Tweed

Back on to O'Brien - since he stopped playing our results have got worse. Fact. Whether he would have made a difference with Aberdeen in the back of his mind is debatable.

Our three best players by far were Ruddy, Reynolds and Jennings. But Ruddy was the best and gets my vote.

I think he meant Pollock instead of McHugh - McHugh stared v ICT no? Could be wrong. I never noticed that when I read it but its far from the worst match report I have ever read.

What should be done with referees? My opinions are: 1. Pick your ten most experienced referees and they do all SPL games. Half way through the season they are graded and if they have not met the standard they are demoted and the top performers from the next group move up. This would mean referees such as Alan Muir would not be in the SPL as early in their career and can make their mistakes at a lower level. Think back three years and every time we saw we were getting Charlie Richmond and everyone though Aw shite he's murder. But look at him today - he has developed into, in my opinion, the best Scotland has. Another couple of years at a lower level and some of the nightmares he had in the SPL could have happened out of the media spotlight. Alan Muir will probably become a decent SPL ref in time but the reputational damage from our game v United will stick to him for a while which can only hinder him. 2. Team up refs and assistants. Its unreal that the assistants are working with different referees every week. Let them build up a working relationship and develop as a team. Its the same as a team's players. Look at Aston Villa - same team playing same formation every week. And they are winning every week. Yet Liverpool with better players who are chopping and changing are not winning as often. The same consistency applies to the refs. 3. On the feedback issue Gannon is right. The SFA ref observer is a valuable tool but those who are being affected by the decisions they make should have an impact too. A four or five question sheet about the officials could be used to improve them. 4. They should include a referees course on the manager's coaching badges to improve an understanding of the game.

Positives Scored two goals against the team that will probably win the league Commitment was unquestionable Jutkiewitz was miles better than last week Ruddy and Reynolds were superb Two young boys who were out of their depth gained some great experience They needed to score wonderful goals to beat us (and if we make it like that every week the poorer teams won't!) Negatives Right back's positional sense is a nonsense Right back's crossing ability is rotten We were too deep second half (though I suspect part of that was partly Celtic's doing) They got into our box far too easily Overall we are never going to benchmark our season based on results against Celtic and Rangers but I think that showed lots of good things about us despite the fact that Celtic had the vast majority of the game. Most teams are finding it hard to win against us because we don't give in and we are stubborn and organised at the back. I was irritated at the end of the game but when being reflective I think today has more positives than negatives.

Hugh Dallas comments! http://www.motherwell-mad.co.uk/news/tmnw/...799/index.shtml

I think it'll be called off cos of fog.

I thought Andy Devlin (journalist) was hosting!

General point but I think the SFA should team up assistants and referees so that they become familiar with each other. In England they stay together all the time and there seems to be more understanding. Also I wonder if there are some refs who are more encouraging to their assistants to get involved. I have noted two or three times this season that Mike Tumilty has been praised for taking the advice of his assistants. Also McManus got sent off at Parkhead on the say so of a linesman. So definite exceptions but I think your point is very valid.

A few errors, the yellow card for Murphy, the HAmmell yellow card and the handball were all mistakes so marked down a wee bit but on the whole nothing game changing in my view and at least had a sensible understanding of how the game was flowing so I'd give him 7/10.

I've watched the highlights about four times and I am still not sure if that was a pen or not. Yellow card was definitely a joke but the Hibs player makes contact with the ball too as you can see the direction change but not sure which order he hits them in and there is no angle that gives you a clear view. Got to say it looks more of a pen now than it did to me at the game but still not 100% convinced.

I see our chum Mr Muir from last week sent three players and one manager off in the QoS v ICT game yesterday.

Coke never wasted a ball that I can remember and on a day of shit passing that gets my vote.

Not 100% sure but I suspect that could be an error.

Not sure about that. Just think that Brines is generally no that good. And he was no that good again. I don't think the refs are going to change their attitude towards us because of what JG says. If we get a reputation for being dirty like United and Hearts have then the benefit of the doubt goes. For now I think we're fine. Also I don't disagree with much Gannon has said however I don't see how falling out with the press and the referees is going to benefit us as a team. I think he should speak to them and only talk about the game, even if its one and two word answers. As much as the love in McGhee and Butcher had its drawbacks they brought lots of good publicity our way, we are now getting bad press all the time. Potential players read the papers, potential advertisers read the papers and whilst as fans that may not matter short term to us it could become problematic - I think we have moved too far the other way.

I think whilst we were disappointing today we were not as dreadful as some folk are making out. I thought until Hibs scored their second goal we were giving as good as we got however they always just looked like they had that little bit more of a goal threat due to their ability to break with such speed. I thought ou biggest disappointment today was Jutkiewitz who has done a lot better than I thought he was going to do when he started but he just seemed invisible. I think Gannon removed the wrong forward at half time. After they scored the second goal our ball retention was frankly rank rotten. We seemed to try and play the ball much more quickly than we had been doing and as such we kept on passing straight to Hibs players which meant far too much of the game at 2-0 was played in our area. When we drew 3-3 at St Mirren when we went 3-1 down we kept trying the same things which worked for whereas today we seemed to get a wee bit caught in the headlights. However Hibs are a better team than us and there is no shame in losing to them. Celtic and Rangers usually see us raise our game and although we were not as good today as we have been I don't think we're far away.

I thought the goal was onside. The Murphy dive I thought he was probably right with as well. Certainly was looking for it and am sure the defender played the ball. The Hammell one was a shocker and the free kick/corner I wasn't sure about - that would have been the linesman's call though as the ref would not have been in the best position to call that. Overall I thought he made some mistakes but nothing that had any influence on the outcome of the game.

Everyone knew December was going to be a bastard of a month before the season started so no surprises this is a tough game. However as much as Hibs are going well I don't think they are that great. They may have won five at home but lets remember: Struggled to beat a St Mirren side who had ten men for 75 mins Needed two goals in last two minutes to beat Aberdeen who had nine men Needed a very dubious late penalty to beat Killie Although they beat St Johnstone 3-0 they could have been 3 down before they started Falkirk are shite Got a point against United who had ten men Lost to ten men Celtic Whilst the stats suggest Hibs are strong and there is clearly the steely resilience there to win games when you look a little closer they are from unbeatable if we play as we can. As for us we will no doubt remain tough to beat because we 1) are generally organised and 2) don't go away even when we losing so I think we will be right in about them. However Riordan v Yass concerns me. His positional sense is dire and if Hughes has a brain he will play Riordan on the shoulder of him and it'll be like feeding time at the zoo in our penalty box. We need to instruct him to stay at right back and let the midfield worry about the creation and the centre halfs worry about the clearing. Also if we fail to win against Hibs or the Old Firm we will have won four games of the first sixteen - quite likely. Thats the same as the Malpas season........ Anyway my prediction today is Riordan will be just too powerful for our right back and they will edge it 2-1.

I think the errors from Lasley came through a lack of sharpness. Don't think Lasley's performance yesterday will determine where he is in the pecking order as a standalone. That was one of the most productive attacking displays I have seen him produce but one of his poorest defensive displays.

Whilst it is a ridiculous rule it was a separate phase of play.

he did - meaning the ball didn't go forwards hence he wasn't offside. And having been positioned more or less in line with the decision I'm fairly confident Lasley was onside.

The difference between a good referee and a bad one is that a good one can read the game and be in the right place to make the decision. Apart from the blatant errors regarding Myrie-Williams, O'Brien and in my view Swanson though there was some disagreement on that one round about me he also made some chronic decisions about advantage. He played it when there was barely one and also decided not to play it when someone had a runner. And as well as that was overly influenced by the East Stand with Bauben's first yellow So all in, inability to read a tackle, inability to read the game, over keen to bring out his cards and influenced by the crowd. Hard to be nice - 2/10.

LJ. Was thinking Saunders but his suicidal pass to Lasley which ended up with them almost equalising in the debit column allows LJ to edge past him.

I think we found a new frustrating way to blow it today. Last week we went too defensive and allowed Aberdeen to play. Today we made a couple of slack errors whilst dominating possession which let them in. However we then weren't composed enough to take advantage of the two extra men.

Lasley looked well onside from where I was sitting. I thought we were a lot better today at protecting the lead than last week when we ended up deep and nervous. Today we held onto the ball a lot better and then blew it with a couple of slack passes, over fancy touches and a right back who ended up out of position. Thing is as playing against ten happens more often and we fail to win its going to become more and more of a monkey. However as the OF are coming little prospect of them losing a man and it may get it shelved to the back of our players minds. However United beat Celtic last week and we outplayed them today. The killer instinct maybe isn't sharp enough and thats the galling thing for us as fans. Its two points we blew but we're close.