RicoS321

Good to know. Certainly has been good so far. Even my wife has managed to follow a subtitled program without complaint.

It's incredibly harsh. It clearly wasn't a case of shoe-horning Considine into the squad, it was a case of not having an option he was happy to start with in centre midfield ahead of Shinnie. That was where we lost the game, even though Hearts were very direct, their midfield pressed us high the whole game. We had no option to go direct, which has been our problem for a few weeks and something everyone who's been involved in Scottish football ever knows is required at this time of year when pitches are very heavy and bobbly. Considine was pish, yer right, but the reasons for playing him were justified. Justified by our lack of squad planning and the purchase of players to fit only one style.

Bottom line is that we now have no sub goalie, so we have to get someone in. Sounds like Liverpool have gone back on their word, cunts. Will be difficult for us to do business with them again. I'm assuming there's no possibility that Ward can just be recalled for a few weeks until they sort their goalkeeping position out (is their first team 'keeper injured?) and then head back to us after that? A few folk I've spoken to criticising the dons for not ensuring Ward was definitely staying before agreeing that Rogers could stay with Falkirk, but I think there has to be a certain level of trust shown, and Liverpool clearly have gone back on their word - I hope the club makes a strong statement about the opportunity we have given Ward and the lack of respect shown by his parent club (although I suspect they let him play the Hearts game and it was discussed before this). Anyway, we move on. I was surprised we got Ward on loan, because it was obvious for about 6 months that we were going to be getting a new goalie in the summer. It seemed strange that we had to go down the loan route. What it suggested was that there was either a dearth of good goalkeepers out there, or that the budget allocated for the position was too little, making the search harder. Hopefully it means that we are well scouted in that position, and that we have at least one or two options available to us. Obviously we weren't expecting to move before the summer, but I'm assuming that with two keepers out of contract we'd have been scouting for a few months now looking to tie up a pre-contract at worse. I'm guessing Ward came cheap, meaning that we replace him on the cheap. Assuming McInnes has a budget for the remainder of the season, do we divert funds that would/may have gone on another striker or midfielder to the goalkeeping position? Or do we stick with Brown, get in a cheap number 2 and continue as planned on our outfield spending? I think I'd take the risk with Brown and do the latter. I think Brown is/was worse than Langfield, but I think our outfield problems are that pronounced, and I assume something McInnes has been planning to address in this window, so we continue strengthening that area and hope Brown can do the business until summer.

Good player, would be a very decent signing. Probably get outbid from some championship pish though, so he can sit on a bench for a year.

Aye, Esson was our last youth team 'keeper to make the break through, but was pish. Can't believe Booth was our last striker to come through. Although the record in Scotland outside the scum in general isn't that great I don't suppose. Hibs had Fletcher, O'Connor and Riardon; Killie had Boyd and Naismith; Motherwell McFadden; Dundee Griffiths; Utd Goodwillie and Russell. Trying to think of others and can't. Most of our more successful strikers seem to be imported, or arrive after being ditched by the scum like McCormack. Maybe we're just not very good at breeding them in this country.

Why, what else will you be doing? I'm not trying to get us to agree, I was just interested to hear your point of view on what I said.

Good stuff, a big whoor, much required. I've said for a good few years now (and it hasn't been that bad for a couple of years) that at this time of year we need some added height up front. Our pitch was virtually unplayable against ICT and Partick, a target man would have cut out much of the requirement (although I wouldn't trust Taylor to hit a target man anyway). I think this year will be a lot worse than the last couple for our pitches, and I can see the long ball being useful. Perhaps my imagination, but Calderwood always seemed to get a decent return at this time of year! The Killie to ICT/Partick games were like night and day. Much as I hate the likes of Hamilton's pitch, I do think a Killie/Falkirk style pitch wouldn't be a bad investment for many of the teams in the SPL, including us. It was obvious against ICT that Hayes and McGinn's first touch was like gouging a golf ball out of the rough. Given their pace over ten yards is one of both their best attributes, they were both hindered by the extra effort required on the shitey surface. Perhaps the option of allowing them to make their runs without the ball, rather than with, by going direct and getting flick-ons will get them the upper hand again. Pawlett could be useful in that too, and it'd be really intriguing to see how Rooney works off a big target man. With the pitches in the state they are, I don't think we can be too righteous in trying to play the perfect passing game. Hopefully the loon winna be pish.

But Langfield wasn't a shite goalkeeper in comparison to his teammates. He was a significantly better goalkeeper than Ifil or Diamond were centre halves. A significantly better goalie than Mackie was a striker, Clark a midfielder, Young a wherever the fuck young played, Duff a midfielder, Vujadinovic a defender, Hughes a midfielder, Zdrilic a striker etc etc. I would also argue that it's simple and common knowledge in football that a 15-20 goal a season striker is required to win things, and a box to box midfielder that can score a healthy number of goals in a season too. I agree that our club has been mismanaged by Milne, completely. I just think you're overstating the goalkeeping element of it. I can genuinely only think of a couple of occasions where I thought we were being held back by our 'keeper (i.e. Langfield) rather than our batch of substandard outfielders. I don't believe I could look back at a Calderwood, McGhee or Brown team and say: "if it wasn't for that goalie, we'd be winning trophies". Our entire squads were simply incoherent. Which I suppose backs you up in a way! One of the problems I have always had with AFC is our lack of overall strategy and continuity planning. We are in a far better position than we were a few years back, but most of the improvement appears to be down to McInnes. I don't believe we have it quite right on the pitch yet, but the strategy appears to be there. We seem to have better sports science, better contract negotiation and possibly better youth team development and scouting (remains to be proven). However all those elements seem to be down to McInnes, so if he leaves then there's a chance that those will not be maintained. I think that those elements should transcend the manager and should be in place, bar a few minor changes, when a manager arrives. The manager should be assessed at interview on his ability to gel with the current "service providers" at the club and only his tactical ideas and motivational skills above that. Milne's biggest failure for me is that he hasn't put a structure in place at AFC that allows us to move seamlessly for manager to manager without massive disruption. I am not convinced that's borne out in our goalkeeper anymore than it is our other positions on the park. In honesty, I think over the last ten years - tragically - our 'keeper has probably faired better than defence, midfield and striker positions. It'd be an interesting exercise to throw up our starting elevens for the last ten years and pick out the seasons where 'keeper was worse than the players in front of him. It would probably be quite depressing!

I disagree entirely. I think it is solely the responsibility of the manager to prioritise the position(s) required - see my McInnes example above. I actually think that Langfield was about right for the quality of outfield player we had at the time (under Calderwood, McGhee and Brown). That is a criticism of the quality of outfield player we had rather than a compliment for Langfield. There was a point when Calderwood should have tried to replace him, when we were performing well. It coincided with Langfield's best spell, but the deficiencies were obvious and we should have looked to spend a decent wage on a better 'keeper. McGhee went into Europe with no central defenders, which was far more of a priority than changing goalie. He then proceeded to employ Ifil and other f'n awful players whilst dicking about trying to replace Langfield with pish like Brown and Gonzalez; arguably he'd have been better spent prioritising a centre half or a full back. Brown's entire spell seemed to be about us not finishing bottom. He didn't seem to have much of a forward plan. McInnes, as I mentioned earlier, held off on the goalie position whilst he sorted out the rest of the side - recognising that good ones don't come along that often in the SPL. If Milne had insisted that McInnes prioritise a goalie, then I think that would have set us back considerably, whilst completely over-stepping the mark as chairman. I agree that Milne has made some spectacularly bad appointments, but that doesn't mean that he should see it as a cue to get involved in team strategy. Once making his shite appointments, he has to put faith in them as a manager - he clearly thought he was doing the right thing. Anyway, I'm not convinced Rogers is the ready made replacement for Ward, but I would like to see him given his chance because I like the idea of us taking through a youth goalie! I'm going to assume that - given the impact Ward has made - McInnes knows that it's a huge position to fill in the summer and he's allocating an appropriately large chunk of our budget for it. To add: I dinna really rate Bain either. Only seems to look good against us - based on SPL highlights only!

It's hardly been ignored by the board. We had Leighton, Kjaer and paid a good fee for Preece (£300K was it?). That Calderwood brought in Langfield and, I assume, paid him well was a management decision - the board can't be expected to question the manager on the merits of signing a player that the manager had previously worked with and obviously rated. Langfield wouldn't have been on shite wages, so its down to poor management that he was never replaced with someone better on the same budget. That said, the state of our outfield playing staff meant I entirely agreed with McInnes's decision to give Langfield another contract when he did, as I simply didn't think we had the time and resource to source a good 'keeper whilst replacing several of the playing squad at the same time. The decision was made early on Langfield leaving, it had been known about for at least 6 months. It's telling/disappointing that at the end of the search, we could only come up with a loanee from the EPL (albeit a f'n good one) to take us forward. I'm not convinced Rogers is as good as this agent-leaked story suggests but nevertheless we're in the position that we know we need a new goalie in June and we've had a year to look for one. I'm hoping there's a huge amount of effort going into sourcing the next guy, with a keen eye on Rogers' progress at the same time. We need to get it right next season, and I'm certain the manager will know that. But it is the manager's job, not the board.

Fourth? Didn't Hearts have a significantly higher budget than us in the JC era? Kingston and such like. I think, on the basis of this thread, we should re-appoint Jimmy Calderwood in 2016.

3-0 after 16 seconds of the second half. Still no dons sub. Fantastic result obviously, but has to be McInnes' biggest failing. We could've easily give a youngster 40 minutes.

Or a step toward summer fitba? Either way, another undisclosed, without-consultation, exclusive bag of shite. Might work like, but can they not have these discussions out in the open, engage with folk? At least pretend you give a fuck about what your paying customers think.

I thought the worst thing about Benn's speech was the complete lack of substance. It was well orated, well timed (for maximum cuntishness) and emotional, but nothing new was brought to the table. I noticed a couple of Labour spineless fucks tweeted that they had backed the bombing after hearing Benn's speech. Really? What new piece of information did he bring to the debate that hadn't been discussed in the previous 10 hours. That sort of thing belongs in a debate down the pub, not in the decision making process for going to war. It should have been an analytical discussion that discussed - only - facts. Like was done by the very committee set up to examine the case for war (who were, obviously, ignored). Our f'n archaic system of democracy doesn't fuckin work, and that's why Jeremy Corbyn has no place in it. Labour need a personality, not a man with conviction or sense, because that's who our parliamentary system works. It's all left to chance. A "who can shout loudest" match. These cunts don't serve a purpose.

Did I imagine Foster being player of the season before being loaned to der hun? I thought he was. Remember he had a decent year that year. Anyway, I don't dislike the guy, and don't boo him, but he can still go and fuck himself. For being a hun, like.

I love how the argument has become binary - to bomb or not to bomb. I'm going to teach that Cameron a right lesson when I get the opportunity to tick a box in 4.5 years time.

It's our best players, picked in the style of Alex Miller. Most folk had forgotten that Left back was actually a position before Shinnie arrived anyway.

Why? Fuck Ireland. What have they ever done for us?

More guns. That's the answer for everything. The only answer is to roll back our foreign policy. Stop interfering in the middle east (leave everything to the UN, so there can still be some involvement), and make it clear that that is what we're doing - don't give people an excuse. Stop spying on our own citizens, and treat everyone like humans. Make society more equal and respect everyone's human rights. Once all that is done, accept that sometimes people do bad things and that spying and guns won't stop that, but make it worse. Perhaps we can use some sophisticated drone technology to get to these incidents quickly and stun the attackers to prevent further casualty. We're down from 150 at its Sky News peak last night to 120 today. Interesting seeing these things unfold with permanent news coverage. Sky were particularly interesting, as they were just randomly speculating. At one point, the attacks were because it was Friday 13th and that they attacked the concert hall because there was an American band playing. The BBC are, this morning, reporting a spontaneous outbreak of singing of the French national anthem at a French national football game - who'd have thought? Although, so far, no news channel has reported the final score.

150 dead now. Crazy. Fuck it, I'm going to bed.

Unless they're good at fitba. It is very much an internal problem. Borders closed, in a European country, fuck sake. Sounding bad for the hostages like.

Edit: nae need.

All kicking off there again. 40 deed so far, in a couple of incidents, with 100 still held hostage. Mental stuff.

I wasn't mixing the two, I thought Farage was clearly holding the British system up as a democratic example. Which I thought was disingenuous given their own poor representation due to FPTP. I could have been mistaken though. I thought Blair did more to put people off democracy completely, become disengaged, and changed the whole political/election process to a charade that focused on personality over policy. I'd say that the vast majority of my colleagues at work have no interest in democracy or politics at all. Whilst, there's still a majority turnout at elections (65% last time round), I think there's a lot of those still do it because they feel it's their duty, and a lot who support Labour or whoever because "that's who I've always voted for" - i.e. folk who have no interest in democracy; it's like they're supporting a fitba team. Obviously, that is all contradicted when the electorate have something worthwhile to vote for, like in the independence referendum. But even with that, try and start a conversation with someone about PR, and the vast majority will glaze over immediately. I think the majority of people prefer the illusion of democracy without even thinking about what it means. See the lack of outrage about the latest changes to internet privacy for example.

Apart from the shite about Britain caring about democracy. It's an interesting state of affairs in Portugal right now, and he's right about the blanket ignoring of it in the media. Al Jazeera was the only place that gave a decent overview. There's only one way Europe is heading if they continue to ignore the rights of countries' citizens. It's a pretty fucked experiment. The legal requirement for surplus for individual Euro members is fuckin bizarre like.