Livi v St Johnstone

At last, the winter break is over and it's back to league games.

Difficult one to predict, St Johnstone have had a revival of late, and are only 5 points behind us, with 2 games in hand. Two wins and three draws in their last five games too, so it wont be anything like the first time we played them, earlier in the season. Oh and both those wins were away from home, so their recent away form looks good.

On Livi, we just don't know how much of the pre winter break Livi will turn up on Wed night, I didn't like the way we slowly played it out from the back all the time on Saturday, Sarkic has started off a few of our goal scoring attacks with his kick outs, really hope Schofield mixes it up a lot more, or Stewart if it's him that plays, looked far too much like the John Hughes style of play for my liking, slow and predictable.

So by the tone of my post you'll have guessed that i'm not too confident here, hoping for a win, but i'd take a draw as a decent result. I feel with us depending so heavily on our home form that we really could do with winning this game though, as our next game is away to Accies, where we usually lose.

We’ll need to be a lot slicker with more energy & a higher tempo if we want anything from this game. If we play as ponderously as we did for 75 minutes on Saturday then Saints will head home with the points.

Want a win, hoping we get at least a draw...expecting a defeat based on Saturday.

Just to make things a bit more unpredictable, Schofield's supposedly injured and has returned to Huddersfield, and we're making a move to get QotS's loaned GK McCrorie from Sevco. Oh the drama.

Liviforever wrote:Just to make things a bit more unpredictable, Schofield's supposedly injured and has returned to Huddersfield, and we're making a move to get QotS's loaned GK McCrorie from Sevco. Oh the drama.

Take it we didn't make an offer to the American boy who trialled in Spain. Oh well we've still got the Maley Mountain.

Think the American lad was one for the future D, don't think he's ready for first team football yet.

Reading the QotS fans comments about McCrorie, and other Championship fans too, he's really highly rated, best keeper in the Championship this season, sounds like we've won a watch getting him in to replace Sarkic, and an injured Schofield. If this goes well we could also get him on loan for next season too. Only negative would be him not being available when playing his parent club.

OSC says McCrorie will battle it out with Schofield for the starting keeper slot.

Bet that means Stewart will be moved on or loaned out... can’t imagine him being too happy about being 3rd choice behind 2 loan keepers.

Another tough one to call.Hopefully we will come out of the traps all guns blazing as opposed to Saturday when it took us so long to get going.Wer,e at home on our pitch which should give us a wee advantage over them though it wont be easy against a team who needs the points as much as we do.Glad big Davidson is suspended for this as he can be such a handfull along with Stevie May and one or two others.I like Tommy Wright and have no doubt he will have his team up for this im sure.Would love to see wee Robbo on from the start and have a real good go at them.Cmon Gary make it happen and as always good luck tommorow night.And before i go a warm welcome to Robbie Mcrorie.It seems its a bit of a coup for us as so many teams wanted him.Hes quality and now has the chance to show it with the Lions.I wish him every succsess.

Looking forward to seeing how McCrorie does, hopefully his kicking is good.

Canny wait for this game now, we're gonna gub them 3-1.

Massive win for us, all the results went well for us with the teams below us too, apart from Hibs managing a 2-1 comeback. Gives us a comfortable gap over the teams in the play off and relegation dog fight.

We looked a lot sharper and more direct than against Raith too, McCrorie really impressed in goals, and his kicking looked good. Was also good to see Pitts finally get his goal after his injury this season, had a couple of decent shots from distance too. The most pleasing thing was seeing us game manage it out at the death with a slender lead, now if only we could do that away from home too.

Bassas have sucked me into going to another Accies away game now, swore I wasn't going back there this season after losing yet another shitfest of a game against them, now I've got my hopes up that we'll actually beat them there.

Tonight was much better than Saturday. Brown looked much more in tune with Guthrie. Both keepers made very good saves & McCrorie certainly showed his bravery on a few occasions. I thought he looked a bit on the small side but can’t fault him at all.

Pittman was tremendous, so was Bartley. Robinson always puts in a real shift. Dykes too. But all in all a really good team performance topped off with a well worked goal.

Bertie Bassett wrote:Tonight was much better than Saturday. Brown looked much more in tune with Guthrie. Both keepers made very good saves & McCrorie certainly showed his bravery on a few occasions. I thought he looked a bit on the small side but can’t fault him at all.

Pittman was tremendous, so was Bartley. Robinson always puts in a real shift. Dykes too. But all in all a really good team performance topped off with a well worked goal.

Am a bit confused by your statement that you thought McCrorie was a little on the small side. When the teams lined up he was on par with Guthrie as the tallest of our player out there. I know we don't have the tallest side in the league but when the linesman shook hands with him she was eye-level with his armpit.

Brown had a far better game and his long throw-ins are a real plus; I've hated it when Dykes goes off to take the throw as that means he's not in the middle causing problems.

It was great to see Pittman's confidence grow after he scored his goal.

McMillen had me a bit worried though with his petulant booking. Was wondering if he'd manage to see out the 90 minutes with the referee's preference for booking players in amber. Bartley's booking was amazingly one sided when Saints were getting away with the same thing time and again without even a word.

Yeah says on his wiki page he's 6ft 4.

I think Brown's throw ins are even further than Lithgow's, we don't even need a target man to head them on, they were reaching right into the middle of the 6 yard box. I think we could get a few goals from them if players were more alert to getting a toe on the ball when it bounces about in the box.

Big improvement on last season at this time of the season, this is the type of game we'd have lost. We're doing a lot better against the teams below us this season too. Just need to beat Accies now, they're a pain in the arse taking points off us all the time.

Liviforever wrote:Yeah says on his wiki page he's 6ft 4.

I think Brown's throw ins are even further than Lithgow's, we don't even need a target man to head them on, they were reaching right into the middle of the 6 yard box. I think we could get a few goals from them if players were more alert to getting a toe on the ball when it bounces about in the box.

Big improvement on last season at this time of the season, this is the type of game we'd have lost. We're doing a lot better against the teams below us this season too. Just need to beat Accies now, they're a pain in the arse taking points off us all the time.

Yes; Hamilton actually really worry me. If St Johnstone continue to play like they did last night then they'll be safe. Its almost inconceivable that Hearts will not start seeing some improvement of really dip into the transfer market at the last moment. Hamilton are really the side on the shoggly peg. They'll be playing for their lives.

Well, I sit corrected on his size, he didn’t look that big to me and I don’t watch the line up at the start, find all tedious & unnecessary. Regardless, the boy dun guid

I was honestly sitting thinking that we may have rued the chances that we had before we scored.Should have know better,well done Livi in a game i said before wouldnt be easy.Would agree on Brown he looked good beside big Guthrie and Lawson who had another superb performance.I know Keaghan got MOM but for me considering it was his debut for us young Mcrorie was outstanding last night and indeed id does look like weve got another gem in our ranks.5th place consolidated and more room from the bottom two,cant ask for any more from these lads.And come Saturday could be even better .Well done Gary Davie and the boys.Oh and good luck to Stewart down at QOS on loan,im sure he,l do a decent job for them.lol.T.

Would love it if we started winning away games too, our home form will keep us comfortably up, but I think we've played even better this season than last, and should be up there with Aberdeen and Motherwell but for bad Refereeing decisions and our habit of chucking away 2 goal leads.

Talking of which, looks like we got one going our way this time, with Brown pushing their player onto McCrorie. Saying that, it looked like Marv was fouled in the box too and we should've had a pen.