MelvinBragg

Don't think he's helped by Lamie at full back. Clearly Lamie is rated higher than McGinley by Robinson given we took off the guy playing left wing back to stick another player at left back. McGinley wasn't great tonight but he looks less likely to actively sell a goal...

I agree with you that Maguire deserves a shot either in midfield or defence but 442 is dead...

By no stretch Bevis the biggest problem in the team. Or even the biggest problem in the defence..

Before you want to jump all over my post accusing me of having a go at Robinson, maybe look at my follow up posts where I say it's not necessarily a bad thing and I was just pointing out that out as someone had said all the money was going directly to the club...

Selling Campbell right now makes financial but not football sense. If Donnelly had not got injured, we could perhaps get away with selling him and going with a midfield three of O'Hara, Polworth and Donnelly. Problem is (as it is now with Donnelly injured) that leaves us with three recognised midfielders (given Robinson has made clear he doesn't think Maguire or Cornelius are ready and doesn't see Grimshaw as a centre midfield option) so you don't have anyone putting pressure on the guys in the team. Robinson started the season with five players he saw as first team central midfielders. We've sold one and have one out injured til at least January. Could be argued we need another centre midfielder for cover at least just now, not to be selling another one...

I don't know. Like I say, I only heard this last week from someone close to the club but it could be bullshit. Speaking about our form in general, this individual stated that 'Results keep going as they are, he might just walk away. He got his commission from the Turnbull deal'. It wasn't like this person was going out of their way to tell me this. No reason for me or this person to make this up. They say they get on fine with Robinson.. Will it show up in club accounts? I have no idea. Maybe under bonuses, agents fees, commission? To be honest, I don't have a huge issue with it. Maybe all clubs do it, maybe given our model is to develop and sell, this is a form of performance related pay...? I only raised it because someone said that all the cash was going to the club...

Nope. Around 8% was the figure I was told that Robinson gets of any transfer fee. Could be bullshit but reasonable (and unbiased) source that told me...

Are you sure about that? Heard talk that Robinson gets a percentage of every sale we make...

Hope that Hastie comes good? So you're wanting to persevere with a loan player til he finds form but you've decided that McGinlay is not a player who'll go up and down? People need to accept that bringing Hastie back was a horrendous error...

Question is, do we switch to a back four to get Lamie out of the way even though the 352 keeps our shite wingers out of the team? Do we shift O'Donnell into the back three and play Grimshaw and McGinlay at wing back? None of these options are fantastic. We need to try and figure out the lesser of all the evils...

When is Charles Dunne back?

Is everyone else not getting astream now?

The number of goals we've conceded hasn't been huge. Conceding 1 goal to Hamilton, Dundee United and Ross County isn't terrible at all. For me, the issue is goalscoring. Not sure Halliday would help with that. Having said that, on the basis of this season, I'm not sure that Hastie would help with that either...

I would be going with Carson Gallagher Mugabi Lamie O'Donnell Campbell Maguire Polworth McGinlay Lang Watt I know that this won't be the lineup though I don't know if it's a million miles away. We all know that Long and O'Hara will start, irrespective of form or suitability for the game...

I agree that 1500 is optimistic but (and I don't know the answer here) how would the new six people rule work? If you're allowed to meet 5 other people, could you have groups of six with one row in between them? The suggestion of every second seat in each direction taped off affects parents who take their children to the game. It's a minefield and I'm glad that I'm not involved in sorting it out...

Not sure. Possibly they're only walking a short distance between two places they'll need to wear a mask and feel there's no point taking it off to put it back on again? I must confess that there have been a couple of occasions when I've come out of a supermarket and walked for about 10 minutes before I've remembered that I have my mask on, so it's easy to forget (mind you, I work in a hospital and wear one for twelve hours so maybe easier for me to forget). I don't know why they're doing it but they're not harming me so I'm learning to ignore it...

We're only at Tuesday. A lot could happen between now and the weekend. I also find it ironic that the games they have selected involve the two teams where players have been known to breach protocols. I suspect that I'm not the first, and won't be the last, to point this out...

While I agree that if test events were to be held, the relatively small crowd in comparison to capacity would make our game this Saturday a decent candidate, I think the current numbers will mean that it's unlikely there will be any 'test' events any time soon....

Then bring on Barry Maguire? Switching to a flat 442 surrenders control of the middle of the park and puts the team on the back foot..

I suspect the thinking is that taking off Campbell loses control of the midfield and increases the chances of conceding corners..

Dunne came back and played one reserve game, maybe even just 45 minutes last season. Clearly the injury recurred. We do really need at least one of our left back options back sooner rather than later...

I was mocked in February for asking where the goals were going to come from, mocked to be fair because I asked in the middle of the St Mirren cup tie. Some of us could see this coming. Fourth highest goalscorers, true. But with the exception of Ross County at home, the goals fairly dried up in the league after the turn of the year. Right after Scott and Cole left. Not saying either of those players were world beaters but they offered pace and strength that dragged us up the field that is now missing We're now left with Chris Long and Jordan White, neither of whom are good enough. Calum Lang, untested at this level. Tony Watt, may have qualities but in his spell with Hearts and St Johnstone in the SPL scored 4 goals in 34 starts. Don't tell me we've been unlucky and the goals will come St Mirren have played 5 games and scored 7 goals. We've played 6 games, dominated possession in 5 of them and scored 2 goals. Pretty obvious there's a problem and what it is. Inability to score goals costs points...

Then we'll be in a relegation dogfight...

I actually think we do look out of out depth. An inability to beat either Accies, Dundee United or Livingston at home suggests we might be. I appreciate what you are saying about taking each season on their own. But that's not how it works in the real world. If we'd started poorly this season having finished strongly last, you might be more inclined to cut a manager some slack and say it's a blip. If it seems like a continuation of the previous season's form then you have to start asking if the manager has either not identified or not addressed the previous season's problems. Putting our current form in context, we Ian Baraclough won 5 of his last 16 league games. Stuart McCall won 5 of his last league games. We have won 2 of our last 16 league games. Our last league win was 8 games ago. That is horrible form even if it is stretched over two seasons.... Of course Robinson's position should be under scrutiny...

A couple of times you've mentioned this about Donnelly. Where have you seen/heard this? I was under the impression he'd be back in October...