Well v Livi.

Start this off then.Tough game i think. Well have had a slight resurgance and will want to steer clear of trouble.We on the other hand after a decent showing against Sevco have the opportunity to cement our place in the top six and get that cup final off our backs.Not sure what team selection will be due to injuries etc and the rotation that Davies utilised due in the main to the number off games weve played recently.I reckon a point here will just about do it for us with other games hopefully going our way.Top of our game of course and we can start to speculate higher.Any way good luck Livi..

All 3 points tomorrow Troy

1 point is all we need, Dundee United will not beat both Celtic & Aberdeen by enough goals to better our goal difference & St Johnstone can only reach our current points total, so a point is enough.

That said Fir Park is rarely a happy hunting ground for us...

I know Bertie, just feeling greedy

Want as many points possible before the split, to open a big gap up on St Mirren, then we can push for 4th place, not having to worry about holding onto 5th.

Secure top 6 then focus on winning the big cup

Been a tough couple of weeks for us. Hopefully the players can get back to their usual selfs, starting at Fir Park today. Wont be easy but we are almost there..

Rangers and Celtic could do us favours this weekend.
I'm away to wash my mouth out after saying that.

orco wrote:Rangers and Celtic could do us favours this weekend.
I'm away to wash my mouth out after saying that.

And Hibs, just to make sure St Johnstone don't creep in there, although if we just win/draw today we'll have seen them off ourselves. Wouldn't mind seeing Accies beat Aberdeen too, and us closing the gap on them to 5 points with a game in hand, then beat Accies next week.

Poplatnik getting a start, holly feck. He'd better do well now he's finally got his chance.

| McCrorie, Devlin, Fitzwater, Guthrie, Taylor-Sinclair, Bartley️, Lawson, Sibbald, Mullin, Serrano & Poplatnik.

Wonder if we're playing a back 3 of Fitzwater-Guthrie-ATS, with Devlin & Serrano as WB's, or 4-2-3-1 with Devlin & ATS as LB's and Serrano on the left wing.

On paper not our strongest lineup against an offencively strong Well team.And Robbo missing.Would take a point here and move on.Hey,but what do i know..

Well we need to score now to get a point, so that’s another loss to add to the winless run...

And St Johnstone are ahead.... so our GD lead over them is down to 6

Well Fitz made me eat my words about not scoring but it’s now 3-1

How can a team that ran the best team in the country so close get walloped by an average team? Too many line up changes? Complacency? Believing their own press?

We need to get back to playing to our strengths as we did when we embarked on that remarkable unbeaten run because it’s now beginning to look like it was just a high new manager bounce.

Lawson was mince, ATS was mince, Marv started mince, could've been 2 or 3 goals down in the first 5 minutes the amount of times we lost/gave the ball away in and around our box.

McCrorie was about the only decent player we had making 2 good saves, then he goes and has a brain fart for their 3rd goal, just as we gave ourselves a chance scoring to make it 2-1.

First goal we didn't clear it out our box, heading it straight into the middle of it, then a clumsy tackle by Poplatnik, 2nd we again feck it up booting it off our players that had blocked the free kick and it lands perfectly for Motherwell to knock it to Cole for him to blast it into our net, bit unlucky but we again didn't clear our lines.

End of the 2nd half prob saved any HT subs as we almost scored twice, Poplatnik and Mullin coming close, but TBH i'd still have made them, Lawson and ATS were my choice too, and for Serrano to drop back into LB. Forrest made an instant difference with direct play, and we looked far better 2nd half (that wouldn't have been difficult right enough), but any hope we had of getting something went out the window with another keystone cops moment by Livi, McCrorie's kick going straight to a Motherwell player.

So many mistakes, if Motherwell were clinical they'd have put 6 or 7 past us, absolute shocking game by Livi. Only consolation was us knowing the Erse cheeks will most likely win against St Mirren (Sevco won that one today) and Utd tomorrow. St Johnstone beat Hibs though so with one game still to play they could reach 40 pts, would need us to concede 3 or 4 more goals to swing the GD though.

Looks like we could limp into the top 6 even if we lose our remaining 2 games, but would be a disappointing end to the season if we can't hold onto 5th place.

Need to file this under a total clusterfuck and throw it in the bin, then get our heads back in the game next week against Accies.

Yeh,good summary L/F.Christ dont know where to start.Rielly apart why didnt we start the same team as Wednesday. Dont know whats happened with Robbo.Proplatnik in the lone striker didnt work today.We shot ourselves in the foot twice today that ultimatly cost us.Mcrorie baffles me.Kept us in it first half then makes an arse of it second half.Weve lost the promise of 6 weeks ago. Havent won since then.Moral has to be lifted,god knows how.Agree we will probably just about get there.But on this form im actuaully dreading going into the top six.But lets get there and i can start taking the valium. God knows il need it.Sorry for the negativity my freinds but thems the facts..

It's St Johnstone that worry me. If we lose our last two games and they win their one then our goal difference goes oot the windae. We are on -2, they are on -7. Say they win their last game v Ross County by 2 goals that puts them on -5. We only need a point but if we fail to get it, it means two defeats. If we got beat by 2 goals in both that puts us on -6. Very close to call. It would actually be better if we only had one game to play. That would mean the team we played would have to score about 4 more than us.
I hope my calculations are wrong btw.

Yep,another week goes by Orco and im absolutely scunnered. Lots of permutations to mull over.Il take any kind of result thats favourable for us.Frustrating that its come to this.But just to cheer maself up, its still in our hands.So unwittingly ive got to mainttain the beliefe we can do this ourselves.

You are right to be worried about St Johnstone Orco & St Mirren for that matter. Obviously two teams have to get above us for us to miss out on top 6 BUT

Perth play Ross at home... should win that possibly by 2 goals, maybe 3
Paisley play Accies at home... should win that

We play Accies & Hibs at home & conceivably could lose both, potentially at least one of them by 2 goals.

If that combination of results happens... we miss out & given where we were before we lost to St Johnstone that would be absolutely ridiculous. Admittedly we did astonishingly well to get to the position we are in but it could all be for next to nothing if my doomsday scenarios play out.

On the bright side I think we could lose all 5 post split games and stay up as (assuming we drop out of the top 6) Accies would still need to win 4 more games & Killie would need to win at least 4 of theirs.

One point rescues the situation...maybe that is the problem, it’s only a point so they all think it’s bound to happn... but it isn’t, they have to work as hard against the so called lesser sides as they did against the champs elect.

orco wrote:It's St Johnstone that worry me. If we lose our last two games and they win their one then our goal difference goes oot the windae. We are on -2, they are on -7. Say they win their last game v Ross County by 2 goals that puts them on -5. We only need a point but if we fail to get it, it means two defeats. If we got beat by 2 goals in both that puts us on -6. Very close to call. It would actually be better if we only had one game to play. That would mean the team we played would have to score about 4 more than us.
I hope my calculations are wrong btw.

Said that on P&B forum, would need therapy if St Johnstone pip us to the top 6 by GD, was bad enough losing the cup final to them.

Us and Killie are currently the 2 worst form teams in the league, St Johnstone are the 3rd best, behind Sevco and Celtic, good news is they're on a pattern of winning every 2nd game and they've just won one today, so hopefully they go to form and lose or draw their final game before the split. It's against Ross County who are fighting for survival and have a bit of form too, winning every 2nd game. Bad news is they too have just won today, and on current form lose their next one. A draw would be a nice outcome for us there.

Accies are on a run of draws, would be good if they keep that run going against us so it wont matter what St Johnstone do in their final game.

After all of that, i just hope Celtic don't decide to throw in the towel before they play Utd tomorrow, they can do what they want after the split, when they'll have nothing left to play for.

Final words, we've a whole week to prepare for what could come down to be our biggest league game, this is like a cup final to make sure we get into the top 6 and can relax for our final pre split game under no pressure, lets make sure we're properly up for it and get a result.

Actually came on to post about the ref and got sidetracked there.

What the actual fuck was that ref doing today, he obstructed us twice, 2nd time he got in the way of Pittman, ball went to a Livi player, he stops the game with a dropped ball, and tells us not to contest the ball, fecking hell.

Constantly gave fouls for players backing in and falling down, worst one was against Poplatnik, Motherwell player had his arms stretched out behind him trying to find Poplatnik, felt where he was and just threw himself backwards into him and fell down, Poplatnik hadn't moved. We got one too that wasn't a foul when ATS was struggling against one of their players and fell down, ref was hopeless.

Why didn't he book Watt for play acting trying to win a penalty?

WTF was Devlin booked for too when taking the throw in, took it, ref stopped play for a retake, Devlin got booked, took it again, ref stopped play again, Motherwell player kicked the ball away and got booked, Devlin had to take it a 3rd time. No idea why the first one was stopped, and why he got a card. Ref was in his own wee weird world.

Right, lets get down to the nitty gritty here.Obviously wanting Ceptic to do the buisness here tommorrow. Takes Utd out of the equesion.Statos,what have we got to do after this.Ridicoulous that its come down to this. Only ourselves to blame.Skin of our teeth comes to mind.Put my nerves to rest guys.

Liviforever wrote:Actually came on to post about the ref and got sidetracked there.

What the actual fuck was that ref doing today, he obstructed us twice, 2nd time he got in the way of Pittman, ball went to a Livi player, he stops the game with a dropped ball, and tells us not to contest the ball, fecking hell.

Constantly gave fouls for players backing in and falling down, worst one was against Poplatnik, Motherwell player had his arms stretched out behind him trying to find Poplatnik, felt where he was and just threw himself backwards into him and fell down, Poplatnik hadn't moved. We got one too that wasn't a foul when ATS was struggling against one of their players and fell down, ref was hopeless.

Why didn't he book Watt for play acting trying to win a penalty?

WTF was Devlin booked for too when taking the throw in, took it, ref stopped play for a retake, Devlin got booked, took it again, ref stopped play again, Motherwell player kicked the ball away and got booked, Devlin had to take it a 3rd time. No idea why the first one was stopped, and why he got a card. Ref was in his own wee weird world.

That was a pathetic refereeing performance. We didn't play well but he didn't help. I'll need to see the penalty again but I thought it was soft. Robbie's knees were bent ready to go down in anticipation of contact from Poplatnik. I've no idea what the foul was for leading to the second goal. And the Devlin booking was a mystery. Motherwell though were diving cheats. The ref fell for every dive. John Ward said on Twitter that the ball that McCorie attempted to clear hit the Motherwell players hand. Kelly made two really good saves and Mullin's free kick hit the woodwork. It was just one of those days when everything that could go wrong did. That apart I wasn't exactly brimming with confidence when I saw the team sheet. I've never been a Lawson fan. He's far too inconsistent. Holt and Pittman on the bench Nope!Time we played it on the ground and started getting into the opposition faces again.
A performance like today will get us nothing against Hamilton or Hibs. I'll be very down if we blow a top six place.

These teams have their own agendas.Always try to be fair. Motherwell deserved to win that today.No question whatsoever. Bigger position. Offencively we cant hurt teams.Davie has to look at this. High balls in SPL to wee guys doesnt work..Our place in the so called top six will ultimatly depend on this imo.Weve a chance of getting there..Hope im wrong

.

Troy wrote:Right, lets get down to the nitty gritty here.Obviously wanting Ceptic to do the buisness here tommorrow. Takes Utd out of the equesion.Statos,what have we got to do after this.Ridicoulous that its come down to this. Only ourselves to blame.Skin of our teeth comes to mind.Put my nerves to rest guys.

We need 1 point