Jump to content

Motherwell V Celtic Sat 17 Oct 12:00


Yabba's Turd
 Share

Recommended Posts

Absolutely rotten to watch, although what McGhee said post match made partial sense.

 

More often than not I'd be happy to try and contain Celtic but in order to do so, you need to move as a unit when you have the ball and we didn't. Moreover, today was a day to go with a front 2 against an accident prone Celtic defence.

 

Going back to McGhee's post match though, we may look to continue with a 433/451 with Laing in midfield. A move that doesn't bode well for Lasley or our plethora of strikers.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well that was the most disjointed and honking Sellic side I've seen in a long time. Stray passes under no pressure, abysmal shooting , no shape.

Sadly we didn't string two passes together until the last 10 minutes.

Pass marks to Kennedy and Grimshaw. Pearo started brightly but got away with a shocker of a challenge then disappeared.

Laing laboured manfully but Makalele he ain't.

Marv looked like a man with glaucoma playing after a massive dose of sedative, just woeful.

Moult practically played left back first half, Chalmers clearly had some of Marvs sedation.

Law has no positional sense at all, although he was exposed by Mogadon Marvs performance.

Fletcher was just not involved, and ridiculously he looked like Big Handsome would take him for pace!!!

Skippy had a shocker too, first/ second/ third touch just brutal.

One nil at least doesn't damage our goal difference much.

Probably useful in as much as it showed all the weaknesses we've displayed all season.

Plenty for Mr McGhee to get stuck into.

Over to you, Mark...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If memory serves McGhee wasn't a fan of Lasley particuarly first time round. WIth Hughes and Jennings in the squad at the time there was a decent case to be made for him not starting. As much as Lasley isn't in his prime and maybe very near the end of his playing career it's a fucking joke to drop him for a centre half who couldn't exactly be described as a ball playing centre half.

 

Laing in midfield, up there with Stephen Hughes on the left wing. Have to admit wasn't at the game, but every source I followed it on suggested it should have been a cricket score. I not expecting McGhee to transform us over night but that line up today reeked of the shite second season.

 

Given Aberdeens abysmal run I have little doubt we'll be the ones to kick start their campaign again next week, hopefully we won't be quite so abject as we were today.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just watched the highlights back

Two absolutely stick on pens!

The handball was f cking tremendous, made me laugh a lot.

All this discussion about it could've been a cricket score, My arse, Ripley had his quietest shift for months. I lost count of the times Celtic passed the ball out of the park or just gave it to us. We were worse to be fair.

An utter shitfest all round , but at no point did I feel that we were going to take a hiding.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I wasn't as baffled by the shape as some. Yes, we sat far too deep however McGhee seems well aware that we need to become hard to beat and narrowed the shape to reflect that.

I wouldn't be surprised to see Lasley revert to right back next week, where McGhee has used him before - Law is utterly shite.

Laing was anonymous in the first half however he was better in the 2nd and I think McGhee will sit him in front of the back 4 going forward and allow Pearson and Grimshaw to brake up play.

Going forward is worrying. We have a plethora of strikers and are impotent.

McDonald will start next week - he did a little focus up top when he came on without contributing greatly, as will Ainsworth.

The question is who else, Moult was garbage today, Robinson is pish and Clarkson is stealing a wage...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Not much to add beyond what's already been said here. 1st half we showed little movement and our inability to keep hold of the ball or pass to our own man was staggering. Johnson's performance was Straker-esque. 2nd half was better but we still looked pretty toothless going forward.

 

There were a couple of things of note though;

 

- Ripley seemed to be throwing/rolling the ball out significantly more, whilst he did leather the ball down the park a few times it seemed to be much less than I've seen previously. Having said that even throwing from hand he still managed to cede possession a few times trying to get the ball up the park on a counter.

 

- Also, the whole Laing in midfield thing; going back to the close season and our reported interest in Jackson Irvine combined with the fact that we've often been dominated then listening to McGhee's post-match interview, all the attributes he mentioned (height, physicality, breaking up play etc) are exactly the sort of qualities of an Irvine *type* of player. Obviously it's up for debate whether or not Laing is the guy to do that job or not however it'd certainly suggest that it hasn't taken McGhee long to identify the fact that we're missing someone like that in midfield.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I thought that was absolutely horrific today. The continued selection of Law and in the other full back Chalmers we must have the 2 worst full backs in the league. The damning thing is Barraclough watched and worked with Law for 6 months prior to giving him a 2 year deal. Criminal! What's up with Watt? Or even Reid?

 

Johnson was tipped by most to be a real threat this season and looks like he's never played above amateur level. Atrocious.

 

Playing Moult as a left mid/left back is another head scratcher. If he wasn't playing there, then he certainly spent most of the first half there.

 

Pearo took no responsibility and did nothing.

 

The icing on the cake was Laing as a holding midfielder?!?!? Shades of Bob Malcolm from McGhee there. Absolute madness. Unless Lasley was injured?…...

 

Killie and Thistle winning puts the tin lid on a miserable day. If Utd get anything tomorrow we're well on our way to be being bottom of the league by November as I predicted a while ago. There will be no "I told you so" though.

 

It will come as no surprise to everyone to hear me say we are absolutely fucked. Straight down this year folks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't know where Marvin Johnston went for his summer holidays but it must have been some fuckin place because he not came back from it yet!

 

what a change in a player, lost his touch and lost his pace - even if I was seeing him playing a blinder in training, I doubt I'd start him.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

It will come as no surprise to everyone to hear me say we are absolutely fucked. Straight down this year folks.

Miserable f#cker

 

It is October for Christ sake.

 

Granted things don't look good, but we need to give the new Manager more than 1 game. Plus we have a transfer window. No money but Les may have too much egg nog and splash squillions on 45 top class strikers....

 

I would prefer too not give up until around March time. You could try doing likewise

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm aghast at McGhee's opinion on Louis Laing as a midfielder? was he at the game?

I understand completely him not saying anything too negative but that was out and out admiration for someone who had no idea what he was doing.

 

I actually felt sorry for Laing, I think he's a decent big centre half but he was totally lost today......obviously, as he's never played there before!!!

 

it has to be one of the worst celtic sides ive seen as well, awful.

 

Anyway, i'll give it a month to see improvement, as much as it was honking today, I think it'll get better.....it needs to.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The writing was on the wall very early last season and we are no better this season. Why should we be, it's the same fucking players! (more or less). We could have pipped Liverpool to getting Klopp and it wouldn't make any difference. It's the players. We have some of the worst players I've ever seen play for Motherwell and we have them all in the one team at the one time!

 

The scope Barraclough was given was enormous and he practically re-signed the same players that gave us our worst season in decades….then added Robinson and Taylor!!!!

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Im not too sure. Did Lasley get much game time under McGhee in his first spell? Phil, Hughes, Klimpl, Boab etc all played a fair bit. I cant remember Las being an ever present but maybe im wrong.

 

Lasley had 49 league starts over McGhee's two seasons. Was in there most weeks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Its incredibly frustrating seeing players close down the opposition, only to stop 5 yards off and allow the pass/cross/shot anyway.

If you're going to press, you need to go the whole way and your teammates have to be on their toes to intercept the pass which is forced etc.

Worrying trend of not tracking runs as well.

Hopefully we'll get that kind of stuff ironed out under McGhee.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In the cold light of day we got exactly what we expected from this game. Which to a degree validates McGhees post match statement that he needed to see what players he was unfamiliar with could do.

So he now knows that he needs to work on giving clear instructions as to shape and formation to them all

And that Law and Chalmers are poor and offer nothing going forward as well as needing help defensively

He knows Pearo is a major asset but prone to starting fights in empty rooms

And that our vast array of strikers are in hiding and have no idea about interplay

Johnson is a jersey filler just now too

Lessons learned

Positives?

Kennedy

Grimshaw

?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The writing was on the wall very early last season and we are no better this season.

Early days, however, I have already prepared myself for another relegation battle. With Rangers walking the Championship, at least this time there will be no play off against the boys from Govan (they are much stronger this year). Is our team good enough to beat Raith, Hibs or Falkirk in a two leg play-off? Assuming we are not relegated outright, on our current poor form I can only see one outcome. :(

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A deserved win for the visitors but an odd pattern to the game.

 

They started like they were going to absolutely blow us away, could have been easily three or four up at the break yet became less and less threatening the further the game went on. On the other hand we were pretty abysmal to begin with, picked it up a bit in the second half and there was even a spell you could have argued we were a just about on top.

 

Overall though it wasn't a huge amount to write home about and on a day where both Killie and Thistle pissed on our chips perhaps the best outcome is that our goal difference didn't take panning.

 

It seemed an interesting/bizarre (delete as applicable) team selection by McGhee. Good some will say I'm sure that it set a tone when two of the expected first picks started on the bench. Others will point to players being used out of opposition and making a difficult task arguably even more difficult.

 

To me it was one of those selections that could be argued is fine with the aim in mind of smothering the opposition's attacking nous yet looks completely redundant the minute you go behind. And so it proved.

 

I'm inclined to think that Lasley could well have offered the same protection in front of the defence in the first half that was asked of Laing and when even more so when our central defender found himself on several occasions in an advanced position charged with the task of orchestrating breakaway attacks in the second half. And it is also difficult not to feel sympathy for Louis Moult who again beavered away in a position far from removed from where his talents are most suited. I mean it's bad enough him being stuck in left-midfield but for much of that first half he was almost a second left-back.

 

But there was a noticeable step up in the second half which offered some encouragement although I actually felt the final two substitutions took the edge off the momentum that had been building every so slowly been building. We didn't get the impact from either Skippy or Dom that we might have hoped for.

 

Of course McGhee's had what, two? three? sessions with them so it is hard to be overly critical about things so early in the process. Let's see what Pittodrie brings in terms of noticeable improvements.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...