Tekel Towers » 6 games until the split

LarsErikKjell · 04/2/2021 2:33 pm

6th Feb: Ross County (A)
13th Feb: Livi (H)
21st Feb: Rangers (A)
27th Feb: Killie (A)
7th Mar: Celtic (H)
20th Mar: Aberdeen (H)

Realistically, our best chance to pick up wins in this run is Ross County and Killie. Both away games though and we haven't won away from home since August.

Our home games against Livi and Aberdeen could be chances to pick up points, but if we manage to get 2 draws in these games I'm sure we'd all take it now.

The ugly sisters games, if we even manage to get a point out of them then we are doing well.

So best case scenario from above gives us 9 points. Highly unlikely. But would take us into the split with 36 points. Just a few points from safety.

I think if we can get 6 points from County and Killie then we will leave ourselves in a strong enough position going into the split. Anything on top of that is a bonus. 34 points at the split and we only need 1 win and a couple of draws after the split to be safe - totally possible.

The fear here though, is our current awful form. If we don't turn it around we could be in a situation where we pick up maybe as low as 2 points over the course of the next 6 games which would be an absolute disaster. Going into the split with 30 points, needing probably 3 wins in our last 5 games to see us safe. This is a situation we cannot allow ourselves to be in.

Mellon has managed 600 competitive matches of football which gives me hope that he has what it takes to sort this out. I must admit though, I am terrified.

Edit to add: when I say 'safety' I am referring of course to finishing 10th, based on the average points needed over the last few years in the Premiership.

Last edited by LarsErikKjell (04/2/2021 2:50 pm)

bowers · 04/2/2021 4:07 pm

Lets hope that our horrific away form changes on Saturday and we take 3 points

Lilley01 · 04/2/2021 5:53 pm

I hate the 'must-win' game' chat. Folk were saying it months ago with run of the mill league games. That said, you do get the feeling that playing the 11th placed team in the league, to either pull them one win away from us or put proper day light between us falls somewhere between 'must win' and 'do not lose'. bordering on the former.

Nothing indicates that will be the case. Our form is terrible, our performances for large parts of games are terrible, we're not scoring, we're conceding and we haven't won away in months.

Our luck must be due a turn....!?

RRDH · 04/2/2021 9:44 pm

bowers wrote:
Lets hope that our horrific away form changes on Saturday and we take 3 points

Dont think we go down if we lose but will change complexion of the season if we get 3 points. biggest game of the season Saturday

Shakey Isles Arab · 04/2/2021 9:59 pm

Every game a must win, granted some games you'll take a draw.
But any football, any tier, any level if you're no turnin up, with 11 men prepared to give 100% to win, to work their bollocks off for 90 mins there's something wrong, you're goin into the game a goal down.

No such thing as luck, you make your luck.

Granted the Hibs game for example Shanks back deep defending gets hit in the oxter, penalty, but over the course of the season the more teams deep in our half - the more decision they'll get (no tae mention the fuck-ups we make) - that is not luck.

Hibs boy does the Thierry Henri gets away wi it, that instance is total linesman incompetence, but over the course of the year that'll happen and again the more we're deep in opponents half the more incompetent decisions will go in our favour.

Ross County is a must win.
Every game a must win.

Last edited by Shakey Isles Arab (04/2/2021 10:01 pm)

Lilley01 · 05/2/2021 9:21 am

Nonsense. You lose a game, so what? No one is happy about it but literally, so what? It’s therefore not a must win. Because there are no real consequences to losing. St Johnstone away circa 2001 was a must win.

LarsErikKjell · 05/2/2021 9:27 am

Lilley01 wrote:
Nonsense. You lose a game, so what? No one is happy about it but literally, so what? It’s therefore not a must win. Because there are no real consequences to losing. St Johnstone away circa 2001 was a must win.

I guess everyone has different levels of where a 'must-win' sits. In terms of Saturday, if we were to lose, we'd almost be certain that we are in the midst of a relegation battle. If we win, we give ourselves a nice bit of breathing space and, assuming results go our way, could start to focus on grinding out as many points as we can before the split. Whereas if we lose we put massive pressure on ourselves to pick up wins against teams I just cant see us beating (except maybe Killie away, but its plastic and we havent won on that all season).

So in my eyes, Saturday is a must win when you look at our upcoming fixtures. St Mirren, Hibs and Motherwell, none of them were must-wins in my eyes. But losing all 3 of them has made Saturday a must-win for me.

kdyteejay · 05/2/2021 9:59 am

At the very least it is a must not lose game. I would prefer a win which should go without saying.

05/2/2021 12:14 pm

LarsErikKjell wrote:
Lilley01 wrote:
Nonsense. You lose a game, so what? No one is happy about it but literally, so what? It’s therefore not a must win. Because there are no real consequences to losing. St Johnstone away circa 2001 was a must win.
I guess everyone has different levels of where a 'must-win' sits. In terms of Saturday, if we were to lose, we'd almost be certain that we are in the midst of a relegation battle. If we win, we give ourselves a nice bit of breathing space and, assuming results go our way, could start to focus on grinding out as many points as we can before the split. Whereas if we lose we put massive pressure on ourselves to pick up wins against teams I just cant see us beating (except maybe Killie away, but its plastic and we havent won on that all season).

So in my eyes, Saturday is a must win when you look at our upcoming fixtures. St Mirren, Hibs and Motherwell, none of them were must-wins in my eyes. But losing all 3 of them has made Saturday a must-win for me.

St J v UTD 12/5/01 - simply MUST win game
RC v UTD 6/2/21 - be handy if we could win game

as pointed out by Lilley, probably cos 'twas he who scored the winner

Finn Seemann · 05/2/2021 4:44 pm

I'm normally in the must not lose camp in the first instance, but realistically you don't go into a game thinking must not lose. You go in with must win. This would put us at least 6 points clear of the team in 11th (assuming (unlikely) that the Accies win their games in hand.) and makes sure County are 8 points behind us and not 2. So, if we want to avoid a relegation fight, and I am assuming we do, this is a must win. You can be damn sure that Hughes will be telling his guys this is a must win.

LarsErikKjell · 06/2/2021 6:56 pm

5 games left. Livi lost today and have Hamilton midweek. Lets be honest, we want them to beat Hamilton and keep them miles away from us, but if we attack them next Saturday the way we attacked Ross Cunty today we have a chance. Nothing to fear.

Edit to add. If they do lose to Hamilton... a win would put us 5 points behind Livi... how is that even possible after the amount of games they have won recently...

Last edited by LarsErikKjell (06/2/2021 6:57 pm)

bowers · 06/2/2021 7:11 pm

The leagues nuts bud.

We really do want livi to win midweek imo if we could then go out and beat them next Saturday would be another huge result.

kdyteejay · 06/2/2021 7:26 pm

bowers wrote:
The leagues nuts bud.

We really do want livi to win midweek imo if we could then go out and beat them next Saturday would be another huge result.

This indeed.

LarsErikKjell · 06/2/2021 7:52 pm

bowers wrote:
The leagues nuts bud.

We really do want livi to win midweek imo if we could then go out and beat them next Saturday would be another huge result.

Agreed. Hamilton and Ross County are the two teams in the bottom two. Lets hope they stay there. Although I think County would take any of the Championship teams in the play offs if thats how it ended up.

Arabdownsouth · 07/2/2021 1:27 pm

Sevco had better be this shite when we play them, they won't be though 😕

bowers · 07/2/2021 2:24 pm

Arabdownsouth wrote:
Sevco had better be this shite when we play them, they won't be though 😕

Hamilton could have won that today.

4 away games on the bounce for them after today. Hopefully pick up 0 points in the process.

kdyteejay · 07/2/2021 3:39 pm

bowers wrote:
Arabdownsouth wrote:
Sevco had better be this shite when we play them, they won't be though 😕
Hamilton could have won that today.

4 away games on the bounce for them after today. Hopefully pick up 0 points in the process.

Livi, Well, St Mirren and Hibs. Hamilton have beaten Livi and Well this season but hopefully you’re right about the number of points.

Arabdownsouth · 07/2/2021 10:22 pm

I know it's a tall order, but the best way for us to avoid the relegation battle is to finish in the top six, so I'd settle for a draw when they play St mirren tbh. We need to try to aim high in our next 5 games and see where it takes us. The gap between us and the bottom 2 is not going to be easy for them to make up, they are there for a reason. The reason being they struggle to pick up points even more than we do.

Hopefully we can finally turn up against livi this time and get another vital 3 points.

Last edited by Arabdownsouth (07/2/2021 10:23 pm)

Lilley01 · 08/2/2021 12:02 pm

agreed, one thing people seem to be missing is although the points to 11th isn't massive, there are still 3 teams between us and them. The games in hand these teams have, and subsequent games, are often against each other. meaning they'll cut each others throats. When they're not paying each other, they're playing the better teams in the leagues.

We're far from safe but we'd be very unfortunate if all 5 teams started picking up all the available points whilst we went back to picking up barely anything. There's nothing to fear from Livi and killie games certainly and both present good opportunities for points.

top 6 will probably prove too much for us with St Mirren's form, fixtures and games in hand. I don't think we deserve it on the balance of the season either so far but if we get there, I'll be delighted.

08/2/2021 1:36 pm

Good point. How many places did we drop during that winless run? One.

08/2/2021 4:58 pm

Goodie Conway 2 wrote:
Good point. How many places did we drop during that winless run? One.

True GC2, 4 points out of 24 & there was no shifting us til the very end of the 'run' when we finally went from 6th to 7th.
4 points out of 24, you'd think we'd be plumetting from 6th to 11th.
The thing is, the best the clubs below us were getting was the occaional point for the occasional draw.
But these single solitary points just don't shift you.
I've often come out of Tannadice after a win saying 'that's 3 draws we got today'.

So I'll tell you where I am on this....

3 points for a win was brought in here in 1994 to encourage more attractive, more attacking football. It didn't. The posttive incentive was outgunned by the negative incentive. Teams would rather deprive their opponents of an extra 2 points than try to gain 2 extra points for themselves, it's the way of the world.

But here's the rub. Htf can some games be worth 3 points and some worth only 2 points? Fixtures must surely be equal merit .How can you have a league where each fixture isn't worth the same number of points for goodness sake?

The solution? Revert back to 2 points for a win, 1 point for a draw where every fixture is worth two points, same as the old days? No. Not rewarding enough & long time dated. 4 points for a win, 2 pts for a draw where every fixture has four points at stake? No no, over rewarding, totals would be too large, too big a disparity between a win & a draw, same as it is now actually. The answer is.... stay with THREE POINTS FOR A WIN, we've got used to it now. BUT....and this isn't gonna go down well, I'm afraid there's a decimal point involved, ONE POINT FIVE POINTS FOR A DRAW. EVERY fixture starts with the same number of points to play for, THREE POINTS.

There, you saw it first on Tek. But still my prime objective is to TIME THE BALL IN PLAY in association football & FIFA are running out of time before I burn down their HQ. Calling them dinosaurs is doing dnosaurs a big disservice.

08/2/2021 5:38 pm

And here's another thing.....hypothetically a team could be undefeated for the entire season & near get relegated..

INVINCIBLES RELEGATED SHOCKER!!
.
Played 38 Won 0 Drawn 38 Lost 0 Points 38

Yes, hypothetically indeed, but it does illustrate a point does it not??

2008/09 ICT relegated on 37 points. St Mirren were 11th also on 37 points. Falkirk 10th on 38 points.

Beharder · 08/2/2021 5:41 pm

smedDUm wrote:
And here's another thing.....hypothetically a team could be undefeated for the entire season & near get relegated..

INVINCIBLES RELEGATED SHOCKER!!
.
Played 38 Won 0 Drawn 38 Lost 0 Points 38

Yes, hypothetically indeed, but it does illustrate a point does it not??

2008/09 ICT relegated on 37 points. St Mirren were 11th also on 37 points. Falkirk 10th on 38 points.

Are you furlough at the moment Smedum?

08/2/2021 6:03 pm

Beharder wrote:
smedDUm wrote:
And here's another thing.....hypothetically a team could be undefeated for the entire season & near get relegated..

INVINCIBLES RELEGATED SHOCKER!!
.
Played 38 Won 0 Drawn 38 Lost 0 Points 38

Yes, hypothetically indeed, but it does illustrate a point does it not??

2008/09 ICT relegated on 37 points. St Mirren were 11th also on 37 points. Falkirk 10th on 38 points.

Are you furlough at the moment Smedum?

Well something like that! Certainly too much time on my hands!
Tho I fail to see how selling cricket bats is not a vital industry....

Arabdownsouth · 08/2/2021 6:48 pm

smedDUm wrote:
Goodie Conway 2 wrote:
Good point. How many places did we drop during that winless run? One.
True GC2, 4 points out of 24 & there was no shifting us til the very end of the 'run' when we finally went from 6th to 7th.
4 points out of 24, you'd think we'd be plumetting from 6th to 11th.
The thing is, the best the clubs below us were getting was the occaional point for the occasional draw.
But these single solitary points just don't shift you.
I've often come out of Tannadice after a win saying 'that's 3 draws we got today'.

So I'll tell you where I am on this....

3 points for a win was brought in here in 1994 to encourage more attractive, more attacking football. It didn't. The posttive incentive was outgunned by the negative incentive. Teams would rather deprive their opponents of an extra 2 points than try to gain 2 extra points for themselves, it's the way of the world.

But here's the rub. Htf can some games be worth 3 points and some worth only 2 points? Fixtures must surely be equal merit .How can you have a league where each fixture isn't worth the same number of points for goodness sake?

The solution? Revert back to 2 points for a win, 1 point for a draw where every fixture is worth two points, same as the old days? No. Not rewarding enough & long time dated. 4 points for a win, 2 pts for a draw where every fixture has four points at stake? No no, over rewarding, totals would be too large, too big a disparity between a win & a draw, same as it is now actually. The answer is.... stay with THREE POINTS FOR A WIN, we've got used to it now. BUT....and this isn't gonna go down well, I'm afraid there's a decimal point involved, ONE POINT FIVE POINTS FOR A DRAW. EVERY fixture starts with the same number of points to play for, THREE POINTS.

There, you saw it first on Tek. But still my prime objective is to TIME THE BALL IN PLAY in association football & FIFA are running out of time before I burn down their HQ. Calling them dinosaurs is doing dnosaurs a big disservice.

Not understanding your fourth paragraph at all, perhaps it's just me but what are you on about with the 3 points 2 points thing? Finding the whole post very confusing tbh