Livi v Motherwell (Betfred Cup)

Good chance of going through here, Motherwell haven't looked that great and lost to Accies in their last league game. The big haddie Sammon is playing for them too so long balls and brute force is to be expected, our CB's should deal with that no problem.

Sibbald can't be far away from being fit again, maybe see him getting a 2nd half sub appearance. No idea about Hardie, last I read he wasn't far away either, hoping he will be back for next week's St Mirren game so would be great if he made the bench for this game too.

Will the manager give Hamilton and Miller a chance up front to see how they get on or will he start himself, really would be a good chance for him doing the former when it's a cup game, only other question will be if we stick with Saunders or give Lithgow a game, prob neither and go for Lamie.

Sammon will want to make amends for missing the pen & being generally less than average.

Cup tie so less bothered by the outcome but a wee cup run wouldn’t go amiss.

I think our lack of firepower up front might hurt us as we are not contributing goals from defenders yet & the midfielders aren’t getting beyond the strikers enough yet.

I foresee us losing in ET (if there is any - Carabao Cup went straight to pens & this is our equivalent comp) or on pens

0-0 at 90 mins
1-1 at 120 assuming there is ET
4-3 to Well on Pens
FG 98 mins


If there is ET

Hmmm Cadden vs Cadden it is them....

McMillan use to be on Motherwell's books didn't he (and Stephen Saunders; Steven Lawless; Ross Stewart & Jordon Pettigrew)?

Kaja is capable of getting to the bye line and Lee Miller is superb in the air, both should be linking up in that regard and we'll score goals.

Really bursting for Hardie to get back playing, he'll thrive with new signings like Sibbald and Kaja providing him balls in and around the box.

Hopefully i dont put the knackers on this game but im reasonably confident of getting a result here albeit even if it goes to pens.I watched Motherwell a few weeks back against Clyde in this very compitition and their full strength side struggled against Clyde for nearly three quarters of that game.If we apply ourselves and play in the right manner we have a helluva chance to progress to the next round and a potential moneyspinner.Well should bring a good crowd through with them and i really hope that we get a good turnout from our own supporters.Team formation is anybodys guess but i reckon it will be along the lines of what we have been whatching recently.Would be great to play with two up front and go for it.They are there for the taking Livi so come on lets do it!!!

So the match report & Twitter feed make it sound like a decent game that we might have won but the only chance converted was by them rather than us...

Any thoughts guys, it’s not like you all to be this quiet after a match regardless of the result.

As I couldn’t be there I’d like to see what folk thought of it.

Couldn't really be arsed coming on before now Bertie, feeling a bit meh about our lack of a goal threat up front as it's the same old same old every week now. We all know we're going to struggle till Hardie is back and KM wont change anything, he'll continue to play himself and LM from the start and LM will end up being left up front by himself. LM does exactly what we know he will do, wins headers and knocks them down...………………………………..but nobody plays alongside him to get on the end of them. So frustrating, then LM goes off and Hamilton comes on and he gets left up front by himself. LM HAS TO PLAY ALONGSIDE HAMILTON or nothing is going to change, at least give it a go because right now all we do is repeat the same pattern as the previous game and it is bloody annoying having to watch us struggle every week.

Bit pissed off that we didn't use this cup game to try that partnership up front today, it was the perfect opportunity to give it a go and see how they did, the league is far more important than the cup and if it worked then we could've done the same in the league.



Right that's me got that off my chest i'll talk about the game.

Good first half, end to end stuff, Lawless hit a cracking dipping shot that looked like it was in the top corner but it hit the bar, then Motherwell went up the pitch and almost scored too. Then KM hit a long range shot that was dipping just under the bar but the keeper finger tipped it over the bar. Kelly made 4 or 5 cracking saves and had a superb game but we got cut open with a ball along our 6 yard box which was stuck away, we had a similar effort but somehow missed it, in fact that was the story of the game, we had chances, they had chances, they stuck one of theirs in.

Basically we just weren't as good as them in the final third and it'll be like that till Hardie gets back playing or we sign another striker, and/or KM plays 2 up front.

It's a cup game so no biggie if we learn lessons, doubt we will though so i'm pinning all my hopes on Ryan Hardie who will be back ready to play in a couple of weeks. We are competing with the likes of Motherwell and Killie but we could be beating them if we had more of a goal threat from our strikers.

Pretty much how I had envisaged then.

Someone at the club needs to remind the manager that the team comes first.

Miserable day both on and off the park yesterday i thought.This one man up front just does not work for us and is so frustrating to watch.At times Kenny was playing basiclyas a holding midfeild player.Hes a stricker for gods sake and as such should be doing the things hes good at instead of limiting our attacking prowess when the chances present themselves.For most part in the game i felt their defence mopped up just about every thing that came their way.Kelly and Halket stood out for me in what was an otherwise afternoon to forget.Of course the League is our bread and butter and hopefully with Sibbs and Hardie coming back soon we should have more of an attacking option because at the moment its virtually non existing.Dissapointing.

First half was entertaining but once they scored it was all over, we didn't show any signs of opening them up.
The 2nd half was easy for Motherwell defenders because we weren't quick enough in our attack and played in front of their defence, and any long high ball was just blootered straight back up the pitch for their big lump of a striker to chase. LM was being battered in the back by their cluggers and Collum was in some weird paradox where he stopped booking players, and let them away with it, they obv did their homework on us and nullified our main/only striker, injuring him.

The logical thing to do would be to sit down and watch a rerun of the game and figure out what could be done to improve us, the one thing that is glaring out at us is playing 2 up front supporting one another as we don't have a goal threat from our supposedly main goal scoring area. So KM needs to either play Hamilton alongside LM, or get himself up there and stay up there when we're attacking, too many balls were played out from defence to a position KM should've been occupying but he was sitting back deep. If he isn't going to drop himself them he needs to actually play as a striker.

Oh and another thing that bugged me yesterday was in the 2nd half Motherwell were dictating play in the midfield with wave after wave coming back at us, so why was Jacobs not brought on, fresh legs and a midfield pittbull of a player would've sorted that out.

Liviforever wrote:Bit pissed off that we didn't use this cup game to try that partnership up front today, it was the perfect opportunity to give it a go and see how they did, the league is far more important than the cup and if it worked then we could've done the same in the league.

This is what annoyed me. Not bothered about the result too much as the league should be our priority, but was hoping we'd use it as a chance to try something different, like KM starting as a manager, giving other guys a start like Lithgow, Lamie, Hamilton or Cadden. The fact we played the exact same 11 as last week gave me flashbacks of Burchill/early Hopkin when we always knew what the starting 11 would be, and could guess what subs would be made before the games even started.

I'm sure Miller will learn his lesson at some point, hopefully sooner rather than later.

I’m not so sure he will. Sincerely hope I’m wrong.

Bertie Bassett wrote:I’m not so sure he will. Sincerely hope I’m wrong.

Looks like you were right then, maybe not how you imagined it'd be proven right enough

My optimism for the season has suddenly gone up a notch. Might struggle for strikers for this game though if Lee Miller is injured after coming off against Motherwell but tbh KM wasn't helping us out much up front anyway.

Still only rumour but the Sun will have loads of egg on their collective faces if it’s wrong