David

It’s all relative, isn’t it? I’d see your point if we were Celtic, consistently facing teams clearly below our level. But we’re not. We’re competing against sides with either equal or greater resources—that’s the real context. Do we, though? I think we’ve all watched enough matches to know that when a team goes behind, they often raise their game and pile on the pressure. There’s more to the tactical side than just our own decisions. Kilmarnock’s approach, how they adapted after us scoring, and other factors also come into play. We’re not operating in isolation. I don’t think our manager has any illusions about us being defensively solid enough to grab a goal and then say, “Right, lads, let’s sit back and trust our brilliant defence to shut Killie down.” I genuinely think it’s about the momentum of the match. I’ve seen it far too often, whether it’s us or other teams, where conceding a goal sparks a reaction, and for a spell, they go all-out to get back into the game.

I'd take that for sure. A point from Celtic away is a good result.

We're fourth because we've beaten teams like Hearts, St Mirren, St Johnstone, and Dundee United at home, while picking up points away against County, St Johnstone, Hibs, Dundee United, St Mirren, and Kilmarnock. Any team putting together that kind of record over the first 18 games of the season is bound to be closer to the top of the table than the bottom. As for the overall quality of the league, that's a separate debate. Scottish football is what it is. We're a smaller nation, comparable in size to Slovakia, Finland, Norway, or Ireland. How strong are the domestic leagues in those countries? Are they known for their quality? Within the context of Scottish football, we're sitting fourth—behind the two biggest clubs in the country and a big city club, and ahead of at least three sides that, given their resources, ought to be doing better than us. It’s easy to look at our relative success and dismiss it with, "Well, the league isn’t any good anyway." If that’s your view, fair enough.

Maybe it would have been best to go a step further and not even mention it? Unless it was just an excuse to let "the nobodies" know their place.

If it were the club who was revealing the name then sure. But on a fan forum? It's basically just speculation, no matter what anyone claims about being "in the know".

How so? You think posting the guys name on a fans forum could put the deal in jeopardy?

A new manager always gets a bit of grace. How long has Simo been there now? A couple of months? At the moment he's lost twice as many games as he's won, and his team sit in 11th. I certainly wouldn't be trading places with them. Are we really reverting to the tired old "we're fourth, so every other team must be rubbish" narrative? It seems some people roll that out every time we break into the top six. The fact is, we’re exactly where we’ve earned the right to be. Right now, we’re the fourth-best team in the league, and whether other sides are brilliant, dreadful, or somewhere in between is irrelevant. Heading into Christmas sitting fourth in the table, with a cup semi-final secured, is a brilliant position to be in. This is such an important point. A lot of our supporters focus solely on what we’re doing, assuming that if the manager selects the “right” team and employs the “right” tactics, everything will fall into place. But football doesn’t work like that—our opponents play a massive role too. Many of the common criticisms and complaints could probably be addressed and explained by the manager, highlighting factors most of us wouldn’t even consider. For example, when we argue that TJ should start ahead of Watt, are we factoring in how McInnes might set his team up to counter that? Or how that decision could create vulnerabilities elsewhere for Kilmarnock to exploit? No, we see TJ come on for the last 15 minutes, play well, and think, “Well, he should’ve started—surely he’d have delivered that same performance over the entire game. Poor choice by the manager.” It’s rarely that simple.

That's true 😂

I could be mistaken, but I’d attribute it more to his youth. With youth comes inconsistency—it’s inevitable. As for quality and entertainment, no matter what fans might think, those will always take a back seat to results. I’ve yet to see a club at the foot of the table with fans delighted simply because they’re playing entertaining football. People’s livelihoods are at stake—managers, players, and even backroom staff. Relegation can mean the difference between someone keeping their job in the office or getting their P45. Last time I checked, you can’t pay your rent with entertainment tokens in place of wages. I don’t for a moment believe any club in Scotland deliberately sets out to play poorly, but they’ll do whatever is necessary to get results. Sometimes that means an exciting 4-3 like we saw against United, and other times it’s the grind of a 1-1 like last night. I’ve also long supported the idea of summer football. I realise most people aren’t in favour, which is fair enough, but when matches are played in dreadful conditions—rain lashing down, wind howling, fans freezing and soaked—it’s bound to affect the quality on the pitch. Countries like Sweden, Norway, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania all run their seasons from March to November, and there’s good reason for it. We’ve chosen not to, so we have to accept that on a cold, wet, and windy December night, the football will often reflect the weather.

All this talk of who should and shouldn't be playing. Maybe time to dust off the ol' tombola.

I'm a happy clapper, mind? My hands are rid raw.

Ah well, always next time, eh?

He's the guy who pays the actual bills to keep the place running so, I guess that might qualify? Who knows? Anyway, back on topic. It's been made clear that those on moderation (not banned) can easily post about the football whenever they like. Those posts will be readily approved by the mods and we can all enjoy discussing the fitba.

This is something that I can't understand. Has he been mentioned as being injured or unavailable?

I didn't see his post as him "boasting" about it. That would be a rather peculiar thing to boast about. It's simply adding context to the reasoning behind the offence taken, and it's a valid point. The truth is, if anyone believes they should be able to post antagonistic nonsense on a football forum, they run the chance of being put on moderation. It's as simple as that. The main point is, no one has been placed on moderation for their views on the team, their opinions of Kettlewell, or anything as run of the mill as that. Those on moderation know exactly why they've been placed there.

For those curious, this is precisely the sort of post moderation is designed to address. On this occasion, I’ve let it remain visible so everyone can see it for themselves. It serves no purpose whatsoever, other than to provoke someone unnecessarily. This highlights why moderation is necessary in some cases.

Sure thing. I very much doubt Kettlewell think Tavares is a right wing back. He's obviously played him there due to lack of options at the time.

Although £8.2 million might seem like a really high sum for a club of our size, it actually represents solid value when you consider the analytics and projections surrounding Miller. While he hasn’t reached their level yet, there’s no reason why he couldn’t follow a similar trajectory to players like Amadou Onana at Aston Villa or Carlos Baleba at Brighton. Onana, at 23 years old, is five years ahead in his development and far more established, while Baleba, who I believe is 20, is still on the rise. That said, based on his current progress, there’s every chance Miller could reach a similar standard in time and with the proper coaching and development. For context, Onana moved from Hamburg to Lille for around €7 million before Everton signed him for £33 million, and then Villa acquired him for roughly £50 million. Baleba, on the other hand, joined Brighton for £27 million. Even if Miller doesn’t quite hit those heights (though he has the potential to do so), the £8.2 million fee starts to look like a decent investment for any club willing to buy him.

He's what I would call a "luxury" player. Don't get me wrong—he’s not a world-beater by any means, but you don’t come up through the youth ranks at Benfica and the Portugal national setup if you’re not a somewhat solid player. He also drew interest from clubs like Juventus and PSG. I could see him doing better in the lower leagues of Italy or Spain, where the game is more technical and suits players like him. Plus, he’s still fairly young and has room to grow. That said, he's definitely not a right wing back. You could tell his defensive game was lacking, even though he showed some promise going forward, even if it looked like he hasn’t played much lately. I’m not saying he should start for us. As I mentioned, I don’t think he’s the right fit, but he’s certainly not the worst player we’ve had either.

Tavares is definitely a winger, and it's easy to see that he has something about him. He played regularly for Benfica B and was frequently called up to various youth teams for Portugal. There's clearly some talent and pedigree there, especially considering he's still only 23. That said, I think he might be more of a luxury player and not necessarily a perfect fit for the Scottish game. I can imagine him having a solid career in places like Italy, Spain, or Portugal—though probably not at the very top level in those countries. I'm not of the belief that he's a particularly good fit for us though.

Hopefully we see Kaleta come in for Tavares.

It's an approach and model that has us sitting in the top six, currently ahead of two major city clubs and a few others that can afford to outspend us on players. As mentioned in the Kettlewell thread, if we maintain the pace we've set so far, we're likely on track to finish 5th or 6th.

This is crucial for me. We can only hope that whatever kept Kaleta out of the starting lineup has been sorted. Whether it was fatigue and the need to manage the minutes of a player who’s only just turned twenty, or perhaps a knock that wasn't serious enough to warrant his complete removal from the squad. Tavares stepped in and gave it his all. He looked decent at times going forward, but he's not a defensive player. At this point, I'm not entirely sure what's going on with Koutroumbis. I thought Halliday looked quite good at the weekend. However, it seems we're only getting around 60 minutes from him these days, so I wouldn't be opposed to Paton starting and then bringing Halliday on for the last 30 minutes or so if necessary. A win here would lift us into fourth place and give us a bit of breathing room before we face Celtic, Rangers, Hearts, and Aberdeen over the next month. I reckon taking four points from the United and Killie matches would put us in a strong position, as there's a good chance we could nick a point or two from the others.

What I see in Kettlewell is a 40-year-old manager who will have been a full-time, sole manager for two and a half years by February 2025. He's still relatively new to management, and I’m sure he'd be the first to admit that there's plenty more for him to learn. In his first full season, we finished 9th in the league, reached the fifth round of the Scottish Cup, and made it to the second round of the League Cup. This season, we're currently sitting in the top six and have reached a cup semi-final. These are tangible improvements so far. While it’s difficult to predict where the team will end up by the end of the season, we can use the statistics from the 15 games played up to now, including a full set of fixtures, to create a rough projection of where we might finish and how the team could perform. At the moment, we're averaging 1.467 points per game. If we maintain this pace, we should finish the season with around 56 points in total. For comparison, last season we averaged 1.132 points per game. Teams finishing in 5th or 6th place typically end up with 50–60 points, so it wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect that a 56-point season could see us finish in 5th or 6th position. So, in terms of points, we’re looking at an improvement of 0.335 points per game, which translates to 12.73 extra points over the course of the season. This would obviously mean an improvement in our league placing as well. These two figures are closely linked and, by far, the most significant of all. At present, we’re scoring 1.2 goals per game, down from 1.474 last season, with a projection of around 46 goals this season, compared to 56 last season. Our goal-scoring is an area that clearly needs improvement if things continue as they are. It seems we're missing the goals of Theo Bair and Blair Spittal—two players we knew would be difficult to replace, and the stats so far suggest we haven’t quite managed it. There's clearly work to be done there. Defensively, we’re averaging 1.533 goals conceded per game, compared to 1.553 last season. This suggests that our defensive performance is almost unchanged, with only a very slight improvement of less than one goal conceded overall. Taking all of this into account, and using our current form to project the rest of the season, here's where we stand: Improved Points Per Game: On track for a significant improvement of 12.73 points over the season. Decreased Goals Scored: A notable reduction in offensive output (10.4 fewer goals this season). Slightly Better Defence: A minor improvement in goals conceded (a difference of 0.020 fewer goals). On the financial side, Kettlewell has overseen the sales of Van Veen and Theo Bair. While he didn’t sign Van Veen, he was the manager who got the best out of him in the latter part of the season before we sold him for a fairly substantial fee. So, I’d say he’s done quite well in that regard. The Theo Bair situation speaks for itself. To answer your question, I’d say Kettlewell has done a solid job since taking over. Is there room for improvement? Absolutely. I'd say this applies across the whole club, which has experienced some disruption, especially with the absence of a CEO, which has no doubt impacted the smooth running of things behind the scenes. As of today, I’d give Kettlewell a solid B-. If the projections outlined above come to fruition and the averages play out as expected, I’d raise that to a B.

Sacking a manager while we're sitting in the top six would be next level patter, really.