2019'20 Game 9: Aberdeen (H)

[The African]

Disappointed by the result, but not entirely surprised. Have been a ‘well fan for too long not to know that we are a team who have to take the rough with the smooth. It seems to have been a day when a whole number of factors conspired to confound us. We are a young squad and, as such, inconsistency is always going to be a reality during the season. The key is really how we cope and whether we can bounce back from these sort of results. Looking for a reaction next weekend, though we have a difficult fixture so may have to be about performance rather than any tangible result. ‘Twas ever this.

[GazzyB]

1 hour ago, Kmcalpin said:

Absolutely. We should have done an Aaron Hickey/Hearts and withdrawn him from the international games. The fact that we didn't cost us.  Hopefully we've learnt our lesson but I'm not convinced. We've taken one for the international squad.

We absolutely should not have. He's been away on international duty plenty in the past and come back and played just fine, even this season. Unless he was doubled over wheezing for breath after 10 minutes today it's purely a coincidence he had a bad game after international duty.

 

Either way, you can't deny a player the opportunity to play for his country because we have Aberdeen at home up next.

[Kmcalpin]

Just now, GazzyB said:

We absolutely should not have. He's been away on international duty plenty in the past and come back and played just fine, even this season. Unless he was doubled over wheezing for breath after 10 minutes today it's purely a coincidence he had a bad game after international duty.

 

Either way, you can't deny a player the opportunity to play for his country because we have Aberdeen at home up next.

I beg to differ. He's come back jaded before from international duty and it has affected his performances.  Other teams "protect" their young players from burn out or whatever, so why shouldn't we? The fact that today's game was against Aberdeen is neither here nor there.  I know you'll not agree so we should just agree to differ over this.

[Big Wispy Flossy]

38 minutes ago, Kmcalpin said:

I beg to differ. He's come back jaded before from international duty and it has affected his performances.  Other teams "protect" their young players from burn out or whatever, so why shouldn't we? The fact that today's game was against Aberdeen is neither here nor there.  I know you'll not agree so we should just agree to differ over this.

Campbell was not jaded, just desperately poor. It wasn’t the result of the international break.   If he’s jaded in October then something is fundamentally wrong 

[GazzyB]

26 minutes ago, Kmcalpin said:

I beg to differ. He's come back jaded before from international duty and it has affected his performances.  Other teams "protect" their young players from burn out or whatever, so why shouldn't we? The fact that today's game was against Aberdeen is neither here nor there.  I know you'll not agree so we should just agree to differ over this.

He played 180 minutes for Scotland in September and was voted 2nd best player in our very next game against Hearts. As for the bolded part, so he's just never allowed to play for Scotland again?

[Pettywulliegrew-2]

Desperately Poor  performances for our young homegrown trio........penalty goes in could have been  a different story

[Welldaft Mk1]

You cannot stop players from representing their country unless they are injured.

For one thing the player themselves would not thank you for it and for another Alan Campbell is a young lad so should be able to cope with several games over 2 weeks. 

For whatever reason all players bar central defence (Mugabe and Gallacher) were so far off their game it was unreal. Maybe that is down to a more experienced and streetwise Aberdeen but that was by far the worst performance of the season. The missed penalty and our captain going off contributed but generally poor all round.

[Pepper]

I thought Gallagher was poor today, admittedly by his own high standards. He seemed to struggle with Cosgrove's "physicality" from the start and didn't quite know how to play him, resorting at times to nipping in front of him desperately trying  to win balls that were never on.  He also played himself into trouble more than once by trying to be too smart (that fake half turn he does is going to end in tears) and his ball to Campbell which led to the second was nuts. Saying that compared to the rest of the performances on show today it is undoubtedly unfair to single him out.

Aberdeen did to us today exactly what we have done to them in the recent past. They were right in our faces from the start and we imploded. Absolute pish  from everyone.

[Burn_Broomfield]

An excruciating performance against an absolutely dug shite team.  Not exposing Logan at any point of that game is a major faux pas from Robbo.  Any team that contains a defenceof Considine, McKenna, Devlin and Logan should be on the emd of regular trouncings, but we barely laid a glove on them.

A desperately poor performance and one, if we repeat it next week, will see us on the end of an almighty hiding.

[Kmcalpin]

When Aberdeen took the field I knew what kind of game it would be, as they're the biggest side physically we've met this season.  We started brightly for the first few minutes culminating in the penalty (I've not seen it on replay yet). Scott's weak effort galvanised the Dons and shook us.  Would we have won had he scored it? Difficult to say but I think not.  Our problems were compounded when Hartley was forced off and Aberdeen took advantage of us being a man short to capitalise on a defensive error.  Questions need to be asked about the delay in bringing Mugabe on.  After that the Dons sat back in depth and comfortably prevented us from playing, preferring to hit us on the break which they did effectively.  By contrast we looked totally devoid of ideas, unable to breach their midfield never mind defence.  After the break they grew in confidence and scored 2 more from defensive errors and looked totally comfortable.  We did mount some attacks in the latter stages but failed to trouble Lewis. If I recall rightly, we had 2 efforts on target all day including the failed penalty and one cleared off the line?  Well before time up we looked a beaten and disheartened side.  over the piece we deserved to lose and truth be told should have lost a few more goals.  

Aberdeen bullied and outmuscled us and we simply didn't compete.  Our off the ball play was woeful and disorganised. By comparison, Aberdeen chased and harried all day and refused to give us time or space anywhere on the pitch, they didn't want to. We were devoid of any sort of plan, disorganised at the back, and in midfield, and toothless up front.  A real off day when we were really naive. Still, Gallagher and Mugabe played reasonably well and Gillespie was blameless.   We simply weren't solid enough and gifted Aberdeen 3 soft, but well taken, goals.  That was always my fear going into this game.  

I didn't get overly enthusiastic about our winning streak and I'm not overly worried about today.  We've now played 3 games against other top six sides at Fir Park and lost the lot.  That tell us something.  On that evidence, we're not a top 4 side, but not a bottom 4 side either.  A long way to go but I suspect we'll finish somewhere between 5th and 8th.  A bad day at the office today but I think it has showed, once again, that we badly need a right back, deputy left back (assuming Carroll is ok), a defensive midfielder (Sloth?) and an out and out striker in the Cosgrove mould.  Little point, like today, in playing 2 wingers if they have no one to cross to.            

[Kmcalpin]

Interestingly I didn't think that our defence was much worse today than it has been during our winning run.  We made the same mistakes i.e. leaving the flanks exposed, letting opponents run at our central defence and fire off shots and gifting opposing strikers room and space in our box. The difference is that a better calibre of team than we've played of late punished us for those same mistakes.   

[Goggles & Flippers]

11 hours ago, Yodo said:

So the team that are murder gub us 3-0 at home says a lot for us and if you think we have played well over the piece since the start of the season then u really are a happy clapper 

Welcome back. It seems Steelboy has been nurturing his Padawan in the Jedi temple of cuntery ...... but this pupil has way surpassed his master.

Newsflash everyone, team with bottom half budget in SPFL suffers from inconsistency .... get over it

[Kmcalpin]

4 hours ago, Goggles & Flippers said:

Newsflash everyone, team with bottom half budget in SPFL suffers from inconsistency .... get over it

Part of our problem is lack of experience in the team.  Young players like Campbell and Maguire tend to be inconsistent.  For all his faults, we missed Hartley yesterday, when he went off, as there was no-one able and willing to take charge and organise the team.  We had a midfield that sat too deep and looked intimidated by Aberdeen, 2 full backs that were posted missing for most of the game and two centre backs, whilst they played well as individuals, didn't play as a unit. I did feel sorry for Gillespie, Mugabe and Gallagher though as they had no protection from the centre midfield nor the full backs.  Whatever else we need, we do need more character/bottle/leadership on the pitch.  

[Welldaft Mk1]

Actually thought Scott was unlucky with Penalty. Yes it was a good height but he fairly leathered it and on seeing the highlights it was a fantastic save by Lewis rather than a poor penalty.  You could criticise if he trundled it along the ground or missed the target but it was not a bad effort imho. 

The second goal was a hospital pass From Gallagher but again watching the highlights straight away he realises this and tells / points to Campbell to pass back to Gillespie. That Campbell decided to fart about was more of a contributing factor. 

Post above nails it for me. We have a bottom 6 budget and so to expect us to win 6 games from 7 is maybe asking too much. Expected a better performance but not to be. Barring a miracle Killie will probably be above us when we play them midweek shortly. That would be an even bigger game than yesterday.....

[Kmcalpin]

5 minutes ago, Welldaft Mk1 said:

Barring a miracle Killie will probably be above us when we play them midweek shortly. That would be an even bigger game than yesterday.....

That will be more of a realistic test of our standing than yesterday's game Iain, given respective budgets.  I've not seen a lot of Killie in the last couple of years but they give me the impression of being a hard working, organised, robust and solid side, but without much flair. Probably a very different team to us.      

[Happy Dosser]

This was the game where it all went wrong:  a missed penalty, an unfortunate injury to Hartley, a goal lost while down to ten men, a silly mix-up and a freak goal. Aberdeen did not have to try very hard to get their points, which was most disappointing. How important that first goal is...

We seemed to lack a leader without Hartley, Campbell looked jaded after Scotland duty and once again we struggled to get behind a packed defence.  Without Donnelly our  midfield  was easily outmuscled.

I'm bemused by Robinson's habit of taking Scott off and leaving Seedorf on. The latter achieved nothing yesterday,  rarely produced a final ball and for every screamer he has nine Row Zs. Scott is stronger and can actually beat his man, given the chance. With a proper striking partner Long might possibly be effective but Cole doesn't look to be that man. 

A pity we have to go to Mordor next Sunday after this knockback. I can't see anything but a confidence-sapping going over from The Hens and then only a few days to get the heads up for a well-organised Killie, Aberdeen mini-mes.

Given our squad, this will be a yo-yo season as far as our performances are concerned.

[wellwell91]

11 hours ago, Kmcalpin said:

Interestingly I didn't think that our defence was much worse today than it has been during our winning run.  We made the same mistakes i.e. leaving the flanks exposed, letting opponents run at our central defence and fire off shots and gifting opposing strikers room and space in our box. The difference is that a better calibre of team than we've played of late punished us for those same mistakes.   

Agreed

That was my point earlier Grimshaw never a full back and Tait never a left back … hence we were weak in the wide defensive areas

Any team that does their homework on us will expose this area

[Yorkyred]

12 hours ago, Kmcalpin said:

When Aberdeen took the field I knew what kind of game it would be, as they're the biggest side physically we've met this season.  We started brightly for the first few minutes culminating in the penalty (I've not seen it on replay yet). Scott's weak effort galvanised the Dons and shook us.  Would we have won had he scored it? Difficult to say but I think not.  Our problems were compounded when Hartley was forced off and Aberdeen took advantage of us being a man short to capitalise on a defensive error.  Questions need to be asked about the delay in bringing Mugabe on.  After that the Dons sat back in depth and comfortably prevented us from playing, preferring to hit us on the break which they did effectively.  By contrast we looked totally devoid of ideas, unable to breach their midfield never mind defence.  After the break they grew in confidence and scored 2 more from defensive errors and looked totally comfortable.  We did mount some attacks in the latter stages but failed to trouble Lewis. If I recall rightly, we had 2 efforts on target all day including the failed penalty and one cleared off the line?  Well before time up we looked a beaten and disheartened side.  over the piece we deserved to lose and truth be told should have lost a few more goals.  

Aberdeen bullied and outmuscled us and we simply didn't compete.  Our off the ball play was woeful and disorganised. By comparison, Aberdeen chased and harried all day and refused to give us time or space anywhere on the pitch, they didn't want to. We were devoid of any sort of plan, disorganised at the back, and in midfield, and toothless up front.  A real off day when we were really naive. Still, Gallagher and Mugabe played reasonably well and Gillespie was blameless.   We simply weren't solid enough and gifted Aberdeen 3 soft, but well taken, goals.  That was always my fear going into this game.  

I didn't get overly enthusiastic about our winning streak and I'm not overly worried about today.  We've now played 3 games against other top six sides at Fir Park and lost the lot.  That tell us something.  On that evidence, we're not a top 4 side, but not a bottom 4 side either.  A long way to go but I suspect we'll finish somewhere between 5th and 8th.  A bad day at the office today but I think it has showed, once again, that we badly need a right back, deputy left back (assuming Carroll is ok), a defensive midfielder (Sloth?) and an out and out striker in the Cosgrove mould.  Little point, like today, in playing 2 wingers if they have no one to cross to.            

I would agree with all of that, we will never know if things would have turned out differently if the pen had gone in, they may have lost a bit of confidence. I though every players was a good 10% down yesterday and as a team we were very sloppy. I thought we missed Donnelly who would no doubt have put away the penalty and is a better fit in midfield than Maguire who I still think is a centre half learning his trade. Robinson has stated he was told Hartley was going back on so no real blame on him there. I still think the main thing we lack is a competent centre forward and that’s going to be the difference this season. I don’t believe Cole or Long are the answer, Long never seems to have the ball fully under control and Cole is still very much a work in progress, Scott will get there but is still a bit off.

[Andy_P]

I don't want to lose full stop and a 3-0 loss does nothing for the goal difference either but the manner in which we lost yesterday will hopefully lead to lessons being learned more than it were a narrow scrappy single goal loss. For there is plenty to learn from.

My eyebrows were raised a little when James Scott stepped up to take the penalty.  I don't really know who else on the park would have been a candidate mind you but I was impressed at his eagerness and lack of fear in stepping up (I remember thinking likewise when David Turnbull took his first penalty also).  It goes down as a miss but at first viewing it seemed more a great save than bad miss.

The loss of the first just compounded the frustration. The build up to it has been well discussed, and to be fair to Cosgrove it was a great finish, but suddenly from licking our lips at taking on a team that apparently had to put two full-backs in midfield to put out a team, we were now a goal behind to team with a minimum of six defensively minded players.  And we just never really seemed to come to terms with it.

The second just seemed to perfectly illustrate the malaise when two of your most consistent performers of the season fanny about, lose possession and gift them what even as early as it came felt like the clinching goal.  Their third was another good finish whilst we waited to bring on another forward.

It certainly raises major question marks over whether we have it within us to be contenders for in and around 3rd place but the more realistic target of a top half finish remains very much achievable. A defeat to an Aberdeen team, regardless of scoreline yesterday, expected for finish above us isn't going to change that.

Given how we defended and the potential loss of Hartley I can't say I'm confident at all and looking forward much to next Sunday though.

 

[ropy]

I expected Polworth to take the penalty

[texanwellfan]

13 hours ago, Andy_P said:

I don't want to lose full stop and a 3-0 loss does nothing for the goal difference either but the manner in which we lost yesterday will hopefully lead to lessons being learned more than it were a narrow scrappy single goal loss. For there is plenty to learn from.

My eyebrows were raised a little when James Scott stepped up to take the penalty.  I don't really know who else on the park would have been a candidate mind you but I was impressed at his eagerness and lack of fear in stepping up (I remember thinking likewise when David Turnbull took his first penalty also).  It goes down as a miss but at first viewing it seemed more a great save than bad miss.

The loss of the first just compounded the frustration. The build up to it has been well discussed, and to be fair to Cosgrove it was a great finish, but suddenly from licking our lips at taking on a team that apparently had to put two full-backs in midfield to put out a team, we were now a goal behind to team with a minimum of six defensively minded players.  And we just never really seemed to come to terms with it.

The second just seemed to perfectly illustrate the malaise when two of your most consistent performers of the season fanny about, lose possession and gift them what even as early as it came felt like the clinching goal.  Their third was another good finish whilst we waited to bring on another forward.

It certainly raises major question marks over whether we have it within us to be contenders for in and around 3rd place but the more realistic target of a top half finish remains very much achievable. A defeat to an Aberdeen team, regardless of scoreline yesterday, expected for finish above us isn't going to change that.

Given how we defended and the potential loss of Hartley I can't say I'm confident at all and looking forward much to next Sunday though.

 

Whilst I’m not looking forward to Sunday, we may still well finish the first round of fixtures in 3rd place which is a vast improvement on last season. Even after our defeat on Saturday I think there is still reason for optimism.  We find ourselves in or close to being third after having played everyone and we all know there is still lots of room for improvement. COYW

[Kmcalpin]

4 hours ago, texanwellfan said:

Whilst I’m not looking forward to Sunday, we may still well finish the first round of fixtures in 3rd place which is a vast improvement on last season. Even after our defeat on Saturday I think there is still reason for optimism.  We find ourselves in or close to being third after having played everyone and we all know there is still lots of room for improvement. COYW

We'll be in a good position to really judge our progress after the first round of fixtures is complete i.e. after the Kilmarnock game.  The Livingston game will also be a useful barometer. 

[2/6 tae get in]

On 10/19/2019 at 5:38 PM, wellwell91 said:

Yip that was a reality check on where we are today 

Have said it before and I’ll say it again Grimshaw will never make a right back in a million years 

Tait is wasted a left back

Seedorf is like playing with a man short ……  something special once every 3 games if we’re lucky not good enough

Young Scott still a work in progress and his head seemed to go down after penalty miss

When we come up against good experienced pros with agame plan we are found wanting

 

Richard Tait was brought in as a Right Back and is a brilliant Right Back in my opinion. Cannot agree enough with you that he's wasted at left back, been saying it since  last season. How can the management team not see this. You see it week after week that he's not comfortable and it's costing us. Wake up Robinson and fix this before we lose Tait at the next transfer window because where from where I sit he does not look happy.

[weeyin]

Who should have played at left back on Saturday?

[Yassin]

4 hours ago, 2/6 tae get in said:

Richard Tait was brought in as a Right Back and is a brilliant Right Back in my opinion. Cannot agree enough with you that he's wasted at left back, been saying it since  last season. How can the management team not see this. You see it week after week that he's not comfortable and it's costing us. Wake up Robinson and fix this before we lose Tait at the next transfer window because where from where I sit he does not look happy.

To be fair I do think Carroll was brought in to rectify this. I don't think Tait has started a game at left back this season unless Carroll has been suspended or injured.