MJC

Hiya Tom Boyd Hiya ya odious, sanctimonious dribbling prick 👋

In all my years I have genuinely never seen us that comfortable against Celtic. Ward’s fine save late on apart we were never in any danger of not winning that. Amazing night.

Wow! Absolutely AMAZING! We’ve beaten Rangers twice in the last couple of seasons. But beating Celtic blows that right out of the fucking water. Well done Motherwell and Get it Right Fucking up you Celtic you horrible detestable bastards. #HAPPY NEW YEAR! HAPPY NEW YEAR HULLO! HULLLO! HAPPY NEW YEAR HAPPY NEW YEAR! HA HA! HA HAAA!!!# Two firm fingers right in your faces 🖕🖕

A minor thing perhaps, but JBA is absolutely brilliant in dealing with the media. He just sticks to facts about the team and doesn’t waffle out any cliched nonsense about either us or the opposition. Top marks to him!

SO’D, Priestman and Slattery in. Welsh out, Longelo and Hendry benched.

Or another interpretation is that I don’t buy into half baked conspiracy theories and aren’t seeing things through a cliched “Rangers get everything” set of tinted specs? 🤷‍♂️

Really? This is what I was getting at when I mentioned the ‘Penalty to Rangers’ thing before. That a narrative is pushed by the media (mainstream and social) and it is then accepted as fact. And that I am being questioned/accused of being a Rangers fan or at least having a soft spot for them is quite telling. All I am doing is pointing out some glaring weaknesses in this theory. If match officials and the VAR team were as is appeared to be suggesting out to assist Rangers even to the detriment of their own professional and personal reputation, then why did they disallow them a goal at 0-0??? And let me be clear…it was clearly offside and therefore the correct decision to rule it out. But surely a set of match officials influenced by systematic bias that goes beyond unchecked or else blatant cheating officials would surely have no qualms about ‘inventing’ a reason why they thought it was onside and should stand even though all the evidence otherwise was available and would see them questioned, scrutinised and ridiculed? Or is that just me ‘showing my soft spot for Rangers’ by thinking along those lines too?

You would have a point I think if the media weren’t going out of their way to highlight every questionable decision that goes in Rangers favour. But they do. Yesterday’s alone is being described as ‘controversial’ which it was and that’s before you take into account the hysteria over “Penalty to Rangers” a couple of years ago which not very subtly implied that every penalty Rangers get is dodgy and also that they get more penalties than any other side, the latter being easily disproven by facts but that didn’t stop the narrative being pushed.

It looked a stonewaller right enough but this “blatant cheating” and “conspiracy” nonsense is just that. Nonsense. If that really were the case then we simply would not get any decision in our favour in games like these because if that ridiculous theory is to be believed then match officials along with VAR would be so brazen as to look at a decision for us/against them and know fine well what the correct decision is yet decide to give the complete opposite one. Thus opening themselves up to media scrutiny ‘trial by Sportscene’ and in some cases having their reputation and their character dragged through the mud. Any decision that goes in favour of Rangers whether justified or not is poured over, looked at from every possible angle and subjected to a level of scrutiny that decisions involving no other side would get. So why then would match officials willingly put themselves in that position when they know what is coming their way?? I will say this again. Having looked at it it WAS a penalty for us and it should have been given. I don’t know why it wasn’t. But as has been seen all too often decisions by onfield officials and VAR have been inconsistent and in some cases downright baffling. For example, Kofi Balmer’s red card against Kilmarnock last season given by VAR which was subsequently overturned. I didn’t hear anyone stamping their feet and howling about cheating and conspiracies about that.

So, the optimists will see this a chance of bouncing back and ending a run of eleven(?) losses in as many of our last home games against Celtic. But this won’t be any different. Either 0-4 or 2-3 with them scoring the winner in stoppage time. Either way we just don’t have what it takes to win this one.

I think we will be too (in the mix for a top six finish). But this season and this team has all the look of “so near, yet so far” about them. We won’t get any ‘big’ results like winning today or against Celtic on Tuesday. We saw it the last time we played them at Parkhead in October, 2-1 up yet lost 2-3 in stoppage time. The same with being 3-0 up at Tynecastle in August and clinging on to a 3-3 at the end. We’re a good side, but frustratingly not quite good enough.

That’s another sore one in a season of sore ones. Our glaring weaknesses were exposed yet again. We can’t score goals when it really matters and we can’t shut teams down when they are on top of us.

Apart from the one Hearts got at Ibrox in September eh?

If you can’t make your chances count in games like these then it’s always going to come back to bite you.

Been coming. Game over.

That’s true it will be a bonus but at the same time it’s this outlook that has hampered us against both of them in recent years. We’ve basically just shrugged our shoulders and written these games off. I don’t think we will do that under Jens regime but unfortunately I just don’t think we will be clinical or streetwise enough to get anything either today or on Tuesday.

If we’re going to get anything from either of the next two games then I reckon it will be today. It wouldn’t surprise me if Celtic drop points at Livingston today, sack Nancy, bring back O’Neill and they’ll be completely galvanised when they come to Fir Park.

There definitely is some ignorance in that but there is also some truth. We don’t have the depth that Hearts and the Old Firm have and as we saw at the weekend we struggle to create that spark when Maswanhise isn’t in the side. We also aren’t nearly strong enough up front to be considered as in the mix for the title race. Yes we play some good stuff but all too often aren’t able to make it counts at the crucial time. We have a No.9 who needs penalties or else a dozen chances in front of goal before he converts one. We are also far too lightweight and don’t have anyone in the side like a Gogic or a Devlin who can give us that toughness that we would need to seriously be considered as in contention. I do think that 4th place is a realistic target for us this season. Long way to go yet but there is cause for optimism. Ultimately though this season has all the hallmarks of “another good Motherwell team that won nothing, but could have done so much more”. Which isn’t (before the ‘faithers’ start foaming at the mouth) a bad thing.

Absolutely and I will be delighted with 2 points, or 3 or 4 from the next two games. Obviously 6 would be the stuff of dreams but we need to be realistic. The reality is that we will probably get 0.

The fact that Rangers lost today leaves me even less confident of us getting anything. They very rarely lose two league games in a row and we’ve seen this all too often over the years when one of the OF loses or drops points just before they are due to play us and we get the backlash. We will not beat either Rangers at Ibrox or Celtic at Fir Park. We might scrape a 0-0 in one of them but that will be our lot because we are not physical enough or nearly clinical enough to make it count when it will matter. I’ve heard detractors of this current Hearts side making claims that “they are a team of journeymen” or “a typical McInnes side, big and physical” but they are a well drilled team and being big and physical pays off in this league especially if you have that other critical ingredient that successful teams have…forward players who can score goals. And that is why Hearts are top of the league and deservedly so. Because they are well drilled, play as a team, have players who can mix it up and crucially have players who can score goals when it matters. We are a good side and I am really enjoying watching us this season. But we will always fall short when it really matters for the reasons I mentioned above.

1-0 home win. We’re not clinical or aggressive enough to win this.

Absolutely. We’re not a ‘darling club’ of the Scottish media like Celtic, Aberdeen or Dundee Utd so we’re always going to attract negative press from those who see us doing well as being upstarts who are daring to do better than we should be. And the fact that we’ve got an outsider leading us and making it all happen compounds it for them.

Was a tough watch but absolutely delighted with that win. That’s all that matters at the end of the day.

If we had a goalscorer we would be top of the league right now.

TJ is going to be a massive loss the next few weeks. We’re pretty toothless when he’s playing but he’s the one who can produce something.