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I'd argue given the size of the squad, rather than a Spittal replacement, we need to find a way of playing that doesn't require a Spittal replacement. Whether that's 352 with a flat midfield three in an early Stephen Robinson style or 433 with a flat midfield three and Watt and Maswanhise either side of a striker, I don't know. And don't particularly care. Just find a system that suits the players we have...

That's how steelboy rolls. Spends all season criticising a specific set of players then, when they move on, talks about how good they were and how we failed to replace them. (Spittal being a prime example).

I only read the announcement on Twitter, but just checked the official site and it's confirmed there: "Zimbabwean international Tawanda Maswanhise has signed on a short-term deal till January, with the club holding an option to extend that further."

Not quite. A previous manager of his said that he "can play" as a number 10, which isn't quite the same thing. That suggests that its a secondary role. From the little I've seen of him, he's not especially creative, although he's an attacking player.

You're assuming that he was going to do a straight swap, but that's not how it works when you lose 7 or 8 first team players. Under those circumstances you need to rebuild and adjust to the styes of the new players. Stuperavic is, apparently, a number 10 and was one of the signings intended to add to our creativity. If you cast your mind back to when Spittal joined the club, he was roundly slagged off by a large number of fans as being useless. He obviously wasn't, but he became the player he was partly through coaching. Any replacement is going to go through the same coaching process. Fans tend to forget that one of the key jobs of the coaching staff is to develop players.

Cynical maybe, eyes on the bigger prize? Co-opted onto Executive board.

I wasn't a fan of Spittal but I will say he was better than nothing. Naismith will no doubt give him a start on Sunday.

While I agree with your second last paragraph we did still manage to encounter a couple of “Mugabi moments” but got away with them thankfully. Wilson and McGinn being the culprits. Both had good performances but all it takes is one silly mistake to ruin it. Hopefully the learn from the scare and don’t repeat.

Playing 1 up is hopeless, we were toothless yesterday, Robinson tries hard but his positional awareness needs a lot of work. We need to be playing a straightforward 4-4-2, or my preference a 3-5-2 as we saw how effective we were when Maswanhise came on yesterday and got down the wings, hopefully SK gets a settled formation.

A tad unfair. 13 of their players who were fielded yesterday played in their Euro ties. Not quite reserves. Even if they weren't at full strength, were we? By my count we had 7 players, who might reasonably be expected to feature, out injured. The selections were what they were. Derek McInnes could reasonably say that his team was beaten by a half strength Motherwell team.

Which we? Your favourites or Motherwell?

The cost of bringing the player we need will be less than the cost of not having an attacking centre mid. League position, cup runs, Lennon Miller's value, crowds and growing the support will all suffer if we continue with this season's brutal style of play.

Turnbull was in the stand too, apparently. Would be quite the coup to bring him back as well!

In florida the now, don't know if it's the heat or the game that had me sweating profusely.

Ok the quality of the football hasn't been great but that's three clean sheets at home and we have honestly not been troubled at all in any of those matches except when Kilmarnock threw the kitchen sink at it in the last couple of minutes of extra time. I think the current squad has potential if Kettlewell abandons some of his pre existing ideas about how we set up. And of course when the injury situation improves.

3-0 Motherwell as we pick up our first win of the season.

Not wanting to and not being able to are 2 different things though. It maybe that he has tried and the players dont want to come, or we cant afford them. What I would say is that if we cant, we should look at a different way of playing. I mean, we didnt replace KVVs goals with one player. We spread them around.

If it comes down to a choice then I'd rather Jack.......than Fleetwood Mac!!. Ba boom.