weeyin

Fingers crossed. We've been promised this is "in development" for 5 years or more, so hopefully it will finally arrive.

What's the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?

Passing the ball along the ground is not a skill reserved for highly paid footballers. Our U20s team has been trained to do exactly that.

You don't need to look further than Fir Park to see examples of teams that have played better football in recent times.

Miserable can be applied to the posters who constantly write "we're gonna get humped", "we always lose at Firhill", "come back to haunt us" week in and week out. I think there is a legitmate discussion taking place on the progress of the team, and the style we play. It may be speculation at this stage, but I'm not seeing misery.

Next TV appearance - Banged Up Abroad.

The constraints on our playing style are due to the type of player we recruit. I have no problem with the approach of signing younger players with a point to prove. There is no reason, however, one or two of them can't have a bit of football in their skill set. McGhee, McCall and Gannon managed to find one or two that could pass a ball. So it is possible. Like said in an earlier post, it's about balance. A ball winning midfielder can lay off a ball to a creative player just as easily as lumping one down the channels. And a striker can score from a precision pass just as easily as chasing down a long ball. There is a middle ground between Pep's Barca and Graham Taylor's Watford style of play.

Even if we ended up with only 2 centre backs we could easily switch to a back 4. Taylor-Sinclair as a left back, and Tait as right back. (I feel like I typed "back" a lot there).

Because we set up as normal against Hibs. Frear on the bench after being one of our best players in preseason, and brought on with bench-warmer Bigi to chase a lost cause. And watching us struggling against Clyde in the wind and on plastic because nobody was smart enough to put their foot on the ball and play short passes. And Hartley talking about having to battle against Accies. Exactly the same as last season. I'll be delighted if I'm wrong, but I don't see much likely to change in our style this season.

I suppose it depends if you want to be entertained for your £24 quid. There's a balance to be struck, but we're not there yet. There was plenty of football in the team that won the cup. Enough to beat Celtic at Parkhead in the league and take 4 off them in the semi at Hampden.

True - but our line up will be closer to the one that lost badly in December. Minus Tanner. I'm not saying we can't win it - I'm saying that we win it by not getting dragged down their level in a needless battle.

Of course. I just meant that after being on the first team fringe last season, he must have thought he had a chance of pushing on this season; particularly because he wasn't loaned out at the start of the League Cup campaign like our other loanees. Until we signed 3 more central defenders.

I know it was end of season, but our easiest victory was when we played them off the park in our last game. The times when we've struggled (like the game in December) is when we were drawn into a battle and dragged down to their level.

Would be fun to see Frear, Bigi, Campbell, Rodriguez, Cadden line up, but I'm sure it will more like Tait, Rose, Campbell, McHugh, Cadden (with Grimshaw as cover).

The transfer policy was, as a first priority, to get some depth to the squad. I can see the sense in that given the issue we had last season when we lost 4 or 5 players, and we've probably achieved that aim. We seem to have gone overboard with defenders, though, expecially once Dunne is fit. And it looks like we are dependent on Tanner coming back for any creativity up top.

Barry Maguire will be wishing he'd gone out on loan.

I don't have any doubts about the quality of Aldred or his attitude. I just worry about the balance of our defence, and the balance of the midfield in front of it.

Don't worry - Robinson will make sure our best player in the League Cup group won't be anywhere near a starting slot. He'll be keeping the bench warm beside Bigi and Gorrin. Lucky for us Templeton got his big money move to Burton Albion, but anyone with pace on either wing is going to cause us problems I think. Tait is great going forward, but not exactly nippy when tracking back.

Although, gubbing them is always a bonus.

The transfer window falls within EU law because of the following decision in the European Court of Justice (for basketball, but applies across all sports): "it established the principle that the restriction may be justified as late season transfers could substantially alter the sporting strength of teams in the course of the championship and thus call into question the proper functioning of sporting competition. It can therefore be concluded that a proportionate restriction on when a player can be transferred is compatible with EU law." Financial regulation and reporting requirements for private companies are a different kettle of fish.

Are you trying to convince me that we didn't rely on Dunne and Kipré's pace multiple times to get us out of trouble? Because we have the same wingbacks this season. Like I said before, I thought he was an excellent stand-in for Hartley, but our lack of pace at the back was something Robinson worked hard to improve last season.

As long as we don't face strikers quicker than my old granny, that should be fine. Without Dunne and Kipré we really need some pace in that defence.

If we were looking to replace Hartley, maybe.

#MeToo

They could make anything a condition of membership, but it still doesn't make it legally enforcable.