Livi v Dundee

A real opportunity to put some distance between us and the bottom end. That said we are notoriously poor after a break of any kind, so I can’t say I’m confident. I thought our 0-0 up there earlier this season was a very poor game but was also a game that we could have won if we had played to our strengths.

Cold Tuesday night in January at The ‘Vale? I’ll be there but not fancying it much.

Play anywhere near as good as we did pre break and we'll walk this, but yep, after a break we're usually lethargic and well off our game. Dundee are crap, but they've quality in Adam and Griffiths from free kicks, so hopefully we don't give any away from shooting distance around our box.

Would think Nouble will start as he's been playing with Arbroath whilst our players have been idle for three weeks, and wont need to blow off the cobwebs. He'll absolutely bully Dundee's defence and get balls to Forrest & Anderson to fire shots off at their goal. Despite our history of being slow to get going, i'm absolutely buzzing for this game, mainly to see how Nouble gets on (odds on he'll be on the bench now and Shinnie will start up front).

Yeh really looking forward to this.Opportunity to move further from the bottom. Hopefully we start with an attacking lineup and get at them from the off.Clean sheet from Max and we've cracked it.Wee Danny will have to be watched,hope to god weve a decent official as we know what he's about.Anyway first outing for my new Livi snood.Reckon I'm going to need it.Will be baltic.Mon the Lions,warm me up..

I’d be very surprised to see Nouble start.

I'd be surprised if Chuck starts, but see no reason Joel wouldn't, he's been training with the team since joining Livi, and playing the 3 weeks we were on a winter break, so he's more up to speed than anyone else and should be well used to the players too.

Would be great to see Joel start up front with Bruce,if only to make Mcpake nervous. Theyl fancy their chances no doubt. But weve nothing to fear here.Were at home and hopefully that advantage will get us the result we all want.Cant wait.Mon the Lions..

Luv a duck Nouble not even in the match day squad.

Terrific display from the Lions.Fought and harried for every ball the way we used too.Andersons goals were sheer class and ran his socks off,deserved mom performance.Hard to pick others but Holt Pitman and Omeonga were stand outs as well.All round team performance and great to watch on a miserable night for football.Dundee were awfull imo and are in danger this season.Tougher game on Saturday against County but one to look forward to. Well done Livi.Lets keep it up..

Nouble isolating with Covid, so i hear. That'll be him posing for selfies with the Arbroath kids after their games.

Anyhoo, absolutely love Omeonga, what a brilliant signing, the wee fella is immense in midfield. Wee Brucie getting a Brucie bonus brace, excellent finishing. Valuable 3pts with County and St Mirren also winning, keeps us in 8th place, and closing the gap on Utd to 2pts. Keep it going and we'll put pressure on Aberdeen & Hibs for a top 6 finish too.

Once Nouble's ok to play it'll be interesting seeing him and Chuck up front as a plan B option, 2 big units for us to batter defenders with. And with Bailey, Anderson & Forrest we have 3 quick tricky attacking players too, looking good for the 2nd half of the season.

Liviforever wrote:Luv a duck Nouble not even in the match day squad.

Told you. Even if he wasn’t isolating I don’t think DM hasn’t worked out how to fit him in to the way we play yet, because the way we play he’d be peripheral.

Bruce Anderson possibly had his best game for us, should have scored twice in the first half & worked a great chance to win the corner that he finally opened the scoring from. Proved to be a real pest but as a team we should have pressurised their central defenders more, they were ponderous & we could have punished them heavily.

I hated us faffing about at the back - okay it could be argued we were managing the game & keeping possession but a three way keep ball session between keeper & the centre backs will get punished by better teams & was nearly punished last night when Holt got involved & gave it away. Not to mention Max kicking it into Griffiths when the latter was blocking him… why didn’t a defender offer himself for a wee throw over Griffs head? Even at 2-0 they were giving me the fear that we would do something stupid & they’d get back into it. If they had pulled 1 back by capitalising on any mistake then they’d have gotten a lift they didn’t deserve.

All in all it was a good result & we deserved the points but Dundee were pretty poor & still fashioned chances that better teams would have taken. Decent that we now have a bit of a cushion between us and the play-off spot.

"Told you", hardly, we'll never know will we.

Yeah Joel would be far better playing than Shinnie, who i thought was playing awfully deep at times, and hadn't a very good game, would much rather see Joel playing when fit and covid free, he'd bring a hell of a lot more to our attack. Really relishing seeing Nouble, Bailey/Forrest and Anderson in a front three, think they'd be a potent attacking force, and Nouble esp will give us something we haven't had all season, a huge physical presence up front. One that is also quick and very mobile to get the ball and press defenders.

Again i don't mind us playing it around at the back, what i do mind though is when we draw opposition players out, we don't take advantage of it and get it up the pitch again, we keep cutting back and playing it around some more.

We were getting caught out with it at times & could have been the architects of our own downfall if we’d been playing a decent side.

Still, bottom line, no damage done and we have enhanced our position.

Ive hated this concept that seems rife at the moment.But most teams have adopted the play from the back policy these days.Its bloody nerve racking at the best of times and in some cases can cost you.The sooner its gone the better imo.

I think we're actually good at it, but once we knock it back a 2nd time instead of getting it up the pitch it becomes a bit more nervy.

My biggest bugbear is not putting a player on the halfway line when we're defending corners, Anderson is absolutely made for being up there to hit them on the counter from a quick boot up the pitch. But all we do is kick it straight to a waiting opposition player, to bring it back down to our box, or even worse just having a dig from outside the 18 yard box as there is also an opposition player hanging around there to pick up loose balls knocked out the box, does my nut in.

We are quite good at it but as we saw on Tuesday night we do also make mistakes doing it and Dundee were that bad they weren’t even pressing that much, so against better sides it will cost us. That said, it is not so much the playing out from the back that I’m bothered about, it’s the playing around at the back that is frustrating. On Tuesday it was probably as much about taking any heat out of Dundee’s potential response to our goals as anything else but it is not particularly entertaining and as I’ve said, mistakes can be costly.

Totally agree on the defending corners point LF, we have no out ball doing this and Brooooooos would have had a grand old time in a foot race with the Dundee centre backs.

Trying to see the logic of having all 11 players in the box defending corners, we're  2 men up with their keeper not being there, and the player taking the corner not in the box too, but putting a player up the pitch also takes at least 2 of their players back from our box to cover him, and gives us an out ball. Seems a no brainer for me.

In the same thinking, i always see it worthwhile having a player go out next to the corner taker when it's us taking a corner, as it drags 2 of the opposition players out of the box to cover him, then putting the ball into the box. Better still do it late just as we're about to take the corner, to create space and movement with defenders being dragged out last minute, disrupting their defensive set up.

While we're at it, talking of annoying things watching a game, when we did have a player on the halfway line when defending a corner, it used to annoy me when one of the players covering him would drag him back towards our box when he left him to go towards the corner taker, taking away the whole point of us having a player go up the pitch for an out ball. There should be one of our players in the box watching for that and covering him, instead of the player up the pitch being dragged back. If the opposition player wants to leave just one team mate marking our front player then fine, all the better for us, they'd soon stop doing that if we didn't get suckered into following him and we got the advantage of being one on one on the counter attack.

However that one is a moot point because we never stick a player up the pitch defending corners.