LA-Don

I think both of you are correct to an extent. The modern player should be shredded, that’s a fact. With the amount of physical training and sports science behind it, the footballers body should be in great shape. I’d suggest the likes of Ferguson and McGinn have diet/nutrition issues. Does Ferguson love a good mars bar? Are they knocking back pints? Pizza suppers and chippies? What’s the carb intake? Particularly with McGinn and injuries, his diet is more important than ever because he’s not burning what he used to since I’m sure he trains less. I’m 47 and in good shape. By no means am I a naturally skinny guy, I can gain weight. Athletic Director at my school and I work closely with my athletic trainer and strength/conditioning coach. I was shredded at 43 then had kids so not so fit now but still good. I’d argue that the dons footballers do way more training than me, but I have many of them on diet. That’s the key and based on what I see with them that’s where the difference is. I’d expect that Mo Salah and Ronaldo kill our boys in what they put into their bodies. Lastly, reading rocket and others talking about not drinking in January. Since new year I went back to the non holiday diet, no booze, minimal extra sugar, monitoring carb and protein intake, drinking lots of water. Since October it’s been ‘candy’ with kids at Halloween, then thanksgiving, Christmas, new year and I chunked up a bit. Since January 1 I have lost 8 pounds. I’m still 11 pounds heavier than when I was in my best shape at 43. I’d argue that McGinn and Ferguson are fit but change their diet and they’d drop a stone. I played too but if I can do that at 47, and I have had knee, ankle surgeries and other injuries, no reason to think mcginn and Ferguson can’t too.

Absolutely gutted for this one having been in LA almost his entire career and being a lakers fan. Stunned.

Just saw the huns lost so they’ll be extra motivated not to fall further behind Celtic. I totally feel we have the personnel to get a result but the manager will royally fuck it up with tactics and team selection.

No clue where Bryson fits in. Or has he been written off, an influential factor in the mcgeouch signing perhaps?

Problem McInnes faces is that he’ll have promised Ojo last summer he’d be our main holding mid, and he was signed in big part because we didn’t get mcgeouch. The panic buy this winter now means he needs to drop Ojo. However, spineless mcinness will play both plus Ferguson and rotate who he subs out. Today it was mcgeouch, Ojo against Motherwell. He is less inclined to sub or drop Ferguson as he carries a goal threat.

Absolute shite. 1 shot on goal today?

Expect Campbell for Kennedy next ?

Zzzzzzzzz. Dire stuff. How can you not have changed things by now?? Or are we holding out for 0-0?

First sub will be nteresting. It’s not really working for us, not creating. Will he remove a center mid and add creativity or will it be the predictable like for like. Ojo for hedges please but I expect Gallagher for Kennedy.

Yup, same shit different day. 3 center mids doing the job of 2. Against Motherwell Ojo was non existent, today it appears to be Ferguson so far. While we signed Kennedy and mcgeouch we didn’t/haven’t fixed our problem and were still crying out of a creative #10. As a result still way too much long hopeful shite balls that get us nothing.

Kennedy signed, confirmed on the club website.

No doubt signed as Shay Logan’s replacement.

Second one is really us extending Curtis Main's contract.

I'm never a fan of re-signing players who already left us...but....resign Jonny Hayes? I believe he's out of contract in the summer. I'm assuming we sign Greg Leigh, and Hayes would be the squad player to back up/compete with Leigh plus play in midfield if needed. Maybe?? This window we cannot fail to sign a creative attacking mid.

That's quality. Hope it's true! Agree too, sending them Campbell for 6 months would be good for the lad.

Still raging about that shite. I don’t get it, how we can be as bad as we were against Dumbarton and no improvement tonight. All aimless and uninspiring long ball. WTF do we do in practice? Seriously, many ask that, you honestly cannot tell. Interesting to note we’ve gone away from the two man corners too, just a long ball in, much like free kicks too. So uninspiring and unimaginative. Will the management/coaching staff take a good hard look at themselves? Don’t see how we can justify our decline, we pay good wages.

100% correct. Are we all naive to think our amateur eyes are correct here. WTF is McInnes thinking with the shite he produces on the park??

We are an uninspiring predictable long ball team. No plan B. And to throw on Anderson and Main for Logan and Taylor, that's just desperate. That was a really bad sign pointing the finger at a clueless coach. We cannot play McGeouch and Ojo together. Too similar but McGeouch was more involved tonight and Ojo barely touched the ball. We have to play McGeouch and Ferguson behind a Maddison/Christie type. We create absolutely nothing without that #10 giving a central attacking threat. That player sucks in defenders to create space wide for our wingers. We get little wide because the opponents defenders are not stretched. the only time I've seen Gallagher effective was when he was central behind Sam. Why play him wide when you have McLennan and Hedges? I don't see how Gallagher is the preffered wide option here. We are going backwards. Sam scores goals but I still think he offers so little. Since we went with him as our main forward we've committed to long ball and it's just brutal to watch.

Free header at the back post from a free kick, awful goal to lose in the last minute when you have time to organize and set up. Joe beaten at his near post but looks like Logan was ball watching and lost his man. Minimal creativity for 45 mins. Surprise surprise.

Why Gallagher and not Hedges? I'm assuming with Ojo Ferguson and McG that Gallagher is wide. Why is Hedges not a regular any more?? Even McInnes has acknowledged we lack flair and creativity yet Hedges is benched for the gut busting energy and running of Gallagher instead of flair.

I'd assume it's timing. If McKenna goes we're short given Leigh and Vyner are injured, and having had the injuries we've had I understand DM is unwilling at present. I really liked the Devlin signing, as much as I disliked the Taylor signing, but not sure what has happened. As acknowledged, he hasn't been the same since the Scotland injury. Offering Main is a poor effort on our part, we want a creative player and offer a complete opposite in return. Would rather see them get McLennan on loan for 6 months, even Campbell on loan too given our potential log jam in center mid, but obviously these could well have been discussed. Surely we tried to give them Gleeson too. According to Wiki, Joe Shaugnessey has played 2 games for Southend this year, what has happened to him? Signed a one year deal last year, worth a look?

Still think Devlin is better than Taylor. Not quite sure why Taylor seems the established central defender now, although if Leigh were fit the form two in the middle would be the two lefties.

No! Are you Derek McInnes, secretly lurking on donstalk? Anderson wide left???

It’s my understanding there is not a sell on clause, read it somewhere, can’t remember where.

One of, if not, the most frustrating games I’ve seen us play. We played the 6th placed team in league 1, below the likes of Montrose and East Fife, let’s remember that. My anger is purely towards McInnes, he got it wrong today. Positives - we won. McGeouch looked good. The rest I love hearing differing perspectives of games and red tv commentators praised dumbarton at the end of the game for shutting us down. They were wrong, our own play shut us down. We played two forwards who looked like they had no clue how to play together. Didn’t look like they worked together or knew what to do in relation to the other. Were they coached or did they train together as a front two?? Neither moved enough or dropped off enough to pull the central defenders out of position. Didn’t see Anderson running in behind for flick ons from Cosgrove either. It was easy for their defenders. Plus neither was able to hold the ball up and get others involved. It was a waste playing two up top who appeared not to know how a front two should play. Huge hole below the two forwards and in front of the holding mids. The dumbarton defense had plenty of time to get back and organize all day. We don’t need two holding mids against anyone bar rangers and Celtic and even that’s debatable. McInnes’ stubbornness to play what he considers a fashionable shape. Neither central mid caused any attacking penetrative threat so again, field day for the central defenders. Neither had to step up to confront Ojo or mcgeouch giving forwards space or angles. Our main attacking play is to give it long, hit and hope, or hope Cosgrove can hold it up. Didn’t work. Then we play to give it to two inconsistent wingers and hope they create something. Not great. Not a fan of McLennan but I actually thought he did ok and created some chances. We did this all day long with minimal success, hence the main chances we created were from set pieces. The game cried out for a change of tactics. Sub #1 - great opportunity to change formation and challenge dumbarton to adjust. Instead we sub like for like. We hadn’t caused them major trouble so we went for more of the same. Such a lazy, uninspiring, and unimaginative sub. Easy to sub a youngster when I though McLennan had done more than McGinn. I’d have subbed Anderson though and played either hedges or McGinn in the middle. Even Wilson. They’d drop deep and give the defense a different challenge. But no. Sub #2. Given the limited attacking threat from dumbarton did we really need to sub our MOTM? If we had to did we really need to replace him with another holding mid when we needed a goal and were so unimaginative? Pull of McGeough and put on Gallagher. He’s got the legs and engine to get up and create additional attacking threat plus is able to get back. But no. Gallagher is limited but his running and work rate causes problems as we saw recently against rangers, I think he could have helped alongside Sam. So DM brings him on in the 91st minute. Great. Actually surprised he didn’t bring on Devlin for Anderson immediately after the penalty. Luckily we won but majorly concerning. But then again today was not much different from most of the season regardless of formation. As so many have stated so many times we desperately lack an attacking creative mid. I expect Ferguson to replace Anderson on Wednesday so this may help but he’s still not the flair we need. I’d pair Ferguson and McGeough and sign a flair #10. That won’t happen as I’m sure Ojo is a starter. Interesting we are trying to sign another winger when we need a 10, will we try McGinn or hedges inside off Cosgrove? I hope so but doubt it.