ascender

Someone on FF has posted that they saw Adam at Glasgow airport.

They've got Steve Harper, so I don't see why they'd be in a rush to spend money on a keeper who is unproven in the EPL, particularly given how their results have been going.

I don't understand this one at all. There's been ample opportunities for us to give the lad a go at LB this season against "lesser" teams in home matches, so why hasn't he been given a chance? Nothing to lose IMO, particularly as we've been playing CBs there all season.

I'd like to see Boyd + one other up front, preferably Naismith or Lafferty as I think either could give the CBs a tough time with their movement and open things up more for Boyd.

Sorry, late to the thread, just wondering if anyone's mentioned our dream front 3 of Alan Smith, Robbie Fowler & David Healy yet?

So is Smith match-fit at the moment? Even if only in reserve football terms?

We've had a few matches against "lesser" opposition recently so its a shame he's not been given a chance at LB in the first team. Would be good to see us with a proper LB, definitely a step in the right direction again.

Disgraceful and I'm absolutely flabbergasted that something like this can happen and no many blind eyes are turned. Shocking.

Its so hard to be positive at the moment. Is it just me? If we win the league this year, which obviously I want us to do badly, then as far as SDM is concerned, it will be business as usual next year and the sun will continue to shine out of Walter's cardie. But for me that's blatantly not the case and will just continue to paper over the cracks for another few months until we're struggling again next season.

The problem with McCoist is that he's part of the management team who are currently not exactly setting the world alight. If we won the league this year, then WS could step aside and let Ally take over and it would at least make sense. But if we struggle to win the SPL, then McCoist's case for being manager goes out the window imo.

TBH if AM is serious about managing us one day, I'd rather he went elsewhere first to get more experience as the manager. A lot of assistants have struggled to take over as manager as it is a very different position altogether.

I've seen a lot of debate about Levein and it would certainly be a controversial decision. I'm not saying I'm for this, but in the current climate, we need to win the SPL first and foremost. So could one of the experienced managers like Jefferies come in and use his SPL experience, coupled with a significant increase in resources, to win the league for us? We don't have the money to pay some big name manager to come in, let alone the money to rebuild the squad. So should we forget our heady aspirations about making an impact in Europe for a while and just get back to the basics of dominating domestically and having a steady financial & footballing base to work with?

I've heard some more good things coming from the RST over the last couple of week and particularly tonight on Traynor's show. Anyway, I've been a member for a while now and have always been a bit disappointed by the lack of communication from them to their members. But since the various resignations some time back, the communication has gone from bad to worse.

Does anyone know what's going on with the Trust?

I don't see how its political though unless you make the jump from paying respect/mourning for the innocent victims & fellow muslims to supporting the people doing the killing?

Surely in the current climate, any potential, serious buyer of the club, could use the fans ill feeling towards SDM in their favour should their bid be knocked back? I find it hard to believe that in a country the size of ours, with a footballing community as small as ours, that any serious bid would be able to be kept quiet from the media.

Much as I have a healthy skepticism when it comes to Murray's comments, I believe he wants to sell and I also believe there's no-one battering down his door to buy the club or we'd have heard about it.

Where does the "of course" come from? The evidence seems to suggest that WS isn't a good manager at all.

Because as a manager with us first time round he won a hell of a lot of trophies. He also showed during his tenure with Scotland that he had matured as a manager and was still capable of motivating a group of players and having them all pull in one direction towards a common goal. Last season, he still got us to 3 cup finals and 2nd in the league during a season which was largely hailed as a step in the right direction for the club.

You can't just write all that off can you?

I think its great to see a footballer standing up for what he believes in and commenting in a mature way about a serious issue like this. Certainly make a change from hearing them moaning about only being offered 20 grand a week to live on.

As for the SFA, he's only voicing his right to free speech and is in no way bringing the game into disrepute or anything.

Its that thing though, only in the SPL is finishing second considered failure.

As to being close to Celtic, I find that very disappointing because Celtic have a very poor team at the moment and have had for the last few years. So the fact we still can't catch them reflects very poorly on the job our players & management are doing. Also, look at the SPL over the last while, the other clubs out with Glasgow have closed the gap on us on the park despite having a fraction of the financial resources available to them. Teams are no longer afraid to come to Ibrox and we are there for the taking at the moment imo.

Of course WS isn't a bad manager. But he does seem to be making strange decisions as regards his team selection, tactics and transfer spending. Some of these were mistakes he made during his first tenure here.

The problem I do have with the current setup is that SDM & WS seem to think they're above questioning or criticism. I posted on this last year when WS got very arrogant during some press conferences when journos asked him some tough questions which we were all debating at the time. He got very annoyed and basically said the fans had no right to question him. When you combine this with SDM's close relationship & friendship with WS, I just think sometimes that's not healthy when it comes to being objective about how things are going.

I thought Aaron was left sided, hence McCoist's comments about him being the most natural player we have for that position?

And is Fleck a winger, centre attacking midfielder or a striker?

I hate the transfer window. Wish I could just sleep for a month or simply ignore all football sites and newspapers until its over.

Fleck must be getting a game as someone's shown that list of the 10 most promising young talents to Bain and he's seeing pound signs.

i've bought some of their training gear and its very good quality & nice kit. While I'd like to see a return to Nike or Adidias, I'd much rather Canterbury than Umbro for example.

Newcastle might as well just start wearing our shirts. They try to nick a load of players. Bougherra, Mendes, Ferguson, Boyd, McGregor all linked this week and now they have got Lovenkrands on trial.

 

Whats with that bloke Willie McKay offering all our players to them!!

He claims its because Bain told him to!

Hopefully Boyd has told them to shove it and has chosen to live with the consequences. I guess given how he's been playing recently, it would be hard to drop him as punishment?

In theory I don't have a problem with us being a selling club if that's what it takes to survive and more importantly grow. But, I'd expect us to at least keep the players long enough for them to make a lasting contribution to the team, not just buy them and flog them as quickly as possible.

The Evening Times claims that the entire squad were available for transfer, but that it was the case that we only had to raise 3M in total. The worrying thing is that we pounced on the first offer to come in which was for Boyd, so that makes me think things were desperate.

It'll be interesting to see what the final fee for him is assuming he goes. Considering we turned down 2.5M or so for him in the summer and he's improved vastly in recent games, anything less than 4M will be criminal negligence.

Left - Aaron - but we still have Beasley, Adam, Naismith can do a turn there too.

 

Right - Novo, Burke if we dont get shot or, dare I say it, Whittaker......

OK then, we're sorted

Barry can go. Result!

I still think it would be best for everyone if Barry moved on. And I think we'd cope without him as we might have a better balance of midfield without him. He's hardly Mr Creative these days and that's our real problem IMO.

Why would anyone want him back after the reasons for him leaving in the first place? Not to mention how disinterested he was in games for us if things weren't going his way. But never mind, so long as he was last off the pitch, applauding the fans, that was the main thing.