MelvinBragg

I disagree about Maguire. I think you have hit upon the reason for his not being as developed as other players of the same age when you mention the number of games he has played. You need games at a good level to aid your development. Over the last few seasons under Robinson, he had McHugh, Gorrin and Donnelly ahead of him for his best position, players Robinson liked. I'd hazard a guess he has played as much under Alexander in one year (and he's been injured a spell) than under Robinson and he has improved. Since his injury against Hearts, we suddenly became a lot easier to play through. For me, he seems to know his limits and is less likely to abandon his defensive midfield position. On a general point about young players (and this isn't aimed at anyone in particular, just a general thought), there is a tendency with young players coming through that if they're not the star of the team or likely to bring in a transfer fee to brand them "not good enough". There's a place for squad players and to use Maguire as an example, if you don't think he's good enough to be a regular starter, is it not better having him on the bench than paying a signing on fee for a Lee Lucas, Craig Clay or another random player with no real affection for the club...

Fuck no...

Who?

I went to an EPL game at the weekend for the first time. I'm definitely not in favour of VAR. Over two minutes standing about whole people look at miniscule details to see if someone is offside. Saturday was a warm day, Tuesday night in November? No thanks. It doesn't even clear up doubt. Still debate over which decisions get looked at, what angle they looked from. And it will still be the same referees looking at the screens, so if you think they favour the Old Firm, chances are they'll favour the Old Firm in what they choose to look closer at...

Brian Martin is better than Johansen and he's 59 now. Ojala is clearly unfit, I suspect not unusually for him. He looks a quality injury prone player...

I think it's possible. St Johnstone would need to win three games and for us not to pick up a point. The second part of that is entirely believable right now. Not creating chances, not defending properly...

Those saying to get someone else in the summer or to get Lasley to see out the season seem to be under the impression there's no threat of relegation out there. Can see us losing pretty much every game from now til the end of the season. Could St Johnstone win three games? They'll have one against us so that's a gimme. Two wins they need out of the other seven games... Real danger of us going down this season...

We're in a relegation battle that we're ill equipped for. Can easily see us finishing in the relegation playoff spot. And I wouldn't fancy us to get a result in those playoffs...

Only a matter of time before we're looking for a new manager. He's not turning this around....

McGinlay and Roberts not on the bench, assuming they are injured. Mugabi is suspended. That's the only three changes from last week. So you can't actually accuse him of chopping and changing this week.. Whether he should have stuck.with most of the team from last week is a different question...

As poor as he was, there was zero movement in the team tonight with the exception of Woolery. He was also the third worst midfielder we had tonight. On a general point, ignoring the scoreline, that performance was as bad as a few that have seen Motherwell managers being sacked...

That would only make sense if it was the same players every year....

I'd be reluctant to dismiss him on that basis. Not getting a game because of Trevor Carson, Mark Gillespie and Liam Kelly doesn't make you a bad goalkeeper. I think during the car crash Aaron Chapman era, he was out on loan. Not saying he is good enough but he's been stuck behind some decent keepers...

Last team that had any real success playing it was Leicester when they won the league. And they had Kante doing the work of three men. To me there's a reason that very few teams play a traditional 442 with a flat midfield four now...

So they'll get the same number as usual then...