steelboy

the number of people who attend games in scotland as a % of the total population is higher than it is in either of those countries. germany has a population of 82 million and france 65 million. that's why they have bigger attendances.

we got good service out of jamie magowan, he was a solid player and i think he captained us on a number of ocassions. kampmann had some rank signings (kraska, mclair, kaven, halliday, miller, white) but also made some decent ones (teale, magowan, matthei, doesberg, michels, adams). plus there was jered stirling. linqvist was only at the club for a month and looked a tidy player. no suprise there's a fair amount of revisionism going on. plenty on here have no problems revising recent history so ten years ago must be fair game.

ruddy saunders hutchison craigan hammell hateley forbes coke o'brien murphy mchugh is my realistic choice ruddy hateley craigan reynolds hammell o'brien lasley coke forbes murphy mchugh is what i'd do if i was in charge

agreed. suprised to see mentions for tony thomas who was a quality player and turned in an immense performance in the cup game against hearts but had mega dodgy knees (only reason we got him) and michels who was a good player who just didn't see eye to with davies. manager: malpas woods christie ready vaughan bollan townsley john davies malcolm roddie henry halliday

that's pretty much the same team that were dire in the first half on saturday. we don't have anyone who can play up front on their own, or anyone in central mid who could get up and support a lone striker. we've got to start with two up front.

he's got 11 days 5 hours and 55 minutes left to get bring in a striker. after that and games agianst an experienced kilmarnock team and a rank aberdeen team we'll be able to make appraisals of his performance so far.

we were playing some of the best fitba ever seen at fir park two years ago and it made almost no impact on attendances.

it was it was a straight either or i'd have reynolds as well but if you'd have given me the choice at 20 past 3 on saturday to switch him with klimpl i'd have had maros on in a second. we've got a serious problem in midfield. gannon obviously thought reynolds might solve it for us but he showed on saturday he can't. coke and forbes both look good but if the two of them play in a two in the centre and we play any combination of slane, o'brien or humphrey on the wings we'll be leaving ourselves far too open.

i think forbes is probably 5 foot 10. buzz was a couple of inches taller than me and i'm six foot. for most of the players it doesn't really matter. dundee united, hearts and killie were all much bigger than us when we finished third and it didn't matter then.

if the choice was between klimpl or reynolds to start in the holding role on saturday klimpl would win hands down. if everybody (except faddy) becomes shite when they leave motherwell.

there were a lot of highs that season but we also went on runs of 11 league games without a win and 10 league games without a win. i'll pass.

the change in formation at halftime was far more relevant than the change of personnel imo. the tactics in the first were a joke: reynolds didn't have a clue what he was doing in midfield, o'brien and murphy were hugging the touchlines and miles away from sutton on the big wide park, neither coke nor forbes were getting close enough to sutton to support him and we were reduced to high balls as the midfield seemed unable to to collect the ball from the defence. i'm no fan of sutton but i thought it's have been fair to give him ten minutes in the 4-4-2. i also thought that craigan did alright in the first half and we were more defensively sound with him in the team. if duechar wasn't so shite we'd have lost two goals to huge errors from hutchison and reynolds. this season's going to be a learning curve and hopefully JG has learned that we don't have anyone who can play upfront alone and that something is going to have to be done to shore things up at the back. on paper st johnstone have the weakest attack in the league and if we give any other team the type of chances we gave st johnstone we'll be punished.

i thought the defence were better in the first half than the second today, st johnstone could have had five with decent finishing. i also think a lot of our defensive problems are to do with the midfield.

aye the difference being that they can all pass the ball, reynolds is a far better athlete than he is a footballer. however if we could somehow combine mark reynolds' body with ross forbes' feet we'd have a player on our hands. there's surely no way this hateley will be the new RB. he's got less experience than saunders and he's been kb'd by accies, killie and st mirren in the past year as well as reading. 17 and a half days til the window shuts, get the finger out gannon!

steaua didn't put us under much pressure though. he was horrific defensively against flamutari. looks like they'll have that big murray davidson at left mid, probably best to have someone decent in the air against him. the one downside about having played so many competitive games is that any suprise element we may have had will be gone. i wouldn't be suprised to see slane getting a few early hard fouls in the opening two fixtures and forbes not being given any time on the ball.

i've seen quite a few memorable moments there. mcdonald making his debut and scoring in the cup. woods getting chipped from the halway line in davies first game when we got pumped 5-0 spencer running 60 yards then firing in a 30 yard screamer stevie hammell racially abusing momo sylla

we played a 3-6-1 against rangers in may 08. it actually worked ok.

add that to saturn being on the cusp of mars and we're guaranteed the victory. unfortunately my granny's bunion is playing up so it's likely to rain. take a jacket!

that's true but how many clubs are paying good money for holding midfielders who aren't particulary talented with the ball at their feet. there's a chance we could turn reynolds into a slightly better marc fitzpatirck. a centrehalf with pace is a rare thing, players who can sit in front of the back four and shield the defence are ten a penny. even lee mcculloch's doing it for rangers.

£800,000 looks like a good deal for reynolds at the moment. wouldn't accept it though unless we would have time to be able to use the money to bring in a replacement and a quality striker. with the business model of the club at the moment we will clearly be looking to punt reynolds within the next year as there's zero chance of him signing a new contract. for me this should be considered when gannon is thinking where to play him this season, it's already been proven he has value as a centrehalf but i don't think he'd be as attractive to clubs down south if we use him as he was against steaua no matter how effective he is at it for us.

thought i'd get this start considering we're less than 48 hours away from kick off. the board seems to have died a death this week with there being no european game, transfer news or much else motherwell related happening. i'm starting to get excited though so let's be having it.... --------------ruddy-------------- saunders craigan reynolds hammell ---------lasley forbes------------ o'brien------coke-------slane ------------sutton--------------- prediction: 2 nil to well with slane and coke grabbing the goals. it's hugely important that we get some points on the board early this season and st johnstone away and killie at home are as good an opportunity as we're likely to get. i've still got no idea how we're going to fare this season but a win on saturday will build on the momentum we gained in the europa league and be a good boost. i doubt we'll see the team i've put up but i think gannon would be taking unneccesary risks playing o'brien at RB and breaking up reynolds and craigan to include hutchison. anyway this is the acid test for gannon, europa league was the honeymoon this is the serious business starting. anyone know anywhere near the ground for a pint and a swatch of some fitba on the telly? cannae wait, fitba on a saturday

the odds. chris "the donkey" humphrey - 3-1 john "the tinman" sutton - 5-1 steven "fatboy" jennings - 7-1 "irish" jim o'brien - 9-1 paul "it'd be a dream to play for shellic" slane - 20-1

gav thinks paul is a sack. i think gav is a sack. this isn't north korea. we all live happily ever after.

top six might be a possibility but i think dundee united and hearts will open a gap on the rest. they're by far the most solid of the rest of the two teams and seem to have made some signings during the summer to help them score more. it's difficult to predict what'll happen with the rest. hibs and aberdeen look like they're going backwards. killie, st mirren and st johnstone look poor but will probably benefit from having stable and experienced squads. us, accies and falkirk are complete unknown quantities but i'd take where we are just now over either of the two of them. it looks like a very weak division this year and if we get in a quality striker and a solid RB we could be looking at europe and a good season. if we don't add quality before the window shuts and we get a couple of injuries we could be relegated. the only guarantee is that it'll be interesting.

whether hammell got tripped or not steaua's third goal happened because slane and forbes had stopped tracking back.