The Six: Premiership Recap

January 19, 2016

Djoum penIt has been a while since I have penned typed a weekend review. It is down to a number of factors, predominantly apathy and a lack of imagination in thinking up metaphors, nonsensical scenarios and anything of substance to say. That’s right, I even bore myself. Yet after another fine weekend of football my interest was piqued into writing something, anything.

These five things we’ve learned, five talking points, five takeaways are popular albeit scorned by some in journalism. But I pander to no one. So here is six. SIX.

Six-y football

Robbie Neilson likes to tinker. He is that woman person – all about equality at the Terrace – who is continuously unsatisfied with their house. A different colour here, a new kitchen there, an upgrade to the bathroom, a sex swing in the basement. Not that it is a bad thing, the unobtainable search for perfection. Yet, as far as this season goes, Neilson has established his strongest XI in recent weeks. If not an XI then a structure with one or two adjustable parts – a 4-4-2 with height, pace and passing ability at the back, a four man midfield with one winger and one narrow wide man plus two mobile strikers.

Igor Rossi brings reliability, height and steel to left-back which has been missing for the majority of the season, while Prince Buaben is not far behind in the trustworthy stakes since moving to a hybrid central-wide position. For much of his career in Scotland there hasn’t been a Buaben without a Gomis and vice versa. Like that loosely termed comedy Stuck on You ‘starring’ Matt Damon and Greg Kinnear, their lives seemed intertwined, conjoined for eternity – in football at least. Moving wide has not only given Buaben a new lease of life but it has added to the balance of the Hearts team.

Balance is the key word. A lot has been made of Hearts being labelled a ‘big, physical team’. Although most of the hoopla has been created by ironic and increasingly unfunny Hearts fans. Big and physical isn’t the words I would use. More appropriate terms are energetic and powerful. Neilson has used Manchester City and Everton, teams Hearts have played in the last two pre-season, as examples. They are full of powerful players with athletic physiques. In the quest to Barcelona-cise football in this country because it is en vogue, the conditioning side of players has possibly been forgotten.

Neilson introduced passing and an attacking gameplan to a post-Gary Lock era of nothingness. The football was technical and quick as they romped to the Championship title. Recruitment in the summer was focused on adding the power and physicality to the squad which would help them match up against better prepared opposition. Now the team is displaying both aspects, most apparent in the cup win over Aberdeen and even more so in the 6-0 melting of Motherwell.

The player that typifies this newfound balance is Arnuad Djoum. The Cameroonian-born Belgian makes everything look simple. He reads and anticipates the game well while possessing a sound awareness of what’s around him as he waits to caresses the ball off to a team mate. He can go toe-to-toe with just about any player in the country. He assisted two goals and then added a deserved goal after a bewitching piece of skill usually reserved for the Brazilian Serie A before a hatchet man guillotined him. In this case that was David Clarkson.

County’s Defensive Issues

November 21. That was the date of Ross County’s last league clean sheet. Since then they have played eight games and conceded 17 goals, plus a further two in the Scottish Cup against Dunfermline (they kept a clean sheet in the replay). We at the Podcast are big admirers of Andrew Davies, while Scott Fox has been a shrewd signing. However, those around them have not lived up to their team-mates’ standards.

Adam Rooney targeted Chris Robertson, backing in, rolling him this way and that. He bullied and harassed him. It was no great surprise when Robertson gave away silly penalty for attempting to have a peak at Rooney’s maracas. That’s my side boob. Marcus Fraser can still be found statue-esque in the Victoria Park changing rooms, staring open-mouthed at the wall after the roasting handed down to him by Jonny Hayes, while Jamie Reckord may have well stayed in bed on Sunday morning after the amount of snoozing he did on the pitch as Shay Logan, a constant threat breaking in behind, helped himself to one and a half goals.

The defence were not sufficiently supported by a midfield who never got a foothold on the game, even when they had a man advantage. Stewart Murdoch was anonymous, Richard Foster did little to prevent Fraser’s terrifying Hayes-shaped ordeal and Michael Gardyne offered little going forward and backwards. Ian McShane was the one bright spot, thumping in the second and generally looking busy trying to support the front. It was a strange decision for Jim McIntyre to drop both central midfielders for a match against Aberdeen. There was no surprise to see Jackson Irvine summoned from the bench to help man midfield and wrestle back some possession.

County should have taken the sting out the game with a period of possession even if they did not go anywhere with it as Aberdeen’s momentum built despite going down to 10 men.

One bright spot in the aftermath was the possible re-signing of Paul Quinn from Aberdeen.

Nothing learned

Usually these kinds of articles come to conclusions. *X player was good*, *Y team won the game because of Z*, *Gary Locke deserves his manager of the year award due to . . . never going to happen*. This game has left me scratching my head.

Dundee United’s defence is laughable. Knew that.

Celtic’s midfield is incredibly weak without Nir Bitton and/or Scott Brown. Check.

Efe Ambrose is a good defender and better than Dedryck Boyata. I’m better than Dedryck Boyata.

Leigh Griffiths is a lethal striker. Brand. New. Information.

I won’t focus on Gavin Gunning. Something tells me he will provide more entertainment in the coming weeks. Instead, let’s concentrate on Griffiths. When he talks his mouth looks like it is being controlled by someone else. But on the pitch he is in the form of his life. You expect him to score every time he gets the ball around the box. He is more comfortable playing nearer the goal, sniffing out space like a Police dog tracking down a kilo of Colombia’s finest.

He recently signed a long-term deal to stay at Celtic Park. But can he rise to play in England’s top league? Does he have that ambition? It’s a bit redundant talking about Champions League qualification in January but it will be his goals that will take Celtic there. And if they get there we should be able to answer the first question. As for the second, Griffiths has talked about his increased professionalism under Ronny Deila. With that hopefully there is also that ambition after failing to get a proper crack of the whip at Wolves.

The Microcosm

Dundee’s 4-2 victory at Partick Thistle encapsulated what has been an unpredictable and topsy-turvy belly of the Premiership. The three teams with the best squads have stretched away at the top, while each week the bottom has leaked more and more shite Dundee United.

Eight points separate third and fourth. A further eight points separate fourth and 11th. A run of good results, one which doesn’t involve getting beat in three games, can propel you up the table as it did for both Inverness and Thistle in recent weeks.

Since October in fact, Thistle have put together a reasonable set of results with their defence impressing to the point where they had the fourth most frugal defence in the league, behind the top three. As for Dundee they were draw specialists – five in six games – before a run of three defeats in four which has now become three wins in four. If you allow me to be completely patronising, these middling teams all have their qualities but they each rely on one or two key individuals. Suspensions begin to formulate and injuries accrue, and teams who were already inconsistent become even more so.

Who could have expected Thistle’s defence to suddenly wilt, Gary Harkins to transform into an amalgamation of Eric Cantona, Juan Roman Riquelme and Yaya Toure and Greg Stewart to curl in from the right-hand edge of the box?

Okay, the last one was nailed-on. You have to ask what Danny Seaborne (he sounds like a jock from 90210) is doing allowing him space and time to weigh up what turned into an easy shot.

Going forward expect the unexpected.

Ctrl, Alt, V

Kilmarnock win at home, conceding only the one goal and Jamie Hamill should have been awarded man of the match. Remember, expect the unexpected.

Gary Locke’s side won so let’s keep this short and not too bitter. Craig Slater’s goal?! My goodness me. Half Di Canio, half Yeboah. If he didn’t shout his name or that of the aforementioned duo when shooting or as he wheeled away to celebrate he missed a great opportunity. It was a stoater. We all know he has good technique but a goal like that makes you appreciate the art of the volley even more. Think Wayne Rooney’s anger-soaked thunderbastard against Newcastle. Give me enough of those and I reckon I could find the back of the net with one. Slater’s? The height he took it at and the trajectory he got on the ball. I could try. I would fail.

Guess who’s back?

Insomniacs rejoice! ST JOHNSTONE! Five matches and no goals. Four teams have now scored more than Tommy Wright’s men in the league, while Dundee have notched the same amount. Welcome back ennui you lovely old friend.

It was not a great festive period for the Saintees and 2016 is not looking any better. Wright’s sunny disposition is beginning to fade as quick as the grass on the McDiarmid pitch – from Yogi Bear to an actual bear that would tear you from limb to limb. Michael O’Halloran has been on the verge of a move to Ibrox for the past week,which would rob St Johnstone of their key attacking weapon. His style is not conducive to the bog which has developed at McDiarmid – cows would look at it in disdain – but you would have still expected him to give Antons Kurakins another long afternoon. After all The Flash has already shown that he has the better of the Accies.

Instead, with Lucas Tagliapietra back in the side alongside Michael Devlin they had little pace to worry about in a game where Sportscene would have been praised if they shown the highlights in a small box during the manager’s post-match interviews.

Props to Joe Shaughnessy for feeling his head after diverting the ball away with the hand. Nothing on Steven Taylor however.

 

Written by Joel Sked


Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *