RicoS321

Could be a good one. It'll be interesting to see our line up. Would reckon at least one of the subs fae Saturday will start (Flood or Parker), or perhaps even a chance for Pawlett. Think Quinn will replace Considine and Shinnie will more back to left back to free up a space for one of the previously benched midfielders. I'm going to guess: -------Danny, Danny Ward-------- Logan---Taylor----Quinn----Shinnie -------------Jack------------------- -------Mclean------Pawlett--------- McGinn-----------------------Hayes* --------------Rooney--------------- *Assuming Hayes can play if his appeal is being heard? If not, Parker. I think it's important to keep the competition for places up, hence why I wouldn't pick the same team as Saturday. We need 15-16 confident players all capable of coming on and doing a job.

Just to add, and I don't know if it's been apparent all season, but the Tims were fucking cynical yesterday. Perhaps it's because they were being outplayed, but the number of deliberate fouls from them was unreal. 4 bookings, should definitely have been 5 (it isn't possible to book Scott Brown apparently), but Blackett was also lucky not to be booked for his clumsy challenge on Logan (as well as a couple of other fouls), and Biton had a couple of niggly trips when he lost the ball too. Normally they just beat us by being better at fitba, but it reminded me of a Hearts team of old, or more recently ICT, with their cynical swipes. The usual level of diving too of course. Be interesting to know if they've been like that all season, or were just in a huff against us.

Just listening to off the ball. Cowan: Do you not think that if Graeme Shinnie had joined Ipswich instead of Aberdeen he would be straight in that Scotland team. Cosgrove: If Andy Considine played for West Ham or some other English team he'd be guaranteed a game for Scotland Whilst Considine made a couple of uncharacteristic (on last 3 season's form) errors today, he's been fantastic. However, Shinnie pished all over Brown in midfield today. Absolute class performance, my MOTM, he could walk into that Scotland team at either centre mid or left back. We're f'n magic.

I couldn't get my online purchase to work, and there was no answer on the phone so I just drove down and picked up a couple about 10:15 this morning. By 11:00am there seemed to only be about 30 tickets left. Will be interesting to see if they give us more at some point.

Second call up. Possibly first to a competitive match. Certainly not a more consistent performer than Jack. And not any improved since he left the jute.

Exactly. The "wanting to leave" part of the story is the journalistic licence. Added to unsettle us. Fortunately the vast majority of dons fans know Shay's position and wouldn't grudge him moving at the end of the season or even a pre-contract in January. He's a hard working lad, who'll do his best. Let's see him get stuck into those racist-supporting fucks.

Nae really. If Poland get anything against Germany tonight then - assuming we win tonight but don't get anything against Germany - we'd have to beat and also need Ireland to take at least a point off them in the final game. We really need Germany to win tonight to give us the best chance of qualifying. If we win tonight and Germany do, then the game on Monday is essentially a free game for us, where anything we get is just a bonus. If Poland take a point or more tonight, then we really need to do the same on Monday. Best would be we win and Poland lose. Assuming results go as expected on Monday, that means we can go through with a win, or a draw less than 2-2 against Poland in the next match. I think that's what we need to be hoping for after this round of games. Or we both tank Germany and knock them out of course.

You assume he knows the answer to that? I suspect he just fancied it at the time.

Okay, we agree that there has been mismanagement of the club, I'm just not entirely sure which motive you're talking about, hence why I'm not quite sure how to answer. If it's that he wants to re-develop Pittodrie for hooses, then he's made a complete an utter airse of it. He's had 20 years of hassle for a site that will barely pay itself back once the flats are built. I do agree with the wrong questions being asked though, that's why I asked you why you accept the Donald's generous gesture as genuine. I find it strange that they would out of the blue put £3M into the club at a time when we're (possibly/supposed to be) doing a building project, and I was disappointed those types of question weren't asked. Again, to re-iterate, I don't believe they are anything but genuine. The other question that has never been asked, and should have again and again and again, is why we sided with Celtic to ensure that the 11-1 voting system was kept in place. That to me showed more corruption and incompetence than any of his financial mismanagement. I'm in total agreement with your points! I find the media more culpable (I ken, you canna be more culpable, but it's late) than the politicians.

I am not saying that, no. I'd say he's made some pretty fundamental mistakes, with his worst offence being the constant siding with the scum - most specifically not getting a more even split of revenues after the huns went bust. I just don't believe he's been any worse than his counterpart SPL chairman. You seemed to imply something more deliberate, but perhaps I misread. I was just curious as to what benchmark we have for financial fitba management.It's a pretty fucked up sport financially, and can't be easy. I probably am just more willing to accept that he's failed, rather than something more sinister.

You're right, it was SMG that invested, not Milne. It was in preference shares. Canna mine the amount. I'm not sure how Milne not being majority shareholder backs up your argument surrounding his financial mismanagement of the club?

Interesting Rocket. Couple of things though. It appears that pretty much every other experienced businessman in the SPL fucked up their investments over the same time period. Also, why do the Donalds get automatic trust and credit for their investment, but Milne not? Who's to say that in return for their investment, WM Donald gets to become main contractor for the training facility and new stadium? I'm not having a go at the Donalds, I know absolutely nothing about them and would not be shocked to hear their motives are genuine - I believe they are. I'm just intrigued as to why you wouldn't raise the same questions about them, given your clear distrust of Milne? Milne invested his own money, and until recently was pretty much a failure. AAM invested their money, and failed. Tom Farmer at Hibs - failed, Robinson at Hearts - failed, Boyle at Motherwell - failed, Johnston at Killie - failed, Gilmour at St Mirren - failed, numerous at Dundee, shop-owner at the Jute, Murray at der bun, and so on. All "businessmen" who've financially mismanaged their clubs. Maybe fitba isn't as easy as folk think?

Airdrie at home for me

I'm nae going. My wife won't let me.

Rocket, I don't honestly believe it is good enough. And actually, I think May is slightly over-rated too! What I mean is that I think he worked very hard and reached the limits of his game at St Johnstone. I didn't really see the room for improvement in his game that others thought there would be. Although I would welcome the opportunity for us to find out. As Stooge says though, it's not as simple as signing a couple of players. The budget we have is only going to stretch to the best of the rest SPL players and loan players as he mentioned. I'd add that even if we were to stretch to 3 players then there's a high percentage chance that at least one of those will be pish (maybe nae pish, but not good enough, or just not settle). We'd have to be looking at taking in 5-6 players of a good standard - realistically - to challenge Celtic. That said, our squad is good enough to beat every team outside Celtic on the basis of rotating 3 players regularly in my opinion. I don't see it as unreasonable Cammy Smith, Quinn and Goodwillie/Pawlett getting 90 minutes against Partick/Hamilton/ICT/County/Killie/Well and us winning them all. I think our squad players are good enough to beat 50-75% of teams. In terms of challenging Celtic, it's going to be about luck. Luck on the day in terms of our personnel (i.e. having everyone fit), their personnel and refereeing decisions against the best 2-3 teams in the country. I don't think we'll get that luck, but if come January we're still up there then we need to bring another couple of players in to really challenge. That's part of the usefulness of the transfer window I suppose. Although Celtic also get to join in unfortunately.

Aye, I see fit yer saying. I know a few of such types through work. If I'm ever socialising out of work it always amazes me how comfortable they are at asking other people to do things for them. I'm always quite awkward when requesting something non-standard in a restaurant or fitiver, whereas there's just an air of expectation with these people. A bill is always put on expenses, no matter how small, whereas I prefer to just buy a pint for someone out of my ain pooch. Not that they're impolite, or obnoxious necessarily, more expectant, assuming and unapologetic - a lifetime of just getting things I suspect. A more obvious example would be our politicians' expenses. It was like a human right to them, to claim everything. Playing the system by flipping a second home was not consciously malicious, it was just the done thing for most of them. An entitlement. I don't know if it helps to persecute people like that either (not saying you were), maybe just highlight their mistakes and stop f'n voting for them every 5 years.

I agree stooge. I really want to like Goodwillie, I think he is a really talented individual, but he doesn't seem to have a place in an actual football team, which is a tad confusing. He has the passing, touch, vision and skill to be a creative midfielder but not the pace, positional sense nor work ethic. He has the strength and awareness to be a great striker, but again his positional sense, slowness and lack of composure in the box let him down. Which leaves us with a guy that looks fantastic on the ball, but actually does very little for the team. His situation in the first half where he took the ball off the Dundee player and was left one-on-one with the centre half was not dissimilar to Rooney's (where he won the penalty). He just tripped over his own feet. At first I thought he lacked pace to be a goalscorer, but that doesn't affect Rooney. I then thought it was confidence, but he doesn't seem to lack confidence either, it's more an in-built dithering. I thought Parker made some intelligent runs when he came on - certainly didn't hide. However, I would like to have seen him take a touch inside and hit it, rather than slip it to McGinn on the overlap (Shinnie's chance near end of BBC highlights). Someone like Stevie May would have buried that. I don't see us signing another striker, and I don't think Parker will be the answer (certainly wouldn't rule him out either), so I think we just have to hope for a fit Rooney, at least until January.

But then, that's nae any different to a manager at a car sales firm, or even the traditional bank branch manager (not yer classic banker, of the bonus variety). To be honest, it's probably the case in manual labour jobs too. I've seen the occasional apprentice being spoken to like shite because their boss could, and he seemed to enjoy it. So I don't necessarily think that the public-schoolness of those cunts made any difference to their attitude toward their staff, but it probably did shoehorn them into the banking/finance industry. The only difference between banking and other industries is the function of bailout (i.e. the rules of the industry they work in). Socialising the risk of failure promotes a pretty care-free, confident attitude that permeates that industry. If banks were allowed to go bust - as they should be - then these incompetent little fucks would be a lot less confident, and a lot less willing to sit around getting cunted during the day because they fortuitously met their daily gambling targets by 11am.

If Flood isn't 100% fit, then he shouldn't play. His game relies on him being able to tank around the pitch like a nutter. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that he shouldn't play at all at home if everyone else is fit - I think he's more the pressing type of player that if perfect for difficult away fixtures. That said, he had a good game against Killie. I'm thinking Quinn ina 5 wouldn't be a bad idea. He toyed with 3 at the back in europe, and it seemed to work quite well. With 2 fullbacks high up the pitch, it could cause them a few problems. I'd go: ----------------Ward--------------------- -------Taylor / Quinn / Considine-------- Logan------------------------------Hayes ----------Jack-------Shinnie------------- ---McGinn-------Rooney----Goodwillie-- Switching McLean for Goodwillie after he misses his first 3 sitters.

And Quinn in midfield? That seems a touch mental too. He's pretty slow.

Ach, we've been missing a Josh since Magennis left. I just hope he can pish in his own mouth. January 2016 doesn't sound like we're convinced. Maybe Shankland away for a few months in the hope he can turn into a player by January.

Is our captain injured? Or have you just gone crazy?

I'm pretty certain McLean was made captain of St Ming after Goodwin went through a period of attacking opponents and getting suspended. He was certainly captain when we signed him.

Bring him up right, and you'll get a good price for him in a few years time. You need to start maximising the potential of your asset there. Nice haircut, and a second language and he'll make you a whack in the market. I'll give you £5K against him @ 2% just now if you want to buy a car or something.

I like the sound of Parker like. He has the potential to be the next Jeffrey Monakana.