joewarkfanclub

Stephen Robinson on Sportsound tonight with Kenny Miller and Stevie Naismith. Talking about Scotland squad, international football and his time at Motherwell. Was a good listen and he appeared to be held in high regard by Miller and Naismith. Pretty sure you can get it as a podcast on BBC Scotland.

Happy to accept your evaluation of Hanley and Cooper. However, both are at far bigger clubs playing in better leagues. Evidence that they arent good enough "at international level" isnt evidence that Gallagher is.

Turnbull was unlucky not to be picked in June before his op and the transfer debacle. However, unfortunately for him, he plays in a position that Scotland are currently well served. McTominay, Christie, McGregor, Armstrong, McGinn, Jack are all experienced players who have played for longer at a high level. Shankland (and to an extent Brophy) are different, in that they play in a position where we have very few options. Given that the next 4 games are effectively warm up games for the play off's we might as well have a look at him and see what he has got. Using the same argument, I can understand the feeling Gallagher deserves a shot, he has been very good this year in our league, but do we really think he is better than Hanley who has captained Norwich into the EPL or Cooper who captains Leeds in the Championship? There is no evidence for that. Comparisons with McKenna, Soutar, Devlin, Halkett and Findlay are fair enough, but even that is subjective given we see far more of our player than the others. Stevie Clarke will undoubtedly have been the same which is why he picked some Kilmarnock players for his first squad but only the 2 who deserve to still be there on merit remain.

Strong language given the 2nd half of my post actually qualifies the first half. If I had said, "I dont think he is of a standard that would significantly improve Scotland at International level", would you still argue? You can argue the point of whether you think Gallagher is good enough or not but arguing the use of language is a bit tiresome.

I think I answered that in the second half of my post.

I think Gallagher has been excellent for us but I dont think he is at the level required for international football That said, we are not exactly blessed with options at centre half for Scotland. I would say when fit McKenna and Souttar are probabably the best we have. After that its up for grabs. Mulgrew, Hanley, Bates et al have all shown vulnerabilities. I think Halkett maybe had a shot at the squad but he is now injured, so its not that fanciful an idea if Steve Clarke wants to try options ahead of the play offs.

Why not?

Not many outfield players getting anywhere near pass marks, so has to be Gillespie.

Wasnt a great performance yesterday. Lots of misplaced passes first half and everything was just a bit slow and predictible. Was good that we managed to get a goal and were able to tough it out, but we really need to be showing better quality than that if we have true top 6 aspirations. I thought the referee was terribly incosistent across the piece. The entire St Johnstone midfield were guilty of repeated fouling, yet they got away with it whilst some of our indisgressions were immediately punished. Davidson clearly dives for the penalty which is quite embarassing for both him and the referee. At least justice was done with a great save from Gillespie. Re the red card. Its never a stamp as some on here are claiming. However, Donnelly does throw an elbow out and throw Kane to the ground so, although the ref has got it wrong, Donnelly cant have any complaints. One area of concern for me is how much Richard Tait appears to have regressed this season. He looks half a yard slower and his form has dipped terribly. Hope its not a permanent decline.

I thought Cole and Polworth both did well in parts of the game. Carroll was having a decent game until the red card. Scott was decent. But the outstanding player on the park was Alan Campbell. The wee man was everywhere and capped it with a really good goal.

Really disappointing result from a game I never felt we were at risk of losing. Thought we played some reasonably decent patient football for the most part and it was very satisfying when we eventually got our goal from such a well worked move. (We do still need to stop these big diagonals from our centre halves though as they barely ever work.) Re the substitutions, I agree with Andy P. The Polworth one is questionable as I felt he was having some influence on the game at that stage and we seemed to lose our shape at that point contributing to the first goal. Seedorf for Hylton is fair enough as he hadnt had a lot of impact on the game and Hylton has already shown he can be an impact player. Both will continue to frustrate and impress in equal measures going forward. Tait was a necessary substitution after the red card. The only surprise was it took so long to organise. Although the ref did make a couple of poor calls, I didnt think his performance was the worst and we certainly contributed as much to our own downfall as he did. Re Cole. I thought the big man did reasonably well leading the line and showed some neat touches, particularly at the goal. However, I agree he doesnt really look much of a goal threat. Unfortunately players who can do both are at a premium. Its clear we are still very much a work in progress and we will need to work hard to get more consistency into our results and perfomances.

I love Las but not sure he is ruthless enough to be a no1. I suppose you never really know until the person in question gets the opportunity. Anyway, here's hoping we dont need to find out in the immediate future.

Listening to him in the interviews, he talks very well and he buys into the football philosophy of the club. He appears to be doing pretty well with the youths / reserves and shows a strength of character that I dont see in others already within the club. PS. Before this gets picked apart and heads south, I didnt say he should definitely be the manager. I said we could do worse than consider him. Bearing in mind the pool from which we will be choosing, Id rather go for a young hungry manager that we know something about, than one of the usual suspects of scottish football, or a total shot in the dark.

I'd be disappointed but not surprised if Robbo ended up at Hearts or Hibs. If it was to happen, we could do a lot worse than consider Maurice Ross as his replacement. Been very impressed by him since he arrived at the club.

The MFC TV feed yesterday was the Hearts commentary. They were surprisingly balanced compared to other feeds Ive listened too but would prefer Lewis Irons. Not sure why its like that. He clearly did some coverage of the game as you hear his commentary on the clubs "Story of the match" post. Also MFC TV doesnt appear to work on the regular mobile phone browser. You need to switch to Chrome to get it to work and if you open up any other tabs it switches off.

Thoughts and best wishes to you and the family Frazzle. Didnt know your dad but recognised his face from round Fir Park. Having lost my old man prematurely a good few years back, I will be eternally grateful to him for giving me my love of our wee diddy club. I hope you get the same comfort that I get every time I visit Fir Park. Its a shared bond that can never be broken. All the best mate.

Thats a pen all day long. Even if you consider the foul started outside the box, Hylton has rolled his man and is through on goal with a clear goslscoring opportunity. So you could see how the ref might have played advantage. To give a foul to Hibs is ridiculous. Its a pen and a red card for Whittaker for a quite deliberate foul.

Depends how the Celtic deal was left. If its totally up in the air maybe DT would appreciate the security we are offering, knowing we wont stand in his way if a big club comes back in for him. Cant see Celtic giving any assurances before they know the result of any op.

I have no idea where we will end up in the league or whether we will win tonight. Thats the excitrment of going to the fitba. Lets all just turn up and back the team and see what happens.

Seems to be a lot of chat about our players looking knackered. Understandable if it is just some of the new signings who had 10 weeks off and have been playing at a lower level. However, Id be concerned if Dunne and Donnelly are not fit. I did wonder whether Tait was a bit off the pace this season as he hadnt really seemed his usual self.

For all Lafferty is experienced at this level, someone else posted his stats a few weeks ago and I was surprised that they werent actually that good. Given that and the fact that he is a somewhat controversial character, Id rather we steered clear. At this stage I would Imagine we are looking at a loan deal. Hopefully we can strike gold and get some quality in, even if it is developing someone elses player.

Post of the day. I understand this is a forum and everyone is entitled to their opinion but some of the posters on here are turning into charicatures of themselves.

Thought there were a lot of good performances in the first half. Polworth Campbell and Donnelly all played really well. However, all much less effective 2nd half. Seems strange to give it to a defender after we've conceded 5 but my MoM was Gallagher. He just strolls it. If Dunne had half his composure we would have some central defence.

Its pink and grey, no?

That is a thing of beauty!