Jump to content

Declaration of Arbroath


partickthedog
 Share

Recommended Posts

Back to earth with a resounding thump folks.

1) That was so predictably Thistle.

2) Dick Campbell once again proves he has our number. Why then was he such a calamity as Thistle manager?

3) Defence has had a glorious few weeks, but got done very easily today. In the long term that may be a good thing.

4) The worry for me is the attack - they've been nullified several times since Hamilton away, and conceding today exposed that fully. There was no discernible reaction.

5) Zak Rudden was more absent today than When The Levee Breaks from a Led Zeppelin live album. Why?

Off to join GRE in the SuckItUp bar.

  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Our recent performances at Firhill have been poor, but we have managed to grind out results. Today we were poor all round and could not grind out a result. The Maciver shot that hit the bar looked a sitter from where i was in the John Lambie stand, we cannot afford to miss chances like that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have been hoping to persuade myself that despite the clear flaws in the side we might at least be promotion contenders but the stark reality is that in our home games against the genuine contenders, Kilmarnock, Inverness and Arbroath, they have been quite clearly more accomplished teams -  we have failed to score against them and hardly made a decent chance. I dislike Dick Campbell and regard him as one of our worst ever managers...but today Arbroath looked quicker, stronger, more determined and more inventive...a 3 or 4 goal margin would not have flattered them.

All the obvious problems were shown up today.  Tiffoney was neutralised by fouls, sharp tackling, double-marking and a dreadful sticky playing surface - we have nothing else. Our full-backs and midfielders don't stretch defences and for a big guy Graham wins few headers and doesn't hold up the ball. There is nothing coming off the bench - Hendrie & Gordon hardly touched the ball - Gordon did hit one pass but it went straight out of play. Sneddon didn't look great for the first goal.

We have shown no fluency or game plan for most of the season. Today was an endless succession of long punts easily won by Arbroath who then retained possession and passed the ball forward. We were woeful - worryingly, McCall has indicated that he is only looking to sign at most two players in the transfer window. It's not good enough.

 

 

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

We were taught a harsh lesson today by a good Arbroath team. They let us off with a 2.0 defeat. They have attributes that we badly need, pace, directness and physicality that bossed our midfield and forwards. 

Some of our players looked as if they were playing in a whirlwind at times. Men v boys. A passerby would have said Arbroath were the full time team.

Today underlines what we need to add in the transfer window plus there is no excuse for not matching  teams with hunger and desire. 

it would be churlish not to acknowledge the team Campbell has built, so I doff my cap to The Bunnet this evening. They’re not short of quality in a well structured and disciplined team. We remain work in progress and need to seriously up our game next week v Raith 

Edited by JAG1970
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

22 hours ago, partickthedog said:

Thank you for this. I did receive an email from the Junior Jags saying the same thing. However it was not clear whether the Junior Jags reps would be outside the JHS, which would have been fine, or inside the JHS, which would have given me a slight problem as my season ticket is for the John Lambie Stand. It was when I emailed for clarification that I was told about the other Junior Jags person who would be outside the mysterious press door!

Did you get the packs?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am really not surprised by todays defeat for two reasons. Firstly in all the games I have seen against Arbroath  since  they were promoted fron League One they have been bigger and stronger, out-played us, clearly the better team  and we have been poor. 

Secondly the timing of this game coming in a period where we have been getting results but not playing well suggested to me that our unbeaten run was probably going to end. 

In summary I saw nothing to suggest our dismal form against them would change.

I am also feeling there will be more of the same next week against Raith - another team I can't recall us beating. We will need a Hamilton type performance to win this game.

As far as January signings are concerned two big strong players required with at least one in midfield.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Barney Rubble said:

Back to earth with a resounding thump folks.

1) That was so predictably Thistle.

2) Dick Campbell once again proves he has our number. Why then was he such a calamity as Thistle manager?

3) Defence has had a glorious few weeks, but got done very easily today. In the long term that may be a good thing.

4) The worry for me is the attack - they've been nullified several times since Hamilton away, and conceding today exposed that fully. There was no discernible reaction.

5) Zak Rudden was more absent today than When The Levee Breaks from a Led Zeppelin live album. Why?

Off to join GRE in the SuckItUp bar.

It's your round. Double brandy please!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We have done really well to grind out results in recent weeks which gives me confidence we can be up there at the end of the season. However, three things which have been infuriating me all season were on display today:

- Our pressing is abysmal. We make it so easy for teams to get out of tight spots by one man going to the ball and no one closing off the out ball. Arbroath hunted in packs today and won several turnovers in the middle of the park which they really should have done better with. Inverness were the same. 
- We give away far too many stupid free kicks around the box. Too many times, players are back to goal and going away from it and one our players bundles them over and provides a chance to put in a dangerous set piece (second goal today)

- I was disappointed to see Cardle go but could see the logic of trying to upgrade in that area. However, we persist in playing Turner wide right where he is completely ineffective and worse drifts inside quite a bit leaving Foster or McKenna exposed. We seem to almost play him for his set pieces. I would like to see him play in the role Smith started in today. However, neither Murray or Hastie are an obvious upgrade on Cardle so we remain unbalanced. 
 

Onwards to Raith - get something from that and it’s been a reasonable first half of the season. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Not making excuses for what was a woeful performance today, but we are not the first or the last full time team that Arbroath will get the better of. DC was up there as one of the worst managers i have seen in the Thistle managerial seat in nearly 60 years supporting Thistle, but i can only admire the great job he has done with Arbroath. We must improve vastly next week and get a win against Raith Rovers to keep our challenge going for a top 4 place.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Contrast the 2 big target men today.  Graham petulant at any decision, poor touches, not holding ball up well then just drifting right out of game.  Nouble taking men on, linking well and pulling our defence over place.  Yes he had a woeful shot but that aside he was exactly the attacking threat we were missing today.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

From the great night at Hamilton we have had  a club record of 8 clean sheets,a fantastic achievement but in reality in those games we only scored 7 goals, 4 of which were against Ayr ,total points collected 13 not a great return..Then on to today we were lucky to only loose 2.0.  The words punching above our weight come to mind..

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, elevenone said:

Contrast the 2 big target men today.  Graham petulant at any decision, poor touches, not holding ball up well then just drifting right out of game.  Nouble taking men on, linking well and pulling our defence over place.  Yes he had a woeful shot but that aside he was exactly the attacking threat we were missing today.

Nouble got them a couple free kicks in dangerous positions too.  Graham’s petulance is a skill - complains so much in the first 10 minutes that you’d think he’s gone a full 90 without a call.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Missed the game due to work so can’t comment on it too much but looks like a fairly hefty doing from the Bunnet’s  part timers .Hopefully a positive from this will be a wake up call for McCall and the board that they’ll need to invest in a wee bit more than the “ two players in only “being currently floated if promotion is their aim ….otherwise we’ll keep slipping to mid league tedium and possibly lower third squeaky bum territory if we’re not careful .

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, elevenone said:

Contrast the 2 big target men today.  Graham petulant at any decision, poor touches, not holding ball up well then just drifting right out of game.  Nouble taking men on, linking well and pulling our defence over place.  Yes he had a woeful shot but that aside he was exactly the attacking threat we were missing today.

Nouble was a real handful, reminded me of Ade Azeez, similar finishing as well. Dowds was a handful too. Interesting that both are full timers on loan

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, Jaggernaut said:

Could have gone top yesterday, but now find ourselves out of the play-off places instead.

Looks like tactics, bottle, skill all deserted us.

Arbroath are a real phenomenon this season.

At the moment we are just hoping that we might scrape into the play-offs.....

Absolutely correct in what you say .

IMO McCall messed up in his tactics today , everyone  knew how Arbroath would play today , how they would set up etc . 
Our best and most experienced defender is Kevin Holt and McCall should have put him directly against Nouble .

The midfield that McCall picked was always going to be too lightweight against Arbroath.

Further on in the game with Tiffoney going off , why was Hastie not put on with his pace to try and get behind Arbroath’s defence.

It was easy today for Arbroath as all our play was in front of them .

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...