Kmcalpin

Overall agree but presumably Dylan McGeoch won't be taking much part in the proceedings. Hibs will be up for a real fight and we'll have to match their aggressiveness. Hopefully the referee will be even handed.

Agreed. As a minimum I'd be looking for a down payment of £1m plus add ons.

If Kipre goes then he will need to be replaced long term with a similar style of central defender with physique and pace. He'll be a big loss. As for Sunday ????? Dunne out; Kipre "unavailable"; McHugh struggling with injury; and Maguire suspended.

Oddly enough thats not quite how it happened. At the time he left, the financial powers that be running the club wanted to retain our best players including him in order to keep the club as a going concern and thereby remain competitive and attract a buyer. It was big Terry who wanted to sell him for playing reasons. His previous boss at Glentoran (I think) told TB that he was very talented but inconsistent playing exceptionally well in perhaps 1 game out of 4 and then being anonymous in the other 3. Terry said the same of his stint at Fir Park and classed him as a luxury player we didn't need. Thats exactly how I saw him at Fir Park. He would be an absolute stand out in one game but then disappear in the next 3. Hull obviously brought consistency to his game. A nice guy by all accounts.

Given our injury situation I'm more concerned about who McGinn is going to mark.

Not into predictions at this stage as its too early. However I think St Mirren will be safe and Livingston will go down. Dundee will be near the bottom as could Hamilton. Killie will challenge for a top 6 place as will we. I reckon St Johnstone will be a tad weaker.

With injuries and suspensions it could be: Carson Kipre Hartley Donnelly Tait Grimshaw Rodriguez-Gorrin Rose Frear Main (or Johnson) Sammon

We need to be patient with some of the players. Main has only played 90 minutes in 2 competitive games so far. Hartley had a 7 month lay off. Our back line has chopped and changed frequently since the game against Edinburgh City. Yes, we need to get up to speed quickly now but the time to start worrying is if some of the players aren't performing by late September.

Anyone expecting to see a good game of football on that pitch was deluded. That immediately influenced our performance. With the wind it was alwatys a case of just getting the job done, which we did. McHugh's injury was also a blow. Hartley and Donnelly's lack of match fitness is more of a concern. Just like last year, the group stage of the League Cup will count for nothing once the league begins. My concern ahead of next Saturday is fielding a solid secure defence. I didn't like the fact or the way we lost the goal yesterday, but our 3 goals were the textbook way to win against a packed defence on a shocking pitch. We haven't been the only Premiership to struggle in the group stage. We won, we qualified, unlike Accies, and now move on.

Ah yes but then add in the likes of Vic Davidson, Peter Marinello, Bobby Graham and Willie Pettigrew and you have a very well balanced team. As far as today's game is concerned win the game then bring on a young lad or two.

Part of the best Well side I ever had the pleasure to watch. He's alive and well living in Larkhall.

Conor Sammon for me as he played very well and scored the 2 goals that won us the game.

In defence of both players they were left pretty exposed by their teammates at times. After ATS came on, he frequently had a couple of players running at him.

I thought the season ticket collection system in the Centenary Suite worked well last night, although quite a few punters were still unaware of it.

A win was important last night and we got it but it would have been nice to get three and edge Queens out on goal difference; we'll just have to beat Clyde now. A decent overall team performance although the midfield looked very shaky in the opening 10 minutes or so. Queens were also given acres of space on our left flank for much of the game and a better side would have made that count. Enough of the negatives though. The defence looked reasonably solid with Kipre improving and McHugh playing well. Midfield played played reasonably well but lacked a bit of creativity at times. The pick of the bunch were Cadden and Campbell. Cadden had no right to survive the 90 minutes given the treatment that was dished out to him but he did and was one of our est players. I thought Sammon was our best player - just. Not quite the player many have labelled him...a slow, ponderous, big target man. He was surprisingly quick and has a deft touch as he showed with his goals. An intelligent player in the Higdon mould who can bring other players into the game and create chances. Johnson looked lively when he came on and ATS did ok. Queens were a very streetwise outfit who possessed a bit of pace, but other than in the first 6 minutes or so when they had 4 efforts on target didn't create very much with the exception of the attempt which brought out an amazing one handed save by Carson. They were fortunate to have 11 men on the pitch at full time. We played some decent football on the deck for example our first goal but overall lost out a bit in the air, moreso than I would have expected. A decent night's work in that players hade more game time and we won. Some weaknesses to work on though. Bring on Clyde.

Yes very much so. All 3 are "physical strikers", but no more so than Stevie May for example who isn't classed as being one, but none are especially good in the air. Tomoorrow's line up will be interesting and Robbo may place his focus more on beating QoS than giving players game time - we'll see.

Why? We have no right to beat any team even the bottom team in the senior leagues. We have to earn wins.

I'm not a fan of our thread on Pie & Bovril. Whilst there are some very good and thought provoking posts its also bedevilled by more than its fair share of trolling and a condescending attitude to some on here. However, one of the best posts I've read recently was written this morning by Welldaft and it pretty sums up my view (we might disagree slightly on Bigi). I hope you don't mind if I quote you Iain. "In all honesty you could debate our style v substance all day long as Ya Bezzer likes to do on occasion. We have a players wage budget and one that is lower than almost every other team bar Hamilton for the season just gone. Probably will be above them Livingston and St Mirren for this season. I am not sure what players we are expected to sign at that level ? A team full of silky creative types just like Luka Modric... The reality is that our Manager is trying to use the budget to get a team on the park to avoid relegation first and foremost. On the budget we had we had no right to reach 2 cup finals and beat Rangers and Aberdeen in the semis. It is almost as if that did not happen and that Robinson is getting almost no credit for that. The compromise is that our football is robust and not always a lot of fun to watch at times. But I have said it before and I will say it again. Would we rather have a team full of Bigi’s for example and find ourselves bumping along the bottom of the table. I am sure the usual glass half empty on Steelmen and on here would be content with that as long as we were trying to play football the correct way - NOT. For all that I do agree with a number of points. I would like to see the likes of Turnbull, Scott and Maguire given a little more opportunity. Quite frankly Scott looked better in pre season friendlies than Sammon has so far. Time will tell as I still think Sammon will be a decent enough signing for us. I also like Bigriamana and the few times he has come on as sub end of last season we improved immediately as a team. I am surprised and disappointed there appears to be no place for him. I can see him leaving and us regretting it."

There will be a reason why Bigi isn't being picked. I don't know what it is but there is a reason. We have to trust Robbo and Keith on this. They see the players far more than we do. They will not be leaving a "good" player out just to be contrary and awkward.

A bit of overreaction to yesterday's admittedly poor result. At this stage of the season smaller clubs are usually that bit fitter than the top clubs and that is a telling factor. Some of today's picks hadn't even played a full 90 minutes. Maybe our pre season preparation was lacking or inadequate? Unlike most in our support I have no problem in us playing the long ball game as we're not going to achieve much success trying to play open expansive football (not my favourite style admittedly). Yes, I suppose there's a middle way. The problem just now is that we're not playing the long ball game very well. Firstly we're not getting decent crosses into the opposition box and secondly we're not winning aerial balls and getting them on target. Still early days. I suspect Kipre and Hartley are far from being match fit and their recent suspension won't have helped. I felt at the time it was wrong not to challenge Cedric's red card and I still think so. Although not at today's game it seems to me that the midfield might have been very culpable in not aiding and abetting the strikers and shielding our defence, but those who were there will know better. Tuesday's game will be important and at this stage of the season Queens will prove very dangerous opponents indeed. They'll also now know how to play us. I'd love them to be in the position of knowing that we'll play the long high ball but also knowing they can't defend against it.

Our penalty record (in all competitions) isn't as bad as I originally thought: 1986-87 Celtic Lost 1990-91 Morton Won 1995-96 Clydebank Won 1996-97 Alloa Lost 1997-98 Inverness Won 1999-2000 Raith Rovers Won 2003-04 Forfar Lost 2011-12 Hibs Lost 2014-15 Hamilton Lost Still we had lost our previous 3 shootouts and so today's eventual outcome wasn't a surprise for me. Not a great result or performance by the sound of things but its not the end of the world. Hopefully lessons will have been learnt. To be fair Stranraer were probably ahead of us in terms of fitness. What does concern me is the lack of ammunition our strikers seem to be receiving - I assume that was the case today as it was for much of last Tuesday? On a tight pitch today was always going to be lumping high balls to big strikers but it seems we couldn't achieve even that. Tuesday is a big match for us now and another slip up is unthinkable. Write off today but Tuesday is a different matter.

We don't normally do penalty shootouts do we? So no surprise. Our record in them is consistent is it not?

And Max Currie.

or Gary Neville it would seem; been "attacked" verbally by 3 different parties.