Budgets etc

Any sympathy we earned last Wednesday due to a difference in budget size has now vanished. Today we lost to a club with financial resources a fraction of our own and we can't even blame their plastic pitch.

We have known for months that Cadden would be missing for a prolonged period but haven't brought in a new right back. Instead we give a central defender the job of playing out of position, a fact not lost on the Livi manager who took advantage of that fact and deliberately exploited it. This central defender has been sitting on the bench for most of the season so far.

We must have the oldest defence in the league with Marshall, Hanlon and Stevenson all regular starters. Maybe some of the large fee paid for Vente could have been used on our defence instead.

Other teams do their research on our side as confirmed by SJM who said Villa had a whole team studying our matches and knew our frailty at crosses. I wonder if we spend much time studying other teams matches.

I really despair at the whole set up at ER. They knew our resources would be stretched playing in Europe but did not do enough to strengthen where required.