Its our first League Cup match this Tuesday against Peterhead (not sure where) so I thought I'd be the first to start a thread for it

Ridgers 

McKay, McCart, Donaldson, Tremarco 

Doran, Carson, Vincent, Walsh

Keatings and White. 

Subs: Mackay, Nicholson, Machado, Todorov and McGregor. 

Edited July 13, 20196 yr by CaleyTennis

According to the Sky Sports Football statistics we had 56% of the possession. Of the 16 shots we had only 3 were on target, 9 off target and 4 blocked.

After a pretty good pre season friendly session which included 3 SPL sides, this result was disappointing. Games are different when they actually mean something. Peterhead were well up for this one as we would have been back in the day of our lower league status. On to the next game now and hopefully we can right the wrongs.

9 hours ago, CameronMurray said:

I suppose it's always disappointing to start a season off like this, but I'd rather see how they are getting on in October when the players should be at maximum match sharpness. If they're doing poorly at that point then maybe there is cause for concern.

With a minimum 3 league cup games and 7 league games before the start of October I'd be expecting them to be at match sharpness way before then and while I expect to see an element of rustiness you eluded to in a previous post, that doesn't account for the completely abject showing in the second half last night.

I'm not normally so critical but to have any real title or promotion aspirations we need to start well.

Full time professional footballers, imo, do not need until October to be at maximum match sharpness.

6 minutes ago, MrCaleyjag said:

 

Full time professional footballers, imo, do not need until October to be at maximum match sharpness.

That sums it up for me MrCaleyjag. I hope there's an improvement on Saturday. 

It's only the first competitive game of the season so I'm not too downbeat about the result but I am disappointed especially with the second half display, as Caley Stan said we were completely dominated. I could go on and on about where we need to improve but hopefully Robbo saw enough from the stand last night to see it for himself.

On a side note to our performance, it's good to see that nothing changes with refereeing standards in our games, quite honestly the ref last night was shocking. 

 

Thanks for the report Stan.

Although you would expect/hope the the team would be up for it and ready for the off at the start of the season I do tend to side with the feelings from Satan and Cameron. I don't see the League Cup as a diddy tournament but it is an excellent opportunity to get some competitive games under the belt and match fitness sharpened before the really important stuff gets underway.

I would imagine Peterhead had a bit more hunger for it than we did wanting to prove they were worth their promotion.

Another issue to bear in mind is with regards to the pre season he squad has been split in two groups for a lot of the early games. I think that does hinder the performance in the first few meaningful games with regards to players getting used to their role in the team, this includes the players from last season if we are trying new formations as well.

Sounds like it wasn't very pretty 2nd half last night so hopefully the coaches can get stuck in and sort things out.

Is Robertson still banned for Saturday???

Yes he was banned for 2 games 

What happened to McKay? Was he injured? If he is we are really struggling at right back.

4 hours ago, Satan said:

Another issue to bear in mind is with regards to the pre season he squad has been split in two groups for a lot of the early games. I think that does hinder the performance in the first few meaningful games with regards to players getting used to their role in the team, this includes the players from last season if we are trying new formations as well.

 

I think that is a very good point re playing two different teams in early games

What's the script with "fans" saying it's a Diddy cup it most defo ain't that I was gutted when we lost to Aberdeen in the final winning builds momentum no point dressing it up as a glorified friendly we had plenty time to play them we lost to a gash part time team in a national cup hopefully still time to turn it round and qualify from the group!

1 hour ago, Alan Simpson said:

What's the script with "fans" saying it's a Diddy cup it most defo ain't that I was gutted when we lost to Aberdeen in the final winning builds momentum no point dressing it up as a glorified friendly we had plenty time to play them we lost to a gash part time team in a national cup hopefully still time to turn it round and qualify from the group!

Partly agree with the sentiment however Peterhead are far from being 'gash'.

From recent past reports Peterhead look as if they are a very determined team.

Quite a surprise for them to win this game in good form. Anyway, good luck to an aspiring team.

Aye Scarlet, I wish them well and hope we get to play them regularly when they join us in the top tier. 

Dundee only got a bonus point against cove this evening so not just us on a rusty start.

Disappointing not to win or at least a bonus point given how pre season has gone with some good results against higher ranked teams. Peterhead are no mugs though and could do well this season