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Lazy copy and paste from P & B.

We were really poor yet again. Far too narrow for most of the pitch with an alarming reluctance to take opposition players on until Calder came on in the second half. This coincided with our best period of the game where Parry was under real pressure from a number of crossed balls and he was made to pull off some smart saves from close range.

Opening goal was pretty straightforward as Mckay strode in to meet a Polworth corner and channelled his inner Laporte and battered a header into the net. The Alloa equaliser came from what looked like a pretty debatable free kick. Zanatta drove between two ICT players an then threw himself to the ground. Nice cross sent to the back post and it looked like it ended up in the net thanks to a deflection off Donaldson or Oakley.

Second half kicked off with some absolute madness from Karadachki. After wrestling with Oakley and conceding a free kick he then spent the few seconds leading up to the free kick grappling with Donaldson before dragging him to the ground and conceding the penalty. Welsh stepped up to send the keeper the wrong.

Calder then won a penalty after he went down in the area. Looked a bit soft to me. He just seemed to run past the Alloa defender and then fell over. No ICT player seemed to really want to take the penalty, Welsh was off the pitch at this point having been subbed, so Donaldson stepped up and rattled the bar.

Parry then, as mentioned, pulled off a number of good saves to deny Doran and White and ICT were made to rue their wastefulness when Rooney channelled his inner Ross Tokely and decided to hack at some Alloa attacker multiple times before bundling him over in the box for the third penalty of the day which was dispatched by Flannigan. Zanatta could have won it for the visitors but his tame shot was right at Ridgers.

All too familiar a tale for ICT fans. Dominate the game in terms of possession but tend not to create much and when we do we are wasteful in taking those chances. Very little width for most of the game until Calder came on and gave Tremarco someone to link with ahead of him instead of having to turn back inside all the time. Welsh had a decent game and we definitely lost a bit of composure in midfield when he went off (presumably due to fitness issues). Donaldson, penalty miss aside, was good at the back but the rest of the squad is quite poor. Austin, Oakley and White all continue to work hard up front but none of them look like they will be particularly prolific for us this season. Rooney was really poor. Defensively naive and poor bringing the ball out from the back.

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9 minutes ago, RiG said:

Lazy copy and paste from P & B.

We were really poor yet again. Far too narrow for most of the pitch with an alarming reluctance to take opposition players on until Calder came on in the second half. This coincided with our best period of the game where Parry was under real pressure from a number of crossed balls and he was made to pull off some smart saves from close range.

Opening goal was pretty straightforward as Mckay strode in to meet a Polworth corner and channelled his inner Laporte and battered a header into the net. The Alloa equaliser came from what looked like a pretty debatable free kick. Zanatta drove between two ICT players an then threw himself to the ground. Nice cross sent to the back post and it looked like it ended up in the net thanks to a deflection off Donaldson or Oakley.

Second half kicked off with some absolute madness from Karadachki. After wrestling with Oakley and conceding a free kick he then spent the few seconds leading up to the free kick grappling with Donaldson before dragging him to the ground and conceding the penalty. Welsh stepped up to send the keeper the wrong.

Calder then won a penalty after he went down in the area. Looked a bit soft to me. He just seemed to run past the Alloa defender and then fell over. No ICT player seemed to really want to take the penalty, Welsh was off the pitch at this point having been subbed, so Donaldson stepped up and rattled the bar.

Parry then, as mentioned, pulled off a number of good saves to deny Doran and White and ICT were made to rue their wastefulness when Rooney channelled his inner Ross Tokely and decided to hack at some Alloa attacker multiple times before bundling him over in the box for the third penalty of the day which was dispatched by Flannigan. Zanatta could have won it for the visitors but his tame shot was right at Ridgers.

All too familiar a tale for ICT fans. Dominate the game in terms of possession but tend not to create much and when we do we are wasteful in taking those chances. Very little width for most of the game until Calder came on and gave Tremarco someone to link with ahead of him instead of having to turn back inside all the time. Welsh had a decent game and we definitely lost a bit of composure in midfield when he went off (presumably due to fitness issues). Donaldson, penalty miss aside, was good at the back but the rest of the squad is quite poor. Austin, Oakley and White all continue to work hard up front but none of them look like they will be particularly prolific for us this season. Rooney was really poor. Defensively naive and poor bringing the ball out from the back.

A bit harsh on Tokely I feel ?. However, spot on with synopsis.  A really poor decision to challenge when all he needed to do was jockey or is that old school?  In any event, the Alloa player was going nowhere and we had men over.  Yes, last year we would have lost but when do we stop using that as a yardstick?  Soon I hope.......

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Shambles pure & simple and nothing coming from dugout to suggest any difference i turned to the person next to me after 5 minutes and said we are not keeping a clean sheet today but all this missed chances is getting silly now and sorry i love Carl and his passion but  i am not seeing any leadership from him and then the shambles when awarded the second penalty is pathetic the captain should know who the penalty taker will be if  we get one. Only Calder when he came on (thats another story why's he not starting) made a difference. Sorry Robbo enough why yesterday was Welsh taken off when he was decent but Polworth & Chalmers stayed on it seems they play 90 minutes no matter what He is saying on BBC website time for changes eh? he tried that and slated them try looking in the mirror Pal there was no reaction from the dugout the whole game yesterday they are like 3 Stooges .

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4 hours ago, RiG said:

No ICT player seemed to really want to take the penalty, Welsh was off the pitch at this point having been subbed

If we could take penalties, we'd be top of the league by two points. Can't we maybe:

1. Practice penalties

2. Have a selection of 3/4 penalty takers

3. If that's a stretch ? ? can we not do a captain's armband-esque switch so everyone knows the penalty-taker for the rest of the game if first choice gets sub'd

Are we pub league or what?

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Haven't read all the previous posts but that was another 2 points thrown away yesterday. Created and missed numerous chances, although to be fair the Alloa keeper made some good saves as well and were horrendously poor defensively at times. In the first half, Rooney and Mckay were terrible and all Alloa's attacking threat seemed to come down that side although, as Rig states, the free kick awarded for Alloa's first goal was a joke. Second half McKay improved but Rooney did not and ultimately cost us 3 points. Welsh looks a good signing and can only assume he was taken off as he was tiring but he was missed. Don't know what has to happen for Polworth to be subbed as he was poor yesterday and just doesn't seem to learn from his mistakes. He takes the wrong option/delays his final ball so many times yet still doesn't twig why it goes wrong. Chalmers marginally better than Polworth but either could have been substituted and we would have been a better team. As for Rooney, he simply isn't good enough on the evidence I have seen, albeit only 3 games. He cannot defend, ball watches, is average going forward and his challenge for Alloa's penalty was shocking. Everybody in the ground could see he only had to keep the player wide, as he was never going to score from there so the challenge was stupid in the extreme, To me, he also looks a bit unfit and struggles later in games.

What is more worrying for me is that the team, as a whole acks discipline. There are times when we have virtually no cover at the back when attacking as everyone goes forward, the midfield all seem to play too far up the pitch at the same time, all of which leaves us vulnerable to swift counter attacks which has happened in the 3 games I have seen so far.

A lot of work to be done on the training ground and certain players need to be dropped to give them a wake up call. Oh and Calder has to start the next game given his recent sub performances.

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All sounds depressingly familiar :  too often we are on top and fail to finish teams off. Two league games in  row where we had a one man advantage at home and failed to finish off the job (including missed penalty!). We should have 9 points and not 5.

Blindingly obvious that our main problems are up front (not to excuse defensive blunders).

With all teams taking points off each other, even at this early stage of the season, there is no stand out team (same last season with the exception of St Mirren), so get our act together and there is no reason we can't win the league (wishful thinking perhaps).

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Worrying that Robbo's post match comments talk about filling the team with Youth players....when it's blatantly obvious that what's needed are a few more players with a bit of experience and composure.

Leaving aside the fact that most of the players he's moved on since getting here have been those with experience and composure, we do have players like Calder and Doran who should be on from the start and who would be more likely to provide what's needed.

Just for clarity, I have nothing against playing youngsters, they just don't offer a solution to the problem that has been identified.

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A depressing read!

I missed the game due to a family bereavement, so was keeping an eye on the BBC app for updates.

All appeared to be going well with us seeming to have found a penalty kick taker (an unlikely one at that), until the late equaliser and then reading on here we had also missed a penalty.

We should be clear at the top on 9 points, but we are not. We have potential but are not delivering, so things must change.

We are at our best moving the ball quickly, but we rarely do so.

In my opinion, we need to start with two wide players, and have attacking options in midfield to support a lone striker.

My starting XI at Dunfermline would be a 4-2-3-1:

Ridgers

Mckay Donaldson McCart Tremarco

Welsh Polworth

Walsh Doran Calder

Oakley

Personally, I think Polworth has done better when in central midfield, so he and Welsh could become part of our backbone, with Polly pushing up when able to.

Calder deserves a start, and whilst Walsh is naturally left sided, he can do a decent turn on the right, and that is where we are weakest just now.

Doran can do a shift supporting the striker for an hour or so, then give way to whichever sub is the best option depending on how the game is going.

Up front, Oakley has the best work rate.

What is going on with Austin? After his early promise at times last season, he seems to be failing to repeat that. Is he struggling for fitness?

What has happened to Elbouzedi? He has not featured forweeks.

Any word on Beith's fitness?

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Same old story of missed chances, but at least we are creating them. Robbo can't legislate for Rooney gifting Alloa a penalty but similar to the Dunfermline match our game management in the last 10 minutes was shocking.

Polworth gets a fair amount of stick but playing him on left side is a complete waste of time. He doesn't hide and therefore his errors are noted more than his fellow midfielders leading me on to....... Why does Robbo persist with Joe Chalmers - he is the worst midfielder we have yet gets 90 mins every week.  He hides, can't tackle and every attacking move that goes through him slows the game down and teams get back in to position to defend. His corners were awful, look at the crosses put in by Walsh and Calder why are they not taking corners?

Hope the strikers are practicing penalties for the foreseeable future - they should be fighting over taking penalties, not hiding behind a central defender.

Whilst we should have 9 points on the board we don't, but we are only 2 off top spot. Three tricky fixtures coming up, these are the games we must take points from if we are going to fight for a top four finish.

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Part of the problem in the last three games has been underestimating Dunfermline Reserves, Ayr and Alloa. Ross County's supporters have a thread about walking the league and I wonder if the BBC's prediction that we would be first has filtered through the club. The good news on that front is that Dunfermline hammered us early last season and after losing to their Reserves a few weeks ago, we must surely go down there this Saturday partly as underdogs but more importantly determined to battle for a point or if things go well, sneak a win.

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On 8/26/2018 at 8:02 PM, tm4tj said:

A couple of bad misses by Walsh in the first half. Really need to be putting these away.

Walsh just looks like a player who's been adapting to his new team mates and Robbo's tactics. He is improving each time I've seen him play and creating opportunities for others and himself with his runs and crosses, but just needs to find that composure in front of goal. I look forward to when it finally clicks for him which I don't think is too far off.

 

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Left the game on Saturday very angry not just about Rooney's ridiculous challenge on Hastie to give away that penalty, that was just the cherry on top but over how dominated the game and missed so many chances to kill off Alloa and with a team like that who might feel they have nothing to lose will always believe they can nick a point if you team isn't clinical enough.

Now looking back I thought there were hints of the team gelling and we looked more like a unit than in previous games. I though most of the players gave a lot of effort and there was almost certainly an improvement in the midfield with Sean Welsh starting and looked even though he wasn't going to last the 90 minutes a step up in quality from previous choices in that position.

What's up with Nathan Austin, why is he being subbed so early every game? Can't be good for his confidence if he is being taken off even before the hour, isn't he supposed to be our goal scoring hope?

 

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57 minutes ago, Snafu said:

Walsh just looks like a player who's been adapting to his new team mates and Robbo's tactics. He is improving each time I've seen him play and creating opportunities for others and himself with his runs and crosses, but just needs to find that composure in front of goal. I look forward to when it finally clicks for him which I don't think is too far off.

 

First time I've seen him live.  Indeed the first ICT game I've seen live in several months. Totally agree with Snafu. He looked great in first half and I feel he can only get better with regular matches.

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Just from the highlights alone...how did we not win that match? It should have been a big win. I note some comments about how poor we were, but again from the highlights only, we put together some decent moves, and Alloa barely threatened... Donaldson's penalty wasn't poor, and had that been an inch lower it was game over IMHO.

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Saturday has to be a win no more of this missed chances or we will know where we will be come next May i am also thinking getting rid of Raven & Warren is now showing with the lack of experience in the team it's all good & well the board telling Robbo they need rid of players on "big wages" but sometimes you need experience too and thats what we are missing right now

 

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