observations from today

My views

Tav needs a winger ahead of him that doesn’t cut inside. Someone he can 2v1 on the wing with and alternatively 2v1 when defending like candieas did.

Helander should start Thursday but who drops out. In terms of form it should be Goldson however helander and katic seem very similar and on paper Goldson and helander make a better pairing

Barasic should get a run of games till the next international break. With Flanagan injured and Halliday no where near good enough he needs that chance.

Jack is heavily missed defensively when not playing

Davis had a poor game by his standards but nothing to worry about

Aribo started so well in Europe . I hope he’s just adapting to the spl and the physicality . There’s defos a player in there but better players than him have failed to cope with this league or demands of this club . Pray not this seasons couilibaly

Arfield- rest him. He looks shattered. 2 weeks off maybe even longer. We have options in midfield. One of only areas we could afford to do this.

Ojo- seems like he’s gonna be one of those players that will frustrate all game then do something really good. Hopefully settles and comes good.

Barker- positive when came on . Hopefully kicks on
 
Laudrup's Right Foot said:
Defence was all over the place and a better side would have punished us from set pieces. In the second half they had 2 free headers and a striker had time to take a touch and get a shot off from a corner.

Badly missed Jack sitting in front of the defence mopping up second balls

Ojo was once again hopeless. I watched his movement in the first half and so many times he was in positions that made it impossible to find him a pass. Whether he was deliberately doing it to hide I guess is a matter opinion. Several games he’s done the same in and for me when the crowd get anxious he goes hiding. As things stand, he is not even close to being good enough to start for us and isn’t a patch on what Candeias offered us

Arfield. Aside from the final 15 minutes he looked poor yet again. What he was doing for the penalty I have no idea but it summed up his start to this season so far

Goldson poor again and I wish Gerrard would tell him to stop trying to play passes any further than 20 yards as his accuracy is terrible. Helander deserves a chance although it’s clear to see Gerrard has a soft spot for Goldson

Barker was a positive, not shy to run at his man and caused their defence problems.

Kent, can only hope it’s a minor niggle as the thought of having very little creativity for 4+ weeks doesn’t bare thinking about
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What I took from this and the Celtic game is we will most likely finish second this season , like it or not we are still behind them in terms of quality and consistency.
 
It was poor again. Centre halves and Halliday were caught out numerous times.
Midfield wasn’t a cohesive unit and showed that we miss Jack.
Concerned over Ojo and Aribo, think the pressure is getting to these young lads.
Arfield wasn’t and hasn’t been showing his form towards the back end of last season.
McGregor, Tavernier and Morelos only pass marks for me.
Don’t think Thursday is the time to make drastic changes but Helander needs to get a start soon and King and Barker should also be showing for a starting jersey soon with the injuries to the squad currently.
All that said was delighted to get the three points.
We were staring down the barrel of being six points behind after five games so to pull it back showed character.
 
While I wouldn't argue that Ojo was great, didn't he get a crucial touch at the 2nd and setup the 3rd?
 
ohstefanklos said:
Worrying that the crowd are already starting on Ojo and Aribo
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By making observations?

I didn’t think Aribo was too bad today. Ojo however, was rotten

The crowd can be grumpy moaning bestirts at times but one thing they won’t tolerate is players hiding which Ojo is guilty of
 
Everything about yesterday was flat and a bit meh! We had a couple of decent chances early in the first half but didn’t take them. If we do then we cruise to a victory as it would have lifted the crowd.

SG definitely has favourites. Goldson, Arfield, Ojo for me should be dropped. Haven’t been up to it recently. Helander, Docherty, Stewart all deserve a fair crack at the whip to show what they can do.

Barker was a real bright spark yesterday. His intensity lifted the team and crowd with his direct play.
 
I think Ojo would be a player to bring on when we are leading not sure he should start as I feel the pressure is getting to him.
Arfield needs rested and we should see if King can produce something if we give him a run of games.
We missed Jack today and would rather have seen King or Kamara in midfield.
Game was very stop start and nightly which also didn’t help our play.
Good 3 points and pleasing to come back from a goal down.
 
the_ref said:
While I wouldn't argue that Ojo was great, didn't he get a crucial touch at the 2nd and setup the 3rd?
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Aribo flicked on the corner at the second.

I've said it elsewhere on here, Ojo came into a game when they went to 10 men and there was space. Before that he wasn't up to much at all.
 
JCDarcheville said:
Really poor performance.

Hard to disagree with a lot in the OP. Halliday was also really poor again, left back remains a huge problem for us, I can’t believe we didn’t try to sign one.
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I was fed up stating threads and posting about our left back problem. Glaring obvious that we needed a new one. Instead we sign a million wingers.....
 
HandsomeHead said:
It was a decent day at the office.
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Sorry, HH, it was a terrible day at the office.

We didn't start playing until they scored. Tav's equaliser was a keepers blunder, the midfield didn't work, Katic wobbled, Halliday should be playing for Livingstone, Arfield and Ojo were poor and generally we were far too passive.
 
Summary of this thread is "we played poorly but won". We were lucky in parts, especially with the foul given on Halliday when the boy ran through and scored, but these type of wins will always - and will always need to - happen.
 
WeeBaz78 said:
Aribo for me has been getting off lightly recently. Ability is undoubted. Looking very like ejaria at the moment though.

Fleets around the edge of games too much without influencing anything.
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Aribo has barely kicked a ball in any league game this season.

Kilmarnock, St. Mirren and the bheggars especially.
 
Forza_Napoli said:
None of Livingstone's chance came from tavs side all there good play came down our left hand side ( halliday and katic ) tav stepped up again and got us back in the game
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He also put at least 2 crosses bang on the money only for Morelos to fluff his lines, chances which if even one of is taken puts a completely different spin on the game. I don't think our performance was that bad yesterday but our end product was woefull in the first half.
 
Commentator said:
Sorry, HH, it was a terrible day at the office.

We didn't start playing until they scored. Tav's equaliser was a keepers blunder, the midfield didn't work, Katic wobbled, Halliday should be playing for Livingstone, Arfield and Ojo were poor and generally we were far too passive.
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Admittedly we never got going until the penalty, but it was against one of the better organised sides - they had two of three players that were much better than anything I thought they had - and ultimately we were always in control and able to step up a gear when we absolutely had to.

Last year we wouldn’t have been able to do that.

It certainly wasn’t a stellar performance by any means and we undoubtedly need to improve, but overall, to come back from a goal down and win comfortably was decent, IMO.

As said on another thread, I think a lot of people are expecting to see a big transformation this season whereby we’re winning all our home games by 3 or 4 goals whereas I always thought the improvement would be more moderate than that.
 
HandsomeHead said:
I think a lot of people are expecting to see a big transformation this season whereby we’re winning all out home games by 3 or 4 goals whereas I always thought the improvement would be more moderate than that.
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The big transformation we absolutely must see if we hope to win anything is in our attitude, if we do not go out and take our game to the opposition we will fail, again. How many times has this, and previous managers, said "we just need to be braver". The players regularly ignore this, play passively, allow the opponents to play their game and then we're chasing the game. If we go out and, within the game plan, express and enjoy ourselves we will sweep teams aside, the bears will go tonto and 'a day at the office' will turn into a day out. It would build confidence and it's a habit we need to cultivate plus the effects would be so much more rewarding all round.
 
Id say last season when international breaks came when we returned we were poor. Last season we wouldn't have won that.
A very poor performance and costly with Kent being injured but Barker stepped up.
Positives are we seem to have a fighting spirit and players ready to take their chance.
 
Our general technical play - touch, passing, shooting and marking is poor.

There were basic passes yesterday that were miles off.

All too often with this Rangers side there is a lethargy and a sloppiness with the basics.

When we're on our game like Midtjylland away we're a very good side but that looks like the exception to the norm this season.
 
Commentator said:
The big transformation we absolutely must see if we hope to win anything is in our attitude, if we do not go out and take our game to the opposition we will fail, again. How many times has this, and previous managers, said "we just need to be braver". The players regularly ignore this, play passively, allow the opponents to play their game and then we're chasing the game. If we go out and, within the game plan, express and enjoy ourselves we will sweep teams aside, the bears will go tonto and 'a day at the office' will turn into a day out. It would build confidence and it's a habit we need to cultivate plus the effects would be so much more rewarding all round.
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We'll certainly play much better than yesterday, in fact we already have, notably against Hibs, but there were various factors involved for our failing to sweep them aside in the first half especially.

Firstly, they were well organised and didn't allow us much room. We can dismiss them and say they're pish, but actually, they did the defend and frustrate part quite well.

Secondly, all eyes were on Kent, but a few nice touches and runs aside, he did look a little rusty.

On the other side Ojo isn't giving us enough incision or ingenuity unless there's lots of space for him to run into. Then there's the Arfield issue whereby he's not providing the thrust from the middle he was at the end of last season and we could also look at Jack's absence as robbing us of his industry and presence in the middle - I remain unconvinced by Aribo.

So it's all very well asking players to be braver, but ultimately I still think, even having added Kent to the squad, that we lack one or two players with the individual quality to negate the need for less gifted players to step up and be more courageous.

I think we have improved from last season, it's just not as pronounced as most would like.
 
HandsomeHead said:
We'll certainly play much better than yesterday, in fact we already have, notably against Hibs, but there were various factors involved for our failing to sweep them aside in the first half especially.

Firstly, they were well organised and didn't allow us much room. We can dismiss them and say they're pish, but actually, they did the defend and frustrate part quite well.

Secondly, all eyes were on Kent, but a few nice touches and runs aside, he did look a little rusty.

On the other side Ojo isn't giving us enough incision or ingenuity unless there's lots of space for him to run into. Then there's the Arfield issue whereby he's not providing the thrust from the middle he was at the end of last season and we could also look at Jack's absence as robbing us of his industry and presence in the middle - I remain unconvinced by Aribo.

So it's all very well asking players to be braver, but ultimately I still think, even having added Kent to the squad, that we lack one or two players with the individual quality to negate the need for less gifted players to step up and be more courageous.

I think we have improved from last season, it's just not as pronounced as most would like.
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Any team that is ponderous will always make their opponents look better than they really are. When we, eventually, genuinely went at them, ie. were 'braver', their organisation was rapidly dismantled.
We need to play to our strengths and those are moving ourselves and the ball quickly.
 
Handsome Head
I actually think many fans did expect a leap forward in quality over the summer. More of the same was rarely discussed by anyone. Board has miscalculated if they are relying on Filth getting a bit worse every year. The fact we have roughly same team as last season is not actually what we expected.
 
Most times when Halliday plays, your hearts in your mouth, what Stevie G sees in him can only be a workman, player?
 
Kamara should be plsying imo

Team looked tired and lacking in ideas but on a plus side, last season that would have been a draw.
 
Earl of Leven said:
Handsome Head
I actually think many fans did expect a leap forward in quality over the summer. More of the same was rarely discussed by anyone. Board has miscalculated if they are relying on Filth getting a bit worse every year. The fact we have roughly same team as last season is not actually what we expected.
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In terms of the first eleven, I don't think we've improved from the side that ended last season.

It looks to me like we've effectively gone for quantity over quality yet again, which is fine - I think the squad has improved and a better squad should translate into a better campaign over the course of the season (yesterday was a good example of this where we were able to bring on the likes of Barker and King and actually look more potent) - but it's not what we were told our focus was going to be.

Perhaps that has been a contributing factor in Allen's departure, I don't know, but the feeling was that the positions filled by Ojo and Aribo needed to be straight out of the box improvements to the first eleven when the reality, at least in these early stages, appears somewhat different.

So I think what we're actually getting is an incremental improvement rather than any great leap forward and more than a few are struggling to accept that.

When we talked about adding 'quality' in the summer I always felt that was going to be highly subjective, but inevitably people will start to look at the £10m spent on Helander and Kent and ask if that could have been better utilised elsewhere.
 
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