der Berliner

This is just dire. We totally lack any grip in midfield, they press all our defenders and MFs and we fail to get anything going. So eventually they drag us down to their level and that quite simply is dire. What can you do? First, I'd give Lundstram some advice where he shall be and play ... or replace him with Davis. I`d also replace Kent with Sakala, who is more direct. IMHO, Matondo right now is more of an impact player, so get him on when the opposition gets tired. but not from the start. Wright is ready made for such games. Maybe I'd also replace Borna for Ridvan, so Motherwell has something new and different to cope with.

7m Kent should rip the @rse out of every Scottish defence every other week. His doing effectively nothing for months, but people hare after Matondo ...

Where and when was King as talented a defender that he is being picked ahead of Sands? Our midfield is rather dysfunctional, Lundtsram not doing his DM duties and all the play from the back is left to King, Davies and McGregor, quite poor.

Well, I was only looking at teams in the current groups. Salzburg, Zagreb, Kopenhagen, Benfica, Sporting, Eintracht, Bodo and Co.. Those are the teams we can face with some sort of confidence of beating them. Brugges? Porto (who beat Leverkusen away 3-0)? Maybe on a very good day at home.

They threw on 100m in the last 20odd minutes and those chaps scored 3 goals and had 3 assists - against a tiring and weakened team. Arsenal is not exactly known to play power and attacking football like Liverpool either. Yet, you are right in so far as Bodo Glimt is about our level. I do wonder how we had fared with all our first team centre-halfs ready, but that won't change Wednesday. It would be good to get an update on all the defenders in today's press conference, by the looks of it, we have Davies, Sands and King remaining, with no idea about Soutar and Helander.

A wee reminder: wages aside ... we paid - 4,3m for Davies, who I would suggest will be playing most games - 3.6m for Ridvan, signed when Borna was essentially on the jump and people wanted him go anyway. Thankfully for Borna, he regained some form and good one at that. I for one wouldn't mind playing Ridvan in front of Borna, since he seems very adapt at attacking and defending too. - 2.7m for Matondo, who was meant to be the answer on the right wing, yet given not much game time to really settle in ... and, after all, he is a winger. - 2.25m for Colak, who made us forget Morelos ... but no matter whether it were those guys or someone else, or we had spent 20m more, we'd still be miles off from the teams we face in our group. Well, make that astronomical units. At this time, we also have 7 players out injured who could/would all contest as starting slot, and lost Goldson and Jack too. Obviously, you can ask for effort and all that, but you also have to keep in mind that the other teams, aside from their class, also can provide the same effort ... and them subs yesterday were clearly out to show Klopp that they should have been first choices. It is a very (football) Germany attitude to look primarily at oneself and not the opposition. Arrogance borne out of permanent success. Either "we" play good and deserve anything we get, or "we" played poorly. The opposition is always secondary. That is hardly objective and we shouldn't fall into that trap. Not least when the opposition is way above us. All the above doesn't mean that we just suck it up and be done with it. But as I noted in the previous post, we need to change and shift some personnel as well as use adequate tactics to develop as a team. We've come a long way from the 4th tier and as before, our way will never end. We're not driving in a Bentley like Liverpool as yet, but a fairly well equipped Rover. A decent Mercedes would be the next step, before we start thinking about Bentleys et al.

NB: my comment regarding us and Elgin City was related to the finances at play, not the form or possible performances. Liverpool sent 5 subs on last night, Millner was a freebie, the remaining 4 alone cost 105m and they essentially destroyed us. I can't comment on the last 3 goals, as I quit the show at 4-1, so how these other goals came about I can't tell. We do not belong there and I have no sado-masochistic streak and want to see my side getting whacked by far superior teams. The Goldson injury didn't help, having a rookie replacing him instead of a US international who got us into the group stages either. Tav had been rather poor at the first three goals, Salah's first also came of a wicked deflection that fell nicely in his path, IIRC. Truth be told, I was rather up-beat when SG signed, not least when we ventured as far as we did in Europe. At home though, we essentially just soldiered on with better players. Be it the league in those first two years, or the cups. Europe was and remains a bonus. After the league title - and IMHO, we won that because our defense held tight like hardly ever before and after, rather than us doing anything exceptional in front of the defence. We simply didn't give as many goals and thus draws and defeats away as before and after that. And again, we soldiered on in the league thereafter, a few new players, but the same insufficient tactics for the Scottish game. And ... we far too much relied on the same players and did not rotate players as much as we could and should. Under Gio, we changed a little, but not that much. It all has become rather stale, watching the same stuff over and over again. You get the occasional spark, like Colak's striking ability or Sakala's enthusiasm, the latent talent of Tillman. But for the best part of 4 years or so, we simply paper over insufficient tactics with the use of different/new players, while keeping underperformers in the side. Finances will obviously stop us from signing top talent - and it has to be said that we also have first team starters or starting contenders in Roofe, Hagi, and Helander out right now. So while we are sure out of our depths in this CL group, we could still try to develop as a team, something which we haven't done for quite some time. Onwards we soldier ... As it happens, my home-tome ice-hockey team was away in the Czech Republic in the Champions Hockey League, where the Czech, Finns and Swedes rule. After 3 thirds it was 2-2 and the Eisbären actually took the lead twice. In the final third, Kralove just upped it a gear or two and the final score was 8-2 in their favor.

Last thought ... Sakala should be kept in that right attacking role.

I was actually wondering, why Sands wasn't given first pick, and neither for that late substitution reel. They were all over us by then.

Getting regular income from auto-reaching the CL stages (even though Scottish footie might lose that comfort soon enough) and possible selling better players to the EPL. Thus we have a better basis for signing better players. BTW, we sure have a chance to grab some points in the CL in the future, even get a stage further ... if we are grouped with Kopenhagen, Sporting, Plzen, Zagreb or the like. But if super-multi-million teams like Liverpool, Napoli and even Ajax get into their stride, we're just canon-fodder in the here and now. And we will be for years to come. Neither Leipzig nor Dortmund were at their best last season ... and we eventually failed to beat a mediocre (by those standards) Eintracht.

... or else?

Money is in the back, and now we see what is required. We are probably another 5-10 years away from anywhere close to doing something against the top sides in Europe. If there is anything Gio could have done differently, he might have sent on Sands and Ridvan to keep the score low, but that would have been deemed cowardly too. We've seen the Scum been humbled in Europe by these teams and laughed about it, not least since they burned far more millions than we did. Yet, this is a level far above anything Scottish ... and we clearly punched above our weight against some CL-regulars in the EL these last few years. While the gnashing of teeth will continue on various levels, at the end of the day, this was to be expected - despite the final score being ridiculous.

We only need to field 6 subs.

This only lasts so long. I don`t even want to check how much even their subs cost today. Essentially, it`s like us at full strength playing Elgin City.

I'd have Helander ahead of him any day of the week. Just my hmble opinion.

Nope.

We've played about 50 mins of decent CL-group football. We totally out of our depths and don`t belong in such a group. It`s rather sad that there is no fall-back option for the group stages, but there you go.

Colak is a really really good all round striker. Works tirelessly, hunts for the ball, scores tremendous goals ... what a find. As Gordon said time and again, we should pair him with Alfredo every now and then and see how it works. Not least in games where we defo did not need a second DM who was more or less trying to attack all afternoon. Could easily have been replaced by Tillman, Wright or indeed Morelos. As I said before, Ridvan likes to attack and we saw that today. You wonder how it would work in a 3-4-3 or him ahead of Borna in difficult games. Sakala, if given the ball, shows that he is a striker. Very direct and always willing to shoot (and able to hit the target). If played as a winger, only Wright is close to Sakala`s trickery and accurate shooting, IMHO. Matondo (played out of position) was every inch a winger today and sure has not yet settled to the Scottish game, while Kent works a lot, but his end product ... Alas, three points, two super goals and hopefully at least one point on Wednesday.

We totally dominate them and can easily sub Jack for a second striker (goal difference in mind). Lundstram immense in midfield, defense solid. For the love of the game I can't understand why we play a right winger on the left and a left attacker on the right. Matondo is clearly not clicking there ... and we will sure see the trusted legs of Kent in the second half. Would be sad, almost excuse stuff by Gio, IMHO, but there you go.

Probably the wait-and-see tactic, since St. Mirren had a couple of good games, including beating the Scum.

McGregor Sands - Goldson - Davies Matondo - Arfield - Tillman - Ridvan Morelos - Colak - Sakala It is Ibrox, it is St. Mirren. Put them under pressure in their half, hammer a good few goals in and then change the line-up accordingly afterwards, if needed. Give Tav, Lundstram, Borna and Co. a rest, the season is long.

Similar to the cup final, once we removed the work-horses and under-performers from the field and added Roofe, Sakala and Wright, we looked a much more capable attacking outfit. For all the fancy and hard work they put in, Kamara, Aribo and even Kent didn`t provide that great a threat to the opposition's goal. And if that happens on the field, things need to be changed. SG was utterly reluctant to change his DM/CM-minded attitude and Gio is not really setting the heather on fire with quick changes et al either.

Very much so, since Eintracht were very "beatable", despite being in the final and a plucky outfit. We had the players, yet once again blew the tactics and didn`t change it when we saw it weren`t working. There was no replay at Ibrox coming ...

Up until the double-penalty in the last game, I had given up on any penalty infringement after us loosing that shootout against St. Johnstone, when their goalie moved at at least three of our spot-kicks, yet the ref didn't care.

Since we had the NHL in Berlin, I skipped this game ... and truth be told, you have to have some sort of sado-masochistic streak watching us getting hammered by the elite teams of Europe. On bare facts, we keep even this sort of opposition at bay for most of our games, very few goals came from open play. None yesterday either. While people might say that they all hammered us so far, chances created and shots at goal don't win you games. Goals do. Kamara essentially gave two goals away against Napoli, Jack and McLaughlin managed that too, Sands deflected a shot into the net. That's not going to change the fact that we are totally out of our depth in the CL and we will sure need a few years to get anywhere close to mediocre CL standards. You have to commend Gio for adopting a different tactic, though you would have to scold him for not trial-ing that earlier. After all, why introduce this for de facto the first time with these players AWAY TO LIVERPOOL? People, experienced or not, need to adopt to that and see how their fellow defenders work. IMHO, last night, effort, grit and determination were needed, and IMHO it should have been Arfield and Colak from the start. Likewise, it gets beyond farcical that Kent gets every game, full 90 mins, 365 per year, and everyone who usually plays on his side is shifted elsewhere. Be it Wright, Sakala and a host of other left-sided attackers before them. From what I heard so far, the game by-passed our wing-attackers again, which is no wonder in Kent's regard, but why on earth we put Tillman on the right is anyone's guess. Furthermore, that chap played 5th tier German footie not so long ago and now we send him out onto Anfield ... Onwards we soldier, the gold is in the bag. Just make sure that come the end of the season, we get direct entry into that hoard, even if it will again most likely mean less European games next winter.