weeyin

Not quite - but it's that extra 10% (or whatever) that can make the difference in performances. Premiership teams have different training schedules and requirements from lower league teams, especially the part time ones. They also tend to have a higher turnover of players, so when the Cup kicks off they might have players with little or no pre-season behind them. And there's players who have been on international duty that take their break late and are two or three weeks behind the rest of the team. And the fact we start with a dozen new players that the manager needs to test out in different formations and partnerships means it can take a few extra weeks to settle in. If it was just us, then you could argue we are doing it wrong, but you see the same issue across all the Premiership teams at this point in the competition.

My only prediction is that more than half of the starting line-up in game 1 of the group stage will not be in the starting line-up for game 1 of the league.

That's a classic commentator remark along the lines of "missing those chances won't bother him - he'll back himself to score the next one"

The "giving them the cup game" seems to be popular in England in recent years, at least in the early rounds. I haven't seen so much of it in Scotland, although tbf, I haven't paid much attention to the other squads in those games. The fact the Kelly was the captain probably made him even more immune to being dropped, even in cup matches. I don't remember much about the QoS tie, but I certainly wouldn't put any weight on form in July League Cup games whether it was that draw or the East Fife win where he kept a clean sheet. Gillepsie was destined to remain a 2nd choice keeper for his Motherwell career until Carson was forced out with his deep vein thrombosis, and he turned out OK. I suspect, however, that Oxborough will remain second choice and we'll bring in a first choice later in the summer. Although if that's Joe Lewis it won't be long before he's back in the first team.

It's always been the case in football that managers will rarely drop their first choice keeper for dips in form. It doesn't say much, good or bad, about their backup other than being a backup keeper requires a mentality that outfield players don't possess. The plus side of second and third choice keepers struggling to win a starting place is that there are a number of good ones available looking for first team options.

No tractor, no truth (or something).

My wife's gone on holiday to Jamaica. Was that her choice? Yes.

Noticed the West Indies were wearing a claret and amber Macron kit in their game today. Maybe we could ditch the hoop and go with this:

I remember that time he nearly hit one past the first man.

That's not the club's aim, though. You just need to listen to SK talk for 20 minutes to know that. It's all about improvement for him and building a competitive team that is finishing top 6. There are 4 or 5 teams every season that are very closely matched and it's small margins that make the difference between 5th and 9th. As I mentioned earlier since the SPL was formed we have finished 8th more often than any other position. The seasons where we finished 2nd and 3rd were very much the (hugely enjoyable) exceptions. It wasn't that long ago that we finished 3rd though, albeit in a Covid season. Dumbarton, Dunfermline, Falkirk, Raith Rovers, Accies, Caley Thistle, Partick Thistle and Morton all used to be top flight regulars and relegation hasn't been kind to them. Even worse for Clydebank, Gretna and the original Airdrie who also spent time in the SPL. Our rivals over the years like St Mirren, Hibs, Hearts, Killie, Dundee, Dundee Utd etc. have all been relegated and in some case spent a number of seasons in the lower leagues. So it's not a bad goal to ensure safety as quickly as possible - that is very different, however, from avoiding relegation as being our only goal and the benchmark of success.

Even if you ignore the fact that Gent returned to his club and Butcher is gone, even you must have noticed Kelly is moving on - the only man to have started in defence 100% of those games. I also wouldn't be suprised to see Blaney or Casey move on over summer. Under contract today doesn't mean they won't be punted tomorrow.

Grieve Dunne Strain sounds like one of Charles' regular injuries.

As insightful as it is accurate.

While obviously on a completely different scale, there's an interesting article in The Guardian today that discusses and rates the successes and failures of American investors in English, Italian and Fench clubs. Full article here.

I think that's a wee bit unfair. While I'm not sure Celtic was the best choice for career development, he was doing OK there until he got injured again. He struggled to get back as a first team starter, partly because the team was winning (and no manager changes that) and partly because he's not necessarily an Angeball player - same reason a lot of Spurs players are being punted this summer. He did make 100 appearances for them with 25 goals, so not exactly a bust Cardiff was a terrible move, as they were an average, struggling Championship team when he moved there. The exact opposite of what he needed. Although I appreciate the need he felt for a change of scenery. He's a confidence player, so I imagine if he finds somewhere he enjoys, his form will pick up again. It just goes to show though that we are pretty good at getting the best out of players.

I hate friendlies. There, I said it. I appreciate they are a very necessary component of our pre-season, but forking out cash to watch a half-fit team go through some training moves is rarely entertaining. Especially these days when the entire group stage of the League Cup is also our pre-season.

He'll really be hoping we sign Joe Lewis.

It's only taken 2 days from season end to start slagging of players we haven't signed. Sounds like a good time to stop reading this thread and just wait for the formal announcements from the club.

If you want to see what multi-millionaires can do to a club, look at Man Utd. They bought everything without investing a penny of their own money, award themselves huge wads of cash every year while leaving the club servicing huge debts at high interest rates - debts that are secured by the clubs assets; not by the owners' assets. I'm not saying that is what will happen here, but there are ways to invest in a club and there are "ways" to invest in a club. As I've said before, the most important thing for me is the exit plan. What is going to happen when the investor leaves, runs out of money or gets bored? Are they going to take their money and run, will they sell to a property developer or will they leave a self-sustaining (or at least healthy) infrastructure behind.

Presumably because SK thinks he'll get a good season out of him after putting the work in over the summer.

Apart from throwing Louis Moult's shot into the back of the net in the Cup Quarter Final, and not covering himself in glory on our second, my recollections of Joe Lewis consist primarily of commentators saying "He's not usually this prone to handling errors" on an almost weekly basis.

Casey has been a bombscare this season. He seems to get a pass because he runs about a lot, but his basic defending skills like marking his man were sorely lacking. I'd be fine with building the defence from scratch next season. Not including the wingbacks in that although I suspect we'll need new faces there too.

I researched our league positions back in 2016, when I was bored. This breakdown is from that post. TL;DR is that 8th is the position we finish most often, so this season was just slightly worse than that. The stats are obviously a little out of date, but I don't think they would change much based on recent league finishes. Some of the the positives for me this season were Theo's breakthrough, Miller establishing himself, Biereth shaking things up, Spittal's performances, 3rd highest goal scorers in the league, and of course the win at Ibrox. When our football was coming off some of the team goals were scored were excellent. The biggest negatives by far were our defensive performances and our feeble cup exit in Greenock. So there were some aspects that I was satisfied with and some that frustrated all season. Then next season, when we are all on zero points, we can enjoy a week or two of hoping for a good cup run and a top 6 finish again; at least until October.

Must be the worst I've seen since our relegation in the 1979/79 season. I didn't know this off the top of my head (although I remember it being woeful), but a quick google shows we shipped 86 goals in 36 games.

I'm glad the team felt "they owed us a performance" or they might not have been very good today. Take your pick...