Whats your team for saturday?

Esson

Raven Warren King Meekings

Doran Ross Draper G.Shinnie

A.Shinnie Mckay

----------------------Esson-----------------------

--Meekings---King----Warren---ShinnieG---

--------------Draper----Morrison-------------------

-----Ross---------ShinnieA------Sutherland----

--------------------McKay-------------------------

I think Meekings is a better option at right back and while Nick Ross has played in central midfield he's a more attacking option so I'd slot Gavin Morrison in there. Hopefully his time eating sheep's head suppers in Iceland has done him well. Nick Ross has used the ball a bit better than Aaron Doran when I've seen him, I think he deserves a start. Sutherland hasn't hit his stride yet but he is strong and we need that in our front four, who are all pretty slight.

Esson

Meekings - Warren - King - G.Shinnie

Draper - Morrison

Ross - A.Shinnie - Doran

Sutherland

Perfect time for the 4-2-3-1 as we'll be counter-attacking. Celtic's weak point is central defence, so I'm putting Sutherland up front. His job is to win and pass back to the attacking midfielders (as Alex Ferguson asked Archibald to do - unfortunately, Stevie completely ignored him and now regrets it). Sutherland can also win in the air if Doran or Ross attack the wings.

I expect the usual suspects to say go for broke. That's madness to me. We don't have the players. A 1-0, or a scrappy draw will do fine.

Esson

Raven King Warren ShinnieG

Draper Ross

ShinnieA

Doran Oswell McKay

Esson

Meekings warren king g.shinnie

Sutherland draper Ross doran

Shinnie

Mckay

Esson

Meekings warren king g.shinnie

Sutherland draper Ross doran

Shinnie

Mckay

That is probably the team that Butcher will go with - except his personality trait will stick with Raven at rite back - personally I would like to see him "experiment" by playing McKay wide and Shane up front with a real attacking A.Shinnie.

Pepper gets a starts over doran IMO. Nick to start also.

We go into this match with confidence, knowing that a 6-0 win puts us top of the SPL.

What times kick off for this?

12.45pm kickoff I think

McKay up top alone doesn't work and Sutherland's not a winger -

Esson

Meekings Warren King G.Shinnie

Draper A.Shinnie Ross

Doran Sutherland McKay

Subs - Reguero, Raven, Morrison, Oswell, Pepper, Laing, Polworth

I noticed that Oswell wasn't even on the bench on Saturday. Injured, or did the manager just prefer Polworth?

Esson

Meekings - Warren - King - G.Shinnie

Draper - Morrison

Ross - A.Shinnie - Doran

Sutherland

I'd go with that, although I'd happily accept an argument for having Pepper instead of Doran and/or Sutherland instead of Ross.

Ross is a good player to have coming on against tired legs, and Pepper has to be in Butchers thoughts after latching on to that ball and securing a point on Saturday.

Whatever the formation, it's good to see that we have a few workable options and despite being without OTJ and Foran can still put out a team that is capable of competing and not seen as makeshift.

Whilst Pepper is a live wire with bags of energy, I am not sure that I would look to start him against Celtic. There will be a lot of responsibility on formational side of things and I'm not sure that he has the experience just yet to go a full 70 minutes without having some form of lapse.

It will be interesting to see why Celtic have available. They played 3-5-2 intially against County on what is a very tight park (it has actually been made smaller this year at Adams request). Mulgrew was very much the play maker (at left centre half!) though I also thought their defense as a whole was poor (County sat too deep for much of the half to exploit this).

Suspect Commons will never play as badly again (though he got 7 in the sundays and of course scored the equaliser).

Isn't Pepper more of an attacking mid like A.Shinnie? Never seen him play, so could be wrong. But remember it's Celtic. Too many attacking players and we get hammered. I know some will say they don't mind as it's the Old Firm. But I do remember criticism when we have been fried by them. A good solid performance is what's required, not pretending we're Barcelona taking on the minnows of Escocia.

Have'nt seen too much of Pepper but against Brechin he came on into a left midfield role ad he certainly has a shoot on sight mentality. He needs to build himself up physicaly to hold down that type of role but he does have pace and good control and could be used as a wide alternative and that may be the competition that Doran needs. I would really love to see - even for a short period of time - to "swop" Sutherland and McKay and see how the wee man is in the wide right role.

Esson

Meekings, Warren, King, G Shinnie

Draper, Morrison

Doran, A Shinnie, Ross

Sutherland

ESSON

MEEKINGS----WARREN----KING----G SHINNIE

DRAPER----ROSS

DORAN----A SHINNIE----SUTHERLAND

MCKAY

pepper is just a young boy. scored the goal on saturday, but if he was a foot further back the ball would have gone over the bar. he contrived to put a simple tapin into the roof of the net, just missing the bar.

does not deserve a start so it's bench for him and only because of the size/ quality of our squad.

one for the future certainly, but not on saturday against mathews or izzaguire

I can just see the headline now - After eating Swedes Celtic's Dogs Dinner in the Highlands Spoiled by Pepper

Peppers performance when he can on against hearts was more than scoring a tap in IMO. Though he made a real difference with his pace and tenacity. You've failed to mention he won the initial header tht started the move for the goal and busted a gut to get there.

I don't think he'll start but I think his legs could help make a real impact off the bench. If we are still in a position to clinch 3 points. Or snatch a draw by that stage.