ONeils40yarder

Losing Carson at this stage of the window would be nothing short of disastrous. We've virtually played without a goalkeeper for the past 4 seasons since Randolph left, and having the assurance of having a cracking keeper has been a big part of our successes this season. I'm honestly dreading losing him, more than I ever did with Louis Moult. Celtic and Rodgers are clearly a shower of cunts...they know fine well that at this stage of the window, and with our guy being signed for a further 2.5years, we're never going to accept a bid of £200k. All they are doing is agitating and seeing how far they can push us, they'll be back with an increased bid of maybe £300k before midnight tomorrow, knowing fine well that they'll have unsettled our player, and are trying to back us into a corner. Motherwell though are in a great position to just say 'no thanks' from now until the window closes. I can understand that Carsons head will be turned (despite his own obvious beliefs) with the extra money, European football and medals at stake this season with the tinks, but we just need to knock things back for the next 48hours and tell Carson to deal with it, with the promise that we'll allow him to leave in the Summer if the offering club come up with a decent package

I thought any type of contact was enough to award a penalty nowadays...

I watched Dunne playing at left wing-back down at Gateshead...it wasn't pretty, to say the least. Everyone is talking about how bad his distribution is, so why in the name of God would we want to push him into midfield where his passing ability will come under even more scrutiny? Rose or Tait will play on the left until we sign someone who is adequate to play there, and Robinson will have to decide on his favourite 3 at the back, out of Kipre, Aldred, Dunne and Hartley.

The big issue right now, is that he appears to be struggling through niggly wee injuries, first his shoulder and then he looked like he had an issue with his right leg on Wednesday.

But you want Kipre in there to show him how its done?

Been saying this for a while now...hes built to play right-back/right wing-back

The left-hand side of the team is a massive concern for me, the squad is as deep as I can remember it, but it seems that our options for left wing-back, are an out-and-out winger in the injured Frear, or the right footers Tait and Rose. I'd like to see us move a couple of the midfielders or strikers on that aren't getting much game time, Fisher, Petravicius, Bigi and Grimshaw and bring someone in that can play the position properly.

Another game devoid of any quality on the pitch at all, and my usual fallback options of Carson and Campbell making one or two uncharacteristic errors, I've plumped for Main...solely because of his work-rate throughout the match...I'm not convinced hes much better than Bowman or Fisher, but we'll wait and see

Best player is a difficult one...Cadden on his day would have a shout, Tanner given that he looks so natural on the ball, Hartley because of the instant impact he had on organising our defence, Campbell because of his work-rate and energy, Tait because of versatility and consistency... ...however, if you were to take any of those players out of the team for any length of time, I'm sure we'd cope, but I'd struggle to say the same about Carson, from a playing point of view, hes our most valuable asset

For all the talk over the past few weeks that Hartley 'was a done deal', its great news to actually see that become a fact rather than gossip. If we carry-on with the three at the back, Aldred and Hartley, alongside either Kipre or Dunne with Carson behind them, starts to look very solid. The video clip is excellent, and has given us a huge amount of free publicity.

For me, its the easiest job in the team, 'wherever he goes, you go, make it as difficult as possible to get space and time'. The better the opposition player, the harder it is to man-mark him clearly. I've nothing against Rose, he works hard and clearly Robinson rates him, I just take a wee bit of exception to folk saying that he had a great game, when his sole contribution was marking Dougie Imrie, and I possibly noticed his limitations a bit more with him being on the right hand side in front of me in the second half rather than being in the middle of the park. When he had the ball, he couldnt wait to get rid of it

I help run a boys club, and from time-to-time, we'll ask a boy to 'man mark' an opposition player...its generally the less talented boys that carry this role out

The pitch is outstanding, and a credit to everyone involved in working on it, hiring the correct people and putting the budget into it

I can't see Cadden getting a Championship club offering money for him to be honest.

If we are happy to completely forget attacking down one side of our pitch to nullify Dougie Imrie, then our style of play is worse than I thought. I get that Rose carried out a particular role, but that particular role isnt the most difficult thing to do on a fitba' pitch. Yes, I've stated that I didn't really notice it at the game at the time, but looking back I can concede that he did keep Imrie very quiet, what I did notice though is his very limited use of the ball when he did have the time to get on it.

Absolute nonsense...we've just sold Moult, a guy that I have never seen criticised on this board

In all honesty I thought we were pretty chronic against Accies, with them being even worse than we were. There were a few good performances, I had the fear when Dunne went to the middle of defence but he had an excellent second half...maybe hes a better central defender than the left-sided defender we've witnessed? Main looked like he could offer something, put himself about really well, lots of energy and very little in the way of service. Tanner is a joy to watch when hes on the ball, really tricky and seems to be able to go by his man with ease. Ciftci is clearly unfit, and looked like he was towing a caravan at times, but some of his touches and link up play was really good. If he is going to be a success here, he really needs to get fit quickly. My man of the match though is wee Campbell (again), maybe its just that he is the type of midfield player that I like, but I could watch him play football all day. Rarely gives the ball away, tenacious, energetic, seems to love going toe-to-toe with players that have bullied our midfield in the past and wears his heart on his sleeve. We really have got a player on our hands in my opinion, one that could go really far in the game. Final word on Andy Rose, I was a wee bit bewildered that so many thought he had a great game on Saturday, but thinking back I can see what people are meaning with regards to Imries lack of involvement, my concern with him playing in that position though is that he looked utterly clueless on what to do when we had the ball, he offered very little in an attacking sense, and more often than not chose the wrong option, even when only passing the ball 10 or 15 yards.

aye, but did you let him know why you were upset with him?

On Joe Wark, and having never seen him play, if he was so good, why didn't he get a cap for Scotland (I'm assuming because of competition for places at that time), but probably more surprisingly, why did he never get a move to a bigger club?

What about the people who unfollow players on Twitter, but let the player know that they are doing it...are they 'winning'?

Nadir Ciftci? Nah, not for me I'm afraid...he clearly has an attitude/behavioural problem and has hardly scored a goal since he hit a purple patch with Dundee United a few years ago. He's also a loan signing from a team in the same league as us, which really doesn't sit right with me, and even worse than that its a Celtic player. Hopefully the media are wide of the mark and the 'smallish black guy with Curtis Main' is the answer to our goalscoring problems

Unfollowing him on Twitter is fair enough in my book, but having a big enough petted lip to go out of the way to tell him that you're doing it is a bit of a red neck for me. We're being incredibly naive if we think that a boy born and brought up in Glasgow, doesnt have leanings towards either of these clubs. Fuck, most people in Lanarkshire support either of the bigoted bastards, and the likes of Kieran Tierney who can probably see Fir Park from his door, are a far bigger problem for me than the likes of a Glasgow boy, born and bred. Some people who sign for us having supported another team growing up, will eventually change their overall allegiance, the likes of Faddy for instance...but others won't, Rab McKinnon never shuts up about Celtic on Facebook for example. If you're offended by Murphy stating his delight that he has signed for Rangers, then unfollow him, but I've no idea what we're trying to achieve by announcing our disgust. Murphy will be a great signing for the dirty, horrible bastards (and yes, I believe that I hate Rangers much more than any Celtic fan does, and vice versa...they can't live without each other) in my opinion...one of the most under-rated players we've ever had at Fir Park in my time watching Motherwell, under-rated by the media, the Club itself and the support, he was one of my favourite players at a time where we were competing at the right end of the table more often than not. I hope he has a shite time of it at Rangers though, just as I do with every single one of their signings.

We'd all prefer to see our own young players coming through the ranks and going on to earn us some transfer fees that way, however I find it incredibly difficult to criticise the club for their current transfer policy when you consider the success we have had from it. There are some cracking bits of debate on this thread, but the thing that keeps coming back to me is that we are at the mercy of two-men, Boyle and Hutchinson, and while both clearly have the Club at heart and don't want to cause the Club any intentional damage, we are still indebted to them and must pay them back as a matter of urgency...and the best way to do that seems to be a short-term fix, of bringing players up from down South, playing at lower levels who we feel could do well for us and then go back down South and play at a higher level, after we allow them to perform on a better publicised stage than the one that the current play on. Once we pay LH and JB back, the noose is literally taken away from around our necks and we can re-focus our policies on a more stable footing. For all that Accies have brought all of these youngsters through and they are now playing in their 1st team regularly, they havent sold anyone of note in years and years, so currently, their transfer policy is of absolute no use to Motherwell FC.

'Loaning' players from Celtic gives me the heave