wellsince75

In recent times Mcghee (1st spell), Mcall both had spells of us playing decent footy. Robinson had us playing at tempo where we really got stuck in and a few streaks of decent play, equally backed up by poor streaks of dreadfulness. GA is set up to work hard without any flair. Similar to Robinson in as much we go through purple patches of winning ugly followed by this run of not winning and it still being ugly. We're missing some longer term thinking where we look to invest through a youth, invest in quality that sees us gradually improve each season and critically approach to our style of playing. Something to help that creates a desire to cheer the team on v's rip our eyeballs out their sockets.

pre season was ugly - we struggled against lower league teams. From there we managed to be well organised and win games - our luck was always going to run out. In the midst of all this we extended GAs contract which most were delighted with. Majority happy when we're winning irrespective of how awful we are to watch. Personally I'd like to see good counter attacking teams who can at least pass the ball and move forwards and backwards as a team. GA isn't the man for that style but he's the one in charge and results speak volumes.

Agree he’s been poor - He’s not a great defender but is decent pushing up . He made far better with Scotland who typically play a different formation than our 433 , where he gets caught out and has no right mid /extra defender to cover him

Tough gig at the moment , 7 clubs doing their upmost to blow the chance of 4th. be good to mix up our approach . Both SOD and Caroll are pish as part of back 4 but both are decent moving forward . Play a 3-5-2 that flips into a 5-3-2 , at least we’d have some natural width

never likely to happen. We extended his contract with the same style of play. he said it himself a few times, we didn't have better stats, better style of play when we were 4th. We were ruthless, took our limited chances. Thats the difference. The club knew what they had an extended the deal. Can't see that changing this season.

I believe we have some decent players, who under a different system would add value. I don't understand why we don't try and pass, move, create space etc. overall it's approach that's annoyed me since pre season and yes we miss having the class of Watt in our team - more for how he brought people into the game than just his goals.

He was easily our best midfielder - got a game every week. Can't help but think he and GA don't see eye to eye. Must have suggested why don't we start passing to one another and got dropped.

This is why we have a good pitch - keep the ball of the grass

Chop , change , chop , change Don't play either of our left backs in left back position. Don't play Slattery who was our best midfield player first half of season. Hope we find a way to win.

When fit I Ojala was excellent. Similarly I'd have Slattery but no issues with the others. We have too many players - I'd be happy to reduce volume and have better quality.

No question that GA stopped the rot and got us back on a stable footing. Also quite incredible that we were ever 4th for a sustained period .. When I do take a step back I don't really see the long term direction/trajectory, that for me is the issue. What type of football we're trying to embed. We're set up to stop other teams, to work our socks off and to press - but then what ? Who's our best players and why do our better players get dropped for long periods ? (Slattery) Why renew contracts on players who have proven not be a starting 11 ? Overall I find it difficult to have warm feelings about the longer term GA plan.

Yorky - point well made about budget. My issue with GA is his attitude /no regrets about zero football, when we were winning and 4th it was easier to accept albeit still hard to watch or listen to him go on. GA has zero interest in the style of play, he doesn't care , as long as we get 3 points. (his words) Will be interesting to see if GA gets us top 6 with his approach, if he does fair enough.. Pretty much any decent mgr will have us +9th in the league, with occasional hot runs of top 6. I don't believe we have to approach this with a total lack of entertainment/style of play..

Entertainment and quality of play has been horrible under GA. easy to forgive and ignore when we’re winning as an ugly win is still a win. far tougher to accept when we lose .

strong team selection. Ojala & Slattery would both be in my starting 11 (if fit) but generally speaking a strong looking team.

A lot of the game was a hard watch - it could have been +4 -0 . Something like 20 shots on goal. hard not to loose our shit when we’re that bad

It frustrates me that we approach a game against Rangers the same way we do against any other club - we won't outplay them. We need to set ourselves up to get in their faces and defend much further up the pitch. There's bugger all need for 3 forwards - total waste. So easy for Rangers , they are a better team by a distance, it's poor game mgt to play into their strengths.

I've given up guessing on who's likely to line up - wouldn't have come up with this as our starting 11 but at least the we have defenders in their natural position . Like you say not holding out any expectation irrespective of line up

I'd be more than happy for him to stay, I'd rather he was second choice than Fox - who we could have let go and at least given PJ a bit of a chance should he need to replace Kelly. At 24 he might be better leaving though - plenty of championship clubs would snap him up - decent young keeper.

McGinley has signed a new contract. Very decent squad player . Not an automatic start , this for me has been an issue for years on left had side of defence. I personally dislike that we have a very large squad, mainly full of ok players, some who will get short runs of games before self destructing. Appreciate the need for continuity etc but hard to see how we'll move forward if we resign players who aren't auto starters.

Good deal for Morecombe , cash in the pocket + bring back a manager who has twice the win record than current manager

pretty underwhelming - at 34 years old is he ever going to be a realistic replacement for Kelly - would prefer to rely on a youngster for the back up. Was looking at our first team squad earlier - time to start trimming back - appreciate we do need 3 keepers but we have c10 defenders on our books and 8 midfield players - too many - too many mediocre pros gobbling up the wage bill

Im completely with you. For me Robinson falls into the same category as Mcall , McGhee (first time) in as much they had a decent spell where things went well but not able to really take the club forward in the long term, made too many poor signings and ran out of ideas. Short term able to a job but will run out of ideas and frankly won't go on to bigger or better things as are limited in their capability.

good observation - completely agree about the last 12 months. He ran out of ideas and really struggled, hence resigned. Had he left for a bigger job 12 months previous (NI job) he'd be hailed as one of the best gaffers we've ever had. He did well for us over the piece, a good guy who did in the main did good things , eventually ran out of ideas and out of decent signings.

completely with you on this. This has been an issue for a couple of years now. Im sure a 3 man midfield could work but not with our current blend - this for me is related to the front 3, the midfield should be able to seamless link with defence and attack - ours doesn't. That said, I believe O'Hara to be part of the solution not the problem, a box to box midfielder is something we need.

Sadly not (or maybe it’s a good thing) I always get legal stuff about some legislation changing