Kmcalpin

So Fisher steps in unless we go for one striker. Who is our back up striker if Newell isn't fit? Not Tanner surely? A decent player but not a striker. Presumably McHugh steps back into defence?

It doesn't sound good and it isn't but I'd like to hear the club's explanation first. Do you know for a fact that it wasn't an administrative error? Most though not all companies know minimum wage legislation but do all their employees? There is something wrong with the regulatory process operated by HMRC (probably due to under resourcing) if employers are allowed to underpay employees for a full year before being taken up for it. A bit like the Police saying we can't stop someone in the act of committing a crime we have to wait until they have finished doing it. As far as the club is concerned it can now afford to pay its lowest paid employees a little more and it should. It should also release a statement to explain what has happened.

Oh yes, its just that they're not operational yet and the wintry weather is delaying remedial work.

Just like the Queensferry Crossing!

It depends on how the comment was expressed. Oathing and swearing isn't on. A rebuke along the lines of "Come on hurry up son" would be perfectly acceptable but I suspect somehow we're not talking about that.

Players who are out of contract next summer are: Griffiths, Hammell, Plummer, Dunne (1 year option), Watt, Hartley, Grimshaw, Rose, Moult, Bowman, Petravicius and Newell. Quite a few there. That said I doubt if Griffiths, Hammell, Plummer and Watt will be offered new deals. Moult will be offski. Of those I'd want to retain the services of Hartley, Grimshaw, Rose, and Bowman. Not sure about Dunne's position. Jury is out on Newell and Petravicius.

No, he isn't. He's taken Scotland's 2nd/3rd largest team to 2nd/3rd place.

I hope not. Given the alleged interest of English clubs, I think he'll end up down there. If Aberdeen show the slightest interest I'll need to stop listening to BBC Aberdeen, sorry Sportsound.

I'm not wholly convinced of Fisher. Newell is a young lad who has had injury problems. If Moult leaves next month we're going to have to bring in another striker either as a first pick or as back up. We're going to need somebody who hits the ground running. True, he's not had a run of games to prove himself but hasn't shown much when he has appeared. Robbo has a decent track record of bringing in new signings but even the best like wee Tommy signed a more few duds. We don't want to be in a position next month where our main goalscorer, Moult, leaves and we promote someone to find out if he's any good or not, especially at the last minute. Fisher might yet come good but he didn't do much at Inverness and hasn't made much of an impact with us yet.

Ian "Laptop" Cathro made some very poor signings whilst at Tynecastle and Hearts are now finding that out. They're there for the taking if we play to form.

Good on you. What was the reaction of the police officers?

Rodgers has previous with us of course. Not that long ago, he and his assistant Chris Davies became embroiled in a bitter spat with our groundsman over training etiquette. Davies and Rodgers denied everything not surprisingly.

Just watched the highlights from yesterday and I'm in no doubt we ran out of gas in the latter stages of the game. Not surprising really given the run of 3 games in less than a week. Overall, I'd say we've done well in the past week. I've no doubt Robbo ans Las will be scrutinising our performances to identify where we can improve, which players are not up to scratch and so on. Celtic are a very good team, so credit where its due, but so they should be on their budget. In each of the games we were thoroughly tested. So, where were our key weaknesses? I think we've been found wanting defensively at wing back/full back. Tait for all his endeavour and attacking ability has been found wanting a bit. Charles Dunne has added much needed pace and height but hasn't been the most reliable. However I think its our midfield thats been under most pressure. Yesterday particularly and to a lesser extent in the previous 2 games we've defended very deeply and narrowly which immediately put our defenders under more pressure. As Captain Oats observed in a different forum James Forrest seems to have been a thorn in our flesh over the past week. He scored again yesterday. Our new found physicality has been much publicised and thats true to an extent, but Celtic more than matched us in that respect. I'm just glad to get the past week out of the way and now we can move on. One positive is that our squad had been thoroughly tested and that will surely shape Robbo's future personnel plans.

Its not, but its no less important either. I would not have them in the POD Stand at all.

Yes but we would have to sit, sorry, stand next to them, for 90+ minutes and share toilets with them. Not pleasant I can assure you.I would not have them in the POD Stand end of. Not fair on our fans.

Apologies. I thought you were suggesting that Celtic fans were allocated the south end of the POD Stand instead of the north end.

Was this reported to the Police or stewards?

X2. A strange line up on paper - can someone who was there tell me how we set ourselves up? Interesting that despite having fresh legs neither Grimshaw nor Bigi could make the team. Very disappointing result which doesn't do our goal difference much good. Still, the last week will have been very draining.

I'm very concerned at Robbo's statement that he doesn't expect that we'll get a reply to our letter to John Fleming of the SFA. This echoes Stewart Gilmour's comment on Twitter. I'm not sure what Robbo meant by that. Does he mean that we won't even receive a reply to acknowledge our letter or does he mean that we'll receive a meaningless response or one full of gobbledegook along the lines of "Thank you for your letter.....Comments noted". Anyway enough of semantics. As a member club and indirectly an employer of John Fleming and his colleagues we should be entitled to a meaningful response and one which details exactly why our employees and club were disciplined. We, the paying public should also be made aware of the details. Football is a spectator sport after all. If we do not recieve a satisfactory explanation or indeed one at all, then we should escalate the "query", maybe by this time a complaint, to a higher level until we receive a satisfactory reply. If this means writing to Stewart Regan or ultimately his employers, the SFA Board, then so be it. Its time to challenge the very foundations of this primordial institution.

What about us Well fans who sit at the south end? Are we less important? We've had to suffer enough in the past.

Agreed. Not sure about being similar to Collum's angle but this is the best angle I've seen it from yet, especially in slow motion, and it does indeed look pretty clear cut. MacGregor cuts in front of Rose and then backs into him, as if he's shielding the ball and then falls forward. If anything it should be a foul to us.

The club's statement raises some interesting issues. I note that there's no mention, none whatsoever, about items being thrown onto our fans from above on Sunday. Do we take it from that, that it never happened / no-one reported it to the club / the club just didn't mention it. The club writing to the SFA about refereeing is very interesting indeed, as is Stewart Gilmour's comments on Twitter i.e. don't expect any official answers on referees or refereeing standards. Now lets go back to basics here. we are constantly told that the SFA is not an independent body on its own. It is "owned" by 42 individual members, the clubs. It serves only to represent them. Basically it does what they instruct it to do. Stewart Regan etc are merely de facto employees of the member clubs. Now from Gilmour's comments it seems like the refereeing section, run by a John Fleming, is very secretive even to the members/employers and will not divulge much information about its activities. Thats neither good enough nor acceptable in my opinion and Steart Regan and those below him should be taken to task and reminded of their position. It all seems like an episode of Yes Minister where the owners/employers i.e. the elected officials are subservient to the civil servants.

In that case its not a penalty. A referee has to be absolutely sure before awarding one. If a ref thinks it was even 80/20 then thats not sufficient. I usually go by our players' reactions, as thats a good yardstick and I've rarely seen them so incensed.

Apparently we are writing to the SFA to clarify refereeing decisions after quite few angry fans contacted the club. https://www.scotsman.com/sport/football/teams/motherwell/motherwell-to-seek-answers-over-ref-decisions-after-celtic-penalties-1-4627559

Can anyone enlighten me here? Last night Griffiths goes off the pitch to his team's technical area to change his boots, seemingly without the permission of Collum. He spends perhaps 2 minutes off the pitch watched by the 4th official and then enters play again without Collum's approval. Is this allowed these days? I still thought that the ref's permission was required to enter and leave the field of play.