Gaffer

I think you've just picked out what you wanted to from my post. How can the manager possibly be blamed for having almost no time to bring in a new bunch of players, get them fit and familiar with a style he wants to play, and all within a few weeks. It's bizarre and if this was any other walk of life you'd be considered unreasonable to say the least. We're the most successful club, but we're nowhere near the best team now. We've got a long time before we get back to that. The difference is that I'm living in the present, with a sense of perspective about the road ahead of us. Too many are stuck in the past. In my opinion, many of the fans of our club are nowhere near the best and yet we "demand" the best. I think our fans have to change, just as China as the manager and players do. I'm personally embarrassed by the reaction our fans have to poor performances. I'm always disappointed and frustrated too, but I continue to support my team and that means cheering them on the pitch and it certainly never means calling for someone to resign after his first few games. In fact, some wanted him to resign before he even joined. Is that a real supporter? I don't get half as disappointed at our team as I do when I read some of what's posted on here. There is however one thing we can agree on. Based on your lofty expectations, we are definitely in for a long season. I will however remain optimistic and I'm looking forward to seeing how the manager and new players perform over the next few months. That seems reasonable to me, but I accept it's not for you. P.s. You assume a lot in thinking I'm not under intense scrutiny by the media, shareholders, etc. I know what intense scrutiny feels like. I am however dealing with (i.e. Having to report to) reasonable and sensible people - mainly. I guess therefore I am lucky compared to PC.

And if we really want to be regarded as being the best supporters, we need to start behaving like it. Of course the manager takes responsibility, but that doesn't mean he has to resign. That's just crazy.

Nor should they be! I've had a couple of shocking days at my work in the past few months but I wouldn't expect to be sacked either. You guys really need to get a grip and stop this hysteria. We lost a game of football because one team took their two chances and we didn't take ours. We won the first game and should have been out of sight at half time. That's football. As for the manager being sacked because he should make sure the players are fit .... fitness is about mental fitness too and if you're the attacking team (which we were), it takes 6-7 weeks to reach the sharpness required for this style of football (or any other for that matter). Progres should be commended because they had a game plan which relied on them putting eleven men behind the ball and keeping us out. They did it brilliantly, and it annoys me to hear them called a pub team. There are few pro teams that can keep the concentration going for as long as they did and I take my hat off to them.

This is surely a wind up!?!? I feel myself just about to jump into a sentence or twelve about the lack of sense of perspective, and the unbelievable negativity from some of our support, and then I think what's the point. There are obviously many people that get a sense of satisfaction out of being so down on our club. Not me! I'm optimistic, but pragmatic too. We were almost finished as a club and thankfully we were saved thanks to the efforts of a few. I'm sure those few had times when things were going badly for them, but they had the determination and persistence to keep going. That's the attitude we need across our support, and it's ironic that those calling our players weak, an embarassment, and lacking bottle, are the very people that have the same traits themselves. I don't mean that as an attempt at an insult, but more an attempt to let some see their own reflection in the mirror. Having said that, I'm sure people like yourself really mean it when you say the season is over so allow me to help. A few of my friends are still desperately trying to get season tickets near us so if you want to sell me your ticket, please pm me. It'll be a win for both of us then. Cheers.

There's no way he wrote that rubbish, at least not while sober. It's utter nonsense and the part about arguing with fans is twisting things to such a ridiculous level. Surely not from him!

One incentive for the other clubs not to get involved is the threat of us boycotting their stadiums. That would kill them off. They nearly were killed off without us, and they don't want to risk that again. Most of them however know that there's no prospect of it happening anyway so they might as well keep quiet.

I'd offer you a year's wages to do just that limeburner. It seems that you enjoy trolling real supporters on here. Why? There's no need for it. By all means contribute something worth reading. There are plenty of people on here with alternative views and opinions to mine, but at least they provide a decent argument or rationale rather than just mindless negativity. Let's hear your pearls of wisdom rather than this relentless trolling approach you've adopted. I may be alone in saying this, but I'd actually be interested to hear your considered opinion.

I'd love to know what horse you are backing. It's clearly not Rangers, so who is it?

You do not represent most fans at all. Most fans are sensible people with a desire to support the club, it's manager, and it's players. It would be so much better for the majority of fans if you did the same.

Everything is wrong?!? Where were you for the past few years? Let's get things in perspective. I can see there's no changing your mind, and I certainly didn't post expecting it to achieve that. Going by your rationale, Barcelona play with 1 up front too. Most top teams do too. As for being apoplectic with rage, this is one thing we can agree on. I wasn't in a rage, and I'd hope I never am again when it comes to my team. I only got angry when I saw people deliberately tear our club apart before we were rescued two years ago. What I see now is a group of managers, coaches and players trying to do their best to restore the club to its rightful place, and for that they'll only ever get support from me. That's what being supporter is about for me. The clue is in the name.

I'd be embarrassed if our club put out a statement such as the one Celtic released the other day. I can understand the need to placate your own supporters but this was a step too far and made them look desperate and pathetic. This statement by Dave King is measured in its tone and content, and yet still manages to say GIRUY. Nice one Dave!

Another myth is that a 5 man midfield is something that needs to be matched by another 5 man midfield. When both sides have 11 players, it means we have 'spare' players elsewhere on the pitch. However, in our game against Progres we had 3 men in 'midfield' that failed to move the ball quickly enough to the forward players. We could have overloaded the opposition had we done that, but there were two reasons we couldn't. First of all, we didn't have the width (as I mentioned earlier), but secondly we failed to move their back four (by switching or even just moving the ball quicker) enough to create the space for our other attacking players to exploit and attack. We need to work on this. We saw it work well in th first half against Progres but the players need to learn how to do this when playing against teams operating with a high line. They didn't adapt quickly enough and we lost.

From the games past be seen him manage so far, I don't see anything that suggests we sit in and hit on the break. Do you? As for one up front, this is a myth. 4-2-3-1 is the most popular structure for a reason. It means teams can transition to 4-5-1 when required, but go directly to 3-4-3 when attacking. So, in actual fact we have 3 up front, with the number 10 (Nico) following up. The danger is that we start to criticise the formation after a defeat or poor performance. The formation is relatively insignificant. It's the transitions, defensive line, width, ball speed, and movement that's the really important defining factor, but the pundits don't talk about that because they don't understand it. It's why we are so obsessed with formations. It's an attempt t dumb down the game. We lost the other night, and we lost because we had no width in the first half. Miller wanted to cut inside always and that meant that Wallace was ineffective on the overlap. Although he changed that in the second half, we did not move the ball quickly enough, and we achieved only 3 switches of play. Rossiter did not play the ball quickly enough forward so it meant that Progres could maintain a high line. We had too many tactical issues but I saw it more that the players didn't perform. I'm sure PC could see this too and I'd expect him to fix it. I'm gutted we are out of Europe, but I don't feel the depths of despair that many on here do.

Many on here (including you) are judging Dalcio after two games. I'm judging McKay after two seasons and I've yet to see an effective player in him. There's no doubt he had the potential but not the attitude or desire, so I'd much rather take a risk on someone who might be effective (i.e. Dalcio), rather than stick with someone who has proven that he is not.

I'm sorry, but this isn't correct. You can of course choose to judge a player after two games, but it would be crazy and the facts don't support this approach. Most signings are made having looked at their stats and performances over dozens, if not hundreds of games. Some people claim to have a skills for it (sometimes referred to as "an eye for a player") but again the stats show that the clubs who select based on selected criteria and stats are 30 times more likely to identify an effective player over a club which uses scouts that attend a couple of games. If you're interested, I can direct you to the sources of this research. I know that our new director of football will be using such techniques so it'll be interesting to see how our recruitment approach changes.

I remember Advocaat going through the same when he arrived. We were well beaten by Hearts if I remember correctly and a couple of months later hammered by Celtic and many were calling for his head. We tend to be like that as a support. I remember the same with Hateley as well because he was "the worst striker we've ever seen". We're a new team that performed really badly in 90 minutes across the two ties. It happens. It's so frustrating, but it happens. Let's get things into a little bit of perspective. I know there are many who didn't want to give PC a chance and that'll be even more so now, but he's our manager and we should support him until he is given enough time to provide one way or another if he is up to the job. It's been less than a month since most of our team has played together. A bit more patience please.

This has been too slow tonight. Morelos is nowhere near fit enough yet so I expect he will be swapped. Miller keeps drifting inside and we are losing width. He may move more centrally and bring on Dalcio to give us the width on that side. We sorely need it. Rossiter is taking too long to make the forward pass too. If we up the pace, even slightly, we will score.

We never know exactly how much is paid for players, or how much is yet due as a result of additional clauses. And you know what .... we don't have to. We have a board which is responsible for that. It's their job to manage our finances and make the right decisions, and from what I can tell they seem to be doing a good job. I'm sure we're all happy with that because we have day jobs and I'd rather not have to worry about anything other than how our team performs on the pitch. That may be dangerous for people like me to have such an attitude, especially given the issues of the last few years. That's why I'm happy to pay into Club 1872, as I'm hoping that it's sizeable ownership can act as a check and balance against any future rogue actions. But let's not get into that again. Let's just look forward to a cracking game of football tonight, and a win!

Your post just demonstrates what we have now ..... options. I hope the selection continues to be a problem for us and PC, because that's a sign that we have a strong squad. Last season, there was very little to debate about, given the ineffectiveness of most of our players. Even looking at the score predictor now it looks as if there is much more variation in people's anticipated first goal scorer. Let's hope the goals this season are spread about more too .... although it would be very pleasing to see one of our strikers hit 20+ goals for once.

That's all paper talk so I wouldn't pay any attention to those numbers, but your assumption about values is wrong. A player that's worth 10m is not 10 times better than a player worth 1m. All they need to be is better enough to be worth paying that sort of money. Pogba isn't 11 times better than Kante, but he was worth that to United so they paid it. The horse that wins the national gets 16 times more than second place, even if it's the difference of a nose. If McKay was worth 1m to any other team, they'd have bid that for him. If he was worth more than 750k to us, we wouldn't sell him. The simple fact is that he is a boy with tons of talent, but the wrong attitude. It's a shame, and as much as I'd like us to get 3m for him, there's no chance. I hope he manages to move on and learn to change his ways fast, but I doubt it unfortunately.

You're usually correct Frankie, but I'm really hoping he plays one of the new strikers so we can see what difference it makes. I'm not someone who rates Miller as you know, but he does probably deserve to retain his place, but I can't help but be excited at the prospect of Candeais, Nico and Dalcio providing the ammo for Morelos. Either way, we have goals in the team so it would be pleasing if we could start scoring more freely, even if this Lux team is very well organised.

No they wouldn't. Who would Celtic sell him to for more? I'm sure if another club was interested, he'd be gone. He is a talented player, but hard work beats talent, unless talent works hard. He doesn't, and that's why he's ineffective despite his undoubted talent.

Where do you think he would fit into our first eleven? I haven't seen enough of him to know where he'd be best played.

I think I could have scored a couple of goals on Thursday. All we need is someone that has the attitude to get in the box for those crosses and cut backs. McCoist (am I allowed to mention his name these days) would be scoring for fun in this team.

I'd challenge the need to replace Holt because I thought he did very well in the first half last week, however I completely agree with the other two. I can't fault the effort and work rate of Waghorn and Miller, but I think we need the quality of Candeas (sp?) and the finishing prowess (albeit still to be proven for us) of Herrera or Morelos.