RicoS321

Aye, it was a fucking shocker like. It was the ref to blame though, there was nothing in that at all that could be considered worthy of a pen. It wasn't like he was fooled by the dive, he could clearly see the faint touch that he gave the pen for and chose to give it. Awful decision, ruining another cup final. Tims support, doing their glorious phone light bullshite again like the best fans in the world that they are. Fucking pathetic cunts, lapping up yet another vacuous hollow victory bought and paid for 100 times over.

Good win, some decent performances. Shakey spell, well cancelled out by an excellent May goal. Terrible linesmanning for the disallowed goal - really bad. In a closer game that could have been costly. Whilst Reynolds was calming and decent when he came on, it was a worrying move ahead of Wednesday's game. McInnes likes to try out formations ahead of "bigger" games that he intends using. It was clear that moving back to our normal set-up today made a big difference, especially allowing McLean to play further forward and maybe getting man of the match (him or May or Shinnie or McKenna). Whilst I prefer Shinnie at left back, Considine played quite well and Shinnie did well in midfield. Based on recent evidence, I don't think Tansey and McLean or O'Connor and McLean or Tansey and O'Connor as a combo in the midfield will cut it, and the 4-2-3-1 is by far our best shape. I'd start the same team against the hun, but consider Wright or Stewart in for GMS who was fairly gash after the first ten minutes and maybe Arneson back in for O'Connor. As an aside, I thought the pitch was quite decent today. Killie's seems to be far truer and with a lot more give than Hamilton's for some reason. Whilst the SPFL pitches haven't started to cut up yet, it'll be happening shortly if this weather continues and that pitch is significantly better than Pittodrie has been for large spells in recent years. Arneson didn't feel he could play on it for whatever reason, but I don't think it's nearly as bad as some other surfaces - including grass pitches - in our league.

Chris Frae Killie nae gan to Killie? That'd be like Garlogie_Granite nae gan to an away game in Westhill.

It's a steaming pile of absolute cunt. It's a fucking wind tunnel that entirely ruins the area. A glass box of fuckery that nae cunt will rent so the public foots the bill.

Aye, it was overly sensible. Tommy Wright's a good example though. I made up my mind in the first second of seeing that fairmer taking to the pitch that he was a fucking awful fitba'r, so I never really got the chance to not hate him. Stockley fits the bill perfectly though, I knew there'd be one. I thought he could be an asset, especially in the winter games with rutted pitches, and he looked okay(ish) in a couple of games early doors. Whilst I couldn't really hate the guy, I very much wanted him to leave because we needed to be doing much better. Although Magennis would also fit that description, despite us not having replaced him with anyone better to date.

His brother Jimi was a better musician.

I have to admit, I rarely "turn against" a dons player. I make up my mind pretty quickly if I don't like them and usually either stick to it or start to like them despite their shiteness (Ash Taylor the most recent of those). I also try and see the circumstances that they're in and not try and see everything in black and white. Aluko was a good example, I just didn't get the hate for the guy. He was inconsistent like many in his position (see McGinn) and looked like he was permanently unhappy (see McGinn), but he was still a great player on his day, or if you could at all get the ball to him quickly. He was playing under the fucking drain that is McGhee and was often just given the ball and expected to do something without the support of his teammates. We made no attempt whatsoever to play to his strengths. Moreover, these guys are loons in their 20s and early 30s. I don't expect them to be mature, committed or consistently good. I canna hold a grudge, I'm a fucking adult (when I choose to be) and I try and give them the benefit of the doubt in every game for as long as possible (two minutes in Maynard's case). You never know a player's mental capacity, what's happening behind the scenes or even the instructions he's given on the pitch, so I tend to reserve my thoughts for the manager, who's responsible for the cunts. Even then it's difficult to hate that much, such is the up-and-downness of fitba. I didnae dislike Flood, and thought he was very professional, but I thought we could have done without him in his last 6 months with the dons and was glad when he left. That's the most recent one I can think of.

Played less than 50 games after leaving the dons. Staggering really. That'll teach the cunt. Mine he scored against Partick fae the half way line for us. Was a fantastic player.

Interesting, fit was the answer? Surely talent is just a function of hard work? Just whether that hard work was front loaded in the early years as part of development, it would be classed as innate talent? In other words, there's no such thing as "talent" per say, it's just an accumulation of experience and physical/biological traits over a period of time? Nobody is born an amazing passer, like Kenny McLean or John Inglis, they just spent many an hour in their younger years perfecting those skills. I've nae idea like, I'm just guessing, you've done the research. In terms of money though, it is obvious. In the modern game, both hard-work and "talent" are bought and paid for. From the highlights, it was noticeable that the players were chasing that ball down all over the park. I don't believe that those players were doing that because of a huge amount of managerial input, rather they were bought and paid for because they had that work-ethic attribute in abundance hence their existing stature in the game. Given the "measurability" of player attributes these days and the amount of money available to certain teams, it's easier to buy success in yer respective pool of teams. Buying Neymar at that level is no different to buying someone like Armstrong at SPL level. Armstrong was bought with his existing attributes of skill and obvious work ethic that were greater than the rest at his level. It's why Rodgers has such an easy job. Which, for some reason, bought him the space to say "we'll maybe lose 5-0" before getting absolutely tanked in McGhee-esque fashion. If money allows you to buy a player that has that strong work ethic and pre-developed talent, then it'll take a particularly shite manager to remove that. The obvious marginal gain from surrounding a player with better players is also guaranteed if you can buy better players. The question from the above pish is, I suppose, does the biggest amount of marginal gain a manager can achieve occur at purchase time? Buy well, play well as it were.

I'm not buying that. Why would a football club tell a player he was "too small" when aged 14? That doesn't make sense. As ignorant as Jimmy was (although could it have been 2003 he was released; before Jimmy?), I'm pretty certain he wouldn't just ignore the fact that boys don't stop growing until around 16. Although, Jimmy being a dick, it wouldn't surprise me if he just told Templeton that it was his size that was the issue to make him feel better. Probably called him a wierdo too like O'Leary and Lovell.

I stand corrected. Released in 2004, so must have been Jimmy. Good shout. Although he's not exactly been amazing so far and now only just playing at a very good level. Also, he has less caps than Ryan Jack, Seve, Nicholson etc. so he'd have really only benefited us for a couple of years in the McGhee era. I put him in the same boat as someone like Don Cowie. Good player, but not a minimal improvement on what we have got/had at best. Interesting, Slim, I had forgotten about Nuttall. I think that's where those youngsters have really missed out under McInnes. In his effort to "build a squad", we've had some seriously shite filler that is no better than the youth prospects we had/have coming through at the time. You could replace Maynard with Stockley and Storey in yer point and the effect would be the same. I'd rather have seen Nuttall coming on for us than one of those two last season. However, Blackburn are fairly pap, and Stockley is "banging them in" for Exeter or some shite too.

I'm not having Coutts. He spent many years as an average midfielder in the lower leagues of England, so it's taken him a long time to come good (not to say he wouldn't have with us). We've had players like Seve and Nicholson in that time who were easily as good, if not better. Also, I don't remember him ever being on our books (I suspect if he was it may have even been before Calderwood), he was just at Cove where he was seen as a good prospect from what I remember? Was never particularly small there either. The good thing about our youth system is that it hasn't produced many talents that "got away". Mostly they were all pish. A handful came through to the first team and lasted the course or went elsewhere for a fee. Really you'd have to look back to a player like Maloney for any sort of example of a player that was let go that we didn't want to keep. In itself, I think that shows that we've got a reasonable record for retaining the correct players. Guys like Anderson, Hart, Clark etc we kept and made money from. Guys like Grimmer, Fraser, Maguire we tried to keep but they didn't want to stay. I can't think of any other than Maloney, and even he had a number of shite years in between a good start and a good end to his career. Then there's Dennis Law of course. That's the thing, there's always a shout fae the taxi driver/man in the pub that we let hunners of players go because they're too small, but actually that's a very rare occurrence and they generally can't name one if asked. Our main problem is not producing good players in the first place. I could name about 100 who've gone on to do nothing.

Those percentages don't ring a bell, I don't remember the Donalds being given that shareholding. If they had, I think it would have had to been offered to other investors, as it would surely have diluted their holding? I don't suppose it matters, just interesting. I agree with you about Milne's tenure, it has been disappointing. Although I suspect Ian Donald would have done a far worse job. Not that they were the only two possibilities of course. The worst decision of his spell being the RDS. How a developer could look at that stand and think that it was a good idea is staggering - a complete lack of foresight. At some point there must have been a plan in place for the remaining 3 stands, so what happened to it? It has - potentially - meant that we have to vacate our actual home and move outside the city to which the club belongs. That's staggeringly incompetent and wildly negligent in terms of a responsible fitba team chairmanship. If you'd said that, that would be our future, to a dons fan 30 years ago they'd think you were a fucking idiot. Nobody could possibly make such a shite move for the club? But it's happened. However, from a business perspective, it probably doesn't look too bad. The relevant major shareholders haven't really lost out over the years and there's still a valuable land asset retained.

A couple of things: 1. I dinna think Milne did clear the debt. He converted his loans to preferential share capital (or at least - I think - SMG did, as did AAM) which would become payable upon sale of the stadium (conflict?) as far as I remember. 2. It is very difficult for any person just to clear debt, or invest etc when yer monies are tied up in businesses. I'm in no way being critical of SM for his lack/perceived lack of investment in the club. We should be good enough, and well enough run, that we shouldn't need Milne or any other person to be investing in us on an on-going basis. Had SM built a better business (facilities etc) earlier then it could be argued that any investment he has/hasn't made wouldn't have been necessary as we may/may not have been making more money from our existing assets.

Never heard of him. Good stuff the dons though. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/42051573

It should only have a negative impact if those higher up at the club allow that. It would be very easy for the constant speculation to be made into a positive for our club and that's the way it should be being played indoors at Pittodrie. However, yer right, as it probably won't be!

Aye, it's all about centre midfield, and we haven't replaced Jack unfortunately. O'Connor doesn't have the coverage, neither does Tansey and Ball is pap. I don't think it helps that we'd pretty much defined Shinnie as a centre mid at the beginning of the season, but we're now going back on that. It's almost like we didn't address that midfield role because Shinnie was going to be there, but now we've re-defined him (correctly) as a left back, we're way short in midfield. That said, with Shinnie suspended, Logan playing poorly and Considine having to move into the centre for a lot of the game because McKenna was struggling, it was blatantly obvious that we were very short in the fullback area as a squad too. There was a huge number of gaps to be filled in the summer, and it appears our signings aren't going to fill them. Tansey, in my opinion, was never going to take Jack's role. I was very surprised at how much McInnes rated him, especially given his team finished well bottom of the league and he wasn't even a stand out. One of the problems I think we had was just getting numbers in, in time for Europe. GMS being a great example of that. That's meant we had varying needs at different times in the summer and we've ended up getting a lot of pish in to fill those needs just to get us through games (Maynard, Ball, GMS). It didn't pay off as we didn't spend the money to get the one player that would have made a difference (Moult) and so those three guys were just wasted signings. The question left is - given we have the square pegs situation - which square peg is the least offensive to us in our quest for a settled first 11? To my mind, if Tansey continues to be pap, then the square peg is Shinnie in midfield with Consi at left back. If Tansey can improve then switch him in for Shinnie. If that can get us through until January, then just do it. Dicking about with 3 at the back, or O'Connor so deep that it is effectively 3 at the back, isn't going to work. Revert to the 4-2-3-1 that has served McInnes well and just get our best 11 playing well in that formation.

Aye, good luck to him if he goes there. Certainly they'll have no issues with meeting the compensation fee, unlike der hun. It's a deserved step up if he gets it and would certainly prove his decision to turn down Sunderland was justified. It's easy to point out his flaws, but his points return has been phenomenal. It's also easy to ignore the number of shite managers in the EPL and Championship too who seem to get infinite chances; McInnes is far more deserving of the WBA job than a lot of the other options. Finally, it proves that it's best never to comment on any speculation regardless of who yer being linked with. If he'd said he wasn't interested in the hun job, the press would be expecting that exact same honesty from him this time round, and I think he'd struggle to suggest there was no interest in WBA from his perspective. I imagine he'll be down the road this week for an interview if he's nae already been tapped up.

Aye, getting latchy with the match threads folks. I will be there pre: dealing with a shiting baby post: booze probably Result: 3-1 the dons. McKenna, GMS and McLean Interesting game like, we've been a bit jaded recently, so hopefully the break will have done us good, and the speculation surrounding Deek will have calmed down. With Shinnie out, I expect just a straight Considine for Shinnie swap. I'd like to see Tansey in for O'Connor to see what he can do (although I don't see him as a player that'll set the heather alight for us, he looks very ordinary - hopefully I'll be proved wrong, but at least he's good at dead balls).

Actually, in fairness to Rocket: He doesn't say he is very good at the antithesis of putting people down at any point. I'm just trolling like, because I'm bored, so don't worry about it.

Homophobe.

Theresa May

McGhee has great interpersonal skills, which is why I'd hire him. According to wikipedia anyway.

That was my second thought. Was because I was sitting right behind it. That should be seabass's next thread: which goals were you perfectly positioned to see? Mine wid be Rico's v Torino, Zero's vs St Mirren and Maddison v the huns. Right in line with the top corner of the goals on all of them. Sort of. Anyway, I have the amazing ability to think of many at the same time. First wid be thon diving cunt McCoist and his diving though. Second wid be the 6-2 game against Hertz. Also the one you mention and fourthly - for some weird reason - Shug Robertson's two identical screamers within a few wiks of one another (hertz and Falkirk maybe? Or Dundee?). Edit: I realise this post makes no sense. It's cool. I'm aware.

The worst part about that story is the "Lord Mayor's Banquet". What a crass and unedifying way we run our country. Pompous, deifying, deferential shite. We can do so much better than this bullshit.