Ya Bezzer!

Also the scheduling has to be looked at. 5 matches in a month on a pitch in February is hardly going to help maintain a good standard of pitch. OK one of them was the League Cup Semi Final and one was rescheduled but that's still 4 SPL matches within a month. If the SPL is really concerned about the quality of pitches at this time of year what about scheduling matches with a bit more common sense - say no more than two home matches per month.

Pretty much. SPL need to make up their mind on whether they want pitches that are playable albeit in poor condition or games called off if the pitch isn't able to come up to a certain standard. You can't have both at this time of year, especially when the weather is particularly bad. It's a complete nonsense to think otherwise. We had 6 weeks + of lying snow in Motherwell this winter and plenty more hard frosts during what is regarded as one of the worst winters in the last 50 years and yet as someone else said not one match was postponed due to the pitch. Presumably the undersoil heating had to be kept on at considerable cost to the club throughout that whole period (even now there is a hard frost in the ground). Sure it's not in good condition but it is playable so for christ sake just grin and bear it until the pitch starts to recover in the spring/summer. Given the circumstances (new pitch laid at huge expense to the club, extreme winter conditions, major problems at many other SPL clubs like Aberdeen, Kilmarnock, St. Johnstone etc) then I'd be pretty unhappy if we get pulled up about this. As far as I can see we've made a serious attempt to repair the pitch last season and not had any pitch related call offs so is it doing to come down to a ruling on how many blades of grass an SPL pitch should have?

Sutton had a good game, Murphy came on to a game later but didn't do much in the first half, I thought Humphrey made a difference. But how many games at Fir Park do you see where you literally have no fear of conceding a goal? I can't say I was as confident of scoring a goal as I was of not conceding and for that reason I'm going for Stephen Craigan. Didn't give Stokes a sniff, organised the back four and was generally imperious.

I sit more or less right in line with where the Miller/O'Brien tackle happened and I thought Miller tried to do O'Brien, it wasn't late or clumsy it was Miller trying to get him. On the highlights it doesn't look so bad but I got a good look at it at the match and to me at the time it was a red card, although when O'Brien reacted I thought he'd probably go to and was very surprised (and relieved!) when he 'got away' with a yellow. On the penalty I didn't get a clear view at the match only later but it looked a sort of 50-50 one, the type you get sometimes and other times you don't. He got the pass back one spot on, Ruddy made a misjudgement in catching it. On the rough play of Hibs, maybe we had fouls denied to us but overall I'd rather have a referee not blowing his whistle and letting things go than stopping the game every minute or so for a 'technical' foul. In the end we deservedly won the match so you can't complain too much, unlike say a couple of weeks ago...

For an attacking midfielder he can't beat a man and has absolutely no goal threat whatsoever. I don't see Coke as an attacking midfielder at all. He's a decent touch, tackle and short pass player. He has no real flair or creativity about him. His game, it seems to me, is based on graft.

Bit of a struggle today as we didn't show much cutting edge but we dominated possession and deserved the 3 points. In a way it was almost a carbon copy of the Accies games at Fir Park a couple of weeks ago. Never looked like losing the problem was finding some creative movement around the box. Humphrey made a difference in that regard in that he has the pace and the ability to go round a player that Coke doesn't have. Back line was excellent again, never gave Stokes a sniff. Have to say I thought O'Brien was very lucky to stay on. A shocking tackle but he did retaliate.

Hughes has been mucking around with the defensive set up at Hibs recently. Expect the experiment to be called to a halt tomorrow and it will be back to the standard line up. Bamba will get the hook, Hogg will go back to centre back and Wotherspoon will come back in at right back.

I'd be happy to have Ruddy on a 3 year deal if we could afford it because he's an excellent goalkeeper but I'm not sure about the idea of selling him on at profit. As a club I can't remember us selling many goalkeepers for a significant sum (probably Sieb Dykstra was the last one and even then it wasn't a huge fee, £250K, which would probably only be half of the transfer and wages needed for a Ruddy deal. Generally speaking goalkeepers don't have huge sell on potential; Boruc is still at Celtic after all these years and Rangers were desperate to sell on McGregor and no offer ever came in. In fact you'd be hard pressed to find 5 examples of goalkeepers leaving the SPL for a significant sum - Craig Gordon was very much an exception. I think you would be taking a huge financial gamble pumping money into a Ruddy deal with the expectation of generating finance out of it. The best chance of making money out of Ruddy would be hoping with a solid back bone to the team we could get high leagues places, perhaps qualify for Europe or have a cup run rather than from a transfer fee.

Feeling a bit more bullish about the game on Saturday after last nights result. It's one thing to lose at Ibrox and then get back to normal, it's another thing to lose at Ibrox and then get absolutely wellied off St. Johnstone. Once you get a sequence of games going it starts to nag at a teams confidence and confidence is the single greatest factor in football. We should also be fresher not having had a midweek game. Still some caution should be advised when you are playing against a team that can put Stokes up front behind a midfield of Zemmama, Rankin, Miller and Riordan.

Saying you wouldn't want Kyle is basically saying "no I don't want a striker who will score 10-15 goals a season in a decent side". He's got 9 goals this season in a Killie side that until the last couple of weeks was absolutely rank.

I keep forgetting it's the 2010's! I'm getting old now and I'm it's convenient to think it's still a past decade! What I really meant was 'in the last 10 years' rather than THIS decade. In the end I wasn't a fan of Graeme Smith and was glad to see the back of him but even I would have to admit he had an excellent first season before tailing off in this second. Gordon Marshall also had an excellent first season, in fact I'd go as far as to say he was the instrumental signing that turned us from a bottom of the league side to a Top Six side. He became a bit of a liability at the end which is perhaps what people remember but for most of his time at Motherwell he was an excellent keeper. To my mind his performance at the League Cup semi final is perhaps the best one I've ever seen from a Motherwell goalkeeper. Marshall got us to the final just as much as Fitzpatrick's goal and he also oversaw a huge improvement in team league form to which he contributed 22 clean sheets in two seasons. And Ruddy isn't infallible like some people will tell you. We could easily have lost on Saturday due to a couple of howlers from Ruddy at NDP. I also think he was partially to blame for the goal against Rangers. I think Ruddy is a bit of a lucky keeper actually in that his big mistakes have generally gone unpunished - think the McLaughlin chance on Saturday or the Deuchar incident on the first day of the season. There have been others but he's got away with them so people tend to forget about them. If Ruddy came back next season and played as well as he has this season I'd definitely rate him as the best in the last 10 years but since that hasn't happened yet I can only say 'maybe'. Overall I'd perhaps just go for Marshall over Ruddy because he was good over a longer period and had a more dramatic effect on the team in that he got us to a final and saw the team leap 6 places in the league.

Sorry, I didn't mean to do this! Delete if you want.

Hibs have a very strong team and won't have many fears about coming to Fir Park. Could go anyway to be honest but I'd take a point like some others above me. A win would be on a par with a win over OF in my opinion.

Better than the last one - definitely. Best one this decade - maybe. Best one in my time as a supporter - no. Best ever - obviously not.

Well that's true

Which is why we tried to forget.

Aye, we've come a long way because there is no booze at the football. Totally against it and frankly if you can't go 90 minutes without a drink maybe some kind of 12 step programme should be your priority!

As a cynic I'm saying you can never be 100% sure things haven't been photoshopped these days. Someone needs to do a shadow analysis on this 'new evidence'.

Good news; Falkirk score against Hearts. 1-1 there.

Scotland. You are a parochial bunch aren't you?

Same team as Wednesday except Coke in for Forbes.

Don't underestimate the amount of energy the players expended on Wednesday. I think we might be a bit leg heavy on Saturday, certainly in the latter stages. I'd be hoping for some early goals and hope we can either demoralise Accies or see the lead out but I wouldn't want to be going into the end stages with the tie still close. We are on a good run of form so you'd expect to take something from NDP. I wouldn't be wailing if we came away with a point but obviously a win is better especially if Celtic beat Aberdeen.

Wait - the linesman 'gambled' on disallowing a goal when he DIDN'T see if the scorer was offside and that's the explanation? Yeah, Forbes really showed selfishness and stupidity by trying to score a winning goal against Rangers! Dougal - just walk down to the beach at Largs and keep going West ya complete fucking trumpet!

'CRAIG BROWN - OUR WINNING GOAL AT IBROX WAS OFFSIDE BUT IT EVENS UP OVER A SEASON'

Said Chiba played for Morocco at the '98 World Cup. George Burley was in the 1982 World Cup squad but I can't remember if he played in a match. [EDIT] You could also add Davie Cooper and Alex McLeish.