buster.

It's one thing being a supporter and another being a football manager considering their due diligence wrt to a future job. More especially, expectation levels relative to financial backing. There will be no shortage of willing candidates, but it's about getting a decent manager who isn't desperate for a job because he can't get one that pays as much, elsewhere.

However they go about it, I just hope they get it right this time. I think there will be a fair few of the better managers who aren't unemployed who won't want the Ibrox job under current circumstances.

The day Steve Clarke took charge of his first game for Kilmarnock.

It's one thing if the board already more or less have something in place but what you don't want is a rushed appointment.

Guess work

You might see counter-measures taken by the board this week to try and push back against those with a similar thouight.

We went out on to the park at Ibrox that day with belief that we could win the game,....however when it came to the crux, we shrank and basically bottled it (or at least to a degree). Today, we were scared from the get-go. Perhaps it had been drummed into them not to give anything away, hang back and not press to high but if so, we weren't remotely capable of carrying out that plan out and resembled a poor school team with so many unforced errors, it was hardly believable.

Is McCrorie suspended for the next league game ? ...(as Alves might be injured)

A lot of these players are better than the way they are playing today. There is no belief or mentality that we could win, they have looked scared.

The way these players are going about things, it wouldn't make any difference.

That was as bad a 45 minutes as we could have played. Nothing there, nothing. This team could end up 4th or 5th in the league.

I think he could have read anything and it would have told him the need to match up in the middle. The important thing is he appears to have altered things accordingly. Now the players need to do the business and in the middle it won't be easy.....but then the best things are never easy.

Murty said we'd be playing 3 in the middle.

'Look at Me'

To have a chance of success .......Halliday, Docherty and Dorrans have to keep the discipline, concentration and play very well.

The midfield 3 is the area we tend to struggle. Goalkeeper, defence and attack...I don't see much difference other than subs bench. Middle is where they have a distinct edge. Brown and Ntcham are good at retaining possession and setting things up..Rogic is a danger going forward. We have to hope our midfield lads play above themselves and Murty gives them a chance with the set-up.

That's a middle of the midfield three that won't be short of will and effort but also one that may be prone to mistakes when pressed. Dorrans playing slightly further forward is very capable if he can have one of his better games and the two wide players can also make a difference. Solid, compact, 90 minutes of hard work and the right mentality = We have a fighting chance (and the 7/2 odds for a win look generous / I had a tenner on Motherwell at 5/2 yesterday)

Att.: 18,470 Very poor number, I'd have expected 23-25,000. Will mean a combined 68,000 ish and Motherwell will get the financial benefit of an approx. 34,000 crowd. There is always a lot of anger wrt to ticket allocation etc, for this type of game but for me the above is the injustice. The ticket allocation issue is simple: a 50/50 split at a neutral venue but if tickets aren't sold within cut-off period, they go to the other team if they are sold out.

He's done a remarkable job. That table shows 20 league games and Clarke has been with Kilmarnock for 24 league games. The 4 other league games were: DDLW Rangers (A) 1-1 Celtic (A) 1-1 Hibs (H) 0-3 Hearts (A) 1-3 It's ironic that his first game was at Ibrox (1-1) and it was also Pedro's last game. It's too obvious that he's our best realistic name as manager. Today they won their 6th league game IAR. To put that into context, celtic have only managed a run of 3 wins IAR this season. We have done 4IAR, twice.

I'd wait until we get the 55th before thinking about removing the stars. Possibly enlarge the middle start the season post title win and after that see what opinions pointed toward.

IMO Sunday is more about an effective collective (team) set-up in a specific way, than the merits of individuals. Mentality, commitment and desire also play a huge part in these games and have to be considered. On a messageboard, rather than at the training sessions makes it only 'gut guesswork' and we'll soon enough see what actually transpires.

Tav and Morelos

I'll forgive him if he can pick the right team and set them up in a way that can put us into the SC final.

If we want a different outcome I think we need to chaange the way we go about things. I think we have to make it difficult for them to play, protect our central defence via a sitter (McCrorie) and make the midfield as solid as possible. I made a point of watching part of the Hamilton v Celtic game last weekend and they were dismal in the last third, haven't been scoring that many goals of late and wouldn't find a well organised defence easy to create against. Don't worry too much if we aren't making too many chances aslong as they don't score and become more adventurous in the last half hour. And although we want to win, remember, we don't need to win this game to go through (penalties are possible). I'd like to go through and I don't care if it takes 'boring football' to do it. --------------------- No passengers allowed so Windass, if fit, can take a seat on the bench. As can Goss. I'd consider Holt, Haliday and Miller. Players who have already put celtic out of the Cup, know what the fixture is about and work hard at the parts of the game that will be necessary. I'd drop Docherty for this one (celtic will target it him with an immediate press because his distribution has been poor at times).