Welsh Woe

 

A visit to Balmoral Stadium to face Cove Rangers on Tuesday night brings fresh urgency after a lacklustre draw against Stirling Albion ended with the Bino's taking the bonus point after a penalty shoot-out. We will have to do it without the injured Sean Welsh. The Cove game kicks-off at 19:45 with live streaming available from Cove Rangers TV for a tenner.

PPV Stream

Official Preview

Attendance info

Both sides had the wind taken out of their sails at the weekend with Stirling Albion causing an upset at the Caledonian Stadium after winning the bonus point in a penalty shoot out following a 2-2 draw after ninety minutes. Mackin and Moore had given the visitors an early lead before Roddy MacGregor pulled one back before the break. Shane Sutherland quickly restored parity after the break but no further scoring saw the tie being decided on penalties where the Bino's took the bonus point.

Cove surprisingly went down to a rejuvenated Peterhead by 3-1. Brown put Peterhead in front after only three minutes before Megginson levelled ten minutes later. However Cameron and McLean scored either side of the break to give Peterhead their first win of the competition. Surprise surprise; Vigurs and Draper both booked.

Cove starting XI v Peterhead:

McKenzie; Ross, Neill, Higgins, Yule, Vigurs, Draper, Scully, Megginson, McAllister, Leitch

League Cup Group 'A'

Stirling Albion v Hearts Tuesday 7:45pm

		Team	P	GD	Pts
1		Hearts	2	5	6
2		Stirling	2	1	5
3		Inverness CT	2	2	4
4		Peterhead	3	-2	3
5		Cove Rangers	3	-6	0

 

 

Latest team news

Captain Sean Welsh looks likely to be out for at least a month. The often injured midfielder turned his ankle at the weekend and will miss the next few weeks. Leaves the door open for another midfielder to stake a claim for a start, or push David Carson forward and see if Wallace Duffy is ready to fill the right back slot. Still waiting for Billy Mckay and Anthony McDonald to surface, although Mckay could be ready sooner rather than later.

 

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Massively worrying that Dodds has persisted with the same formation again for another 90mins. We have conceded 5 goals against L1/2 clubs in 2 games and couldn't keep the ball against Cove. We were so wide open. Felt sorry for the central midfielders chasing shadows

Is it too early to start the #DoddsOut campaign?

Just to add Cove were depleted

Just now, Jack Waddington said:

Is it too early to start the #DoddsOut campaign?

No. But he needs to realise quicker in game situations when things are working

Wonder what 'The Boss' has to say about this fiasco.

Can’t believe we have wasted part of our budget on Broadfoot and Gardyne. Both hopeless. Would have preferred to give our kids a game, couldn’t be any worse. Drapes played centre half for Cove and probably didn’t need to go for a shower afterwards. Communicated to his fellow defenders throughout, something Broadfoot seems incapable of. Not sure what he brings to our club.

How was Broadfoot? Wasnt overly happy when he signed and haven't been overly impressed in the previous two games. Was really surprised to see him made captain tonight. 

Fer fecks sake this is pre-season with a new team, finding out the positives and the negatives. Many are not match fit and need time to suss out who they are playing with and the best system to use. 🤣 Mind you it is the weather for vultures to circle. 

 

I’m glad I didn’t fork out for the livestream. Sounds like we were good on Saturday compared to tonight, and that’s saying something.

I was encouraged last Tuesday with the performance against Peterhead, but Saturday dissolved that and tonight it has totally disappeared.

Interesting comments about Broadfoot. He seemed to stroll through the Peterhead game, but I was less impressed on Saturday. Hopefully Dodds has the bottle to drop him and restore the Devine / Deas partnership that did pretty well last season.

Sounds like our wide players need to remember to defend also.

How did McAlear do tonight?

 

Edited July 20, 20214 yr by Robert

Just now, IMMORTAL HOWDEN ENDER said:

Fer fecks sake this is pre-season with a new team, finding out the positives and the negatives. Many are not match fit and need time to suss out who they are playing with and the best system to use. 🤣 Mind you it is the weather for vultures to circle. 

 

We've pished away the easiest group stage we've had in seasons, all against the wee part timers too. Dodds is a raging fraud. 

19 minutes ago, IMMORTAL HOWDEN ENDER said:

It is commonly known as sarcasm. As Yazoo once said to me after getting beaten by Wick Academy - "The only way is up baby".

Wtf does Alison Moyet have to do with it?

Can she play centre back?

Edited July 20, 20214 yr by Satan
Sp

11 minutes ago, Robert said:

How did McAlear do tonight?

He was the one plus for me. Looked quite accomplished, but got little hep from those around him.

You kind of expect us to start badly then improve, but this season we started well in the first game and then got worse in each of the next two matches. Very odd.

The League Cup is a competition we should have a chance of going deep into, but this is embarrassing. I say it every year but an unambitious pre-season of mainly doling out beatings to HL teams disnae prepare us for the hard stuff. 

I turned up at the game on Saturday full of hope after the win over Peterhead. Now after the Stirling and tonight's results I'm utterly disillusioned. I think I'll be doing something more interesting like watching paint dry or washing my hair between 5:15pm and 7pm this Sunday.

That was grim. Despite a first half that was arguably quite even in terms of chances created as soon as Cove were two goals up the game was over. Duku and Sutherland both passed up decent chances for us with Duku perhaps missing the best opportunity when he rounded the keeper and decided to take about 74 touches in the box before having a shot. Neil and Draper looked quite suspect at times. Unfortunately for us our entire defence looked even worse with Broadfoot and Deas really struggle to understand where one another was. Duffy looked incredibly rusty at RB and was continuously beaten by Leitch down the Cove left side whilst Harper, although reasonable enough getting forward, is a little suspect defensively for me.

Wonderful opening goal for the home side. nice little dinked ball over the top of the ICT defence and McIntosh sent a superb curled effort beyond Ridgers into the net. Barely a moment later Cove had a second. Another ball over the top found Megginson and he easily beat Ridgers for number two. With this the game was pretty much over as we struggled to get anything going in the second half. Walsh had the best chance when Duku sped past a Cove defender and cut the ball back from the bye line but Walsh saw his effort blocked and then cleared off the line. Cove's third goal looked, from the opposite end of the pitch, a little similar to the chance Walsh had missed. Bursting run into the box, ball cut back and Yule finished well to wrap things up. Although a penalty from Duku saw us get on the scoresheet it did nothing to mask a pretty desperate performance.

I don't particularly care about going out of the League Cup, we have been dreadful in it since this new format was introduced, but I am bothered about the poor performances against Stirling and Cove Rangers. The latter had nothing to play for, only had 14 fit players available and were absolute toilet for their first three games yet they cigared past us no problems. I'm also worried that there were evident problems on the pitch which Dodds did nothing to address. The players still seem to be adjusting tot his 442 / 4411 setup Dodds is trying to implement. Last night we were outnumbered in midfield and struggled in the centre of the pitch for long periods yet nothing was done to change it which was a concern. When we did look threatening it was when we had the ball on the deck and were passing it around but too often we were sending high balls up towards Duku and Sutherland who struggled to control them under pressure from Draper and Neil. It was evident this wasn't working yet it seemed to be our main way to "attack". 

We need to improve and quickly.

11 hours ago, IMMORTAL HOWDEN ENDER said:

Fer fecks sake this is pre-season with a new team, finding out the positives and the negatives. Many are not match fit and need time to suss out who they are playing with and the best system to use. 🤣 Mind you it is the weather for vultures to circle. 

 

I agree.I am as unhappy as anyone else and I agree that there is a great deal to be concerned about.

However, we are talking about two poor performances, albeit abysmal poor,

It is far to early to be calling for a newly appointed head coach to be dismissed or to be condemning two experienced professionals who have signed for the club before the, all important, league campaign begins.

There needs to be vast improvement and it needs to be very soon but, especially with fans back in the ground, there needs to be support for the team too.

Dodds has indeed much to prove after those two shocking displays but give him a little bit of space and a little bit of time to do so.

11 hours ago, KirkieRobRoy said:

The League Cup is a competition we should have a chance of going deep into, but this is embarrassing. I say it every year but an unambitious pre-season of mainly doling out beatings to HL teams disnae prepare us for the hard stuff. 

We are notoriously slow starters and I am beginning to forget when we last emerged from the League Cup group stage or were rapidly out of the blocks in the league.

I am increasingly convinced that a pre season consisting almost exclusively of kick abouts against Highland league teams is a large part of the problem.

I accept that, these days, a trip to Italy or Spain is financially beyond us but surely 10 days or so in the North of England with two or three friendlies against Championship or League One clubs is not out of the question.

It would get us far better prepared to start the season and would give a fair few long suffering fans an opportunity to plan a wee Summer break into the bargain.

Alarming comment to make that there has been no work done with the back four. Maybe COVID has had something to do with that I don't know but it's somewhat concerning that after a good few weeks we have, based on this, done nothing to get the defence organised.

From what I’ve heard we were hit hard by covid and also track and trace meaning players were out of training for up to 20 days so I can imagine we’re well behind. 

27 minutes ago, FrontRow said:

From what I’ve heard we were hit hard by covid and also track and trace meaning players were out of training for up to 20 days so I can imagine we’re well behind. 

Which is a reason, despite these two terrible performances, we should cut the players and head coach some slack for now at least.

If, by this time next month, things are looking no better that might be a different matter.

Cove have also been hit hard. 

Our annual lethargic start to the season is not Covid related but points to a continued issue that we seem to happen under different regimes and different management.

I don't really care hugely about this cup itself but the manner in which we've been bested twice by part timers leagues below us is a huge concern not just the result but the manner of defeat/draw. 

Also Dodds was appointed over 8 weeks ago but hasn't worked on the back 4? Wot. 

7 hours ago, Kingsmills said:

I accept that, these days, a trip to Italy or Spain is financially beyond us but surely 10 days or so in the North of England with two or three friendlies against Championship or League One clubs is not out of the question.

Fully agree with all the comments in your post Kingsmills - as far as the financial cost of travelling to friendlies is concerned it would be in our best interests if we could persuade one or two of those English sides to play us in Sneck if they were on a wee tour north of the border. Would have been out of the question this past two seasons with Covid travelling restrictions but for future years it would be far better than giving some HL sides a hammering and thinking we're on top of our game.

I'm stunned with Dodds comment about not working on the back four yet. The foundations of any team is built on not conceding goals. If you dont concede goals you don't lose matches. To be nine days from the season starting and not to have done any work on the back four is unbelievable. If he's not bothered to work on it play Deas and Devine who played for the majority of last season together and get Broadfoot on the bench. 

Edited July 21, 20214 yr by SteveA

An absolutely shocking interview. Oh dear!