Kmcalpin

Livingston have just signed defender Hakeem Odoffin from Northampton. Surprise surprise he's 6-3. No sudden change of style from them then.

I don't see how. Of late their attendances have been about 9,500 - 10,000 - roughly double ours.

Barry Maguire doing really well at Dumfries. I think our priorities now should be to sign up Hastie and Maguire on longer deals as both expire this summer. Hopefully negotiations are already underway.

And how many of those 5 are scoring goals? Of those 5, one (Scott) is young and inexperienced, another is nowhere near fit and won't be for some time; and another (Johnson) is not suited to playing as a lone striker. We need to get rid of some to balance the books of course we do, but the issue is one of quality not quantity. Robbo himself said that he's looking for another striker and left back.

If a decent striker is available at reasonable cost I hope we'd bring him in. I get what you're saying Greg but a place higher up the league will net us another £80k. No point though in just bringing in another jersey filler. A lot will also depend on who, if anyone, we can move on.

I agree with that. Currently we can't match their physicality but we do have better football players. I think they'll sit in and hope that we just shell in high balls to their central defence and then launch high balls to their striker(s). Hopefully this time Robbo will prepare Mark Gillespie and our central defence to withstand roughhouse tactics at set pieces. Its a game we should be looking to win.

I don't know about matching them physically man for man but we have to be prepared to stand up to them physically, albeit with some real footballers in the side. When they're in possession they'll play long and they'll play hard and thats when we have to match them, whether we like it or whether we don't. Gillespie, Aldred and Dunne (if they all play) will have to be prepared for a battering as will our striker(s), if the game at Livingston is anything to go by. If we don't we'll lose its as simple as that. When we're in possession they'll get wired into us and we have to be strong enough to stand up to their challenges. When we have possession we have to try to play it on the deck though and give our wingers and the likes of David Turnbull a chance to play some football.

Not a great display yesterday but we won and the 3 resultant points takes us that bit further away from the bottom 3 and closer to Livingston, who we can catch if things go our way. The game was close and Dundee are an improved side, if only slightly. They were always going to be up for it but lacked quality and composure in the final third. Young Turnbull stayed cool and under pressure and tucked away a perfect penalty. Interestingly no Sammon on ther bench at Dens.

Scotsman portraying it more as a run of poor results culminating in his criticism of players following an unnaceptable result at Fir Park during the week. It does however mention behind the scenes rows with others. All that said, the Scotsman isn't the most impartial source of information on Hibs or Hearts.

Absolutely. Bringing in another striker will be dependent on moving on at least one player surplus to requirements.

I say that because Robbo himself has said that he's looking at a left back and striker, budget permitting. Whilst its great to see midfielders chip in with goals I'd like to see our strikers do what they're supposed to do. We can't always rely on midfielders or indeed defendèrs.

A striker too?

No need to worry. Midweek games always attract far fewer fans. Add in a freezing night in January and you have your explanation. Had the game been played on a Saturday you'd be looking at 5,500ish maybe?

A great result last night and a vastly improved performance to boot. Robbo has a knack of pulling these great results out of the hat when under pressure. As much as he got it badly wrong on Saturday he deserves credit for changing things and getting it very much right last night. The team looked right as did the tactics. A great all round team performance and its heart warming to see the likes of Gorrin, Ariyibi and ther young lads shine. Hibs showed they can put it about and all told deserved nothing from the game as we were the better team. My only concern is misfiring strikers. We can't rely solely on the likes of Hastie and Turnbull doing the busienss week in week out. Striker is one position we have to get sorted. An encouraging night last night though.

I noticed that too. We must have been bad.

Could also line up 4-4-2. Defence looks better than Saturday but central midfield still looks defensively light. Hope we're not lining up with a sole striker.

Jack MacMillan moves to Partick on loan for the rest of the season.

Stevie Hammell did that for years and years and not just him. The problem we have is that Hartley has struggled to recover from injury and is too similar in style to Aldred. We badly need some pace in the middle of the defence and we currently don't have a central defender who is really dominant in ther air. Am I right in thinking that Dunne played in the middle as one half of a central two at Rugby Park just over a year ago and was a standout?

The chances are that he would receive service mainly via long aerial punts.

But who would be our target man? He would need to be physically strong, mobile and good in the air. These players aren't easy to find and don't come cheap. You're right about the issue of isolation. In the recent past when the likes of Moult or Sutton have been playing alone up front supporting colleagues, were they playing wide or centrally, were usually about 30/35 yards away rendering any occasional knock down useless.

Very much my view. We had several weeks off to prepare for this game and still blew it. Ok, I accept ring rustiness can be a factor. Surely the management must have known County's strengths and weaknesses beforehand and I really thought we'd be prepared and set up to handle a midfield battle. Unless he was unfit, Allan Campbell, should have been one of the first names on the teamsheet.

I know. In the meantime play 2 up front with Scott being given a chance. He's young and a bit raw yet.

Robbo himself has admitted that we don't have a target man and presumably we'll try to sign one before the window closes.

Fair point. Going by reports more than a few players didn't know where they were meant to be playing and/or weren't clear about their role. I suspect a fair few also took the same view as we fans when they learnt the team i.e. Whats that????

We currently don't have a striker capable of playing as a target man on the books so a single striker up front is a non starter for me. Its never worked for us in the past. You also need a very mobile central midfielder to play off him - only person who could possibly, and I mean possibly, fit that bill is Hastie.