RicoS321

Johnson scored (twice maybe?) for the Tims the other week, doubt he'll be leaving them anytime soon, he'll probably get a new contract and be available for loan in a year's time when he's been rotting for six months on their bench. Baccus was good yesterday, very efficient and covered a lot of ground. Would be a solid signing. However, Taylor was the absolute standout for them, he was very good and streets ahead of Jensen.

I agree mostly, but Robson's tactics are very clear regardless of how shite they are. Draw them out, and then fast ball in behind for Miovski to score from. If the ball falls short then Shinnie and Ramadan.... McGrath pick up the scraps and move it quickly to Duk or drive into the box or whatever. Clarkson is giving away passes because he has to use the ball very quickly in order for this tactic to work. The stupid thing is, it's got such a low success rate, for very obvious reasons (because you have to play a pinpoint sixty yard pass - that everyone's expecting - between a deep defence and goalkeeper without even glancing over your shoulder first). Yet nobody at the club is pointing this out to Robson. Just as nobody pointed out to Goodwin that Ramadani was shite playing between midfield and defence and playing Barron ahead of him (on the pitch) was playing to his weaknesses and running him into the ground (exactly the same as Shinnie). The two tactics are extremely easy to identify, extremely easy to rectify and - most importantly - extremely difficult to justify. That's why it's clear, to me, that we have nobody at the club capable of asking the manager to justify his decisions, and explain why they aren't working and how, with current personnel, they could possibly work. It's not acceptable that two managers can come in and continually, stubbornly, make the same mistake every week and not be held to account. It'll be pure luck if the next guy doesn't end up doing the same, because we've got no structure of accountability. We're needlessly blaming and then sacking managers because we're not getting the opportunity to tell them to stop, take a breather, and try something different until it's too late and the players have lost every ounce of confidence.

Yep, we're saying the same thing basically. The guys in the background aren't good enough, exacerbating the problem of the manager not being good enough. Our strategy is clearly to take many of the functions "in house", like recruitment, to make things easier on the manager allowing us to hire guys that don't want the control someone like McInnes did. That seems to be the strategy anyway, and it's one that I agree with personally. The point is that the building blocks should transcend the manager, and whenever he leaves we're not throwing everything out and starting again like we had to with every manager from McInnes backwards. If we're insisting on that strategy then the guys in the background have to be doing their jobs to the highest possible standard. They have to be very good. That seemed to be the case in hiring Mowbray, and I'm assuming the Miles lad is also of that ilk (there isn't a recruitment person in the world that isn't hit or miss). The point is that we're in no position to be appointing a new coach until we get that backroom sorted. Glass was hung out to dry by us not having anything in place when he joined, with Robson we've just got a recruitment team, which is only half the job. We could argue that Gunn is there, and he might be great to work for and with, but nobody that's good at their role could sit through the mistakes that Goodwin made and now Robson is making and call themselves fit for purpose. At some point, you have to be calling the manager in and showing him very clearly that he's doing exactly the same thing every week and asking what his strategy is and telling him very clearly that if he continues and it fails then he's out of a job. If Robson can't explain himself to a layperson then he shouldn't be in a job. Goodwin played Ramadani as a holding midfielder every week, Robson plays Clarkson there every week and neither of them are being held accountable by anyone. Without fixing the problem, we'll be sacking the next guy in January 2025 for exactly the same reason. I feel sorry for Robson for the same reasons I did Glass (less so Goodwin, who'd had a few jobs already), as the club has failed them by not having the right pieces in place before hiring managers to their first position. It's completely unacceptable. Whoever is sitting watching this shite unquestioned every fucking week within pittodrie needs canned immediately.

I think you've just answered your own question! There's absolutely no way on earth that Robson is being held to account for his tactics, even in the form of a devil's advocate, by anyone at the club. That's not good enough. I don't know, or care, whether it's Gunn or anybody else's job, but someone has to assist the inexperienced guy during his period of failure. Surely this was the whole strategy, hence Glass, Goodwin and now Robson? We get an inexperienced coach with some good attributes (Robson seems fairly decent at motivating a team), and then give them the support to build on the others. They haven't done that. In order to back a manager, you have to, and you have to have a plan and a strategy and you have to give him more than one window, and especially not just one window with a massive turnover of players and a hit and hope signing policy from across Europe (a bit harsh, I know!). But I'm not saying the above for the benefit of Robson. I'm saying it because I said it for Glass, to a lesser extent Goodwin and now the same problem occurs with Robson, so I'm making this point for the next guy we get in. Robson has to be held to account for his own obvious failings, and I point them out every week. However, the club have to take a huge portion of the blame for the failure and if they don't, it's just going to continue to happen.

Thing is though, we very easily could come good. It's a shite County team next with an absolute weirdo in charge of them, and then the winter break. If we sign a midfielder in the window capable of doing the Ramadani role, then there's reason to suggest that his one tactic could begin to work and we go on a run. We'll still be left with a guy who doesn't seem to understand the basics of football however, and we'll just be delaying the inevitable.

That was worse than the Killie game. Worst of the season so far. Once again, as predicted, Shinnie and McGrath in front of Clarkson, playing to Shinnie's weakest attributes again and being surprised when he plays badly. lt hasn't worked yet this season Barry, it will not work, for fucking obvious reasons. McGarry and Duk to be fired into the north sea tonight hopefully. I made the point after the Livingston that moving to that stupid 4-3-3 shit wouldn't work against a better team because we're too open at the back, and it's no surprise that we got easily picked off. Robson has shown he's not a great manager, completely unable to change strategy, but we've also got to be clear that we've got a lot of dross in that squad. We keep hearing that the manager has been backed, but that couldn't be further from the truth. Spending a shit load on foreign crap in a single window isn't backing a manager, it needs three to four windows of solid improvement. I'm saying that because the directors of the club need to be held to account at some point and we can't have them claiming that they've done their bit just by throwing money around. Three rookie managers in a row with inadequate backroom support, and some very weird influence in regards to young players and their contracts (Barron and previously Duncan). If we're going inexperience, then we need experience in staff (director of football, or whatever). Robson clearly isn't answerable to anyone that has a clue about fitba and neither was Goodwin before.

Out of interest, who are the BBC bringing us commentary from at 3pm today @Panda?

That'll teach that dirty wee shite Barron for not signing a contract! Dropped without playing a game. Shame, would like to have seen him get another run out. Looking forward to seeing Clarkson in the number six role and McGarry tripping over his shins.

We don't play two holding mids, it's usually Clarkson behind Shinnie and one other (usually McGrath). There is good reason to suggest that playing two holding mids would be a much better strategy.

Exactly, well put. I don't think many folk would be advised to directly criticise their workplace on social media or forums of any sort.

Absolutely ridiculous that we've had no games in ages, and they get to play three games in 8 days. Completely unfair advantage for them.

It's not really that anonymous. @Panda is a fairly famous journalist. Sorry, "journalist".

That's because he's not very good at football.

He'd be an okay replacement for Miovski I guess.

As does Boyle. The Dons' legends combine to put Killie ahead.

We won't need to if they're extending the season for us.

1. Maintain status quo 2. Maintain....

My mistake. I misread that. Is it unusual to have commentary online? Is Livingston v St Johnstone online? I thought they'd canned that.

Not according to their schedule this morning. I stand corrected though if so. Reprisals from the Hun of course. You can call it the old firm and still believe the Huns are a new club, but that's not the same as the BBC, whose remit is accuracy and impartiality. I don't believe you don't know the difference, hence why this is definitely not personal against you, whose position is that of every self respecting dandy.

Anyway, it's Christmas, we should all be getting together and having a go at the weegies and teuchters that got our game cancelled in perfect conditions in the city tonight.

No, it means being accurate regardless of partisan beliefs. For the betterment of, and justice within, the game.

Yep, they had live commentary of the Hun game tonight alongside the obvious game of the day being the Edinburgh derby. If anyone else's game had been on tonight, they'd have just - correctly - have done commentary for one game. I doubt the commentary slot will be deployed elsewhere and the main radio Scotland channel will be returned to a best of Brian Burnett or some shite. It's a massive, destructive, bias. It occurs because they view impartiality through the lens of two teams rather than the entire league (thus, you have to broadcast a Hun game because you broadcast a Tim game yesterday). I don't believe Panda would be terrified of the reprisals of not calling them the old firm, but the BBC most certainly are. At no point would the BBC air (and stand by) the factually correct and impartial view that the Huns are not the same team as prior to 2012 and so they would no longer be referring to them as the old firm for the sake of both accuracy and to ensure that another liquidation left off can be encouraged in future.

Because of @Panda's team suggestion? Probably justified.

There's a part of me hopes Barron leaves in January in order to prevent you from continually suggesting playing him alongside Clarkson. In fact, I think you're lineup ideas should be subject to a restraining order. You could quite easily have thrown those 11 players into a 4-2-3-1 too, albeit with McGrath in an unfamiliar position, but you have to take it too far.

Think it's supposed to be fine by mid afternoon, but just took a drive to stonehaven and the roads are wild due to the wind. Don't know what it's like further south, but it'll certainly be a rocky trip up from weegieland.