Stevie O'D

[Spiderpig]

2 minutes ago, Happy Dosser said:

Step forward, Connor Shields.....

Is it no a bit early in the day to be drinking 

[Motherwell Daft]

It’s 5 o’clock somewhere...

[joewarkfanclub]

SOD  is a very solid SPL level right back who we are lucky to have at the club. Short of bringing thru an emerging talent (Max Johnston?) we will struggle to get a better player than him coming to Fir Park on the money we pay. I do though have mixed feelings about his Euros.

Was chuffed to bits for him re his performance against England and his interviews after the game and the next day showed what a genuinely decent guy he is. However, his limitations were exposed against both the Czechs and Croatia where he appeared to be somewhat nervy.

The presence of Billy Gilmour and McTominay inside him at Wembley undoubtedly had a stabilising effect on him as they were always available  for a pass. But even so, some of his crossfield passing at Wembley was sublime.

It makes me wonder if he has self confidence issues particularly playing at Hampden where he is more aware of the criticism he gets from within our own support?

For what its worth, I think Nathan Patterson is the future for Scotland at right back as he showed in a 10 minute cameo on Tuesday night the directness and pace to drive forward that is required at international level, however, he will need games, which he wont get at Rangers as long as Tavernier is there and fit.

So for now, Im delighted to have Scotlands first pick right back at our club. Whether he plays the full term of his contract or is sold for a decent fee, the club will undoubtedly benefit.

 

 

[Great Balls of Shire]

21 hours ago, dennyc said:

Nobody is saying it is perfect and I agree with you regards Goalkeeper and Centre Back needing upgraded.

But no vital wins with 2/3rds of a good team? What about Wales? What do they have? TWO decent ageing players in Bale and Ramsay but their qualifying and tournament record is superb of late despite the rest of the team being way below that level. And those two players have hardly played all season for their clubs. And some of that national success under a caretaker Manager. Northern Ireland also had some praiseworthy success.

We have four players currently starring at huge clubs in England in Tierney Robertson McGinn and McTominey,  Players who could argueably have a case for featuring in an EPL select squad. Add to that Gilmour Turnbull Adams Patterson Nisbet as younger newcomers who are an upgrade on where we were 6 months ago. All of them will improve given the correct support. I would add Kerr of St Johnstone and maybe Doig at Hibs as options worth trying. And whether we like to admit it or not the Scottish players at Rangers and Celtic are of a decent standard. So we are far from starved of talent and quality.

Tactics and formation are another matter and Clarke has to construct a formation that plays to the strengths of his squad and stop being focused on setting up a team not to lose, rather than setting up a team to win. He is not in charge of Kilmarnock any more. The Czech game is a prime example of that approach. That  game cost us qualification, not the Croatia game.

But some are using last night to once again rip into SOD, who was far from being our worst player. And those same folk never uttered a word after his outstanding performance against England. Seems to me they have an agenda and last night's result simply played into their hands. Sadly some of them are Motherwell fans.

Not at international level clearly, but the same thing happened all the time with Dunne, and more recently with Lamie, Mugabi and McGinley. Deafening silence when they play well but jump on for every error. I get it that fans play favourites, but how about some credit where credit is due rather than using every slight error to try and prove a point. 

Having said all that, Scotland need to find a goalkeeper who can take over for the next 10 years.

I dont get the criticism Marshall gets, I dont even blame him for the Czech goal...just a piece of brilliance from them.

With the Scottish defence , I dont know what goalie would look that good.

[Happy Dosser]

4 hours ago, Spiderpig said:

Is it no a bit early in the day to be drinking 

Yes, but  I'm   on Lewis & Harris time.

I can hear corncrakes.....

[SteelmaninOZ]

1 minute ago, Happy Dosser said:

Yes, but  I'm   on Lewis & Harris time.

I can hear corncrakes.....

Are you off your medication….again 

[Happy Dosser]

2 minutes ago, SteelmaninOZ said:

Are you off your medication….again 

No, scrub my last ornithological remark. Just discovered Tormod in the next croft-house along has just bought one of these: Latin Percussion Cuban Style Guiro LP250 | DV247 | en-GB

It's going to be a long close season.

[Stuwell2]

17 hours ago, Yorkyred said:

My take on it is he’s not the greatest player ever to grace a Scotland jersey but neither are the majority of players capped over the last ten years or so. The days of players like Kenny D and the like who were the backbone of Man Utd and Liverpool are well gone and may never return. I personally don’t get the amount of stick he gets by some Motherwell supporters but hey each to their own, it’s a free country I guess.

I don’t get the amount of stick he gets in general regarding his Scotland appearances from Scotland fans.

Yes he’s not the best RB Scotland has produced but given the current crop on his day he’s as good as the rest if not better - Patterson aside as he’s just emerging. 
I’d also add that he can’t be that far behind both strikers for shots on target over the 3 games. 

[grumpy]

On 6/23/2021 at 9:57 PM, 0Neils40yarder said:

I'd suggest it's the opinion of most Scotland followers who arent blinded by the good old claret and amber spectacles 

 

As for the strikers, both are playing consistently at a higher level than our guy

 

On the manager, I have a fair amount of time for him, but I think he could a fair few things wrong over the past couple of weeks

And yet neither look capable of scoring in the proverbial barrel of fannies. SOD's job is to defend and, for the most part, of the three games he did that pretty well. The criticism he is receiving is miles over the top.

I do agree that Steve Clark could have made better choices on a few occasions during the three games, a back three in the first game when Tierney was injured or having that pudding McKenna come on v Croatia for example, backing SOD was not one of them (IMHO).

 

[GazzyB]

2 hours ago, grumpy said:

And yet neither look capable of scoring in the proverbial barrel of fannies. SOD's job is to defend and, for the most part, of the three games he did that pretty well. The criticism he is receiving is miles over the top.

I do agree that Steve Clark could have made better choices on a few occasions during the three games, a back three in the first game when Tierney was injured or having that pudding McKenna come on v Croatia for example, backing SOD was not one of them (IMHO).

 

20 years ago maybe but a top full back is required to be just as good going forward as he is defending.

[Kmcalpin]

SOD's international performances have confirmed what many of us knew already. He's better attacking than he is defending.

[David]

On 6/24/2021 at 11:50 AM, joewarkfanclub said:

For what its worth, I think Nathan Patterson is the future for Scotland at right back as he showed in a 10 minute cameo on Tuesday night the directness and pace to drive forward that is required at international level, however, he will need games, which he wont get at Rangers as long as Tavernier is there and fit.

While Patterson may very well turn out to be a really good player, I find it amusing at the amount of people who have just bought into the narrative that he's top class. And this isn't aimed at you specifically, by the way.

He's 19 years old, and made seven league appearances last season with five European appearances as well. Four of those league games saw him come on as a sub, including one game after 86 minutes, while he came on as a sub in two of the European games. He also played two Scottish cup games, with one of those against Cove Rangers. 

So that's three league starts, and three European starts, with two Scottish cup games. In total.  

Not to be funny, but I spoke to two guys who were sitting near (but two metres away, of course!) me and my mates in a beer garden during one of the Euro games and they were banging on about Patterson being a future star and that he should be starting for Scotland, with the added piece of information that seems to be popular, that neither of them were Rangers fans.

They ended up admitting that they'd seen him play once or twice on telly. Their opinions have undoubtedly been crafted by the seemingly relentless drumming up of this lad by the written press and talking heads in the media. And we all know why that's the case. 

Could Patterson turn out to be the real deal? Of course he could, and if he does then he'll deserve to be looked at as an option for his country. 

But the truth is, he's proven nothing at club level yet, never mind done enough to warrant international football. O'Donnell isn't a world beater, but few of our players are. The clamour to see him dropped for this kid was as blatant as I've seen the Glasgow-based media act in recent times. 

I'm glad Clarke didn't bend. O'Donnell deserved to be on the field as much as any other player. 

[Stu92]

I couldn't agree more with the defence of SOD throughout the Euros. He was there on merit. Played absolutely superb against the English and was generally fine against the other two teams barring a few awkward moments. You really can't blame him for looking nervy at times when you see the shite directed his way by his own fans and his own nation's media, when his only crime is being a better pick than a Rangers youth player. As someone else alluded to earlier in the thread, I get the feeling that there is a degree of impostor syndrome with him whenever he plays for Scotland.

In lieu of any other obvious contenders from leftfield, Patterson will almost certainly be the Scotland right back for the next wee while. O'Donnell is 29 while Patterson is 19. I suspect the transition will take place over the next qualifying campaign, with Patterson getting a few token run-outs for Rangers in the lead-up to squad announcements. Which I am okay with if he turns out to be half as good as made out to be, as I generally try to keep my Scotland hat and my C&A specs for separate occasions and wouldn't want the national side to be detrimentally affected just to prevent an OF player getting a game. I don't see Clarke being the type to pander, but think in the interest of bringing in new talent and being seen to move the national team forward he'll make the call soon.

The above is all said with the caveat of never having seen Patterson play, other than the 10 minute cameo against Croatia. He looked positive when he got the ball, but also lost it twice by running down a blind alley or diving in and leaving space behind. That's maybe about the same number of times O'Donnell lost possession across 260 minutes. Potential is there, but on that brief viewing not ready (in my opinion) for international competition football. I actually tried to find a highlights video of NP prior to the tournament starting to see what the hype was all about, but all I could find was a compilation of him playing youth football and that one goal against the Belgian side . The fact that the fan boys still couldn't cobble something together suggests how little senior football he has actually played. 

On Turnbull, quite surprised we didn't see him off the bench in any game. This is pure speculation on my part but I wonder if the occasion perhaps got to him and he didn't train as well as he could've? Similar to with us and when he first moved to Celtic, it took him a fair while to establish himself in the team. Both Robinson and Lennon made similar claims about how he needed time to adjust, etc, I wonder how much of that was true and how much was defending their stance to not play him. It'll be interesting to see how he features in future squads where the 'win or bust' thing isn't quite so strong.

[texanwellfan]

There’s one or two players I would leave out before thinking about dropping O’Donnell. 

[joewarkfanclub]

6 hours ago, David said:

While Patterson may very well turn out to be a really good player, I find it amusing at the amount of people who have just bought into the narrative that he's top class. And this isn't aimed at you specifically, by the way.

He's 19 years old, and made seven league appearances last season with five European appearances as well. Four of those league games saw him come on as a sub, including one game after 86 minutes, while he came on as a sub in two of the European games. He also played two Scottish cup games, with one of those against Cove Rangers. 

So that's three league starts, and three European starts, with two Scottish cup games. In total.  

Not to be funny, but I spoke to two guys who were sitting near (but two metres away, of course!) me and my mates in a beer garden during one of the Euro games and they were banging on about Patterson being a future star and that he should be starting for Scotland, with the added piece of information that seems to be popular, that neither of them were Rangers fans.

They ended up admitting that they'd seen him play once or twice on telly. Their opinions have undoubtedly been crafted by the seemingly relentless drumming up of this lad by the written press and talking heads in the media. And we all know why that's the case. 

Could Patterson turn out to be the real deal? Of course he could, and if he does then he'll deserve to be looked at as an option for his country. 

But the truth is, he's proven nothing at club level yet, never mind done enough to warrant international football. O'Donnell isn't a world beater, but few of our players are. The clamour to see him dropped for this kid was as blatant as I've seen the Glasgow-based media act in recent times. 

I'm glad Clarke didn't bend. O'Donnell deserved to be on the field as much as any other player. 

I dont disagree with anything that you have said here, which is why my post was carefully worded. I certainly havent bought into any media narrative. Patterson will be the future. When that future will be is uncertain.  He needs games to prove himself, but he has come thru the all our youth levels and has physical attributes that SOD does not. He also appears to have a belief in himself that will serve him well. Its still SODs jersey, but the heir apparent is obvious.

[weeyin]

He might be the the future, and it's certainly worth including him in the squad to give him some exposure. However, the footballing world is full of promising players whose trajectory nosedives quickly. Sometimes for obvious reasons, sometimes not. Seven first team appearances is certainly no guarantee.

 

A prefect example of that is our own Tony Watt. After he scored his famous goal against Barca he got a 4 year extension as the "next big thing" - but it never quite worked out, except for us.

[ropy]

14 hours ago, weeyin said:

He might be the the future, and it's certainly worth including him in the squad to give him some exposure. However, the footballing world is full of promising players whose trajectory nosedives quickly. Sometimes for obvious reasons, sometimes not. Seven first team appearances is certainly no guarantee.

 

A prefect example of that is our own Tony Watt. After he scored his famous goal against Barca he got a 4 year extension as the "next big thing" - but it never quite worked out, except for us.

Harry Cochrane was a recent example of a young boy that was going to rip it up, he might yet but after an initial flurry he faded.  Could easily be the same for Patterson after he discovers post-scrabble kebabs.

[The African]

If Patterson needs game time to aid his development, play him in the under 21s.

The idea that a player with his level of experience should just walk into the national team because, let's admit it, he plays for Rangers, is both ludicrous and typical of the thinking that now finds Scottish football in the hole it is in.

[weeyin]

47 minutes ago, The African said:

If Patterson needs game time to aid his development, play him in the under 21s.

The idea that a player with his level of experience should just walk into the national team because, let's admit it, he plays for Rangers, is both ludicrous and typical of the thinking that now finds Scottish football in the hole it is in.

He didn't walk into the national team, though - only the squad. And the only reason (like Turnbull) that he was in the squad was because UEFA allowed expanded numbers for the finals.

If O'Donnell was injured, 99.9% chance Tierney would have been moved out there.

[Great Balls of Shire]

On 6/25/2021 at 12:22 PM, David said:

While Patterson may very well turn out to be a really good player, I find it amusing at the amount of people who have just bought into the narrative that he's top class. And this isn't aimed at you specifically, by the way.

He's 19 years old, and made seven league appearances last season with five European appearances as well. Four of those league games saw him come on as a sub, including one game after 86 minutes, while he came on as a sub in two of the European games. He also played two Scottish cup games, with one of those against Cove Rangers. 

So that's three league starts, and three European starts, with two Scottish cup games. In total.  

Not to be funny, but I spoke to two guys who were sitting near (but two metres away, of course!) me and my mates in a beer garden during one of the Euro games and they were banging on about Patterson being a future star and that he should be starting for Scotland, with the added piece of information that seems to be popular, that neither of them were Rangers fans.

They ended up admitting that they'd seen him play once or twice on telly. Their opinions have undoubtedly been crafted by the seemingly relentless drumming up of this lad by the written press and talking heads in the media. And we all know why that's the case. 

Could Patterson turn out to be the real deal? Of course he could, and if he does then he'll deserve to be looked at as an option for his country. 

But the truth is, he's proven nothing at club level yet, never mind done enough to warrant international football. O'Donnell isn't a world beater, but few of our players are. The clamour to see him dropped for this kid was as blatant as I've seen the Glasgow-based media act in recent times. 

I'm glad Clarke didn't bend. O'Donnell deserved to be on the field as much as any other player. 

I've only seen the guy on TV a few times but even in that time,  he looks more accomplished and comfortable than stevie o...its a problem position for scotland , so maybe that's why the young guy is being touted so much.

[Spiderpig]

37 minutes ago, Great Balls of Shire said:

I've only seen the guy on TV a few times but even in that time,  he looks more accomplished and comfortable than stevie o...its a problem position for scotland , so maybe that's why the young guy is being touted so much.

I have no doubt Patterson will have a good future in the game, but so far he has only had about 8 1st team starts, and if he was at any other club than Rangers he would have been nowhere near the Euro squad, the only people shouting about him are the blue ugly  fans and the compliant and  biased West of Scotland media who think  Rangers and their players can do no wrong.

[star sail]

The SOD criticism is baffling generally but when Well fans are happy to stick the boot in, I really am left scratching my head as to the negativity. As Steve Clark himself asked ' Tell us what he did wrong?'

I don't know what magic mind bending dust the media has been spraying this last month but I had the most surreal experience of a Celtic fan arguing that Patterson should be replacing O'Donnell before admitting that he had never actually seen Patterson play!!!! 

At the very worst (and I don't share this view) O Donnell's performances could be described as mediocre but then how many Scotland players performed better?

Take Stuart Armstrong as an example. SA's tactic seemed to be to run with his head down into trouble before promptly losing possession of the ball. He did it several times. I did no hear or read the witch hunt against him. 

Did anybody really believe that Lyndon Dykes was going to score a goal in these championships? We could have played ten games and I would not be convinced our strikers would have scored.

In other words many of the players performances were at the same level or below that of SOD. So why was O'Donnell singled out particularly from Scotland fans and more interestingly Well fans.?

To top it all, had he scored at Wembley (as he nearly did) his value as a player and reputation would have rocketed. I doubt he would have stayed a Motherwell player had that shot gone in.  That is how superficially we assess players worth and value. It is all shallow analysis.

As a Well fan, I was proud to watch him play and thought he did the club proud.

 

Quote

 

 

[fizoxy]

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?

[sinjy]

Just asking but when Patterson came on at Hampden was that the first time he had played in front  of a crowd? Rangers only had him and the third choice goalie in the squad. The media needed a Rangers player to write about to satisfy their readers. It is that sort of parochialism that harms the progress of our national team. Good on Clarke for ignoring them. 

[daver]

SOD's international performances have confirmed what many of us knew already. He's better attacking than he is defending.

It shows how opinions differ as I'd say the opposite. If anything, and from the little I've seen of him, Patterson looks better going forward and his inexperience is noticeable in his defensive duties which is why I think Clarke preferred O'Donnell.

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