Worst Signings of the 2021/22 Premiership season (part 2)

The players ranked 25 to 11 can be found here.

Before we move on, there has to be an honourable mention for Caleb Chukwuemeka, whose exploits for Livingston had escaped me before I published the first part of this double-bill. Chukwuemeka, on loan from Aston Villa, suffered the ignominy of being subbed just seven minutes after coming off the bench against Aberdeen with David Martindale criticising his work-rate. That was less than a month after arriving; the forward has made a couple of appearances off the bench since but has disappeared in recent weeks, suggesting Martindale's opinion of him hasn't improved. So he probably should have been in the top 25 somewhere...

Anyway, on to the top ten!

10 ALEX SAMUEL (ROSS COUNTY)

Striker Samuel claimed on arrival in Dingwall that he hoped to use his move to Ross County to force his way into the Wales squad. Given he hasn't started a league game since October and has played more minutes in the cup (sixty) than in the league (fourteen) since then, I'd say he's probably not on Robert Page's radar right now. Samuel may well have had injury problems but County do tend to be Pyongyang-esque in their levels of secrecy (the joke about Dingwall is far too obvious and has therefore been removed - Ed.) so it's not clear whether that is the case, or that he is just out of the picture.

9 BEN WOODBURN (HEARTS)

Woodburn isn't on this list because he's been a waste of space; he's on it because he was playing in the Premier League at age 17 and has eleven caps for Wales, so expectations were appropriately very high. But he's been in and out of the team - mostly out since Ellis Simms arrived in January - and has managed just three goals and a single assist. Whoscored.com rates him about the same as James Brown and Eamonn Brophy for this season, which is not a good look.

8 JACK GURR (ABERDEEN)

What can you say about Gurr, other than to feign horror and shock that a guy who was a fringe player for Atlanta United's reserves would turn out to be out of his depth in the Scottish Premiership? Thankfully Stephen Glass realised this quickly so that he didn't take precious minutes away from the talented youngster Calvin Ramsay. He returned to the USA in January, and Dons fans will never speak of him again.

7 JAMES MCCARTHY (CELTIC)

Following on from Shane Duffy, it now appears to be enshrined in law that every season Celtic must acquire a Premier League player who was a boyhood fan of the club. I'm pretty sure Ange had nothing to do with this signing, given his attempts to strengthen the midfield area in January. McCarthy is an okay option off the bench for Celtic and he's largely managed to stay fit for the first time in a number of years...probably because he's only started six games all season. The trouble is that he's on decent money that's out of proportion with the gametime he's getting, and that a player with such an injury history was given a four year contract at the age of 30. Still, he's better than Ismaila Soro.

6 JAY EMMANUEL-THOMAS (ABERDEEN)

To be honest I was already prejudiced against Emmanuel-Thomas after he put 'JET' on his jersey at Livingston last season. The Dons thought they were getting a jet, but instead they got a Sopwith Camel (it was pointed out to me on Twitter that Sopwith Camels were relatively successful in WW1, but I thought it was a more polite comparison than calling him a Fokker). Emmanuel-Thomas managed one goal for Aberdeen; Bruce Anderson, who went to Livingston from Pittodrie last summer, scored nine. Most damningly, Jim Goodwin publicly called him out on his fitness, which improved so much that the player had his two year contract terminated before it was halfway through.

5 EETU VERTAINEN (ST. JOHNSTONE)

How Callum Davidson complained about the work permit delays that left Vertainen waiting several weeks before being able to play for St. Johnstone. How Davidson bigged up the Finnish striker as having bags of potential and loads of ability. How Davidson insisted for the next two months that Vertainen wasn't ready for more than the occasional cameo off the bench for a team struggling for goals. And how quickly Davidson turned on him, subbing him at half-time in his first start, and again a few weeks later as the scapegoat for a goal by Rangers scored after Vertainen gave away possession cheaply. At the time of writing that's his last appearance for the Perth Saints, as he is currently on loan at Linfield where he scored four in one game last month, but hasn't scored any other goals before or since.

4 LEIGH GRIFFITHS (DUNDEE)

Oh, Leigh. His return to Dundee on loan was clearly high-risk, high-reward; in the end it was all risk and no reward. He managed just a single goal from open play - though a free-kick goal at Pittodrie was insanely good - and was quickly restricted to the subs bench; to be honest he was lucky to be available at all after he was arrested for kicking a firework into the crowd during a cup game, but the SFA held off banning him until the end of the police investigation (and we're still waiting). Celtic activated an option in his contract to release him in January and Griffiths went on to become the marquee signing who would definitely fire Falkirk to promotion from League One...or not...

3 JAMES SCOTT (HIBERNIAN)

It feels like a long time since Hull City paid Motherwell £1.5m for Scott, but it's actually been just over two years. It looks like injuries have wrecked the 22 year old either physically or mentally, but he's been a shadow of the young starlet he was. Jack Ross dropped him due to his poor fitness and publicly called him "selfish" and "lazy". Shaun Maloney showed more faith in him, but the lack of impact during his sub appearances was such that Scott was actually booed when introduced late in a win over Ross County. And then in recent weeks, with the forward line decimated by injuries, Scott has finally got a run in the starting lineup. Number of goals scored? Zero. Number of Hibs fans who want him to make his loan move a permanent one? Probably about the same.

2 MAX BIAMOU (DUNDEE UNITED)

Biamou made more than thirty appearances in the English Championship for Coventry last season, so he looked like a pretty solid signing for United in October 2021. He made three sub appearances as he built up his fitness... and then in late November he injured his foot. And he hasn't played since. With Tony Watt brought in during January Biamou and United agreed he should leave...but then he injured his thigh just before the window ended, scuppering any move. So the Frenchman will finish his United career having played 55 minutes of first team football and having got pressure sores from spending so much time on the treatment table.

1 MATTY LONGSTAFF (ABERDEEN)

Longstaff spent the second half of the season at Mansfield Town where by most accounts he was the outstanding player in League Two during that period. He spent the first half at Pittodrie, complainingn afterward that Scottish football was "long ball" and "more of a fight, there's probably not as much quality there as there is in the Premier League". That last bit is obviously true, but the rest? Given how honking Longstaff - considered a potential star in the making ever since a Premier League goal against Manchester United in 2019 - was for the Dons I think we can store this away as powerful evidence that the Scottish Premiership is a higher standard than the English fourth tier. Stephen Glass' statement that "Matty would've liked more game time, clearly we would've liked better performances" had a mic drop feel to it. On the bench by October and out of the matchday squad by November, Longstaff left Aberdeen with three starts, five appearances in total and one Worst Signing Of The Season award.

Lawrie Spence has whinged about Scottish football on Narey's Toepoker since September 2007. He has a life outside this blog. Honestly.