Ya Bezzer!

HB are ranked 215th in Europe. HJK are ranked 153rd in Europe. Hearts are ranked 138th in Europe. I think that gives you an idea of what we are up against. HJK will be favourites over two legs but the tie is winnable for us. What, maybe a 40-60 chance of getting through?

Every HB European home result in the 21st Century 24.07.25 Brondby (D) 1-1 01.08.24 Hajduk Split (D) 0-0 13.07.23 Derry City (D) 0-0 07.07.22 Newtown (W) 1-0 12.08.21 M. Haifa (W) 1-0 22.07.21 Buducnost (W) 4-0 22.06.21 Inter Escaldes (L) 0-1 23.07.19 Linfield (D) 2-2 16.07.19 HJK (D) 2-2 07.07.16 Levadia (L) 0-2 09.07.15 Riteriai (L) 1-4 22.07.14 Partizan (L) 1-3 08.07.14 Lincoln (W) 5-2 11.07.13 Vestmannaeyjar (L) 0-1 19.07.11 Malmo FF (D) 1-1 20.07.10 Salzburg (W) 1-0 23.07.09 Omonia (L) 1-4 25.07.07 Hafnarfjordur (D) 0-0 15.07.05 FBK Kaunas (L) 2-4 21.07.04 WIT Georgia (W) 3-0 16.07.03 FBK Kaunas (L) 0-1 09.08.01 Grazer AK (D) 2-2 P22 - W 6 - D 8 - L 8 Record is decent and has improved in recent times. It must be said though that some of their most impressive results, for instance beating RB Salzburg, came after away pumpings and it's unclear how motivated the away side was or if they played second string sides.

It's almost as if they actually update the page multiple times a day and that algorithms will determine what you see.....

Having seen Antman play I think their interest in Maswanhise might increase again in a couple of weeks!

There are two articles and a podcast concerning Motherwell on the first two rows of the BBC Scottish Football web page. BBC radio live broadcasts just about every match day involving a Scottish club, league, cup or Europe. It also puts out daily podcasts and broadcasts a TV highlights show for every set of league fixtures and is set to broadcast live all Scotland matches on TV. They also live broadcast plenty of lower league matches. Scottish football has lots of problems but media coverage isn't one of them. Scottish Premiership clubs get vastly more coverage than similar sized clubs in the English lower leagues. It's fashionable to knock the BBC but if it didn't exist we'd be in a much worse situation. You'd be lucky if you even got a highlights package on terrestrial TV as its doubtful anyone else would pay for the rights.

Fancy us to score at least once and that means HB would need to get 3 just to get it to extra time. Based on what I saw at Fir Park that doesn't seem very likely. I think our team is significantly stronger with just Longelo and Maswanhise back. I know Maswanhise won't start but coming on the last 20 minutes might suit him with his pace.

I've probably mentioned this before but when I was a teenager Stevie Kirk used to come into our local chippie at lunch time and get a big bag of fritters! Obviously on his way home from training. Dunno if Tommy knew! 🤣

What colossus of the contemporary music scene do you propose to replace it? Doechii? Chappell Roan? Psychedelic Porn Crumpets?

We sang it before then. The first time I heard it, and I used to go to all the away games back then, was at St. Mirren. I'm not sure how it started, possibly just played on the tannoy?

Considering there were quite a few sub optimal factors going into this match I thought we performed well. Priestmann and Fadinger were excellent. Sharpness and fitness will increase and so will understanding between the players. We lacked a physical presence in general and a cutting edge up front but I'm sure we will address that and we were missing our four first team centre forwards tonight. Overall a decent win with improvements to come.

Would be nice if we could score Scotland's first European competition goal tonight.....

We paid a fee for Just and he's actually a good player. We didn't pay a fee for Theo Bair, he wasn't a good player and we still sold him for a couple of million inside 12 months. So if flipping players makes the best ever signing Theo Bair is king. In all seriousness, of course, Davie Cooper is our greatest signing in the modern era. He revolutionised the club and its history.

We beat them 7-1 in the 1990's but I doubt it will be that easy this time around. The standard of Scottish football has dropped immeasurably since then. In recent times Scottish clubs have lost ties to teams from Andorra, Luxembourg, Gibraltar, Wales, Malta, Liechtenstein etc so you really can't take anything for granted. This is a tie we should be winning but I think it's just about getting through to the next round rather than chalking up a cricket score given the whole context around the match. I agree we will probably be in a better place for the away leg but it's important we don't travel at a disadvantage.

It looks nice but when are we going to wear to when it's more of a clash with most of the teams we would normally wear our away kit against?

There is a big difference between playing Scandinavian teams at this stage in the season and other teams who are just starting their seasons too. Summer season clubs have a pretty big advantage in being at full competitive fitness. Even if you look at the League Cup group stages there are way more 'shock' results than happen in the Scottish Cup and that's pro teams playing semi professional or part time teams with no fitness advantage, they are just starting on a sort of level fitness field. Steaua, Panathinaikos, Levante and Kuban are/were all different level clubs. Big ask to get anything from them.

Wasn't at the game but he corrected the interviewer in the post match game saying we weren't changing the system we were consolidating it. Think that spells out his position pretty clearly.

Worth mentioning going into the new season. Askou avoided going into the relegation zone in game 9 only when we scored an injury time goal against Livingston. The new manager will need time.

We've won more matches at Easter Road this decade than any other current Premiership ground. The only places we have a better record is Livingston and Ross County.

Our reversed colour strips are completely pointless as change kit especially when they have large features on the top like the hoop and shoulders. Our away kit should be a different colour. These reversed colour strips have a 'Celtic, we only wear green' type vibe about them.

Fucking hell, he'd be better off staying here!

I had a look into this. There is no particular stat I have that exactly covers this but some that give a general idea. If you look at the shots to goals ratio from selected sides (top, bottom, teams around us) in the Premiership we weren't bad at all. Hibs - 12% Motherwell - 11% Falkirk - 11% Celtic - 11% Livingston - 10% Dundee Utd - 9% If you look at touches in the box to goals ratio again we don't seem to especially stick out as being poor in this regard. Hibs - 6.6% Falkirk - 6.5% Motherwell 6.1% Celtic - 5.5% Dundee Utd - 5.3% Livingston - 5.3% So at a glance Hibs were the best team in terms of being clinical in front of goal but there really isn't any significant margin between the teams.

The joint worst ever penalty I've ever seen was Jim Hamilton against Aberdeen (I think, it was down at the South Stand end, maybe it was someone else) and a Hugo Sanchez one for Real Madrid were it would have hit the corner flag if the corner flag was 80 feet in the air.

Apparently he's already agreed terms with Samsunspor. He won't be featuring in the European ties if there is nearly £2 million quid on the line.

Yeah, I thought Ruddy was much reduced in his second loan spell. He makes more mistakes in that 6-6 draw than Randolph made in his entire Motherwell career.

Celtic will get a lot more for Arne Engels than we will for Elijah Just. That's just a fact. Same with Raskin and Rangers. But the Miller transfer has set a new bar and I think Just is worth at least £6 million and possibly has high as £8 million. Just has performed at the highest, most elite level of the game, no Motherwell player has ever done that before and I think that should be reflected in the transfer fee. I've said before that the poor standard of Scottish football keeps transfer fees down and that in some cases transfer fees are actually over valued. You don't have to be that good to perform in this league and the step up to higher quality leagues is big. Elijah Just has completely blown that doubt away. His performances at the very top level have shown he can do it on the top tier.