Thistle v QP

[Aliballibee]

Picked the wrong day for my first visit to Firhill this year - my mates wee laddie was one of today's mascots.

Frankly, after the penalty miss, that was as good as it got!!

[johnkebab71]

Smith is a disaster as is Fitzpatrick so there isn’t much between them now. Can’t get my head round what is up with Tiffoney this season, must be fitness/injury struggles that he can’t shift?? 
 

Tiff was the only player with pace on the park and was effective in spells in first 45.. to replace him with arguably the slowest player in the squad is mental…baffled as to why Weston still isn’t getting any game time….waste of time him being here. If Smith, Fitz and Mullen are ahead of him then he must be awful. 

McKinnon as done nothing for weeks. 

Squad depth being shown that it’s not as good as we maybe thought it was at the start. 

[Weebaw1]

Is Hodson a defensive mid?

We need protection for our CB’s and nobody fits the bill.

[Dick Dastardly]

3 minutes ago, Weebaw1 said:

Is Hodson a defensive mid?

We need protection for our CB’s and nobody fits the bill.

Is Hodson a footballer ?

[Garscube Road End 2]

McCall saying he wasn't even angry at the players. What a twat.

[Dick Dastardly]

17 minutes ago, Garscube Road End 2 said:

McCall saying he wasn't even angry at the players. What a twat.

Should have been Fergie’s hairdryer 

[Winter of '63]

A game of two halves - both of them unsatisfactory.

In the first half we had a lot of good possession and pinned Queens back for long spells. If we had scored the penalty, we might well have gone on to give them a thrashing...but throughout the game they were able to break through our defence with some ease as shown with their first goal. The second half started in a similar vein with yet another ball across their box not converted...and Tiffoney, who doesn't look fully fit, injuring himself in stretching for the ball.

It was downhill from there - Queens could have scored 5 or 6 in the second half - their No10 scored 2 well-taken goals and hit the post. Embarrassingly, there was only one team in Glasgow today. It was a good day for them but I would be surprised if they end up title challengers.

It is a worrying sign that rather than starting Akinola or Brownlie, we switched McMillan to Centre Back. Hodgson was poor in the first half and I was pleased that he was taken off at half time...but it didn't take long to work out why Brownlie isn't starting...he is mule slow. I was a big fan of Muirhead back in the day but he was hooked after 20 minutes on Wednesday and had a poor game today with a stupid passback leading to another free header set-piece goal.

All the subs made us worse - MacKinnon hadn't been great but we were undermanned in midfield when he went off. Cammy Smith's sole contribution was to lose possession in our box to concede the fourth goal. I don't know why we signed Mullen when we are clearly short of a defensive midfielder and a decent central defender - we missed Holt badly. 

Only positive note today - Banzo was very good 

 

[laukat]

30 minutes ago, Garscube Road End 2 said:

McCall saying he wasn't even angry at the players. What a twat.

Thought his body language and his other comments told a different story. His comments about sloppy finishing and a sloppy penalty suggests he wasn't just putting it down to injuries.

However if he is angry he should be looking at himself. The starting 11 was questionable but the subs were terrible and that was his doing not the players. Smith may be poor and not what we needed to replace Tiffoney but Smith isn't the one deciding who goes on the park.

Also don't see to many of the starting 11 or indeed most of the players as being the problem today. If you were going to be angry at players I would reserve that for Fitzpatrick and Mullen as both looked like disinterested. Its one thing to have a poor game but another to just not work hard enough.

[1876]

Do we actually send someone to watch the opposition  the week before we play them 

A 6ft 7  centre half and we fire every corner and free kicks into the 6 yard box

Not one cut back to penalty  spot or 18 yard line

Personally thought the team looked tired today or just didn't seem interested  

 

[dl1971]

3 hours ago, Garscube Road End 2 said:

McCall saying he wasn't even angry at the players. What a twat.

Maybe he didn't want to stray into contentious bullying territory? 

[lady-isobel-barnett]

4 hours ago, Weebaw1 said:

Is Hodson a defensive mid?

We need protection for our CB’s and nobody fits the bill.

We missed Docherty today but that in itself is a problem. Without him we more or less depended on Turner and Bannigan to win balls and break up play. Even when those two are on their best game they're not going to be winning balls. When Docherty plays we often get away with that weakness in our set up, or at least there's damage limitation. But he's still far from being a rock solid defensive mid.

I have no idea whether Hodson could play as a defensive mid. He can play either full back role so perhaps he's adaptable. Muirhead has played in that position but by most accounts not very convincingly. Reckon if we were only to bring in one player in January a defensive mid should be first on the list. Definitely need an Osman, Draper, Murray Davidson, Steven Bell type of midfielder.

[Garscube Road End 2]

5 hours ago, dl1971 said:

Maybe he didn't want to stray into contentious bullying territory? 

If he can't channel his anger without resorting to bullying then he has no place being where he is.

[Lenziejag]

The starting 11 was probably the most logical. McMillan was fine at left centre back - not sure if Akinola or Muirhead can play there ? The problem was the subs. We have a bench of 9, but he hasn’t given Weston or Stanway a chance. 

[Stephen1876]

7 hours ago, lady-isobel-barnett said:

We missed Docherty today but that in itself is a problem. Without him we more or less depended on Turner and Bannigan to win balls and break up play. Even when those two are on their best game they're not going to be winning balls. When Docherty plays we often get away with that weakness in our set up, or at least there's damage limitation. But he's still far from being a rock solid defensive mid.

I have no idea whether Hodson could play as a defensive mid. He can play either full back role so perhaps he's adaptable. Muirhead has played in that position but by most accounts not very convincingly. Reckon if we were only to bring in one player in January a defensive mid should be first on the list. Definitely need an Osman, Draper, Murray Davidson, Steven Bell type of midfielder.

Feels like Stanway should be given a chance - maybe not an experienced and disciplined DM but has looked very competitive on the admittedly limited occasions I have seen him. 
 

Suspect Hodson could step into DM. Another alternative would be to go to a back three like we did at Pittodrie with Hodson tidying up when Brownlie / Muirhead / Akinola get turned.

[Weebaw1]

1 hour ago, Stephen1876 said:

Feels like Stanway should be given a chance - maybe not an experienced and disciplined DM but has looked very competitive on the admittedly limited occasions I have seen him. 
 

Suspect Hodson could step into DM. Another alternative would be to go to a back three like we did at Pittodrie with Hodson tidying up when Brownlie / Muirhead / Akinola get turned.

We used to call that ‘sweeper’.

Seemed sensible at the time

[Fawlty Towers]

Having watched the highlights, it looked to me that their number 66 (who was hard to miss) was standing in the box before Muirhead started his run up and was certainly inside it before the ball was kicked. Don't want to sound like I am balming the ref for our defeat because that was down to us but he surely has to see that?

Edited October 23, 2022 by Fawlty Towers

[Albert's Ghost]

10 minutes ago, Fawlty Towers said:

Having watched the highlights, it looked to me that their number 66 (who was hard to miss) was standing in the box before Muirhead started his run up and was certainly inside it before the ball was kicked. Don't want to sound like I am balming the ref for our defeat because that was down to us but he surely has to see that?

Absolutely - taking his second step inside the box, almost blocking the ref's view of Muirhead hitting the ball!  Didn't affect the outcome, but a clear breach and a retake was due.

He'd probably have missed anyway,

[Dick Dastardly]

23 minutes ago, Fawlty Towers said:

Having watched the highlights, it looked to me that their number 66 (who was hard to miss) was standing in the box before Muirhead started his run up and was certainly inside it before the ball was kicked. Don't want to sound like I am balming the ref for our defeat because that was down to us but he surely has to see that?

I don’t think the penalty made a difference. We were outplayed by technically better and physically stronger players who were better organised and more motivated.

[lady-isobel-barnett]

31 minutes ago, Dick Dastardly said:

I don’t think the penalty made a difference. We were outplayed by technically better and physically stronger players who were better organised and more motivated.

Agree. Scoring the penalty could well have made a difference against a team content to come away with a point. QP were more adventurous than that.

[Jimbo]

16 minutes ago, lady-isobel-barnett said:

Agree. Scoring the penalty could well have made a difference against a team content to come away with a point. QP were more adventurous than that.

Don't entirely agree. Momentum is so important at all levels. We were on top when we missed the pen & QP scored a couple of minutes later. Similarly when Tiff missed that chance & had to be substituted. Two minutes later they get their second. Having said that we were really really poor in the 2nd half & the strength of depth is the squad has become very questionable.

One final comment. After our first game against QP I posted that Boateng was exactly the kind of defensive midfielder we lack - disciplined, always available to receive the ball, can tackle cleanly & rarely gives the ball way. He's been  head & shoulders above everyone else in both games & could comfortably play at a higher level. He was outstanding again yesterday.

[Albert's Ghost]

Crystal Palace seem to churn these guys out.

[lady-isobel-barnett]

21 minutes ago, Jimbo said:

Don't entirely agree. Momentum is so important at all levels. We were on top when we missed the pen & QP scored a couple of minutes later. Similarly when Tiff missed that chance & had to be substituted. Two minutes later they get their second. Having said that we were really really poor in the 2nd half & the strength of depth is the squad has become very questionable.

One final comment. After our first game against QP I posted that Boateng was exactly the kind of defensive midfielder we lack - disciplined, always available to receive the ball, can tackle cleanly & rarely gives the ball way. He's been  head & shoulders above everyone else in both games & could comfortably play at a higher level. He was outstanding again yesterday.

That's a good shout re Boateng*.  He's the sort of loan signing we should/could have made. Put another way he plays well in a position that at worse we need covering. Rather think if we had him he'd be a first choice pick. 

* to avoid confusion Malachi Boeteng. Not his sidekick (brother?), David. 

[Jaggernaut]

15 hours ago, 1876 said:

Do we actually send someone to watch the opposition  the week before we play them 

A 6ft 7  centre half and we fire every corner and free kicks into the 6 yard box

Not one cut back to penalty  spot or 18 yard line

Personally thought the team looked tired today or just didn't seem interested  

 

Yes. What were their names: Boateng and Eddy? They basically stopped everything we tried to throw at them, and ran the show. More class than most of our players combined.

[Bobbyhouston]

17 hours ago, Dick Dastardly said:

Is Hodson a footballer ?

woeful player 

[Auld Jag]

For me missing the penalty and them scoring a few minutes later was a turning point although we continued to press for the rest of the first half we could not break them down. The second goal really gave them confidence and they really upped their level and ran out worthy winners. But imo if the pen goes in we have a very different game. This is also what some Queens Park fans on P&B think. What it boils down to is another missed chance because we don't take our chances and they did.