Galway saint

Continuing to play Bazanu, new contract for Stephens, the signing of downs, not signing a decent CF- nothing has really changed at the club. y 2 wins in gods knows how many games Watched the game yesterday and felt nothing when we conceded.

I can’t understand why we want to play Stewart up front as a target man as he’s so ineffectual. What are his strengths ? Maybe once had had some but to me he looks slow, lumbering and brittle. Has he scored a goal yet for us ? I had he mind he might have got one at some point.

I understood his style to involve pace and wingers with plenty of crosses into the box. If that’s his style then it would make sense to play a decent sized target man yet he plays Archer. Maybe he thinks Downs and Stewart are shit and he might not be far wrong. My point was SR employed a guy who plays a certain way and then for the umpteenth transfer window in a row fail to sign a decent CF. What was the point in appointing him if you aren’t going to give him the tools to try and succeed ? That said he hasn’t looked great so far with or without a decent CF but then no manager has at this club since Ralph

People keep saying we haven’t replaced Danny Ings - the reality is we haven’t replaced Che Adams who would walk into this side. Dont know if you can blame Still for transfers as we don’t know how much influence he has had. I’d hope he wouldn’t have said I want a small guy up front to feed of the crosses from two wingers so at the moment it doesn’t look to me like he has been given what he needs but that’s the SR way

I am not sure how much influence Still has over transfers so this may not be his fault but we have ended up with a manager who likes to play pacy wingers ( presumably to get the ball into the box to try and score) and a short guy up front on his own as our first choice CF. The back up is a guy who has been injured for several years and looks like Bambi on ice, another short bloke plus Downs and where ( being polite) it’s early days. Today was poor but we did get some balls into the box into the second half but had no on to attack them and hence didn’t look like scoring from open play. I’m not sure how we correct that with the personnel assembled.

We play two wingers and a short arse up front

Just a poor coach who has been found out

West Brom away 23/24 he made a good save and we won that game. ultimately if the club want a keeper that is good with his feet, doesn’t make many absolute howlers but rarely makes any saves then they’ve got their man. Personally I like my keeper to make saves and will forgive them the odd error as they will all make howlers even the best

I suspect Baz will continue until around Xmas and by that time Still will have had enough and McCarthy will play for the rest of the season. The clubs isn’t prepared to give up on this ‘project’ so we have to endure another season of this.

Need to wait until the window closes and you see how the team shapes up in the coming months We have been here before and it’s pointless speculating Id say a team that still has Baz, Stephen’s as captain and no stand out CF still requires work

Typical SR signing Might be good but probabaly will be worse than what we have as the squad quality continues to deteriorate season by season.

I could see him on strictly - think he would do well

he’s an articulate guy but a terrible football coach

Guess they will just need to trust the process

Although it’s supposedly been ‘rebooted’ we still have Baz in goal, Stephen’s at CB and captain ( with a new contract), AA upfront on his own, 5 at the back, acquisitions who are no better than what we have and in some cases worse ( Quarshie and Downs) and have failed (to date) to bring in a decent no 9. Seems like the same old shit to me. It’s not the managers fault the players are on the whole crap but it did worry me when he apologised to the players for substituting them. Seemed to betray a lack of confidence but he’s a young guy. Seems to me that as things stand we have a far worse squad than the one that was playing in the championship in 23/24. Big week ahead and I have no real confidence it will be a good week given the past few years.

I saw that and it was abysmal but that was more a product of the wrong system, rather than shit players ( Holgate excepted). The current team is a product of another two seasons of poor recruitment. We knew we were down by Christmas yet in the intervening period we have signed Downs and Quarshie, both of whom look really poor footballers. Spoors has come in but still it looks like we cannot pick a good player. I don’t think things will improve until SR move on and we are palpably a worse team than now than the one that came down in 23/24. I’d love to see Che back up front as he’s light years better than the current pile of shite.

An articulate guy but a poor football coach

I can’t watch ‘Super Sunday’ with Drury commentating. He ruins the whole thing with his overblown ‘game of the ages’ guff. He’s incapable of letting the game do the talking and seems to view himself as some sort of literary figure

he certainly has height and some pace but he looked a liability to me

I agree - thought that was at times what we needed I wonder why our scouts thought quarshie was a good player, particularly if you want to be a team that plays out from the back - thought he looked awful

you would only give him a lengthy contract to ward off interest from others (of which there has been none as far as I know) or to preserve his value and where again there is none at this level. we are a dispiriting club at present. We continue to play poor players in an attempt to generate interest and sell them and if they actually manage to improve we sell them, meaning we never derive any benefit in footballing terms. difficult to get behind that as a fan

Great news if he is - will ward off the transfer interest from Derry City. Jesus wept - can’t believe we would contemplate offering new contracts to both Stephens and Bazanu. If the latter also happens then god help us and the club is clearly still in a mess

Ipswich away was pretty poor by way of example. You and others keep talking about people not ‘liking him’ or ‘ hating him’ but you are missing the point. Objectively he is in my view a poor keeper. The main issue I have is his positional sense which often leads to him conceding goals which should be comfortable saves. That coupled with the fact his shot stopping is mediocre at best means his performances rarely ( if at all?) have resulted in the team winning points. If we hadn’t have spent £12million or so on him he wouldn’t even be near the first team and as far as I am aware the total lack of any interest in buying him tells its own story about what the wider football world thinks of him. If I was Ipswich, Leicester, Sheffield Utd etc I’d be delighted to see Saints had chosen Bazanu as their number one - absolutely over the moon

Starting the season with him in goal and stephens at CB would illustrate in my view the club hasn’t moved forward despite assertions to the contrary. Not sure I can be bothered with another season of having to debate whether a better defence would mean Bazanu would save more low shots, or whether his positioning would be better if we had a better RB…

I understood after the shambles of last year there was a recognition within the club we had to try and build a side in the championship that had a structure and pedigree capable of surviving in the premier league. At the moment I don’t see any evidence of that happening and the award of a new 3 year contract to Stephens is an indication to me that the club is still a basket case