MOTHERWELL FC: ENTERTAINMENT IS FOUND IN THE LACK OF DEFENSIVE ABILITY

As Josh Magennis got the final touch on Andy Considine's blooter in to the ground, deep in to injury time at Pittodrie on Sunday, 3 pairs of hands were thrown headwards in disbelief. Those hands had been clenched in to jubilant fists only 10 minutes earlier as Nicky Law looked to have secured a well earned win for The Steelmen, which would propel Stuart McCall's side three points clear of Hibs and four ahead of Celtic, ahead of next Saturday's match versus the current Champions.

"Motherwell have snatched a third to take all three points back to Lanarkshire!" I boomed down the MFCTV mic as Law and co celebrated in front of a dissenting home crowd, some of whom had fixed their gaze on Graham, Flow and I in the gantry. Many in front of us began to leave, as we gave it big licks for two minutes, exclaiming it was no less than we deserved.

Then Niall McGinn scored from a free header, and that cockiness, smugness and stupidity that I was exuding took a hefty knock. Us three, plus the hearty band of travelling fans who had trekked up to the Granite City had gone from confident winners, to the squeakiest of squeaky bummed panic merchants in 120 seconds.

It was inevitable that when Jamie Langfield lofted his free kick towards the Well box that something bad was going to go down, and for the second time this season, a late late leveller has left Motherwell feeling that they have lost all three points when it has really been two.

I don't buy in to the "play Motherwell to break a duck/lift a curse/turn your season around" patter anymore, but it did have some resonance yesterday, particularly given the Dons as the opposition. Just shy of 13 years ago, Ebbe Skovdhal's dismal Dons travelled to Fir Park on a Wednesday night, having failed to win any of their SPL games ahead of the clash. Not only did they get the win that night, but Robbie Winters claimed a hat trick, as did Well's John Spencer. 

The irony of such a high scoring game was that the two goalies that night, Goram and Leighton, were two of the modern great at International level, meaning that the defending must have been very suspect indeed.

As it was yesterday. With the Aberdeen fans been bereft of net bulging action at home this season, it was a stick on that this game would follow suit, but thanks to some woeful marking and positioning, they were treated to a veritable goal fest.Each of the six goals scored were highly preventable, with the defending for the three Well goals by The Dons' defence probably the worse.

Three set pieces gifted Motherwell three goals, which Craig Brown was quick to lament after the game. Having kept out all visitors in recent weeks he was dismayed at the lack of prevention used by his experienced defence. Considine, Reynolds and Anderson have done and should have done much better when Higdon poked home, when Hutchinson got his sizeable dome to Hateley's corner and Law bundled the third in after Cummins and Murphy tried to force the ball past Langfield.

Not that I am complaining. I was loving the ineptitude of their backline. Not so much ours though.

Motherwell were the better team throughout, and could have been forgiven for switching off to allow Gavin Rae to score from Hayes' cross so early on, had they held out for the 3-1 win. The quality of Fraser's cross for the second can't be argued, but with Hutchinson getting caught under the ball, similar to Cummins last week against Dundee, it gave McGinn the easiest of headers to place in to the net.

If only the defence could have clenched themselves as tight as the gluteals of every Motherwell fan going in to injury time, then this blog may have been a celebration of staying top of the league, regardless of the outcome of the game against Celtic on Saturday. But that's fitba. You win some, you lose some, you draw some from the jaws of victory in a game you deserve to have won. It happens.

With Ibrox to come on Wednesday, a similarly attack minded performance will go a long way to getting to the next round of the League Cup. I'm not going to go in to all the permutations of how and why we can beat this incarnation of rangers, despite us having not won their this decade, nay, this century. By and large we have ground out results this season and been deserving of a win in others, and but for misfortune, we could have held on for just a few seconds more against Aberdeen and St Mirren to be more than one point ahead at the top of the SPL.

Perhaps on Wednesday, it's our time to lift a hoodoo.

Up The Well!

MOTHERWELL FC: DOING THE HIGGY WHEN WE'RE TOP OF THE LEAGUE

Six games. Three draws, three wins, out of Europe, but Top of the SPL. Not too much to grumble about so far in this season where every team is going to suffer, where Armageddon is imminent and Scottish Football is set to implode on itself without the blue side of Glasgow turning up once or twice to bouncy bouncy their money in to our gate receipts.

 

It may still be early on in the season, but the hand wringing, wailing and gnashing of teeth which darkened the summer as the SFA and SPL failed to really get to grips with the Ibrox saga, has yet to be proved. Sure financially, there are a number of clubs who will miss the money that having both sides of the Old Firm in the league would bring, and there may still be cause for worry of administration, liquidation or whatever other financial meltdowns are abound, but for now, the SPL is proving to be as exciting and as closely matched as it has been for some time.

 

As  a Well fan, it will never not be exciting being at the top of the league, and having done so amidst a grueling, if somewhat underwhelming, Euro adventure, makes it more impressive. Playing 8 games in the first 4-5 weeks of the season, jaunting from Dingwall to Athens to Kilmarnock to Valencia, with some stops at home between, no doubt took it's toll on some (if not all) of the players. Those like Randolph, Ojamaa and Francis-Angol have also clocked up a power of air miles in this time, representing their nations in International battle.

 

To those who have given their all over the last two month's there can be no greater credit than sitting atop the domestic division, looking down on the chasing pack. But it has not been pretty getting there. Ross County away looked to be two points dropped in a lacklustre display, until it became evident that Derek Adams men would cause frustration to every team they came up against so far.

 

Bob McHugh's leveller against St Johnstone earned a hard fought point off the back of the trip to Greece, before the 2-1 win over Killie showed signs of some great counter attacking football.The home draw with St Mirren was a sickener having held on for so long to a 2nd minute lead, only to chuck it in injury time having gone a man down, before Higgy struck his magnificent treble against Inverness. Despite the emphatic win, the game was much closer than intimated, a common occurrence with ICT last season.

 

Saturday's win was a proper smash and grab job, at times neither side seemed interested in keeping possession, but when the game and The Well needed a spark, they got it when Henrik Ojamaa bowled in to the fray. It's been far too long since we've seen the pistols bang banging, he didn't even get them out when he scored a late double against St Johnstone at the end of last season, but his work rate has set up Higgy for vital goals in the last two games when he has come on as a sub. It would seem that there's nothing currently better than, as the fans chanted, "Doing The Higgy When We're Top Of The League".

 

With the transfer window now closed, it was a bit of a shock that nobody left, particularly those in the final year of their contract. The only standout amongst those in the early stages of the season has been Randolph, arguably our most bankable asset. Murphy and Humphrey have underperformed so far, and Shaun Hutchinson showed his rawness probably at the most inopportune time with two red cards in two games, possibly dulling down interest in the lad. Offers for he and Nicky Law were knocked back as being derisory, but performances throughout the team have perhaps not shown the true value that these players are worth, hence they are still at Fir Park.

 

I quipped after the Dundee game that it's a sign of a great team when they can win ugly, and while that was rather tongue in cheek, abit of it stands true. While we haven't played like the Scottish Barcelona of late, we've ground out results and made the most of the start to the season. Others have too. Dundee's win over Hearts was their first of the season, thanks to their first goal of the term, a penalty, which they defended for the rest for the game. Hibs have made a decent start with Leigh Griffith's earning plaudits for seemingly reigning himself in a bit. Dundee United haven't hit the heights expected of them as yet while St Mirren sit third. With Celtic minds on European glory, their complacency resulted in a first SPL win of the season for St Johnstone.

 

While the title will no doubt end up back at Celtic Park once they are dumped out of the UCL, it's up to the other teams in the league to battle away at the top end. The number of draws and coupon buster results that have happened over the last few weeks has shown that it will be a tight league this year, but with the number of draws on show, a sequence of wins for one or two teams could see an early breakaway emerge. Had Hibs not won at the weekend, The Well may well have been four points clear at the top. Alas, it is just the one.

 

With a jaunt up to Aberdeen on Sunday, Stuart McCall's men will know what they need to do to stay top before the visit of Celtic the following week. Having a great record in the SPL against Aberdeen over the last few years and The Dons seemingly very shot shy at the moment, it's another great chance for three points, however, defensively, they have been pretty good and have conceded about as many as they have scored. It may be the case that a ground out win will be required yet again, to stay at the summit.

 

Up The Well!