Digs

This was our main issue. We were so poor behind the ball both attacking and defending which made it look like we were standing off, we weren't per se, we were just disorganised, our lines weren't tight enough and it allowed them to play through us. Going forward it was the same. Once they sat on Moffat, he disappeared and that mean the only forward threats from midfield were in Comrie and Edwards but they can't do it all as they need a link up to move it through the lines in the middle and Chalmers and Allen to a much lesser extent, weren;t doing that. I'm a big fan of Joe Chalmers, but I'm not sure how anyone can say he played well. He was off the pace, gave the ball away and didn't put a foot on it often enough to take the sting out of them in the second half. We were far too rushed in recycling the ball second half when we should have been focussed on keeping it for 6-10 passes to break their momentum. That is why I was absolutely furious at Mehmet's mistake. Not only was it a terrible pass, there was no need to do it so quickly. We need to be cleverer than that and manage the game better. As for McCann, he was absolutely anonymous for the entire game, and how he stayed on whilst Jakubiak went off, I will never know. We can't keep saying, 'he's a young lad' forever, at what point does consistency become the expectation? You never know what version of him is going to turn up. A great example of his lackadaisical display the other night came in the first half, Moffat got wide and put in a brilliant cross right in between the centre backs, a strikers dream ball, exactly where you'd want him to put it. Where was McCann, standing ball watching behind the second defender. As a striker, the first thing you are told is you must get across your defenders, either in the box, or when it goes up to the park. He is easily our most frustrating player. When he's on it, he's brilliant. When he's not, we're a man down.

If this had been in the other end, Dundee would be getting hammered. They'll likely still get hammered for letting them get into the ground in the first place, something I'm surprised about because every time I've been to Dens, the searches I've been subjected to would normally have cost me money with happy ending included.

I don't really take any interest in German football but that was brilliant. Some great goals there, Muller is still an absolute baller and it was a debut to remember for the young lad for Bayern. An assist for the first goal then caught in possession for the equaliser! A great goal to win it and fair play to them for still committing at that stage in the match to go for it. The Saarbrucken kit is also very nice.

I don't think that will be the case. McPake has said on numerous occasions that he is wary of this generally speaking having known what he was like himself as a player, and it being to his own detriment. Also, if they are back, he said it will be as part of the squad so will make the bench at most and may not even get on. There's no way they'd be started.

Morton 1 Dunfermline Ath 2 (27/1895) Arbroath 1 Partick Th 1 Ayr Utd 2 Queens Park 0 Dundee 2 ICT 1 Raith Rovers 2 Airdrie 1

Some are starting to panic after three defeats on the bounce but when you look at the league table, we win the two games in hand and we go 3rd. That's how tight this league is and we, along with a few others will be yo-yoing up and down this league all season until some start to drift away from the pack at both ends. As I said before, I am not too concerned yet as we played well on Saturday and should have taken at least a point. I didn't see Ayr so can't comment on that, but at Partick, whilst we lost soft goals, I thought again that we did ok on the ball and again, had chances. We just need a couple of things to click and I don't think we need to drastically change all that much. Individually, we have a good squad, so getting the most out of each individual, whilst regaining that brilliant team spirit from last season should be McPake's priority. For this, I'll go 1-2 Pars.

To be fair to Comrie, a few chances have fallen to him, one of the league cup games, can't mind who against, he could have had a hat-trick, but he's not a striker so is never going to be clinical. Guys like Matty Todd took a lot of these chances last year, and we have missed his threat no doubt, 11 goals last season, so I think when we get him and KRH back and Moffat gets a bit more confidence, it will fall into place. I;d be more worried if we weren;t creating chances at all.

I can't be bothered to even offer an opinion on this as I'm still scunnered. It was a total kick in the teeth to lose it like that. Only thing I'll say is, I'm nowhere near panicking yet, the performance was good and an improvement on Patrick and the Ayr game I didn't see by all accounts, so I'd rather we had our slump early on with a window to go, than after January. Goals win games, that's a fact and we can't keep missing chances. Two games we've been the better team against that mob, and we've walked away 3-0 down from them collectively whilst they f***y about on social media as if they are Real Madrid. Hubris this early on in the season often comes back to bite you is all I will say...

That Tranent score is a shocker even though they both play in the same league, nobody saw that coming. Tranent are probably a better side, but not by that margin. Also, well done to Jeanfield, they've got a great set up and are a decent side and this is the biggest shock of the round. They play in the EOS Premier and so are a league below Tranent and EK. They play in the same league as the Swifts, and Hill of Beath!

Possession stats aren't based on time you have the ball, it's based on percentage of the games completed passes. If you stand and pass the ball side to side in your own half your possession stats will go up. It's a bit of a misnomer. On Saturday our possession stats were poorer than Raiths, but we were the better team for huge parts of the game.

Fri 27th Oct 23 Dundee Utd 2 V 1 Arbroath Queens Park 0 v 2 Partick Sat 28th Oct 23 Ayr Utd 1 v 0 Morton Inverness CT 1 v 1 Airdrie Raith Rovers 2 v 1 Dunfermline Ath (37/5987)

0-8 Dunfermline.

There wasn't a fight. The way it was relayed to me was that a Armadale player, ex-dunfermline, ran off the pitch chasing a ball and ran into the coach and they banged into each other, a bit of a rammy but not even handbags, just shouting, then the game was abandoned after the girl claimed to have been assaulted with an elbow to the back of the head. Much to the bemusement of the coach and he told the person who relayed this to me that no-one had any idea why it had been abandoned. It was apparently the girls mother who called police.

Whilst I agree with you on the word legend being thrown around far too liberally nowadays, you have to remember, you're also looking at it through players/managers who have done something in your lifetime. You've completely forgotten, for example, about Charlie Dickson. club record goalscorer for nearly 60 years, and likely forever, played for the club for ten years, won the first of our Scottish Cups. That surely has to qualify him easily? There's likely others I'm also forgetting, point being, these legends will evolve over time and the window for qualification is different within us all, a 10-15 year old would likely not even mention all of these and would likely say someone less than deserving due purely to how poor we have been in their lifetime.

Absolute legend of the game, only one of the ‘Holy Trinity’ left now. RIP Sir Bobby.

Glad I was poolside in Turkey this afternoon 😂

Fri 20th Oct 23 Airdrie 2 v 0 Queens Park Sat 21st Oct 23 Arbroath 1 v 1 Raith Rovers Dunfermline Ath 2 v 0 Ayr Utd (37/4789) Morton 1 v 1 Inverness CT Partick 1 v 2 Dundee Utd

That was an absolute shocker. Had that been McTominay on Rodri in the centre circle it would have been a free kick to Rodri and a booking for McTominay it was a straight knee to the back FFS! The tackle from Carvajal on McGinn was an absolute joke as well. The ref motioned that it was a coming together!? He jumped straight at him and took him out, preventing him from getting in behind the Spanish defence, on what planet was that not a foul? I don't blame refs generally speaking, I think you get what you deserve out of a game, but when you have things like the above, whilst Laporte got away with about 3 bookings before he eventually got booked, you have to question the referees competence, if not his integrity* *This same ref has been questioned in the past as part of a match fixing investigation where he was named in allegations by a player.

Well if they noticed that, they should also have noticed Le Normand's arms locked round Dykes waist and awarded a penalty!

He got offered a deal, he turned it down in the hope we would improve it, he continued to train. In the meantime, we then signed Ben Summers, then Jakubiak and he sent his agent back to accept it and was told, too late, we had everyone we need so it's off the table. It's his own fault.

"Enjoy yer night pal..."

Heard from a couple of people in the club since Saturday that during the pitch inspection, the ball was barely bouncing and consideration was also given to travelling fans coming down too. There were already warnings about travelling only out of necessity before this and the M90 holds pools of water if it starts spitting. Sensible decision for the game to be off, despite what some of the crackpots on social media have been saying about the pitch being atrocious, and 'needing sorted' whilst ignoring the fact that the pitch sits about 3m below street level on all sides meaning drainage options are somewhat limited to what you can do underneath the grass. There is always a limit to what that will achieve. Good for us injury wise and means the like of Summers has two weeks extra recovery time.

Pitch is looking ok at the moment, water just seems to be sitting round the edges but pitch inspection is still possible depending on how much rain continues to fall.

Of course he is. It's clearly Friday and I'm clearly in need of a beer...

That sounds concerning unless it's for a review of how the op went. He's said that in the past, even referencing his own injuries where he took a risk as he felt fine but it set him back or caused another injury.