MJC

Halcyon days. I often find my mind drifting back to that wet Tuesday night in 2012 as we lost 2-0 to Panathinaikos without laying a glove on them. Ah such memories and such fun.

18 years since we last managed to knock them out of a cup. That was a 2-0 win after extra time at Love Street in 2005. Since then we’ve lost our last four cup ties against them. The 3-0 gubbing at Love St. in January 2006 when they were in the lower leagues, the loss by the same scoreline at their new ground in the league cup in 2009 under Gannon and the 4-4/penalty defeat in the Scottish Cup at FP just before lockdown in 2020 still give me nightmares. We also lost a SC replay in Paisley in 2009.

Since this current format for the LC was introduced in 2016 we have been drawn against Premiership opposition in all bar one knockout tie. And outwith 17/18 we have won just one of them. I cannot see that getting any better in Paisley in a fortnights time. Our luck with Cup draws is absolutely ridiculous, particularly in the League Cup.

Awful draw as usual for us. We’re not winning that one.

It probably is. I’m generally ‘glass half empty’ with most things. I’m not bothered how the rest of the board view me. I’m on here to read and give views on the club and the team, not to be ‘popular’ or try and score points through snidey wee remarks. I’ll admit I have occasionally lowered myself to the likes of the aforementioned weeyin’s level and bit back but in the main I’d much prefer to discuss the football.

Slattery looks a few yards faster and a good bit fitter than he did last season from what I’ve seen so far. I know these games aren’t the best at measuring players fitness and performance levels but he has stood out so far.

He took his goal well and that was about it. He won’t do for us going into the league campaign unless we bring in another forward who he can play off. Today wasn’t great performance wise but we got the win and managed to scrape a seeded spot for the last sixteen so our aim has been achieved for this group. We will need to improve greatly if we are to progress beyond the next round. The big positive has to be Lennon Miller who bagged another goal and looked comfortable and composed throughout.

It depends how you look at football and supporting the club. If you view it purely as an entertainment, a hobby, something you do on a Saturday afternoon like going to the cinema to pass the time then you would have a point. I invest a great deal of time, effort and money into supporting the club. It goes way beyond just a hobby or a spectator sport for me. I am fully aware that a lot of the times I am not going to be entertained, take joy out of it, but that’s part and parcel of it. I support the club through thick and thin and the hope that we can get to cup finals/have cup runs/win a cup helps drive my desire to keep supporting. I realise it’s unlikely to happen most of the time but you have to have that bit of hope. I’m glad you still laugh at that. Because you frequently come across as a boring, pedantic and argumentative individual who would try and start an argument in an empty room with alot of your posts and retorts on here, so if that gives you a reason to laugh then crack on.

Global warming. I couldn’t give a shit about it. If it’s happening then it’s happening and there’s nothing that I or anyone else can do to stop it. Yes we were very lacklustre against a lower league side with ten men, but it’s hard to see this team properly ‘going for it’ in terms of racking up goals because we just don’t have it in us.

I didn’t even realise that’s who that was until the club Twitter posted that it was Page. Yeah 16 year old Miller is easily our standout player so far. That’s both worrying and brilliant at the same time.

Nice long putt there from Wilkinson.

Could easily have been 0-1 down there then go straight up the park and a cool finish from young Miller.

A golf club would be an upgrade on Wilkinson.

That’s the scariest thing, this is the best we have available and it’s not very good.

That is one thoroughly uninspiring lineup. 0-0 looming here.

Getting back to tomorrow’s game, this is one we need to win. It won’t be easy and it won’t be pretty but I think we’ll just edge it 1-0.

No, the manager has my full support.

I’m certainly not making any judgements on him yet I’m just asking the question. As I said earlier he has earned his chance to make his own signings and give them the chance to settle in. Early signs are uninspiring but only time will tell how they work for us in the new season.

Well as things stand it’s a case of “so far, so good” from Stuart Kettlewell’s management of the team. To come in in February and lead us to relative safety from the position we were in when he took over was an excellent achievement so he deserved huge credit for that. What now though as we enter his first full season? We’ve lost KvV and Johnston, two of the key players in the Kettlewell revival last season and the signings we’ve made so far and the squad options aren’t exactly inspiring. But there is of course still time and the manager deserves his chance to get his first full transfer window under his belt before any judgements are made. At the moment he has done well enough but I have concerns heading into the new season. edit: just noticed the Stuart Kettlewell discussion thread. Feel free to delete or merge this.

He has a point, I don’t see anything wrong with what he has said. I don’t think it’s a suggestion that we actually sign any of those players mentioned, rather players of those standard who are quite a bit better than what we currently have on our books.

Absolutely agree, after all we’re Motherwell not Barcelona. We’re a wee club punching way above our weight. I’ve been proudly riding the rollercoaster that is Motherwell FC for years and am aware that we were in the first division in the early eighties. There’s still plenty of time for us to bring in signings and welcome them to our great wee club as we continue to exist to improve people’s lives. ’Mon the Well

We’re always ‘skint’ or so the club keep telling us.

If this is the standard of players we are bringing in then we are in big trouble. I am fully aware that we have budget restrictions (hiya weeyin, spiderpig etc) but signing St.Johnstone flops certainly doesn’t bode well. As things stand the first team lack goal threat and any sort of creativity and given how much we relied on van Veen last season for goals then you’ve got to be concerned about how we are going to cope without him.

Us drawing Airdrie give me the fear as they would almost certainly beat us.

Twitter or the standards of the contents of my posts? No arguments on the Twitter front to be fair…