We all knew that relegation to the Second Division was going to mean cost-cutting, but it seems Dick Campbell is now concerned about the number of players he'll have at his disposal. Hopefully though there will be another couple of additions before the start of the season, meaning the squad will consist of around 22 players (including 7 youngsters) - the size of squad that has been talked about all summmer long.
Campbell insisted last season that he had the experience to cope with cuts to his player budget, stating: "The number of players will ultimately rest with me, and this is where my 24 years in the management side can come in. Inexperienced managers often lose their jobs because they don’t know how to work the system. I do, and know from the business side that, while you have to live within your means, you have to be prepared to take the odd chance."
But now, speaking after the 4-0 loss at Brechin; the latest in a run of demoralising defeats in pre-season, Campbell is bemoaning their injury woes and having to reply on youth players. He told the Evening Times: "You can see we are very weak in depth and I had four players sitting in the stand (Billy Gibson, Jimmy Gibson, Marc Smyth and Derek Fleming) who would have started the season. But we had to go with what was left and again I had to pitch the young laddies in. It is now abundantly clear the young lads aren't up to it yet.
"The bottom line is we just can't do without our experienced players as there just isn't the depth there to cover for that. The other thing is I don't see any of the injured ones being back for Sheffield Wednesday in a couple of days and that is worrying."
While struggling to take any positives from the defeat, Campbell believes the lessons that can be learned from Saturday are best done so during pre-season. He continued: "You always learn lessons in pre-season games and surely the lesson on Saturday has got to be that our concentration levels just aren't good enough. For 17 minutes they hadn't been up the park, then they scored off a poor clearance from us. So that could have been avoided. The second goal was a defensive error again. We had eight chances and failed to score.
"I had a word with them and thought I had sorted it out, changed the shape and we did well in the first 15 of the second half. Then we gave away a goal from a set piece in a wide area, and gave the ball away in midfield and lost another one. But we are better to get these problems sorted out now."
Brechin boss Ian Campbell rather diplomatically stated: "We scored some excellent goals and also played some great football in spells. I think our experience showed against a very young Partick Thistle side."