Lions v Albion Rovers.

So off to Cliftonhill tomorrow we go.Hopefully we carry on from Tuesday night and put in a good performance. Imperative we get of to a flyer in this group as there's tougher games to come and get ourselves in pole position to top the group.Still no word on the injuries to Bruce and Jack which is frustrating but hopefully nothing to serious.Davie won't take Rovers lightly but I assume we will get the three points needed to set us up for the tougher games to come.Decent weather forecast so a good day in store.Mon the Lions..

Troy wrote:So off to Cliftonhill tomorrow we go.Hopefully we carry on from Tuesday night and put in a good performance. Imperative we get of to a flyer in this group as there's tougher games to come and get ourselves in pole position to top the group.Still no word on the injuries to Bruce and Jack which is frustrating but hopefully nothing to serious.Davie won't take Rovers lightly but I assume we will get the three points needed to set us up for the tougher games to come.Decent weather forecast so a good day in store.Mon the Lions..

Read Jack should be back for the Sevco game, but nothing about Bruce.


Not allowed to play trialists in this cup comp, so unless international clearances have come through, Bitsindou, Omeonga* and Bahamboula wont be playing.

Still plenty available to field a team capable of beating Albion Rovers right enough, but hopefully Fitzwater is ok as he wasn't in the squad against Linlithgow, or it'll be Cancar and Obileye in defence. Cancar looked solid but Ayo is a bit of a bombscare at times. Josh and Nouble on the wings please.

*Still no idea why Omeonga is listed as a trialist in our pre season games when he was signed and playing for us last season.

Looking forward to it - must take it seriously though.

Bahamboula in the squad.

At 3-0 we were cruising…then the engine management light came on & eventually the wheels fell off.
But Three points, job done.

Bring on Caley

More so Nick,bring on Caley on Tuesday night.Then worry about Cove next Saturday. They haven't played in the group yet.Ive said on a couple of forums 50 mins we we're cruising today and was expecting the floodgates to open.They didn't.To let Rovers back into this was criminal and questions have to be asked.Baring in mind the opposition and no disrespect to Albion,that second half capitulation was worrying.Yeh were top of the group,but FFS surely Martindale has to accept responsibility here.So many changes when we were in the ascendancy, baffling to say in the least.Caley won't be as benevolent on Tuesday night,guaranteed 🥲.

The subs def changed things for the worse, we were comfortable till Penrice went off. Still offered an attacking threat ourselves with Brandon looking decent replacing Devlin.  Bahamboula was opening them up on the left too, and Bruce should've added a 4th when right through on goals running onto a good ball, should've just chipped the keeper but brought it down and took it closer to have a shot, and missed a great chance.

Bitsindou and Fitzwater were comfortable playing the ball about at the back, no Ayo slip ups, and we have plenty options in attack with Nouble, Bahamboula, Mullin, Brandon, Devlin, Penrice, Anderson and Goncalves, but that was poor not defending a free kick and throw in for their goals. Still think the disruption bringing on Longridge for Penrice was the cause of our problems. I understand why Martindale made so many substitutions though, we were 3 zip up and he wanted to get as many players as he could having game time before the league starts. These cup games are like competitive pre season league games. But it almost cost us the 3 pts.

Sort ourselves out at the back and we'll be pretty much ready for the league starting, we're looking pretty good everywhere else. Not sure about Konovalov yet, he had little to do till those set plays leading to their goals, but handled pass backs and distributing the ball well enough, looked suspect for their first goal though.

The set peices is whats worrying me the most L/F.Against so called inferior opposition, shouldn't happen ,but it did.Agreed the disruption to our game with the Subs didn't help us.But the old adage of taking our foot of the gas being 3 up didn't happen here.As ive said Caley won't be as generous on Tuesday night. Yeh its only the league Cup.But early stages usually point to how well this current team do in the season ahead overall imo.

Livi have had a tradition over the years of making fans sweat till the end. We got that again today in spite of dominating the game till the last 15 minutes.
Two points to mention. Bruce should have squared the ball when he was one on one with the keeper but typical striker he went for glory. Second point. our goalie spilled the ball for their first. Konovalov had precious little to do in his last two appearances so it's hard to judge him. I did see him in a couple of games last season and did not feel he was anything special. I like a keeper that commands the box and I haven't see that from him yet. Early days though so hopefully he gets a chance to impress us soon.

Troy wrote:The set peices is whats worrying me the most L/F.Against so called inferior opposition, shouldn't happen ,but it did.Agreed the disruption to our game with the Subs didn't help us.But the old adage of taking our foot of the gas being 3 up didn't happen here.As ive said Caley won't be as generous on Tuesday night. Yeh its only the league Cup.But early stages usually point to how well this current team do in the season ahead overall imo.

Don't think we took the foot off the gas, we totally dominated the game and slipped up with 2 stupid defensive errors when Penrice went off for Longridge, was no need to take Penrice off other than giving Longridge game time, and it lead directly to their first goal with Jacko giving the foul away. Dunno about Caley not being so generous Troy, we were 3 up playing well in attack, attack isn't our problem, we've an abundance of good attacking players that are looking pretty decent for their 3rd game this pre season/season, even defensively we weren't bad till the LB/LWB substitution disrupted us. Not enamoured with Ivan though, he had precious little to do in the way of making saves and didn't deal with the 2 that gave them goals, particularly the first one hit straight towards him that he spilled but looks like we're bringing in a new keeper to rectify that weakness.

Anyway, i don't think we're a million miles away from getting our act together. These cup games are an excellent way to prepare for the league, we scraped through the group stages last season yet finished a comfortably 7th, just narrowly missing out on top 6, and i think we've better looking attacking players this season to get that top 6 spot pushing for Europe, providing we sort ourselves out stopping set piece goals.

orco wrote:Livi have had a tradition over the years of making fans sweat till the end. We got that again today in spite of dominating the game till the last 15 minutes.
Two points to mention. Bruce should have squared the ball when he was one on one with the keeper but typical striker he went for glory. Second point. our goalie spilled the ball for their first. Konovalov had precious little to do in his last two appearances so it's hard to judge him. I did see him in a couple of games last season and did not feel he was anything special. I like a keeper that commands the box and I haven't see that from him yet. Early days though so hopefully he gets a chance to impress us soon.

Looks like he'll be offski along with Stryjek, and we're bringing in a new keeper. If both are going we'd need a back up too though.

I do think we took our foot off the gas at 3-0, I agree with Penrice’s & DM’s post match comments, first half was fine but second half was unacceptable. In easing up Albion had a little more possession and while they didn’t really threaten us, they scored twice through poor defending of set plays.

Ivan doesn’t fill me with confidence, he didn’t in his few games last season and didn’t yesterday either. Bits & Fitz strolled the first half but my one gripe was that they spent too much time just passing between each other. Whenever they played in Penrice, or anyone else up the left for that matter, we were putting them under pressure, we didn’t do that enough IMO.

Where are you seeing suggestions of wholesale goalie changes LF?

Take out their 2 set plays and nothing changed 2nd half, other than a few needless substitutions before their goals. We still attacked them down both wings and created chances, Bruce scores that sitter, or squared it and it's 2 goals each half. It was more taking off Penrice than taking our foot off the gas.

Bahamboula was ripping them down the left side and when Brandon came on he was ripping them down the right, Devlin was also working that side before going off, not seeing where we eased up at all.

Been impressed with Brandon, would like to see him and Devlin both playing and working overlaps down the right side. We've plenty options on both wings this season, Nouble, Bahamboula, Mullin & Brandon all showing good quality that they could replace one another and we wouldn't be weaker. The LWB/LB position though is pretty dependent on Penrice, neither Longridge or Montano is anywhere near as good as he is.

It was 1 way traffic in the first half with Rovers getting a couple of corners toward the end of the half.

2nd half after it went to 3-0 I expected us to push on and end up with 5 or 6, we didn’t - we understandably made changes with the game apparently won and we lost cohesion, moves broke down quicker, from the game being played essentially in Rovers’ half, they started moving the ball themselves. Got their set plays and scored twice at which point every time they got forward after that our defending was a lot more panicked with sclaffed clearances. Yes we still caused them difficulty when we came forward but nothing came of it. Both Penrice and DM admitted our second half wasn’t good enough.