Kmcalpin

In terms of our budget and the playing squad. Goalkeeper: Presumably Lee Hollis is leaving and Dan Twardzik is coming in. Twardzik isn't great in the air. One out and one in. Defenders: Steve Hammell and Stephen McManus have re-signed. No change at left back or in one of the central defensive berths. Craig Reid to re-sign? Hutchy - will he be replaced and if so by whom? Midfield: Lionel Ainsworth (not the best defender in the world) to re-sign or more likely leave? Keith Lasley likely to re-sign? Josh Law an attacking midfielder comes in. Given that a few players have re-signed or are likely to re-sign there will be limited scope to bring more players in. I'm simply curious as to how we are going to address our defensive weaknesses which were undoubtedly our Achilles heel last season. Now it may be that Stuart McCall is going to sign a defensive midfielder or that no personnel changes are required - simply that the same players will play better as a defensive unit next season but that isn't an obvious outcome at this point. To put things in perspective we did finish second last year and so you could argue that replacements for leavers aside, no change at all is required, but I would hope that we'd try to tighten up our defence as that was our obvious weakness. Overall I think our offensive players did the business and therefore little change there is warranted on our tight budget.

Although he isn't my choice of keeper I do think he's better than either Neilsen or Hollis. So, from that point of view I'm slightly happier than I was. Irrespective, he'll get my backing. I'm a bit puzzled and concerned however as to how we're going to improve our very poor defensive record. Early days in the close season of course and Stuart McCall may yet sign a very competent centre back to replace Hutchy and/or a defensive midfielder but we seem to running out of potential options to tighten things up at the back.

I think most of us accepted Iain that we weren't going to replace Darren Randolph with a keeper of a similar calibre. However we seemed to go from one extreme to the other. We lost far far too many goals last season from aerial balls and that was not lost on posters here. Now of course not all of those goals can be attributed to the goalies, but a fair proportion could be. Our two centre backs lacked confidence in the guys between the sticks and had to adapt their natural game to provide additional cover. I'm sure we could pick up a keeper who isn't necessarily world class but who could come out for aerial balls with a modicum of competency.

Like you I'd be happy with Twardzik as back up but surely we couldn't afford to retain Hollis & Neilsen?

Firstly, its almost certain that Lee Hollis will be leaving. We simply cannot afford to keep 3 senior keepers on our books and Gunnar has one more year left on his contract. I'm a wee bit disappointed with this signing. Dan Twardzik did well for us in his loan spell but he is still weak in the air and won't solve our problem in that respect. We're seem to be fast running out of options to address our defensive frailties. With the exception of Hutchy it seems as though the other defenders will be much the same as last season. Twardzik is not the answer to our aerial weaknesses. We can then only look to midfield to improve defensively and we've just signed an attacking midfielder. Maybe SM is going to be even more gung ho next year. "Happy to lose 2 goals every game we'll just go out and score 3" Confused.dot.com

I don't care where we sign players from as long as they do the business. Championship and EPL players are way out of our league as they are of almost all Scots clubs. We have to be realistic.

How much are we short of sponsoring a third player Iain?

Come on folks - this Board has several thousand members. I know the vast majority of you are lurkers but surely a few of you could donate £5.00?

There is also the raffle, which I forgot to mention. This is due to be drawn in August........which reminds me I'd better start selling tickets.

They have. There was a bucket collection at the St Johnstone game and a quiz night was held on 9 May. In terms of overall fund raising, Welldaft has hit the nail on the head, as he often does. To quote him " Hearts got 8000 fans to sign up for their appeal. But that was because their club was going bust. We sign up less than 1000 because we did not appear under any real financial threat or pressure." I'm confident that if we are in real trouble our fans will respond.

Good to see us sign an attacking central midfielder. Welcome on board Josh. My only question is how he will fit in with the existing central midfielders. Encouraging though.

Think the sell on figure was about 15% Jim. Don't know that the situation was purely about money, as some sections of the media have suggested. Of course money comes in to it and had Stuart McCall wanted to keep him as a priority I'm sure we would have done so. However probably his injury situation and performances were also important factors.

In June / July you could be looking at 42 degrees C in somewhere like Mostar. That's hot.

Sad of course but I'm with others in that its the right decision. Good luck to him wherever he ends up. Stuart McCall has a limited budget and he obviously feels the money can be put to better effect in another part of the team. He will know what personnel changes he wishes to make for the coming campaign.

£20 from me Iain.

A good idea and one which I back. The devil is in the detail however. How would the £75 be split, given that some clubs charge more than others for entry? MFC raised this idea several years ago and discussed it with other SPL clubs. One or two agreed (Kilmarnock and Dunfermline come to mind) but many opposed it - mainly the city clubs. The issue would be trying to get agreement between club representatives. In the SPL that was virtually impossible, with bickering, squabbling and the usual horse trading going on.

Ditto. An intriguing encounter. Hopefully both clubs will have gained financially from the play off games. Of course we can't just sit and wait for the English bubble to burst. I think that will happen anyway but the Scottish game has to be proactive and come up with progressive initiatives to boost the game north of the border. Pricing, media coverage and facilities all need to be looked at.

My feelings exactly. Its been decades now since Scottish teams could compete with the best in Europe. I don't ever recall Well competing with the best in Europe to be honest. The current rich V poor situation is all down to media hype, overexposure and brainwashing. How often do folk want to watch Barcelona V Manchester United or Chelsea V Barcelona? The same goes for the EPL. Eventually the game will return to its roots and fans will have more realistic expectations and the game as a whole will benefit.

Well it was your good self that raised the issues of the terrible standard of football and lack of competition for the league title. I was merely responding to the points you yourself raised.

You obviously never watched Scottish football in the mid / late 60s. When was the last time we had 3 or more teams challenging for the league title?

I don't agree with you about Lee Hollis, but do on the other points you make. Good post. I was prepared to give Lee a chance but he has never inspired me with confidence. Even at Pittodrie last Sunday he looked very shaky at times, although fortunately nothing came of his errors. His distribution in the first part of the game, culminating in that throw out directly to an Aberdeen player meant that my heart was in my mouth. That could easily have resulted in the loss of an early goal and our game plan would have been blown before it had hardly started. Your take on the goalkeeping situation is probably right. I'd be surprised if Stuart McCall doesn't retain Gunnar as back up and brings in a new keeper.

When Stephen McManus re-signed earlier in the week, Stuart McCall mentioned that he expected to see some other out of contract players do likewise in the coming days. No news yet but I hope we hear soon. When that happens it should clear some of the current clouds of uncertainty and clarify exactly who is stalling or moving on. Then SM & KB can move to target any players on their list. This year I'd like to see a reasonably settled squad in time for Euro preparations.

Like many of you I don't like the power that the TV companies wield over football or the distribution of their cash, which I think has only served to damage the game by inflating the vastly bloated and obscene monster that is the English Premiership. However I don't blame the TV companies as they are doing the best they can for their owners and shareholders. The bottom line however is that the interests of their owners may not coincide with the interests of football outwith the EPL. I've said before and I'll say again if fans don't like the situation then they should unsubscribe from the TV packages. Hit these companies where it hurts - in their accounts. They might be pouring cash into the likes of Chelsea, Manchester United, Arsenal et al but it won't be my cash. I rarely watch EPL matches and go out of my way to avoid them. Years ago Scots fans would be happy to watch their local senior side and perhaps local junior/juvenile teams but this is becoming increasingly rare. Expectations have risen enormously since the late 70s and we frequently read about our team and other Scots sides being rubbish. Rubbish compared to what? The EPL or La Liga? That's totally unrealistic! It saddened me to see two elderly gents (70+) dressed in Barcelona / Arsenal tops discussing the merits of reserve players of those two clubs who I've never heard of. If these two daft old duffers can't see sense what chance have younger fans got? Me? I'll stick to following the Well and local clubs. That's where the future of football lies. We have to go back to our roots. The EPL is totally unsustainable and I'll be delighted when it rots.

In part you're right. Firstly a decent goalkeeper would add some stability to our defence. We have been guilty of losing too many goals at set pieces despite having two big guys in the middle - why is this? We do seem to suffer from lack of organisation at the back though - too many needless corners conceded. On too many occasions our central midfield has failed to protect the defence. Is this down to the mix of players there? We certainly suffer from a lack of pace there as we witnessed at Tannadice. SM also likes to pull our two full backs into the middle when we're under the cosh and this gives opposing wide players a bit more scope to do what they want. Why is this? In terms of our defence, something somewhere is not right. It might be that we have good players at the back but that some don't play well together - this can happen. Anyhows, it should be a priority to sort out our "defence", however that is defined, for next season.

Does anyone have comparable figures for the English First and Second Divisions? From what I can glean they are way in excess of our own SPFL.