wokinginashearerwonderland

Does that even really happen though Rico? Not saying it wouldn't at a club like Keith, Deveronvale or Cove but at a higher profile club like ours is there really normally a proper recruitment/interview/selection prawcess? Unless we throw in a real curve ball appointment, the people at Pittodrie must know who they want and could just go out and approach someone. I'm sure that must happen at most clubs. Did the Huns wait until a flood of CVs came through the door before approaching Van Bronkhorst, I doubt it. I'd be surprised if we have ever appointed a manager after he sent us a CV. I take your points above but think you are massively over complicating the whole thing. We have, some may disagree, a decent squad of players, most of whom have played international football of some description. There is not a massive recruitment job needed, we are unlikely to be relegated this season, the club is on a decent financial footing, we have a new training ground. Get someone in who knows what they are doing and just crack on. We've mucked about too long and gone out of the last three domestic cup competitions with a whimper. All this director of football, recruitment manager stuff is just smoke and mirrors. We're not Man Utd or Bayern Munich, we just need someone to coach the players and pick a team on a Saturday.

Said this last time we were looking for a manager and the same applies this time around, why on earth are we needing an interim appointment? This sacking has hardly come out of the blue, Cormack must have been pondering it for weeks. Surely he should have been doing the spade work before now and had someone ready to just walk in the door. You don't need to have fired the guy before you starting talking to others on the quiet, I don't think anyone is naive enough to think it doesn't happen in other clubs so why are we so different? Villa fired Dean Smith and his seat was hardly cold before Stevie G was in there.

Hoping not to read the words Scott Brown and player manager mentioned anywhere in the next few days

You’re comparing apples and pears HaarDon. Celtic have spent about £23M in the last six months. I’d have fancied my own chances of being a success with that budget. If a foreign manager comes in you may have language issues, he won’t know the league, the players, the culture basically. Remember we are also shopping in Lidl, not Harrods. We’re not gonna be after Ancelotti, Simeone or Pochettino. Would you be happy with someone you have never heard of who just finished fourth in the league in Finland or Belarus? Foreign managers at provincial clubs in Scotland have usually ended in a complete disaster.

You can’t be signing Scottish internationals then taking in someone from league one to coach them. Assuming Brown is staying on, it needs to be someone he has respect for as you would assume he carries a fair bit of weight amongst the dressing room.

This time we have to go low risk and just make sure we get a steady pair of hands. With a half decent manager this group of players should be at least fourth in the league. We’ve done the young manager thing. I want to see someone who’s been round the block a few times and knows what he is doing. Going foreign would be plain stupid. For me he also has to have managed in the Scottish top flight before otherwise you are giving yourself a handicap straight from the off. It also has to be someone with no ties/affinity to the old firm because as we have seen from McInnes, McGhee, Calderwood etc the fans just do not accept these guys. Also if I hear Cormack come out and say he consulted “Sir Alex” during the prawcess I will scream.

Keep seeing folk using the word experiment. Why was appointing Glass an experiment? Anyway I can forgive a crap appointment, every chairman makes one now and again. When you realise it was a mistake though, just hold your hand up and make a change.

Big difference for me from last season is how the fans interpret things. It would be interesting to be a fly on the wall at Pittodrie to see exactly who does what and each persons responsibilities because let’s be honest, we all think we know but we don’t really have a clue what goes on day to day. Last season when things started to go pear shaped it was blamed on the managers tactics, the managers recruitment, the managers training methods. Glass has had a pretty easy ride from the fans. The bad signings are being blamed on not having a recruitment guy in on time, the striking coach specialist is blamed for us not scoring enough goals and even the guy Henry whatshisname was being blamed for the tactics the other night. The director of football also took a bit of flak on here the other night.

Think I am right in saying our entire starting line up has played for their country either at full, under 21 or under 18/19 level.

Come on Glasser, give us a reason to believe in you. We are long overdue a home win against this lot. 2-1 Besuijen,Forrest, Ferguson (Hart to have a nightmare)

Ross did a decent job at Sunderland then took Hibs to third and to two cup finals, I'd take that over fighting to make the top half of the league. Why you would want Glass in charge for next season is beyond me. I'm sure you said at the start of the season there was no way we would finish sixth?

The damning thing about this season is that the old firm and Hearts aside, the rest of the teams in this league have been honking yet we are still struggling to make the top 6. Failure to beat the crap teams in the league has a horrible resemblance to how we were back in the days of Ebbe and Alec Miller. I hope the signings of Polvara and Besuijen are not just Nigel Pepper and Andy Dow in disguise. We have 14 games left of the season. Get in Jack Ross now and let him get an early start on his preparations for next season. Blaming Cormack IMO is totally wrong. He has backed Glass to the hilt. Not only has he had free reign to bring in 14 new players, he has also managed to hold on to Ferguson and Ramsay when he could have taken the cash for them.

Very difficult for a team with any kind of aspiration of success to develop young players, as a manager you just do not get time. As we are seeing right now at the Dons, if you drop to 7th or 8th in the table the fans want you sacked so why would you jeopardise your job as a manager just to fill the team with a few youngsters? It's fine if you are Motherwell or St Mirren and nobody really cares whether you finish 10th in the league, there is no pressure. That's why it is very rare to see a young player coming through the youth set up at Celtic, Rangers, Man Utd, City etc. It only happened for Chelsea a couple of years ago due to their transfer ban which forced them into using their youngsters.

Ok, I’m not convinced Rico. Tell that to the guy who Gallagher battered with a baseball bat who had a bleeding brain and 20 odd staples to fix his head wounds. It’s like arguing whether paedos or murderers are worse, there’s no real point. Why it is ok for Gallagher to represent Scotland and the Dons but Goodwillie gets it in the neck over signing for Raith is beyond me. Both are total animals, just monsters.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion of course and what Goodwillie did was awful. For me, the issue this brings is how bad does the crime have to be before you are no longer allowed to do your job again? Is what Goodwillie did deemed to be worse than what Declan Gallagher did, which he spent three years inside for? Yet, Gallagher plays in our first team and has been capped for Scotland in recent months. Just playing devils advocate here but supposing he was a car mechanic, should he never be allowed to be a mechanic again? Gazza allegedly beat up his wife yet is widely acclaimed. Just for curiosity, I was searching for a Goodwillie thread on this site last night to gauge the feel for when he was our player and seems a number of our fans were quite happy to have him at the beginning so none of us should get too high and mighty over this one.

Undoubtedly fans bum up their own players a bit and make out they are better than what they are BigAl. Having said that, Ramsay and Ferguson are good prospects and we will get a decent wedge for each of them in time. It does come across like clubs hate buying and selling in January unless they really have to, either to avoid relegation or if they are pushing for the title. An awful lot of January deals are loans, with teams unwilling to commit to either buying or selling. I think we will see Fergie move on in the summer, hopefully Ramsay sticks around for a while. If he can get a few caps we might get a bit more for him. I do think we should have been more pro-active in replacing Hedges properly, not convinced this Dutch dude will be the answer.

Almost choked on my coffee when I read the BBC headline "is Ramsey on his way to Ibrox?"

I am going off the point a bit here but what the huns #1 did before in not paying their creditors and evading taxes was totally out of order but I don’t have a problem with what the huns #2 are doing just now. If someone wants to bankroll a club then good luck them. You wouldn’t have seen Blackburn, Man City, Chelsea and rest do anything if it wasn’t for that. We have had it with Milne, the Donald’s, Cormack and Crotty and I guess without that investment we might be £10m in debt. However clubs who sell their best players are inevitably worse off in the end.

I can see what you are saying boys but as a fan it's shit. When I watch my team I want to see the best players on the park, I couldn't really care less what the balance sheet looks like. Part of our Data Man's pitch to the fans about Glass was that he had helped Atlanta make millions when they sold one of their top players. That might be great if you are the chairman but fans want entertainment and the chance to compete. Replacing Ramsay with some second rate right back from Rotherham won't make it any better viewing for us just because Cormack has £5M more in his pocket. I would rather try to hold on to him until we have a gun at our head and really have to sell.

Not sure why you would want rid of our best player mate? After the last couple of years with no crowds, Glass would surely get very little of that fee to spend so the team would end up weaker. The longer we can keep a hold of the lad, the better. Unless you're on the board like?

Bet the geordies are pooping themselves at that news because Hodgson might just manage to keep Watford up.

"I am getting among the players and telling a few home truths because the past has not been good enough." Nice quote from big Dunc. Would love to have been at the Everton training ground these last few days

Fair point Rico. It was fine to see us actually compete with them and not be hanging on for a change. We look like a blunt knife going forward though, just not making goalies have to make saves too many times this season. Plenty of "attempts" if you like, which Dave will be noting in his data book but lacking the killer instinct.