Ok, devils advocate... (could this give us hope if he don't sign another forward??)

Could it not be reasonably argued that our main problem this season has been that we have given a lot of cheap goals away because our defence has been rubbish.

This has left a situation where we have needed to score a lot of goals to scrap a draw.

If our defence becomes better and we leak less goals. Then the odd one or two we tend to score (from all over the squad) will start to earn draws and wins, and this will be enough to avoid the drop.?

Grinding out results as Brewster likes to call it..

I'm no stats man but I believe, Saint Mirren have frequently in their historry score'd the least number of goals in the spl and still avoided religation.

Anything in this also:

Username (Roby) "Why the hell would we bring in another striker . We already have 4 on our books and our manager only ever plays one at a time . As long as he is still here there is no point as he is obsessed with this 1 up front system which has brought him so much success! We have capable strikers, if he would allow any 2 from 3 to form a regular partnership. Off course that would be like admitting you were doing something wrong and i have yet to hear Brewster accept the blame for anything to do with our current prediciment."

Edited January 14, 200916 yr by kiltarlity

kiltarlity, have you posted the correct sub title, did you mean defender?

kiltarlity, have you posted the correct sub title, did you mean defender?

No I ment Striker.. I am just questioning if perhaps we really need one as desperately as everyone is making out!

i would say that we dont need one if the clown was playing Rooney week in week out. He seems to be the only striker we have who is actually capable of scoring a few goals if he gets the right level of service to him instead of the "tried and trusted" hoof it up an hope for the best.

Barrowman i think could maybe be the player who is capable of coming off the bench and scoring if he gets the right help and guidance which he is clearly not going to get under Brewster.

Same with Wood but again it comes down to if he gets the right tuition and guidance.

But it wouldn't harm any of them if there were a bit of decent competition for places. Im not saying that an expierenced striker would give them this competition but with limited resources and wages blah blah blah i dont feel we could get someone who would give them what they need to lift thier games

yes we do. you don't win games if you look as though you can't buy a goal.

not only is the scoring of goals an important issue, but an experienced striker would help the likes of wood and rooney develop. I know we have brew already taking up this position, but playing alongside an experienced player who has been there and done it would be fantastic for the young boys.

2008/09 sees our worst F/A total ever at this stage of the season (I took it to end of December). We have never scored less than 20 by then (although we have been close to this total most years) and we have never shipped more than 34 which is how many we have conceded in each of the last two seasons.

TO END OF DECEMBER

2008/09 Pld 20 / F 20 / A 34 / GD -14 / Posⁿ 11^th

2007/08 Pld 20 / F 28 / A 34 / GD -6 / Posⁿ 8^th

2006/07 Pld 22 / F 23 / A 31 / GD -8 / Posⁿ 10^th

2005/06 Pld 21 / F 23 / A 21 / GD +2 / Posⁿ 7^th

2004/05 Pld 20 / F 20 / A 29 / GD -9 / Posⁿ 8^th

We need a young Dargo i.e Annnnnnnnndy JACKSON (think I might have mentioned this already)

Edited January 14, 200916 yr by Harry Chibber

20 goals in 21 games is awful, no excuses.

its not only the strikers fault for this (and some argue the manager) but the midfield have been disappointing for me this eason. cowie and dougie in particular should be scoring many more goals than they have been.

Strikers have scored 9 of our 20 ----- the rest have been from midfield/defence

http://stats.caleythistleonline.com/index.php?sort=goals

I accept that goals for are only relevant if the goals against column is OK!

Surprisingly, at this moment of time, we are 4 goals better than St Mirren, 1 better than Hamilton, the same as Hearts, 1 behind Motherwell and 2 behind Killie.

No way is that out of touch with other comparable teams to ours but as stated above, the against column is a problem - so get that fixed, sneak a goal or two and watch us go up that league!

Had we not been in the position we are in then I would say that there's an argument for not breaking our backs to get a striker if we could stem the flow at the other end. However, that kind of mindset lends itself to "draws being enough" by way of low scoring games and I don't think we can afford to go into the second half of the season with that mentality. We need to start winning against those immediately above us and looking to secure (at least) draws against those further up the table if we are to get out of the mess we're in. To do that we need to be putting the ball in the back of the opposition net AND stemming the flow into our own net.

I think with Brews constant changing up front it is clear that even he knows we dont have the answer up front and need somebody with a bit more experience.

Goals against in last 5 league games: 3-2-3-3-3, meaning the new striker needs to score a hattrick every time. He'd better be good.

Tactics are the problem.

No lone striker, no matter how experienced he is, is going to get you 20+ goals a season.

Even if we bring in someone experienced, does that mean we're suddenly going to be playing 442 for the rest of the season?

I very much doubt it, because Brewster obviously favours 451....greaat away from home, if you've got the players to play that way, but at home against our relegation rivals?

The fact that we've got 3 very inexperienced guys up front, playing, for most weeks, on their own, is just nonsense.

Add in the fact that the front person changes every week, when clearly any of them needs a decent run of games to get them up to what it is they're supposed to be doing.

Rooney is clearly the best we've got, and if he'd been our main striker from the start, I've no doubt he'd be in double figures by now. Wood is raw, but there's definitely something there (a lot more than Rory ever had for sure), and he could be a real asset. Barrowman, sorry, but in my opinion, it was an undestandable gamble to take, but he's just not got it for this level.

So, we;ve got two very inexperienced, potentially, very good strikers in Rooney and Wood. Neither of them are THAT good though at the moment that you can build a system around them where you play them as a lone striker.

Until we play a 442, where we've got an experienced player, playing alongside either of them, then we're just wasting, and demoralising, two very good, young players.

I agree to an extent that we don't actually need an experienced striker here, because all that'll happen is that he'll just replace the one we're playing up front at the moment. Until Brewster gets away from this 451 mentality, then, to me it's not going to make a blind bit of difference who's up front. It's the system that needs changing.....442, with an experienced striker alongside Rooney or Wood.

Can you just imagine Dargo alongside either of them two??

It's our defence that's killing us. We are the worst defence in the entire SPL by a fair distance. Even if we had a marvellous strikeforce we would still find it tough to win games because we are always liable to lose a couple at the other end.

If we had the defence working fairly well then we would be further up the table. It's as simple as that. St.Mirren are further up the table because they have a top six defence and they seem to manage to keep clean sheets. Keep clean sheets and you only need to nick a goal to get the win.

I think our midfield is good and our strikeforce is not really any worse than quite a few other clubs. Or certainly our ability to score goals. It's the defence that isn't working.

We need a young Dargo i.e Annnnnnnnndy JACKSON (think I might have mentioned this already)

Please do not SPAM the forum Harry Chibber. There are plenty of Andy Jackson threads on the go without you try to advertise him here

Seriously though I like Jackson and I believe a bid of ?100k is what would be needed to get him from Saint Johnstone. Or was that Milne? Either way, one of those two would cost ?100k from what I have been told. Can't see us stumping up that cash to be honest. Unless we sold Imrie...

I think with Brews constant changing up front it is clear that even he knows we dont have the answer up front and need somebody with a bit more experience.

Tactics are the problem.

No lone striker, no matter how experienced he is, is going to get you 20+ goals a season.

The fact that we've got 3 very inexperienced guys up front, playing, for most weeks, on their own, is just nonsense.

Add in the fact that the front person changes every week, when clearly any of them needs a decent run of games to get them up to what it is they're supposed to be doing.

Agree with this entirely. Have we ever kept the same front line two weeks in a row? Constant changes and high balls blootered up to a lone frontman trying to hold off, for example, Kenneth and Wilkie is not going to get us goals. And put simply, like anyone needs a reminder, goals win games and we aren't scoring enough goals. But we are also leaking them like *insert witty metaphor here*

No lone striker, no matter how experienced he is, is going to get you 20+ goals a season.

Boyd doesn't do to bad a job when he plays as a lone front man sometimes...

It's our defence that's killing us. We are the worst defence in the entire SPL by a fair distance. Even if we had a marvellous strikeforce we would still find it tough to win games because we are always liable to lose a couple at the other end.

Also agree with this. I'm sure a lot of the fans would take a tighter 1 - 0 win than a 4 - 3 victory where the defence falls apart and gives away goals for fun. Both ends of the park need working on.

Why would Andy Jackson or Stevie Milne want to come to us? They are on similar wages as we pay. They are very likely to win a league medal this season. They are very likely to be in SPL next season. We can't gaurantee we will be.

Why would Andy Jackson or Stevie Milne want to come to us? They are on similar wages as we pay. They are very likely to win a league medal this season. They are very likely to be in SPL next season. We can't gaurantee we will be.

Who said they would want to? So far all that has been mentioned is the names of two strikers that a couple of ICT fans like the sound of and a guesstimate of their approximate transfer fee based on what Saint Johnstone fans have said. Nothing at all about whether they would actually sign.

To illustrate the defensive problem, here is the rundown of the season to date.

League Goals Against, per match, average, season to date

Rangers..............0.81

Celtic..................0.95

Dfc/Dons/Hearts..1.04

St Mirren.............1.04

Hibs/Killie............1.33

Falkirk/Mwell .......1.48

Ham....................1.71

ICT.....................1.76

This proves that we have defensive problems as well as the need for a striker.

Reason or one of many, they clear lines- big punt upfield- straight back down field again, however, a short pass/throw out gets midfield involved, holds ball up, helps create and gives defence time to regroup. This is why I think Esson is perhaps better for us, his distribution is geared to buildup rather than the big 'hit and hope' clearance.

The need for an experienced striker has been obvious since before the season started. I still think that Rooney has huge potential but, like the other young forwards on our books, he's not going to realise that either by playing as a lone striker or by being paired with another rookie.

Surprisingly, SPL goals conceded per game this season:

Esson 1.9

Fraser 1.6 (despite 5 in one game)

Edit to add points per game :

Esson 0.7

Fraser 0.9

Edited January 15, 200916 yr by Yngwie

Definitely YES!!

Theres been times where none of our strikers have looked like scoring and when they do they either miss the chances or get hesitant and make mistakes.

We have no striker which has a proven track record in the SPL or even in the 1st Division which i think was a really poor move from Brewster given he spent about 25 years playing as a striker. The fact that he chops and changes constantly suggests they are not impressing him.

The only promise we have had up front is in Adam Rooney but he seems to never play for some reason so yes we do need an experienced striker because we need to find some sort of consistent scoring form if we are to have any chance of getting of the bottom.

Surprisingly, SPL goals conceded per game this season:

Esson 1.9

Fraser 1.6 (despite 5 in one game)

Edit to add points per game :

Esson 0.7

Fraser 0.9

so are you suggesting fraser has been better? this is a misleading stat because esson has played in more games than fraser has etc etc

The need for an experienced striker has been obvious since before the season started. I still think that Rooney has huge potential but, like the other young forwards on our books, he's not going to realise that either by playing as a lone striker or by being paired with another rookie.

This is true, but what puzzles me is that Rooney is the only striker in the team not to have had a real run, if memory serves me correct. Maybe someone could produce the statistics, but I'd guess that he's started fewer games than either Barrowman or Wood this season, yet is still our highest scorer. Why not give him a run with Morais playing in behind him?

Wood - 13 Starts, 4 Sub Appearances - Goals 3

Barrowman - 12 Starts, 10 Sub Appearances - Goals 2

Rooney - 8 Starts, 14 Sub Appearances - Goals 5

McAllister - 2 Starts, 3 Sub Appearances - Goals

Just look at when we had Niculae

he didn't get the type of service to score many goals.

Barrowman is never in the position he should be. Which is poaching, he gets the ball and tries to hold it up and nothing becomes of it, same with wood.

Im hoping that if Morais can get a lot of space he can run at defenders and feed the ball to Barrowman or Wood and create much more opportunities. Need a better delivery into the box aswell.

But I think Rooney should definitely be starting. Barrowman and Wood have been very very woeful.