League Cup Semi Motherwell v St Mirren 1/11/2025

[wellon]

46 minutes ago, FirParkCornerExile said:

But there is no stadium other than Hampden , Ibrox and Celtic Park could have accommodated that attendance yesterday. Mind you if we get to another semi final our ticket sales might not be so good. I'm sure some fans are starting to question why they bother at semi finals, the die hards will be there but persuading the floating supporter will be harder based on our recent piss poor efforts.

Right at this moment, I myself, question why I bother and couldn't care less if I never saw them again I'm so annoyed at yesterdays garbage against a very beatable team. However I do know that wont last. I'm glad our next game is away at Aberdeen cos I'm not interested in going. Be interesting to see what carry over this has to our improved attendances for the next home game. I think it will have some effect. 

Could Tynecastle not have accommodated the attendance? I don't know what official attendance was...the empty stands behind goals doesn't look good 

[Wee Alpha]

Sussed. We're not Indiana btw

[Ya Bezzer!]

18 minutes ago, wellon said:

Could Tynecastle not have accommodated the attendance? I don't know what official attendance was...the empty stands behind goals doesn't look good 

There was 21,277.  Bigger than the attendance limit at Tynecastle, or Easter Road.

No issue for me from an atmosphere point of view.  

As a proportion of seats there are probably as many empty ones at Fir Park most of the time.

[wellon]

Jens seems an intelligent measured bloke. He will have a good idea where we need to improve...as people have mentioned he's less than 6 months in the job , so we all need to chill despite yesterday's disappointment. 

[FirParkCornerExile]

33 minutes ago, wellon said:

Agree with most of what you say bar st mirren are shite, they're good at what they do...liked robbo at fp but watching his interview after game, he's got a big chip on his shoulder,  hopefully we get them in Scottish Cup. 

I don't want them in any cup. We list our last 6 /7 Cup ties against them ,, 😚

[Ya Bezzer!]

Last night I didn't want to go down the 'the ref was bad' route but.....

How bad was Don Robertson in this match?  

There first goal comes directly from a refereeing mistake and he was just abysmal the whole match.  

 

[star sail]

7 hours ago, Kmcalpin said:

I didn't like St Mirren's style of playing but it was effective. Strip out the cynicism, playacting and fouling and you are left with a sound gameplan that succeeded. They bottled up the wings and were quite content to let us knock the ball about nicely in areas of the pitch that didn't matter. Sit back, test us and wait for the mistakes. It worked a treat. 

I'm still not 100% sold on our brand of football. Call me a dinosaur if you want. Yes, I like attratctive flowing football, but it has to have some purpose, some end product.  There has to be a solid defence and an attack thats lethal. As it is, we knock the ball about nicely but too often in an aimless way. 

If, and its a big if, St Mirren win the League Cup Final how many of our fans will stick to their principles and say that they'd rather be knocked out 4-1 in the semi trying to play modern football than win it playing ugly. Our experiment still has a way to go and that must involve personnel changes in January, but I'm still not totally convinced we can pull off our switch to modern possession based football. I hope I'm wrong. 

St Mirren's game plan was successful last night but there is a ceiling to that style of play. That is why Scottish teams are embarrassed every July/ August by European minnows who'd style of play had moved on from the 1980's.

Remember that Robinson's / Alexander's/ Kettlewell's style of football was generally rejected on this forum because of it's pragmatic industrial approach.

A Motherwell team playing the traditional Scottish way could just as easily have lost that game last night. SR is very good at what he does.

I don't doubt that this is an experiment that may not work. Our old Captain Stephen Craigan had already written it off during the League Cup group stage. Kris Boyd predicted us as relegation favourites but I think both of those dinosaurs have already been proved wrong.

I think any one of us would have taken this season to date if we had been offered it back in August. 

[Kmcalpin]

22 minutes ago, wellfan said:

Just watched the highlights back. The manager and a number of the players should be embarrassed. We were second best all over the park. St Mirren were the better side on the day and fully deserved the win. I don’t want to dismiss all the good JBA has implemented so far, but he now has the challenge of showing he can learn from being outfought and outthought by making the changes required where and when possible. Yesterday was pathetic.

I've decided to give the highlights a miss. Agree with the rest of your post. I'm getting the impression that JBA might not be the best tactician in the world, although he has other strengths.  Yesterday wasn't the first time that we've struggled tactics wise; its now occurred several times, espcially at half time when opposing managers make changes and JBA doesn't seem capable of reacting effectively.  It could simply be, of course, that he's still acclimatising to Scottish football. 

As far as Slattery is concerned, I appreciate he is still recovering from injury, but maybe it wasn't the best idea to give him a full 90+ minutes on Wednesday.  

As you say, the focus will now be on JBA to see if he can lift the team and alter his gameplan, if only slightly, for the next fixture. 

[FirParkCornerExile]

27 minutes ago, wellon said:

Could Tynecastle not have accommodated the attendance? I don't know what official attendance was...the empty stands behind goals doesn't look good 

Why do people obsess what it looks like in TV, who gives a fuck about those watching on TV. They are putting fuck all into the fixture. 

[Ya Bezzer!]

13 hours ago, weeyin said:

I know people are upset, but if we're going to abandon everything after a poor game, then we might was well bring back Hammell or Malpas and play "proper" Scottish football.

Go back and reed last season's match threads if you want to see what's in store if we go back down that path.

I'd rather we keep developing and bring in a few more players that fit in January than go back to Kettle-ball.

It doesn't matter what style of football you play fans like to moan.  Even more so these days when pretty much everything is infused with a sense of entitlement.

We put in a better performance against a better team in last year's semi final and the knives came out.  It shouldn't surprise anyone.  

Right now we are Top 6 and got to a semi final.  We are playing the best football since David Turnbull was in the side, which is 5 or 6 years ago now.  

The manager has less than 20 games in charge and we are a work in progress.

There is areas we need to improve in but since football perfection can't be achieved by teams spending half a billion in the close season, why don't we just accept that and let the manager try to improve in those areas.

 

[Kmcalpin]

3 minutes ago, star sail said:

St Mirren's game plan was successful last night but there is a ceiling to that style of play. That is why Scottish teams are embarrassed every July/ August by European minnows who'd style of play had moved on from the 1980's.

Remember that Robinson's / Alexander's/ Kettlewell's style of football was generally rejected on this forum because of it's pragmatic industrial approach.

A Motherwell team playing the traditional Scottish way could just as easily have lost that game last night. SR is very good at what he does.

I don't doubt that this is an experiment that may not work. Our old Captain Stephen Craigan had already written it off during the League Cup group stage. Kris Boyd predicted us as relegation favourites but I think both of those dinosaurs have already been proved wrong.

I think any one of us would have taken this season to date if we had been offered it back in August. 

I agree with much of that, but the jury is still out for me as to whether the change in style will work. For me the $64 m question is whether we can successfully recruit the type and calibre  of players we need to complete the jigsaw. As others have said, we need a reliable keeper who can also play sweeper; a right back; a physical but talented central defender (for this season) and a more robust but effective goal scoring striker. This may already be in hand, I don't know.  Although we have some cash in the bank, it may not be easy to recruit these types. If we can, and we retain our better players, then our new system will succeed.  If not, it will fail. 

For me the whole atmosphere at Hampden yesterday was flat and our support muted. In large part that was down to onfield proceedings.  I sincerely hope that many won't lose faith but yesterday was huge let down that won't be forgotten in a hurry. 

[couttsy]

25 minutes ago, star sail said:

St Mirren's game plan was successful last night but there is a ceiling to that style of play. That is why Scottish teams are embarrassed every July/ August by European minnows who'd style of play had moved on from the 1980's.

Remember that Robinson's / Alexander's/ Kettlewell's style of football was generally rejected on this forum because of it's pragmatic industrial approach.

A Motherwell team playing the traditional Scottish way could just as easily have lost that game last night. SR is very good at what he does.

I don't doubt that this is an experiment that may not work. Our old Captain Stephen Craigan had already written it off during the League Cup group stage. Kris Boyd predicted us as relegation favourites but I think both of those dinosaurs have already been proved wrong.

I think any one of us would have taken this season to date if we had been offered it back in August. 

Great post! Bigger picture is top 6 so far, a semi final appearance and a great style of football to watch every week (after less than 20 games in charge).

We lacked a physical presence in both boxes yesterday and didn’t get the rub of the green. Whilst 4-1 looks awful the scoreline flatters them massively if you watched the game. As others have said we are 2/3 players away from being a really good team with an attractive style of play. Question is can we find those 2/3 players on our budget, time will tell but it’s much better to watch than Kettlewell or Hammell’s poor teams over recent years. 

[stv]

10 minutes ago, Kmcalpin said:

I agree with much of that, but the jury is still out for me as to whether the change in style will work. For me the $64 m question is whether we can successfully recruit the type and calibre  of players we need to complete the jigsaw. As others have said, we need a reliable keeper who can also play sweeper; a right back; a physical but talented central defender (for this season) and a more robust but effective goal scoring striker. This may already be in hand, I don't know.  Although we have some cash in the bank, it may not be easy to recruit these types. If we can, and we retain our better players, then our new system will succeed.  If not, it will fail. 

For me the whole atmosphere at Hampden yesterday was flat and our support muted. In large part that was down to onfield proceedings.  I sincerely hope that many won't lose faith but yesterday was huge let down that won't be forgotten in a hurry. 

Flat because we lost a stupid early goal with their first attack .

[star sail]

4 minutes ago, Kmcalpin said:

I agree with much of that, but the jury is still out for me as to whether the change in style will work. For me the $64 m question is whether we can successfully recruit the type and calibre  of players we need to complete the jigsaw. As others have said, we need a reliable keeper who can also play sweeper; a right back; a physical but talented central defender (for this season) and a more robust but effective goal scoring striker. This may already be in hand, I don't know.  Although we have some cash in the bank, it may not be easy to recruit these types. If we can, and we retain our better players, then our new system will succeed.  If not, it will fail. 

For me the whole atmosphere at Hampden yesterday was flat and our support muted. In large part that was down to onfield proceedings.  I sincerely hope that many won't lose faith but yesterday was huge let down that won't be forgotten in a hurry. 

I agree about the atmosphere. St Mirren players and fans were more up for the game from the start. 

When the direct blood and thunder approach of a good Scottish football side works in can certainly stir the emotions and St Mirren did it very well yesterday. You could see the passion in their play. SR had them well up for the game and he had clearly used the negative press about their style to his advantage.

I actually thought SR was a great manager for us and I don't think his achievements were ever fully appreciated for the very reason that supporters now believe that they should be watching budget Barcelona's every week. 

[Lobey_Dosser]

Fair bit of chat about the need for recruitment. Two players that were brought in to be integral to JBAs style of play are Just and Said and are presumably amongst the highest earners. I like the pair of them but both went missing on the big stage yesterday. 

[Orinoco]

Our style of play will fail. Like all the other styles have been a roaring success. Fans want to be  entertained. We have been this EARLY in the season. We are Motherwell and as history shows are not consistent in performances. We are all disappointed but stop the OTT reactions and get behind the team and encourage them to improve. 

There seems almost like a smugness by some that we failed to win yesterday.  A sort of I told you so that it would fail. There is no patience in society and realism of where we are in the football world. 

Fans moaning no matter what we do. What the hell do they want from a team that's unlikely to win a league or fluke a cup. After all you do need abit of luck to win a cup.

Our team is much better than 12 months ago. We can only improve.

Finally St Mirren are an effective team and even the very best teams in world football struggle against that type of team. That style gets you so far and I don't recall any teams playing like that winning a league or a cup on a regular basis.

Motherwell doing Motherwell things ain't new.  You would think we would be used to and expect it by now. That's what makes supporting our club special. You just never know if it's going to be awful, average or brilliant.

It hurts today, but you just know that won't last. 

 

[well_said]

2 minutes ago, Orinoco said:

Our style of play will fail. Like all the other styles have been a roaring success. Fans want to be  entertained. We have been this EARLY in the season. We are Motherwell and as history shows are not consistent in performances. We are all disappointed but stop the OTT reactions and get behind the team and encourage them to improve. 

There seems almost like a smugness by some that we failed to win yesterday.  A sort of I told you so that it would fail. There is no patience in society and realism of where we are in the football world. 

Fans moaning no matter what we do. What the hell do they want from a team that's unlikely to win a league or fluke a cup. After all you do need abit of luck to win a cup.

Our team is much better than 12 months ago. We can only improve.

Finally St Mirren are an effective team and even the very best teams in world football struggle against that type of team. That style gets you so far and I don't recall any teams playing like that winning a league or a cup on a regular basis.

Motherwell doing Motherwell things ain't new.  You would think we would be used to and expect it by now. That's what makes supporting our club special. You just never know if it's going to be awful, average or brilliant.

It hurts today, but you just know that won't last. 

 

Absolutely spot on.

[grizzlyg]

Decided to watch brief highlights,  3rd goal is like scene from a keystone kops movie.

Longelo and Watt been excellent but both decided to have worst game of season yesterday.  Also he wasn't reason we lost but Ward doesn't inspire confidence in me.  I also feel Maswanhise blows hot and cold.

However......if askou and players can learn from this there is no reason we cant get back on track for a good season.  January transfer window will be very interesting and hopefully we bring in the right players for key positions. 

COYW 

[yosemite sam]

What seemed very obvious to me was that St Mirren and to a lesser extent Livingston did not pressure the goalkeeper or back four when we were taking goal kicks. They sat off and allowed the defence to pass it about at the back  and concentrated their players in the midfield which restricted our midfield space to impose their passing game, which nullified our ability to go forward with any real urgency. If other managers employ this tactic, I think it will be a long season. 

[claretband]

The height difference was so obvious. Apart from Gogic and I think 1 other all their players towered over ours…


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[mio]

3 minutes ago, claretband said:

The height difference was so obvious. Apart from Gogic and I think 1 other all their players towered over ours…


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Watching StMirren is like watching a really well organised, extremely fit and half decent junior team from the 1980s 

We were awful yesterday to a man and it was just a terrible day at the office and it did just feel St Mirren wanted it more and I did mention before we were maybe believing our own press a bit.

gutting to go out to that side and it’s gutting listening to some comments flying about on social media from their fans and ex players…. Disappointingly one from our old captain Peter Hartley making smart ar5e comments about style of play. 
in saying that and as much as I dislike him, I thought Gogic was the real difference yesterday, he was the driving force behind their win…. I’ll clear the vomit from my throat now 

[wellon]

1 hour ago, FirParkCornerExile said:

Why do people obsess what it looks like in TV, who gives a fuck about those watching on TV. They are putting fuck all into the fixture. 

I was at the game and empty seats add nothing to atmosphere or spectacle..hardly obsessing suggesting ithat it goes to a smaller stadium 

[wellon]

1 hour ago, Kmcalpin said:

I agree with much of that, but the jury is still out for me as to whether the change in style will work. For me the $64 m question is whether we can successfully recruit the type and calibre  of players we need to complete the jigsaw. As others have said, we need a reliable keeper who can also play sweeper; a right back; a physical but talented central defender (for this season) and a more robust but effective goal scoring striker. This may already be in hand, I don't know.  Although we have some cash in the bank, it may not be easy to recruit these types. If we can, and we retain our better players, then our new system will succeed.  If not, it will fail. 

For me the whole atmosphere at Hampden yesterday was flat and our support muted. In large part that was down to onfield proceedings.  I sincerely hope that many won't lose faith but yesterday was huge let down that won't be forgotten in a hurry. 

The attendances fairly rose after 1991...not

Just need to accept a lot of people turn up for a big event, it's not a criticism,  it can be an expensive pastime and ultimately frustrating..we are all emotionally invested but other people not so much

[wellon]

8 minutes ago, mio said:

Watching StMirren is like watching a really well organised, extremely fit and half decent junior team from the 1980s 

We were awful yesterday to a man and it was just a terrible day at the office and it did just feel St Mirren wanted it more and I did mention before we were maybe believing our own press a bit.

gutting to go out to that side and it’s gutting listening to some comments flying about on social media from their fans and ex players…. Disappointingly one from our old captain Peter Hartley making smart ar5e comments about style of play. 
in saying that and as much as I dislike him, I thought Gogic was the real difference yesterday, he was the driving force behind their win…. I’ll clear the vomit from my throat now 

I don't know what Hartley said but I mind him being smart when he broke a rangers players cheekbone, in a challenge I think it was.   We won so we kind of went along with it

[mio]

1 minute ago, wellon said:

I don't know what Hartley said but I mind him being smart when he broke a rangers players cheekbone, in a challenge I think it was.   We won so we kind of went along with it

He made a few quips at us but one was “football with a purpose…. Total domination” talking about st mirrens style.

whether you view he has a point or not he was our captain and was well liked at Fir Park, try and be a little respectful rather than mocking the style of football we play.

i look forward to him inevitably failing as a manager.