weeyin

The Covid seasons have thrown up some strange times. Last season, behind closed doors, St Johnstone winning 2 cups was pretty incredible and unlikely to happen in a regular season. This season hasn't been quite as chaotic, but I think the clubs are still trying to manage the impact and there has been a general leveling of the gap between about 4th and 10th which is why 3 wins this year have put us into Europe while double winning St Johnstone are headed to the relegation play-offs. And then there's Rangers who have been pretty average (for an ugly) in the league this season but stormed their way to a Euro final.

Or we beat Celtic

Dug out another result when it mattered. Too late to change my vote for Lamie as POTY after his Livi and Hearts goals?

Had to join a work meeting at half time. Back online now and watching through my fingers. Just hang on!

I think it's fair to say the Donnelly/Ojala combo is not our most effective.

Get Bevis on for Ojala.

Slattery - POTY.

Aye, it sounded like he shouldn't have been anywhere near the first team squad on Saturday due to his illness, so I guess he just hasn't been able to recover. Hopefully the fit players will be able to take advantage of his good work from the County game.

If you read the details on the official site, it explains why investment is needed to maintain this standard. So it seems a pretty clear cut case.

While I haven't always enjoyed individual matches, it's always interesting to me to see a new manager and new players try to develop tactics and style of play over the course of a season. If the first full season of transition ends up with Euro place, I'm OK with that. If lessons haven't been learned and we aren't better next season, I'm not OK with that. I'm certainly willing to give any new manager time and don't want to go down the Dundee/Hibs/Aberdeen path as we can see where that got them. Another good example for patience is Arteta at Arsenal. Had a decent start, hit a rocky patch shortly after when a lot of fans were screaming for his head, but was given time to turn it around and just signed a contract extension. The one thing I have been pleased with this season is the fact that even after a disappointing 2022, the players have stuck at it and pulled out important results at the right time. From St Mirren and Livi to the Ross County game. But I don't think anyone on here is expecting anything other than improvements over the summer.

If it saves us ripping up the pitch every summer (and continuously fixing the drainage etc.) it should save us money in the long term.

A few nice touches from him though. Would be happy to see him back at Fir Park to continue his development.

I certainly hope the players aren't taking their tactical advice from my posts on the internet.

BTW, here's that Luton goal I mentioned earlier in the thread. This is the one that guaranteed their play-off spot.

The other side to that argument is how we performed in our last few games of the season when McCall tried that approach before our cup final.

Hearts have secured 3rd spot and have nothing left to play for in the league. So hopefully they will thinking about the cup final and let us get on with taking the 3 points. (Zero chance of that happening)

Cifiti had a productive spell with Dundee Utd, but outside of that he has never been a regular scorer. As for Campbell, I'm delighted for him, but not surprised about his success. I think sometimes we admire his engine so much we sometimes overlook the fact he is also a good footballer. Combine that with his healthy obsession to fitness and the way he's always looking to improve, he's a manager's dream. I don't know whether it was luck, judgement or a bit of both, but he picked the ideal club for his moves south. A team with aspirations for promotion but no expectations. I've watched a few of his games this season and he is getting to play in the advanced midfield position which I think is where he most productive. It's a tough ask to get promotion in the English playoffs, but John McGinn must be hoping they fail so he doesn't end up in Al's back pocket again.

The thing is, managers never sign players they don't think are quality and that they don't think will improve the team. As every team in the world knows, you have no real idea of how a player will fit into your team until you start playing them. It doesn't matter if you are Tony Watt (who fans doubted) or Paul Pogba (who is world class, but not at Man U). However, now that GA has had a full season in the Premiership and better knows how he wants to play and what level is required to compete, I expect like most posters on he we'll see a pretty drastic overhaul in the summer. Having said that, I didn't think we were "inept" yesterday. I wouldn't claim we were playing free flowing football, but in our last 2 games against our closest rivals (both away from home) we lost one to a jammy goal and won the other while keeping a clean sheet. We were pretty solid and dug in when we needed at the end when County threw everything at us knowing their season probably depended on it. The one plus is we're being average in the right half of the table. Let's just win on Wednesday and then start the summer clear out.

O'Donnell definitely improves the quality on the right side - both defensively and from an attacking perspective. It's no slight on Bevis to point out he's not a natural full back or wing back. Was interesting to hear GA after the game talking about how County like to play counterattacking football even at home. It looked like tried to disrupt that by sitting in ourselves and givin g them plenty of possession. For the majority of the game we looked pretty comfortable and it was always going to be one goal that decided it.

You know you are doomed to relegation when you concede a goal to Curtis Main (his first league goal for St Mirren).

I was watching that game this morning. If you get a chance to see Luton's goal, it's well worth seeing. Not the keeper's finest moment.

Thoughts and votes from the Dingwall ding-dong...

I think we've actually won more points under GA when we played his "concede possession where it doesn't hurt" tactics. This year, we've had much more possession in games and won nothing.

That's got nothing to do with your claim that " We have a manager who only looks down south" In fact, it might justify the manager focusing on down south if the other regions haven't produced any successes.

Also signed Sam Foley from St Mirren and Robbie Crawford from Livi. And Ojala and Sol and Efford.