Did Walter do wrong?

[Gribz 847]

Can we question his decision to start with Hemdani in the centre, Davis on the right (who is non-exsistant there) and not start our inform scorer Nacho Novo??

 

Fair play to Darcheville who works his socks off up there on his own but the guy needs better support. If Cousin had the same attitude as JCD we could see a pretty darn good partnership.

 

For me Ferguson and Thomson are always going to sit in the middle but id rather see a attacking man (Buffel) infront of them causing the opposition problems than a defensive man (Hemdani) doing extra tidying up and passing backwards.

[ian1964 10,720]

My answer to that question would have to be NO !,if this and if that,doesn't really make any difference IMO.Zenit have quality players,we don't,they were the better team,simple as that.I'm proud of the effort our players have put in this season,I just hope we can recover and go on to lift the title.WATP

[alexscottislegend 2,306]

I actually thought that just before they scored, we were playing our best stuff. The ITV team were saying that WS must have thought about replacing Darch. Think he could have brought Novo on then instead of waiting till his hand was forced. Even then the wee man nearly equalised. If we had scored first, I am convinced we would not have lost; for all their impressive football they never hurt us till Arshavin put that ball past Carlos.

[calscot 0]

Thought we were pretty unlucky last night or maybe the reality is we didn't get much luck.

 

We created the better chances while Zenit had most of the ball. The shooting statistics are a joke as countless Zenit "backpasses" to Alexander will be counted as "shots on target".

 

In the end we gave them a good game and don't deserve most of the negative reporting we're getting about the game.

 

Yes, Zenit were marginally better, but not by much. We were well in the game right up until the last minute. We just couldn't put one of our many excellent chances away and were seemingly denied a "double" penalty shout when they simultaneously handled the ball while their keeper brought down one of our players in a late tackle.

 

Their first goal came from an unfortunate and lucky ball through Cuellar's legs.

 

Hopefully we can build on the experience and with some new faces, can go on and give another good account of ourselves next season.

 

We've played 19 Euro games in one seasonwhich used to take us about 4 or 5 years for players to get that kind of experience. Let's hope it improves our younger players.

[Gribz 847]

We've played 19 Euro games in one seasonwhich used to take us about 4 or 5 years for players to get that kind of experience. Let's hope it improves our younger players.

 

Good point, thats half a domestic season.

 

It can only be good for our more average type players like Broadfoot, and will bring them on a good bit and make them better players in general, placing them above the average band.

[pete 2,499]

Personally i don't rate Broadfoot and hope we bring in a better right back. Davis is also starting to disappoint although it is maybe to expect that he may go through a bad patch as Thomson did last year. Hemdani just isn't at the races anymore and i feel we should bring in a good defensive playmaker. Putting Fergie back in that role may be the answer but i don't know if his reading of the game and defending are good enough to do it.

[Gribz 847]

Personally i don't rate Broadfoot and hope we bring in a better right back. Davis is also starting to disappoint although it is maybe to expect that he may go through a bad patch as Thomson did last year. Hemdani just isn't at the races anymore and i feel we should bring in a good defensive playmaker. Putting Fergie back in that role may be the answer but i don't know if his reading of the game and defending are good enough to do it.

 

I dont rate Broadfoot either and hope Whittaker moves to be long term RB or bring someone else in. But it looks like Walter fancies Whittaker as a vertisile midfielder - similar to what Ricksen was under previous managers - and i was against this also as I prefer more attacking midfielders.

 

However these games will still give the likes of Broadfoot that experience that he couldnt have dreamed of getting at St Mirren.

[ascender 352]

I think what he's achieved while being halfway through a rebuilding exercise has been phenomenal to be honest. Last night though I did kind of hope that he'd have just gone 4-4-2 and gone for it. There was absolutely nothing to lose, but at the same time, why change something that's worked so well?

 

Our shortcomings in the squad are clear to everyone, but hopefully that'll be more than rectified in the summer given the successful season we've had and the bonus revenue coming in.

 

The SPL is there for the taking, hopefully last night will make the guys even more determined to win it now.

[Guest ackbar]

Yes he did make a mistake, he ignored the x factor of playing an in form player in order to stick to his system that is designed to win over two legs.

 

Nacho should have started.

[craig 5,199]

Thought we were pretty unlucky last night or maybe the reality is we didn't get much luck.

 

We created the better chances while Zenit had most of the ball. The shooting statistics are a joke as countless Zenit "backpasses" to Alexander will be counted as "shots on target".

 

In the end we gave them a good game and don't deserve most of the negative reporting we're getting about the game.

 

Yes, Zenit were marginally better, but not by much. We were well in the game right up until the last minute. We just couldn't put one of our many excellent chances away and were seemingly denied a "double" penalty shout when they simultaneously handled the ball while their keeper brought down one of our players in a late tackle.

 

Their first goal came from an unfortunate and lucky ball through Cuellar's legs.

 

Hopefully we can build on the experience and with some new faces, can go on and give another good account of ourselves next season.

 

We've played 19 Euro games in one seasonwhich used to take us about 4 or 5 years for players to get that kind of experience. Let's hope it improves our younger players.

 

You are right Calscot, we DO agree on most things.

 

I actually think that everything was playing into our hands until they scored. We came out 2nd half and looked the better team to me, creating a couple of half chances in the process. I don't think we should have had a penalty though.

 

But having said all of that, Zenit had much possession but did little with it - in fact, I felt that Fiorentina caused us more problems than Zenit.

 

Their first goal was a slide rule pass but, as you say, was unlucky in that it went through Cuellar's legs - but Broadfoot too allowed himself to drift wide instead of coming narrow when all the Zenit players were narrow.

 

I think we gave a good account of ourselves.

 

I agree that Novo should have started and, in fact, my preference would have been Novo on the right with Davis playing advanced and Hemdani making way. Hemdani is either badly out of form or completely disinterested - he was awful last night.

 

Re Whittaker playing RB I am sure you will be right Gribz but, yet again, I thought he had a very good game at LM.

 

Thomson is now a vital player for us and Papac I thought was excellent too last night.