blaney, & McGinn all out it leaves SOD & Casey as our likely centre halves. With Winmer quoting Johnny K as a possible in a 3, it means we are down to bare bones in defence. Incredible when you think about the size of our squad!

Exactly this. If we signed half the players, we could afford to pay for a little more quality (maybe less injury prone) and supplement with youth. We seem to have lost our way in the transfer market.

Tell that to Man United....... Obviously not the same league. But the principal is the same. As highlighted above, you need to spend your money wisely. Given how little so many of our players have contributed this season, it could be argued we havent done that, or at least need to do better. Of course we have been unlucky with injuries, but again, as others have pointed out some of those could have been forseen. Others, not so much. Wimmer needs to be quite ruthless if he wants to get his own players in and give himself the best chance of playing his style of football, if indeed ge still thinks he can do that. I note today there was lots of talk about "compromises". But if he does want to play a high intensity game, he will need youger fitter players to do so.

What concerns me isn't about any individual who's recruiting , more the general direction we've gotten into. Over the last decade we've transitioned from bringing in 7-8 new players and regularly brining in 16-20. There's a lot less of the younger crew coming through on a regular basis and we're going from full overhaul one season to a next. We've always had budget constraints , for me we're being really wasteful and the approach needs to change.

Apparently Liam Gordon has again been ruled out.

See Daws name mentioned regularly and I’d wager nobody knows the role or what club demands of him? He’s not known to sign players. only being part of a process. Club invest in data analytics, perhaps the use of that analysis is open for debate. Factor in budget constraints and player demands those who arrive at the club are likely way down the wish list and not recruiters first choice recommendation. A lot of merit in your closing paragraph.

Appreciate this season has been plagued with injuries so I decided to have a look at who we've signed since 21/22 when Dawes first arrived. Also did a bit of a comparison to 19/20 (excluded 20/21 due to Covid) Sine 2021 we've signed 73 players. 18 new signings per season. Roughly 50% have had reasonable game time and that's without debating who's good enough etc. Looking back to 2019 we signed fewer 15, of which 10 got game time. Thought worth sharing as helps illustrate how we're operating, for a club with financial constrictions we've signed far too many players, many of which haven't seen the light of day.

Even as we speak, some fans are firing up Google Translate to find the German phrase for "wage thief"

Hang on?......Kettlewell signed Bair?......no way........he never mentioned that 🤪🤪

Our signing policy has been all over the place this season,wasting limited funds on the likes of callaghan and tavares is pretty gutting.everytime we got an injury there was a replacement brought in,we have piled shite on top of shite all season.i could well be wrong but it looks like we have went daft with the bair money and going to have nothing to show for it.

You prompted me to have a look at who we signed and who from SPL clubs. From what I can see we must have signed 13 players who have hardly or haven't kicked a ball. From Scotland - Callaghan, Robinson, Watt, Tavares all from SPL clubs. Summer signings from elsewhere - Stam Koutrombis, Stupavic, Hegyi, Kaleta - almost all a complete waste of time and effort. Add to that the winter list of Ward, Plange, Mair, Dickson. Honestly would get better joy from a lucky bag.

The gaffer said

The problem last season was Kettlewell got a god complex thinking he could turn anything into gold after Bair and sadly it failed so badly we pissed all the Bair money down the drain on two of the worst signings windows I have witnessed at the club. Signing two players on loan from rival clubs in the same league that were honking that have surprise surprise added nothing to our season another fail due to Kettlewell thinking he was some sort of transfer guru. Anything is achievable with the right set up but our recruitment seems to be lacking somewhere down the line and for Wimmer to have a chance maybe it needs to be tweaked a bit cause we 100 percent can't go down the same path as we did this season injuries or no injuries the players brought have not really offered us anything at all.

Spoiled ballot paper for me. Usually even in a bad season, one or two players rise above dross level but this season that’s not been the case.

Player wages = success

I understand that. So we need to try and bridge the gap in other ways. You dont do that by signing a team full of other teams cast offs. As I said, there will be exceptions to the rule. Someone like Paul McGinn has done very well for us until his injuries. Experience will always have its place. But with SOD, probably Halliday and potentially McGinn all still here next season and Nicholson and Robinson still under contract and likely to be still injured at the start of the season, we need our new recruits to be young and full of energy. Otherwise we are likely to suffer another season like this one.

Young Max scored his first goal for Sturm Graz this evening.