Number Five Arrives

[Footymad]

The promised creative midfielder has arrived at Fir Park. Alejandro Rodriguez Gorrin is a 24 year old Spanish catch who has been on Stephen Robinson's sights for some time. He joins on a one year deal. - External Link

[Gowboy]

This one is a bit of a head-scratcher. Our manager was talking about a midfielder “of stature” which tended to make me think it was a player who had “stature” in terms of being well regarded in the game. Of course “stature” can refer to height and while he is 6ft 1in - a decent stature height-wise - it still means he is an inch shorter than Andy Rose and I don’t think SR ever referred to Rose in those terms. So, I feel a bit underwhelmed by Gorrin’s signing. I hope he turns out to be a real asset but his pedigree is not exactly stellar. Fingers crossed.

[Handsome_Devil]

Who knows, I'm happy enough to give him a chance. What I find odd is that we felt the need for yet another midfielder...departures must be coming. Campbell, Cadden or Bigi (or even two of them), Turnbull out on loan?

[wellin]

We have a shed load of midfielders to chose from now. Don't know why we signed another. Lets hope he is better than what we have so will improve us in the middle of the park.

[Wellup4it]

We have a shed load of midfielders to chose from now. Don't know why we signed another.

Becayuse we lack creativity, pace; and someone to retain possession there. According to the manager we lacked someone to take ownership of the game there. That was obvious last season. For whatever reason, Bigi has not done the business. Its also possible we'll lose a midfielder or two during the window.

[jwok]

I suspect the manager expects to lose at least one midfielder before the window ends....

[Handsome_Devil]

Becayuse we lack creativity, pace; and someone to retain possession there. According to the manager we lacked someone to take ownership of the game there. That was obvious last season. For whatever reason, Bigi has not done the business. Its also possible we'll lose a midfielder or two during the window.

Zidane at his peak wouldn't have taken ownership of the game in our midfield because he'd have spent the game watching the ball sail over his head.

[Wellup4it]

Zidane at his peak wouldn't have taken ownership of the game in our midfield because he'd have spent the game watching the ball sail over his head.

Probably a chicken and egg situation. Midfield didn't take ownership of the game because we played the long ball and we played the long ball because the midfield wasn't quite up to it.

[Handsome_Devil]

Probably a chicken and egg situation. Midfield didn't take ownership of the game because we played the long ball and we played the long ball because the midfield wasn't quite up to it.

Mmm. That's an interesting one and I'm not saying it's wrong but I'm not convinced...at the start of the season, Robinson would regularly sub in Bigi to make an impact before we were trailing. He'd say we'd battle in the first half for the right to play. But by the end of the season we were only battling...we set out to do that because that's what we did and we seemed to almost take pride in our identity of not being a football side.

You could argue that with Cadden's running (and he can play centrally as part of a three), Bigi's passing and then one battler, we potentially had a midfield more than capable of not watching the ball sail from box to box all game. Not as good as having Jennings or Law there, doing what they did, but also capable enough to feel able to meet Hamilton, Thistle etc, actually play football and not get relegated.

Where I think we'd have struggled is in the cups...I seriously doubt we'd have beaten Aberdeen, Hearts, Rangers trying to play them at football. So why not practice what you intend to do when it matters, in the knock-out games, week in week out?

Given we were all happy with the season we had, you can't criticise Robinson. But relying on the cups as being our difference between success and failure is a hell of a thin line for us...lose with 10 men in Dingwall or McHugh doesn't hit the goal of his life, neither of which are hard to imagine, and our season looks very different. And I think even finishing seventh, playing like that, there would have been grumbling from the stands.

Of course, it should be noted that our knock-out draws last year were brutal. It's perfectly possible to be handed a walk in the park to Hampden and for that you don't need to set your team up like fight club.