In the end, lucky to get away with a draw. Motherwell were the better side, particularly second half, and carried much more threat than Rangers did (which wouldn’t be hard to be fair, given our goal threat was close to zero) .
First half, lots of possession without really troubling Motherwell. Scored from a set play, of which we had many, but didn’t really create anything from open play.
Even without the ball, Motherwell looked like more of a goal threat first half and Butland had a few decent saves (plus a mistake). Their keeper never really had a save to make.
Second half, we messed around with the ball, took a lot of chances in our own box (which will eventually get punished by better teams), but again created nothing. Couple of saves for their keeper at least, but half chances at best, where they forced a few last ditch challenges from Souttar and Djiga as well as a few good stops from Butland.
Few specific things:
1. Pick Tav or Aarons and get a left back in the team. Playing two right backs isn’t working.
2. I would assume Aasgaard will play where Diomande is now. If we get an offer for him, I’d happily take it. He has some talent, but he offers next to nothing in SPFL games. Might just not be suited to the league, but he’s been posted missing in most domestic games since he arrived.
3. RW required. Dowell isn’t and has never been the answer
4. Raskin has been sacrificed for Rothwell in this system, he’s nowhere near as effective in the role he’s now playing
5. We badly need a CF, neither Danilo nor Dessers work in this system.
6. I’d like to see more of Cameron
7. I’d like to see less of Bajrami, Cortes and Barron. They made us weaker when they came on
Overall, a really poor start to the bread and butter stuff, both result and performance.
I could say that it’s early and we’re still learning the system so we need time, but we were playing a team going through the exact same transition, with far fewer resources, and they were a lot slicker in their new system, under a new manager, with new players, than we were. So, I don’t think that excuse washes.
I have huge reservations about the way we’re trying to play. Willing to give it a chance because it’s still early, but we take a hell of a lot of chances to dictate the ball in our own third, with those risks having very little in the way of reward in the middle and final third. When we get out, having taken risks, we invariably go backwards and let them get back into shape. The risk to reward ratio is very skewed at the moment.
I’m looking for something positive from today, but I’m struggling to find anything. Lucky point, same old problems with a few new ones as well, zero goal threat, concerning risk taking. Much harder games to come.
At least Russell Martin is being honest in his post match interview saying we were lucky to get a point. That shows me a bit of something in him that he’s not going to try and gaslight us. So fair play to him. That’s probably the positive today. His honesty in the interview is actually quite refreshing.