Voice of Reason

Shooting from the lip

In all teams, figureheads are needed.

Not always to do the shouting and screaming – the calm assurance can be just as effective.

Leaders do just that – by dragging others around them up to a certain level.

At Somerset Park presently, Mark Kerr’s squad face some stark stats.

The quick concession of goals – a fragility if you will – has become too regular to be regarded coincidence.

Kerr and his coaching staff put in far too many hours on the training pitch for it to be a lack of preparation.

They have an attention to detail, the like of which hasn’t been seen at this club in many a moon.

So the reasonable assumption is something else is making these players switch off come the crunch.

To Kerr’s obvious frustration, Saturday was evidently enough.

He didn’t quite throw people under the bus but made his thoughts known all the same.

Certain players are not stepping up, he said.

And whilst he contends leadership is not the issue at hand, there can be no doubt Ayr have undergone a major transformation this term.

At Palmerston, United’s oldest player was 26.

It’s a team chock- full of new players who’ve had to gel without the aid of a physical dressing room to do so.

Some will come and go in an Ayr shirt without ever playing in front of a supporter.

To say the season – Kerr’s first full one in the job – is surreal would be putting it mildly.

A shrewd January is required to get Ayr pointing in the right direction again and looking up rather than down.