MJC

I don’t know if I’d agree with that but I can see the argument for that. The 94/95 team that finished 2nd was pretty special and had some top quality players, but so did the ‘91 team. You think about Arnott, Kirk, Paterson, McCart and Maxwell who were really good solid players at the level they were at plus Cooper - who was genuine quality- plus Phil O’Donnell who was still breaking through but was already well on the way to be a top class player, which he would have been had it not been for injuries. Not to mention Nijholt (an excellent player) and Colin O’Neill (a Motherwell cult hero) and even Tom Boyd (a seriously good player even if he’s since shown himself to be a complete Celtic wank, the type of you’d expect to encounter in the Railway Tavern). That was a seriously good team.

As frustrating and sad that it’s now 30 years since we lifted the Scottish Cup, I will be forever grateful that it happened in my lifetime. Some absolute all time Motherwell FC legends in that team.

It’s happened plenty of times when Vigurs has played and scored against us at Fir Park since he left us.

Sums up our season to be truthful. Rotten stuff. And yes, Lawless will never cut it at this level.

There’s one upside to no fans being allowed in, as the usual mugs in our support would be applauding that chancer Vigurs for scoring against us.

To be honest I'd agree with that, as as much as I dislike Accies I do enjoy the Derby and it certainly feels like we have a 'score to settle' especially after the way the games have gone this season.

Well no one is forcing you to read it if it bothers/bores you that much. Regardless of how tonight ended up, concerns about the quality of players in the team and what next season holds are entirely valid. That’s fairly normal for football fans of any club to be concerned about and want to discuss. Though I don’t think anyone actually said that “relegation is a certainty next season”.

Never doubted us.

Long gets one back...

You know things are bad when Long is the only one who looks interested. And yes, Lawless has been a poor and totally pointless signing. I thought we’d moved away from this re-signing ex-players who need a club policy.

A lot of them inevitably will be, but this is when we will see what GA is made of as a manager as he will also have to bring in a good few signings of his own and spend a full pre-season getting the squad in shape. We’ve seen this work before when McGhee came in first time in 2007 and if we are to see an improvement next year, we will need Alexander to do similar.

This team is just not good enough to rely on them to get a result regardless of whether we’ve got the ‘foot on the gas’ or not. We’ve been dismal all season and didn’t score a single equaliser until the end of January and even since then we’ve not looked in any way convincing whenever we’ve fallen behind in a game. Needless to say there are a huge number of issues that need dealt with this summer if next season is to be any better.

And there is is, 2-0 - game over.

Yes I do. I’ve seen this movie too many times this season to know how this goes. As I type, Shankland misses a penalty...

Game over I reckon. Don’t see us getting anything from this now.

Very likely that’s the last time we’ll see Campbell in a Motherwell shirt. Horrible way to end his time with us.

Yes, rightfully so. Hopefully we get a decent result tonight to put a decent end to what has been a poor season.

I genuinely did not see something like this coming and nor would I have thought it was possible, especially after everything that's happened over the past fourteen months. But what a fantastic move from the club and let's hope that there is a huge uptake on this offer which I'm sure there will be. Well done to everyone who has made this possible.

Exactly, plus it reduces the likelihood of their fans getting tickets for the home ends.

Yes but there weren’t many Motherwell managers other than McCall who had such a good squad of players at their disposal and at a time when circumstances were very much in his/our favour. Yet for all we did well, really well, in the league during his tenure, McCall’s Cup record in the same time was a disgrace and indeed saw us record two of the most embarrassing results in our entire history (Rangers in 2012 and Albion Rovers in 2014). That for me was a major black mark against him and a massive missed opportunity to win silverware again. And to get back to the subject of the playoff, there was not a snowballs chance in hell we would have won that had McCall still been in charge of us.

The tension was massive before and during both games. This was serious, serious stuff as relegation would have been a hammer blow for the club and losing to Rangers, particularly under McCall would have made it all the worse. I know what you mean about there being no ‘day trippers’ and that’s what makes the Ibrox game in particular all the more sweeter for me. To be part of that group of Well fans in that corner, there more in desperate hope more than anything else I think(I certainly was) to support the team in a massive game, one of the biggest in the clubs history. It wasn’t about ‘a day out’ or a jolly into Glasgow more for the ‘sesh’ pre and most patch than the game itself, or folk bringing their maws pal that works in the butcher who has no interest in football, this was proper football tension and the Motherwell support that night were magnificent. The ‘Twist and Shout’ at the end in an empty Ibrox having just pulled off a result that hardly anyone saw coming was incredible.

Ainsworth’s goal to put us 3-0 up that night was one of the best and most surreal moments I’ve ever had supporting ‘Well. I remember just screaming “is this actually fucking happening?!” for about 60 seconds after it hit the net. I still didn’t believe we were actually going to do it until the second goal in the second leg.

Sticking it to McCall was also a bonus for me as well. Considering he set us on the road to that point with his poor signings and lazy attitude it seemed horribly inevitable that he would finish the job. But of course as we all know, McCall couldn’t win a big knockout tie to save himself and the rest is history. I look at that as karma for all the Cup ties that we bottled under his watch, not least the one at Ibrox a few years earlier.

Indeed. As great as it was at the time, and utterly mental the celebrations at the sixth goal, had we actually gone on to win that game 7-6 having been 6-2 down with something like half an hour remaining then it truly would have been one of our best ever results and a magnificent win.

I’m still disappointed we didn’t win that game.