fizoxy

We would have been daft not to take the loan on those terms.

It was a small sample size with us, but he gelled well with Watt and Cole and didn't have a bad game, I'd definitely have him at motherwell if we could get him (can't believe I'm saying that after his completely underwhelming announcement in January). The only issue I'd see is that he'd be one of 6 players competing for that front 3, so he could end up not getting the minutes he's after.

I'd expect them to rest Murray Davidson. Thats a couple of weeks without an injury, so he's due one.

Checked the lyrics, I knew "come on eileen" and "to-rye-ay". I prefer their song about darts anyway.

Works better than what I had in my head, which was just repeating his name to the tune.

I vote for this. Let's hope this isn't a Jan Michels or Davide Fererre style debut. I'm confident it isn't, but i have been burned before.

Van Veen had an excellent league debut, and was definitely the standout. I would have been happy to just to see the ball stick with a striker instead of a 10 yard first touch, but he worked hard and brought others into play, and it was great to see him finally get off the mark. He's going to get at least one red card this season, but we need a couple of absolute bastards in the team. Carrol deserves a mention for the assists, as well as kicking Boyle around, he definitely offers more bite than McGinley, but can be reckless. Maguire also had a good game with his midfield partners still getting up to full fitness. Shame he couldn't make anything out of that chance from the edge of the box at the end.

We could have done with a bit of luck, the first two hibs goals just fell right for them. The penalty was a dumb one to concede. We seem to go out of our way not to concede penalties, but still somehow concede a bunch of them. It was also at a time when things were going end to end and I thought we might get something on the break. It's a real shame woolery couldn't convert that chance, it was as clear a chance as he's going to get. Overall we played pretty well against a good side, with some encouraging signs considering we still have some recruiting to do and a couple of guys getting up to speed.

Cool, I can watch beavis and butthead at half time.

The captain does more than scream at people on the park, and they don't necessarily need to do that either. There's all kinds of captains, and not every player reacts to a head case shouting at them. Not everyone wants to be captain either, look at what happened to McHugh. Hartley barely played as captain, he spent most of the time on the bench, and if we need someone to drag everyone into position, then that's a failing of the manager. As said above, the manager sees the players every day, and he's seen how odonnell has interacted with everyone during his time and obviously sees him as someone the players look up to. SOD is also an experienced player who, wether you like it or not, has a good deal of international experience and is likely to play the majority of our games, and he handles the media well. Also, I'm skeptical whether the captain has any effect on a game. Maybe there's a stat for that.

He mentioned that tomorrow is his first day of full training with the team, so guessing he's a couple of weeks out. Maybe a place on the bench on Sunday? Given how lackluster our pre-season/cup run has been, I predict we'll hammer hibs.

Ha, well spotted, a bit more subtle than Strong and Ready.

Lawless proved himself in the premiership for both Partick and Livi, finishing top six with both of them. He's been good for us the last couple of games, and played well in the central position when he was shifted there later in the game, if he can stick there it would give us a good range of options in the forward areas. Like with the bad performances in these early games, I'm not getting too excited about the good performances, but it's still an improvement from the end of last season.

We took it too easy in the first half, and even then if we had been more clinical with our chances we would have had the game wrapped up. Our slackness came back to bite us and they took advantage of it. I liked Paton's hand rubbing gesture after the second, suggesting they had it wrapped up. We showed more urgency in the second half and were all over them, save a couple of counter attacks. Woolery benefitted from them being knackered, but looked sharp anyway, and they couldn't handle him.. We could have scored plenty more. Van Veen could have had 4 on his own, but looks like he's going to be fun to watch once he shakes off the rust. It was good to see Donnely get more minutes and I thought Cornelius acquitted himself well. Watt was his usual self, and Lawless looked lively. On the negative side, Carroll was lucky to stay on the park, with a couple of bad tackles after he got his yellow. All being said, it was good to get the win and "get minutes into the legs".

Van Veen was unlucky with a couple of chances, and should have done better with a couple more. If nothing else, his first touch is better than Coles. He's going to be fun to watch this year. Woolery made a big difference when he came on, and is another I'm looking forward to seeing more of, with his pace and strength. Cornelius looked OK and was tidy for the most part. He seems to have grown a foot taller since last year. I went for lawless though, he worked hard all game, rarely lost the ball, and looked sharper than the others.

Sounds that way. He's been on trial for quite a while, so I'm surprised we've only signed him until January. I'm guessing we need the cover in actual games right now, so signing him short term give us that while we assess him further. I hope he continues to blow us away with gradual improvement :-)

I would like to be Kevin Van Veen fat. I'd even settle for Robbie Crawford fat at this point.

Maguire played one half with each foot. Sorry, these Maguire 2 footed jokes aren't going away, blame Jock.

He's guaranteed to score against us, just like every other ex-player has* * may not be able to back that up with numbers.

Utd will have signed Carson because Seigrist is sure to be gone. Although, we signed Gillespie because we thought Carson would be gone, and you see how that worked out, so you never know. We clearly competed with Utd financially in this case, or they weren't really in for Kelly, as we're sitting with the guy that we wanted, and they have our second choice keeper. I doubt any other team would have asked for a fee for Carson in this situation, we've just signed his replacement and deemed him surplus to requirements, so we needed his wage off the books. Kind of similar to Kelly with QPR. I thought Carson was an excellent keeper for us, and would have been happy with him as number 1 this year, but knee injuries are scary. I hope his run of bad luck has come to an end, as he still has a good few years ahead of him if he stays fit.

No chance we paid that kind of money, that's in record fee territory.

You sure about the Luton guy? It was Dundee that had a guy on loan from there according to p&b. The liverpool guy has barely played for anyone, cant imagine him being a starter.

Papers with the "former rangers" shite again, played about 15 games for them almost 10 years ago and has been with 6 clubs since. He was at Scunthorpe under Alexander and Daws, so we could possibly be doing the guy a favour by giving him a pre season, or the management don't quite trust the analytics and video and want to stick with known quantities. I don't know much about him, but he seems to be an injury risk. Had a decent career in England, so maybe something there if he can stay fit.

He kept the only rangers player out of the team, and that's about it. As said above, he wasn't our worst performer, and played really well in the England game, so dropping him for the last game would have been dumb. Does the young guy have much chance of playing 10+ games this season? Will he be accommodated in another position due to him being a wonderkid?