Pre-Season is now upon us.

Michael Beale and James Tavernier have already returned to the training ground, and it’s only a matter of time before the rest of the players start to return for their preseason under Beale & his coaching staff.

So far we have five players in, with five leaving after their contacts expired and one player sale for the young polish lad. So it remains to be seen who else comes in, from the five in it would only be Butland, Lammers & Sima who would be potential first choice strikers it would seem.

At the moment our line up would be –

                                                                      Butland

Tav                                                  Souttar                             Davies                                                        Yilmaz

                                                                      Raskin  

                                                                      Cantwell

Sima                                                              Lammers                                                                    ??????

                                                                      ??????

It might be the case with Lammers’ versatility he could play out on the left, with Lawrence pushed into the number ten role. Goldson has been left out as there is a question mark over his return from injury, Sakala has not been included as a starter as despite the stats from last season he’s simply not good enough to be a regular starter IMO. Despite being a huge fan of Matondo, as I don’t think he’s been given a fair crack of the whip, I’ve left him out too-I thinking having him down one side & Sima on the other and allowing them to switch wings would cause havoc in Scottish football, making defenders think whether they cut inside or go down the flank and get the ball in quickly-again something that has been missing from our game, the speed at which we get forward at & attack the opposition defence.

But what the above shows is that we need more ‘starters’ to come in, certainly to play up top if Colak is not in Beale’s plans. We desperately need a number 9 (Dessers? Danilo?) who will give us between 25-30 goals a season, something that has been lacking for a good number of years.

As silly season is in full swing now with the money being spent down south, as well as in Saudi Arabia, this means money will now flow across Europe and teams will have money to spend – this could mean one or two players getting sold and replaced (shame we don’t have anyone who could be sold for big money to the Saudi league-that comes down to poor recruitment & retainment)

Beale has said he wants business concluded quickly so he can get to work with the players on the training ground to implement his ideas & install them into the players – the more time you have on this the better chance of success on the field. I do expect another two signings to come in, a number 9 & a centre half – with at least four players being moved on.