der Berliner

Back to the DVD collection ...

Hagi behind the obvious main striker, no Diomande. We need someone creative to feed our "front 3", someone willing to shoot. Diomande always reminds me of Sir Walter's quote on Scott Nisbet (methinks): "you never know what he's going to do with the ball." (After that freak goal against Brugges.) But in Diomande's case, I sometimes wonder whether he knows it either. Like a mixture of Kamara and Sakala ... Maybe give Sterling a job next to Raskin or Barron, so either of them get a breather, Kasanwirjo as RB.

I'll probably never get the changes our managers make ... Dessers were down and out after 75, Diomande too. McCausland, Lovelace, and Igamane should have seen football earlier, or ahead of Tavernier. Raskin and Barron immense again, our defense looked rather solid once more in Europe. Dessers does his business, a goal every other game. We need to start Danilo and Igamane more regularly, though, preferably alongside one another. PC must finally come up with some goods in that area ...

Never an easy ground to go to, but we don't look too overawed so far.

Hagi and Bajrami await relevant slot allocation ... unless PC goes fro Diomande. Bajrami through the middle might mean McCausland on the left. Or one of the strikers.

IMHO, with him and Jefte, we are well covered on the left side of defence and attack. I'd have no problems playing both and Bajrami through the middle behind our striker(s).

... and we were robbed at the last, weren't we?

Thought your days were those of Jimmy Millar? It was obviously a sarcastic joke, but even the most inept board-member can see that the football we play is not made for Scotland. So any newcomer, and I assume a loss on Sunday will see changes being made, should be questioned whether he's willing and able to change our current style of play.

The mess we were and are in are not made on the business part of things. We are where we are money-wise, we knew and we know it. What failed us time and again, under SG, Gio, Beale and now Clement, is sticking to a system that is not made for the Scottish game - unless you have the players to play it. And even if we had them, it would have been difficult. For this system to be successful, you have to have two fullbacks playing the winger part, and two attackers either side of the central striker who supply assists and contribute with goals. We fell into the Morelos trap, as we essentially geared much of our game to assist him. As soon as he dropped out of form, we toiled. Now everyone looks at Dessers or Colak or whomever to become the new Morelos- or Negri-like saviour, instead of playing two strikers, two wingers, and just one DM. Most modern DMs can play football as well, i.e. if space opens up, attack. Throughout the years we had too many midfielders on the pitch who are not goalscorers, so they 7 out of 10 times passed the ball on from a good position rather than shoot. We still see this today. Coming to think of it, I'd give Kris Boyd the reigns to see whether he would finally approach an aggressive attacking style (every now and then) instead of a de facto "6-man defensive line-up with the 'potential' to attack". Against dross like St. Johnstone, Dundee, or the like. I'm so sick and tired of this tactical formation, which has proven to be pointless in Scotland ...

Oh, there is. Stop playing 4-2-3-1 and instead some proper line-up to defeat this Scottish trash. Which should have been the order of the day for about half a decade, if not more.

What style ...

All that epitomizes our current failings were there to see in that last attack. Our ageing right-back in the middle heading the ball past the post. Not a striker, not an attacker ... No matter the bad goals given away by inept defending, this has been coming. Coming for months. There is no reason to believe that this is going to change, I simply see no will management-wise to change something. Project - once again - failed. Pass the bucket please.

How much luck can you have. The red trash has been out of it most of the half and then get such a gift ...

From that angle they can claim his whole body was ...

The three attackers get no service whatsoever and are easily crowded out. Playing out of defence is shocking, but gets repeated time and again. We make it pathetically easy for the opposition again, and so far this season, only the latter's lack in quality in Scotland let us off the hook. Leadership on the pitch amounts to zero as well.

Did they show the off-side at HT, not seen anything in the highlights?

I liked the what, 45 ° picture to prove that Robertson was correct?

And all this shyte only happens because Butland tried to play out of the back and for 4 mins we can't clear the lines. This pure lack of understanding the basics of the game by manager and professionals on the pitch is utterly shocking.

Surprise us ...

IMHO, it is not time for indecisive dancing in midfield. Raskin has roved that he's fit and ready again, thinks forward, so it would be either him or Barron for me. Next to him should be Sterling though. We need a tough tackling physical presence that can play football and is thinking forward too. Thus, no Diomande for me. To ruffle some feathers (and as we will sure stick to 4-2-3-1), it should be Bajrami through the middle, Cerny on the right and Igamane on the "left side of attack", Dessers through the middle. Do a hard press and have people up there to convert chances, not wannabe attackers. Once we pulled their teeth, it is perhaps time for Hagi, Diomande and/or Lawrence to pick them up on the counter with a precise pass. EDIT: Insert McCausland for Cerny, if the latter is unfit.

Referee - John Beaton 🤡 Assistants - David McGeachie and Jonathan Bell Video Assistant Referee - Don Robertson 🤡 Assistant Video Assistant Referee - Sean Carr ... the SFA surely trolls us. Missing - Ridvan Yilmaz (end of October), Rabbi Matondo (middle/end of November), Danilo Pereira (end of October), Oscar Cortés (December) Lawrence and Souttar might return, as does Hagi after his suspension.

... somehow, I had an instant reminder of 55, i.e. the season we played in front of empty stadiums. Anyway, I leave these numbers and projections to others. Mainly because I can't change anything about it, have at best a basic knowledge of what they "might" mean, and being too old to worry about other people (with probably not much more knowledge than me) going ballistic (one way or another). I do believe that those at the helm try to do their best for the club and won't go into any greater detail (for obvious reasons) about what is going on financially (e.g. litigation). Most of them, albeit business-men, are Bluenoses too, who will try to safeguard the club from any future harm. Idealistic maybe, but that's MHO. As pointed out before, we failed to cash in on our star-players (Kent, Morelos, Tavernier, Goldson etc.) at the height of their game, and IMHO, that's not due to us not wanting to sell, but there were simply no offers. Which begs the question: were they really that good? That's all past, though. In the here and now, the main way to get income is getting into the CL, whether we're getting hammered or not does not matter ... in regard to the business topic. Once we get our finances in order, we can look after European results again. And, truth be told, we'll be also-rans in the CL for years to come. Our biggest failure since the start of last season was not to capitalize on the Scum's bad run at the end of last season, but instead throwing the title away within 14 days. It cost us direct entrance to the CL (and its riches) ... and the way our transfer window went, getting there through the qualifiers was hopeless. For much of the latter, I still blame the management, as they - like this season - stubbornly play the "Plan A system" no matter what, toiling and failing time and again. The straits look pretty narrow these days ... (at least from the perspective of an average Bear)

Due to working commitments, I enjoyed "only" those 5 mins of highlights ... and the groans and moans of our German board's admin ... (wonder why they didn't rule out Diomande's goal, looked somewhat offside).

Bajrami is a playmaker that has been shoehorned into a left winger slot. Attacking MF - 136 games - 23 goals - 21 assists Central midfield - 48 - 6 - 4 Left winger - 21 - 3 - 5 Right winger - 21 - 1- 2 Lawrence ... Left winger - 191 - 37 - 25 Second striker - 67 - 9 - 12 Attacking midfield - 40 - 11 - 3 ... though they probably battle it out with one another once Cortes and/or Matondo return.

Our German admin put the highlights out, dunno whether you can watch them in Britain ... https://streamable.com/0bktm4