DMAA

Possibly. It’s also possible we bring him in to give him an easy 6 months of settling in, ready to compete for a place next season when Barisic moves on. Rather than taking him in with weeks to go until qualifiers.

That’s a good point. 3 changes is very prohibitive. I think it is incredibly unlikely we sell and replace Dessers at this point in the window, even less likely when it weakens our Euro squad.

Yes, 13 last.

Non-pen goals per 90 is a far better barometer, and he's in line with Dessers in the league this season (who barely even got started with us until Clement came in). Shankland has scored 15 penalties over this season and last and that makes a huge difference to his numbers. He's clearly hit a great run of form recently but there is literally no indication at all we are interested. The Silva signing pretty much sealed it for me because he will not have been cheap, his wages will be high and there was probably a fee too, and I never believed we would bring in two expensive strikers in one window.

That was fan generated nonsense by the way.

It isn’t really. All through January there’s been a massive clamour for Shankland among Rangers fans and every single one of them don’t seem to think Silva is a striker. Clement has signed him to play and I think it’s very unlikely he’ll play him out of position. Maybe left forward if needed, but he confirmed himself he signed him to play CF.

The Shankland fan club will never accept it but Silva is a striker and will play a major part in the rest of the season. He’s not prolific but he will score goals and bring quality to our front line.

I think we looked increasingly well coached, even though the quality is lacking at times. And I’m very hopeful Silva will have a very good few months with us. I think he adds a lot to the team.

Would be very happy with that one. Excellent going forward.

Sima confirmed as out “long term”. Forget striker, we are absolutely desperate for a wde forward now.

Always wondered why we can't recruit directly from academies like that.

I think it remains pretty important in Scotland. It's one of the main ways poor teams in our league get success against us. Agree on tackling though. Diomande’s tackling stats at pretty hard to understand. A mix of good and bad.

Just in case people haven't seen his stats. https://x.com/KieranScouting/status/1748985505989935502?s=20

Red flags were there in the stats for most of our summer signings. In particular, the stats indicated that only Sima was a good goalscorer. The rest all had very average xG vs Goals, or very poor in Lammers’ case. I don't know how Beale expected that to go. The usual caveats apply with Diomande as with any in terms of settling in and adapting, but I don't see red flags in his stats at least, other than being hopeless in the air. Very good signing on paper.

Big fan of the Diomande signing. Centre mid urgently needed strengthening, and Diomande seems to have the skillset to make an instant impact but develop into a better player over time. A return to a trading model after a summer window where we abandoned it. Diomande is more promising than Cifuentes for me, only concern being that the stats suggest he is utterly hopeless in the air. You can't have it all though.

Could the handball rule be more confusing? Johnston is looking right at the ball, and the ball was just about to fall at Sima’s feet so the handball directly interferes with play. He moves his hand towards the ball. It makes no sense to me.

Incredible

Absolutely amazing. Happy to admit that I did not see that coming at all. That result is up there with our best ones in Europe for me. What a morale boost that is for us.

It's very satisfying that Hart’s form has plummeted at the same time.

Which is exactly what the stats said. I remember quoting the stats on here pre-season and they showed that neither Dessers or Danilo were that good in front of goal, and Lammers was horrendous, but the best by far was Sima. And so it has turned out. I think Danilo certainly has shown more than Dessers and Lammers though.

I thought he made an impact initially, played some good through balls, but then did nothing right the rest of the game. I think k taking Cantwell off at that point will come back to haunt Clement. Made the wrong call with the starting line up, and has possibly damaged his relationship with one of our most talented players beyond repair. Granted he has been poor, but look at everyone else? Major lack of quality across the team and Cantwell would have offered more quality in the final third than most.

The writing was on the wall when Betis lost.

Lammers is just so poor though. Struggle to watch him.

Very poor decision. Playing Cantwell wide to accommodate Lammers is just not a good decision. Cantwell should be central and mcausland wide. I fear Clement is going to waste and lose one of our best talents, and he's backing at least two duds out there tonight.

Mostly with the same players too. There's every reason to be optimistic at the moment. He has a huge job trying to win the league though.