Livi v Caley.

Really looking forward to this with some kind of trepidation. Got to tighten up that defence though.As I said on Saturday Caley won't be as generous with gifts.Theyl no doubt fancy their chances here and will pose our biggest threat thus far.Hopefully weve got our shooting boots on.Were at home which I reckon could just about swing it our way as long as the aforementioned defence keeps it together and a clean sheet from whoever is between the sticks.Asking to much?.I sincerely hope not.Mon the Lions.

Depends how open Caley will be, they looked quite attack minded in the play offs, which would suit us. We were patient against Rovers low block though, and opened them up down the wings. We've good wing players in Nouble, Bahamboula, Penrice, Devlin, Brandon & Mullin, and with Anderson & Pittman in the team we've 2 players who are excellent at scoring from balls put across the box.

Basically i don't think scoring will be a problem, it's keeping them out the other end that concerns me, we've given away 5 cheap goals so far this pre season and cup game. An og from a pass back, 2 GK errors giving the ball out to opposition players, and 2 from set plays, granted the Morton goals prob wont happen with Ayo and Max out of the team, but our inability to defend set plays has haunted us since last season.

So a high scoring 0-0 with Caley winning the penalty bonus point.

Hopefully it doesn't go to a pen shootout.Just don't balls it up if we go a couple ahead.Highly unlikely of course..

Troy wrote:Hopefully it doesn't go to a pen shootout.Just don't balls it up if we go a couple ahead.Highly unlikely of course..

Stryjek's in goals, anything could happen.

Livingston Football Club
@LiviFCOfficial
·
20m
Stryjek, Devlin️, Fitzwater, Cancar, Penrice, Kelly, Pittman, Holt, Bahamboula, Goncalves & Nouble.

Subs - Konovalov, Longridge, Brandon, Bitsindou, Montaño, Omeonga, Shinnie, Mullin & Anderson.


Very strong subs bench.

Looking forward to a decent game but unable to forecast an outcome… LF sounds like he has channelled his inner me!

Well that was an exciting last 5 minutes, too little too late though, even though we should've got at least a draw with Holt having a penalty. That goes in and who knows, we may even have snatched a win with all the momentum with us piling it on their goal.

Mad moment again from Max getting a red card changed the game in their favour but we still managed a mini comeback. Their first goal came from us not taking the shot on in front of goal and losing possession, then getting sucker punched in the counter attack. All a bit Mortony first half with no goal scorer on the pitch taking shots at goal, and 2 sitting on the bench. Game immediately looked a lot better when Anderson came on till the Max rush of blood.

Would like to know why Mullin was kept on the bench all game though, he was getting stripped when Holt was taking our pen, obv coming on for pen kicks at the end, then sat down again when Holt missed. Flummoxed as to why he didn't get to play when we still had a chance getting something.

We'll need another miracle from other groups being as pish as us to qualify as a best of the rest runner up. Or Caley getting beaten by Cove and drawing with AR, and us winning our remaining games..

We had some good moments in the first half, a few near misses, Nouble had his defender on toast in the first half. Devlin almost pulling off a wonder goal (decent save in the end). Agree with your assessment of the opener, Goncalves should have shot having worked the opening & then we get sucker punched, good diagonal ball by their defender but even then I thought Cancar had done enough to get back but somehow the Caley lad got his foot on the cross.

My initial take on the red card was that Max got the ball and the lad ran into him but I also thought he should have tried to head it clear. Happy to be proven wrong and to blame Max but I am giving him the benefit of the doubt for now.

I then think DM made an error by going 3 at the back, that gave their left winger acres of space and led to the second goal.

Our goal was excellent but how Holt could score that and then miss a penalty so badly I’ll never know. Fundamentals of a pen are hit the ball within the goal frame, if the goalie saves it at least you’ve made him work for it… sending it over the bar is just poor.

Still, we were not the only Prem team to suffer tonight. Falkirk 1 Hibs 0 and St Johnstone lost on pens at home to Annan. St Mirren of course also lost at home on Saturday to Arbroath. So tonight’s result was always a possibility.

Doesn't look good from this pic.




Typical keeper going in with his knee first, gets away with it inside the box when catching the ball and protects himself with high knees, but outside the box it's a clear foul.

Not sure what DM's thinking was with his subs, crazy leaving Mullin out the team when we needed goals, Shinnie and Bitsindou aren't attacking mids or goal scorers, one of them would've done and Mullin should've been on.

This was the game to win us the group and we should've thrown everything at it from the start by playing Anderson and Mullin, then we could've afforded to rest them on Sat instead. I think he's overthought it again with some master plan that backfired and didn't work.

Stills can be misleading unless you see the before & after; as I said earlier, the way I saw it, Max got the ball (the photo shows the ball a distance from the collision… what we don’t know from this photo is whether it is still travelling towards Max, in which case it’s a clear foul, or is this after he made contact with the ball and it is travelling back up the field? I believe it is the latter, in which case IMO, no foul as the Caley lad has run into Max) the thing is the Caley lad was running towards Max but once Max has jumped he can’t then change direction or stop in mid air… whereas the Caley lad can stop his run or change direction. The only thing I would say against Max is he should have headed it. Ever since Schumacher assaulted Battiston goalies have not been penalised for this.

But it’s done now & while it could be argued it cost us the game, we should still have equalised from the penalty spot.

Another thing to remember is we had chances before and after Max saw red but didn’t take them. One of them goes in before Caley score and it’s a different game entirely.

Shinnie & Bitsy actually did ok though; Shinnie was the best player on the pitch when he came on and Bitsy helped stop them breaking on us and tried to feed in the guys who you look to for goals or creating chances. The biggest subbing mistake was going 3 at the back and giving their left winger the freedom to do what he liked…including setting up the winner.

Firstly, credit to Billy Dodds and Barry Wilson for their game plan which worked to a tee.The way they broke up play and hit us on the counter attack was painful to watch at times.Indeed those counter attacks hugely contributed to both their goals.As has been said Maxs brainfart really put us up against it.Thoght Ivan did pretty well when he had to come on,and a terrific save from the free kick.Yeh,we had chances at times and dominated for large spells of the game but didn't take them,including Holts penalty miss.Thought we were going to take it to pens,but not to be.Overall I agree with L/F.Its going to be so difficult to get out of this group having to rely on favours from others.Was a lovely night for football,unfortunately the Lions didn't deliver which was so dissapointing. Was hard to decipher at times who was the Premier league team.Testing times ahead for us,no doubt there.Frustrating.

We are playing nice football but so far we've been against teams who are setting up to stop us and hoping to catch us on the break. It's never easy. We are also a bit shy to shoot although I have to give credit to Devlin for that audacious shot. If that had gone in (and it nearly did) we'd have the goal of the season. We also need a wee break of the ball here and there. Lady luck has tended to smile on our opponents rather than us.
I'm glad Davy has shone more light on that red card. The still pics do look damning but show nothing of what led up to the clash. Certainly at the time I thought it might be a foul but no more than that. There was a coming together and the big guy couldn't stop. Things like that turn games. Full credit to Holt for getting us back in to the game but that penalty miss has haunted my recall since last night.
If we are very lucky (got to change some time) we might crawl in to the second spot qualifying place like last year but it is not really looking likely.
I hope big Obileye gets back into the team. I know he can have a brainfart now and then but he is solid. Cancar hasn't convinced me yet.
So 2 and a half weeks till the league kicks off. Let's hope we get the mistakes sorted before then.

Cancar is rapid, had about 20 yards to make up on their break and did so, just didn't manage to get his foot to the ball ahead of Samuels.

Think it was Goncalves that had an open shot at goal inside their box and elected to play someone else in for the shot instead, and lost possession, which led to them breaking up the pitch, till that point we were totally dominant and won every midfield battle on the ball. Anderson on from the start with that dominance, esp from Nouble ripping them apart, and i think we'd have scored a few goals. Still perplexed Mullin wasn't on at all, him and Anderson are our main goal threat just now.

On the red card, it's irrelevant who gets the ball first, the follow through catches him in the face with a high knee, same as a studs up challenge gets a red* in the follow through, no matter if you get to the ball first. FWIW he prob gets away with it inside the box though, for some reason keepers are allowed to knee players after they catch the ball, they do it all the time, esp McGregor for Sevco.

The way we play the ball around the back Stryjek and Obileye are bombscares, Bitsindou, Fitzwater, Cancar and Ivan are far better at handling pressure on the ball, or just passing the ball to our own players.

We've dominated Morton, AR and ICT, and are strong on the ball in midfield and both wings, but without Anderson and Mullin we look incredibly light for players willing to have a crack at goal. Devlin is ok for the odd shot, and almost scored a worldy, so is Pittman if we get him playing up the pitch to get inside the box, but we haven't done that enough, and only in the AR game when Mullin started was Pittman making good attacking runs. Hopefully Goncalves will come good once match fit, doesn't look anywhere near sharp enough just now though. We def have the wing player to get at the goal, just need someone getting into the box to score goals (Anderson & Mullin).

*noticed one of their players stamping downwards onto the ball that set up an attack, and the ref let it go, the amount of persistent fouls should've picked up some cards too, nothing new we don't seem to get a fair shake from the ref when he's dishing out cards though. Also bugged me he let a foul on Nouble go to play advantage, then didn't pull it back when it was obv we weren't gaining any adv, yet twice he did the same for Caley and pulled it back for fouls for them. Then he stopped play a couple of times right away giving us a foul and not playing advantage when we still had the ball and could've ran up the pitch with it. No consistency from the ref does your tits in.

My point on the red… as I said he gets the ball first (irrelevant? it may be but it shouldn’t be because it shows intent was to play the ball) and as he is in the air (why shouldn’t he be? He looks like he’s going to head it but for some reason didn’t - perhaps it swirled causing a misjudgement) but once he is airborne he cannot then stop or change direction, Samuels continued and ran into Max, furthermore he was clearly unhurt as he got up and played on without too much difficulty.

Strangely enough DM’s take on it is uncannily similar to mine.

Jumping in the air like that with your knees raised is similar to a flying raised elbow, you could argue you need to raise your elbows when jumping, but it's dicey if you catch someone, you're taking a chance on a red card. Doubt you'll see many incident of outfield players going for a ball like that with their knees up into a players face.
Keepers have a habit of bringing their knees up to protect themselves after collecting the ball, they get away with it inside the box, but outside of the box they get treated the same as an outfield player and it's deemed dangerous play when following through like that, same as a studs up challenge is on the follow through.

Livingston boss admits team selection mistake but insists it didn't cost them victory over Inverness

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/local-sport/livingston-boss-admits-team-selection-27472791

“But did we lose the game because of team selection? I don’t think so. We lost it through individual’s bad game management and we’ll need to deal with that.

I'd say so yep, certainly didn't help.

Not starting Anderson.

Not playing Mullin at all.

Resting Shinnie was the least of it, he made a difference when coming on but so would Mullin, and Anderson did too, but if he started i reckon he'd have had a couple of goals with the dominance we had with Nouble getting balls into the box. Anderson buries some of those chances, certainly the one Goncalves passed up that led to their breakaway goal.

This was our toughest game against the 2nd seed, yet we rested prob 4 of our best players, huge mistake by Martindale, it would've been better having our strongest starting XI then resting some players up when we got a 2 or 3 goal lead. He must've thought ICT weren't worthy of fielding our strongest team and we could afford to rest players.

It's almost like he's treating these games as friendlies the way he is chopping and changing.

He did say he needed to give players game time in the first two games before the competition started, emphasising he’d still put out teams he thought would win. We won the first and that only got uncomfortable after multiple changes, we had enough about us to win the second and almost salvaged a draw.

LF Max didn’t “follow through” it’s impossible to stop/change direction in mid air.

Auld Nick wrote:He did say he needed to give players game time in the first two games before the competition started, emphasising he’d still put out teams he thought would win. We won the first and that only got uncomfortable after multiple changes, we had enough about us to win the second and almost salvaged a draw.

LF Max didn’t “follow through” it’s impossible to stop/change direction in mid air.

Yes so you don't put your knee up and hit someone in the face, same going into a tackle, studs up makes it out of control and dangerous, pointing your toes down makes it safer and less likely to get a red when momentum takes you into an oncoming player. Like i said, keepers do it all the time inside the box, to protect themselves, and get away with it, so could be a natural instinct for him, but outside the box the ref treats it differently and sees it as going in with the knee.

It's similar to leading with your elbow going into a challenge the way his knee was raised going into Samuels. I doubt we'd be happy if it happened to Anderson from their keeper.

orco wrote:It's almost like he's treating these games as friendlies the way he is chopping and changing.

Def yep, we all do tbf, these group stages give us the chance to get players ready for the league, like competitive pre season league games. However you also need to try and get wins to stay in the cup and win the group, and this was always down as our toughest game, that if we won it almost guaranteed us topping the group. Against Albion Rovers we got away with resting Anderson, but we had Mullin on from the start, who is a goal threat and a good attacking player for assists, still almost cost us making our final 2 subs and taking Penrice off. That close call hasn't deterred DM from taking risks resting players though, and doesn't even mention why Mullin didn't get on the pitch at all.

We're now in the position we need to go all in for our final 2 games and hope for the best with runners up in other groups having lower pts/GD than us, or Caley losing to Cove.

His knee was up, I agree, but it wasn’t up for the purpose of hitting Samuels, watch the video, Max is focused on the ball. Samuels is also looking at/for the ball but he doesn’t jump, Penrice gives Samuels a slight nudge and he is already going down when contact happens. Oh…the photo suggests it was Max’s shin rather than his knee and it barely touched his face.

And the fact is that it shouldn’t matter where on the pitch it happens.

But what’s done is done, the only thing that matters now is 6 points from the next 2 games. 9 points is quite possibly enough to be one the three best runners up.

Auld Nick wrote:His knee was up, I agree, but it wasn’t up for the purpose of hitting Samuels, watch the video, Max is focused on the ball. Samuels is also looking at/for the ball but he doesn’t jump, Penrice gives Samuels a slight nudge and he is already going down when contact happens. Oh…the photo suggests it was Max’s shin rather than his knee and it barely touched his face.

And the fact is that it shouldn’t matter where on the pitch it happens.

But what’s done is done, the only thing that matters now is 6 points from the next 2 games. 9 points is quite possibly enough to be one the three best runners up.

Where do you find the video?

LivingstonFC YouTube channel. It’s supposed to be the highlights but doesn’t include Dev’s long range effort and the editing isn’t great. It’s not the greatest camera angle but you can pause it and do 10 sec rewinds to watch anything repeatedly.

https://youtu.be/xSCDXjDO1LU

Auld Nick wrote:His knee was up, I agree, but it wasn’t up for the purpose of hitting Samuels, watch the video, Max is focused on the ball. Samuels is also looking at/for the ball but he doesn’t jump, Penrice gives Samuels a slight nudge and he is already going down when contact happens. Oh…the photo suggests it was Max’s shin rather than his knee and it barely touched his face.

And the fact is that it shouldn’t matter where on the pitch it happens.

But what’s done is done, the only thing that matters now is 6 points from the next 2 games. 9 points is quite possibly enough to be one the three best runners up.

It's a reflex thing for keepers, they do it to protect themselves inside the box when jumping to catch the ball, not getting away with it outside the box though. Anyhoo after watching that vid it looks like Max leads with his knee to knee the ball away, or off his thigh (shin, knee pedantry)  Devlin and Samuels are in the way blocking the camera view when contact is made, but i presume that's how the ball gets cleared, silly thing to do when an oncoming player could get caught with you afterwards, why didn't he just head it away?.
Splitting hairs now with what caught him   , knee, shin, elbow, forearm, they all hurt and are bookings, mainly red cards.

Maybe shouldn't matter where fouls happen but it does, refs are reluctant to give 'soft fouls' inside the box that anywhere else on the pitch are fouls, because they would be penalty kicks. Also don't know why keepers get away with raising their knees to protect themselves inside the box, if a player did that going into the keeper he'd be off.