RicoS321

Really? What did they say? Doesn't surprise me mind.

You didn't make a point. That's the point. Do you think the dons should: a) spend tens of millions over multiple seasons chasing the league b) work with other clubs to force a complete overhaul of the game and its financial distribution. c) neither of the above, just "believing" is enough to win the league.

If we've offered him an increased deal, which it looks like we have given the list of leavers just announced then we're due a training fee for Anderson. Something like £250k I think would be the asking price, however it's unlikely anyone will go close to that so as bait in a swap seems fine. Although I am far from convinced by jet.

It was absolutely criminal of Cormack not to allow any signings in the January window. I completely understand that McInnes was likely on his way out, but that's not remotely the point. We've changed nothing in terms of recruitment (that I'm aware of), so the notion that we'll suddenly start picking up amazing talent with Glass being the only change is silly. At most, he'll have one or two players that he'll favour but so far we're fishing in the same pond. Gallagher, Jet, Robertson are not signings that McInnes wouldn't have pulled off. As I've been droning on about for years, recruitment is a club responsibility, with a manager signing off. The club should be assessing targets and coming to a consensus. That process should have happened in January so that we weren't stuck with needing 5 or 6 first team players. That's an exceptionally difficult task in a single window. If Cormack had doubts about McInnes, which he should have, then all he needed to do was to instruct the club's scouting team to look for targets in the areas where we would be short in the coming season and tell McInnes to take a back seat while that process occurred. If he didn't think that the recruitment team was good enough then that needed to be addressed in January. Glass is a manager, not a scout, the roles need to be separated. It very much seems like Cormack and Glass are winging it.

I agree. He had decent potential when he was here but was lightweight as a youngster. He obviously would have addressed that with age and has made a half decent career playing in the championship. As others have mentioned, the fitness over the last year or two is a concern. And he's a hun.

That's not the question I asked. We're not at the stage where teams don't even bother trying to challenge, that's the point. We're at the stage where teams don't pretend to you, the supporter, that they're going to challenge. There's a logical difference. There is no correlation between a team that says they are going to win the league and them winning it. None. Just as there was no correlation between St Mirren saying that they were going to finish fourth and finishing fourth. Jack Ross cannot win the league, neither can Stephen Glass, or any of the players that play for either team. It will take tens of millions of pounds of investment as shown by the dirty scum. We don't exist in some fairy tale where all it takes is some shouty melt that will get £2K per week players to romp to victory with good old fashioned grit. If you're suggesting that we spend tens of millions of pounds then do that, or suggest a way that we can change the politics of our game to challenge the duopoly, but don't spout some disingenuous pish about "not challenging" as if it's as simple as trying hard.

They do try, they're just realistic about their chances. Would you prefer that they pretended they could win the league before every season? Would that make it more acceptable? Or are you someone that thinks there is a significant correlation between believing you can win the league and actually winning it?

I've not seen anything particularly good about Glass so far, nor anything completely horrendous either. When you say he's not taking any passengers, what do you mean? I don't think there's much evidence either way so far.

Just like Brown, it would be a high risk signing. If I were the manager, I'd steer well clear of guys that you have to devote a lot of time to and I think Griffiths would be one of those. That said, I'd like to think it wouldn't matter if we sold Ferguson or not, and if we wanted Griffiths we'd offer him a reasonable contract. Then again, I wouldn't sell Ferguson either, I think we need him for at least another six months. I think the chances of us successfully implementing a complete overhaul of our team in one window are virtually nil and I think that Ferguson has the potential to be very good in the coming season. Similarly, I'd be concerned that with a good pre-season we'd be missing out on a very good player in McRorie. McGeouch, Ojo, Virtanen, Kennedy, Devlin are the guys we want to be shipping to drop the numbers in the squad. It would be a fucking abomination to give Devlin a contract while letting McRorie go.

Strict liability doesn't exist in Scottish fitba. It's what the clubs, including AFC, want. Let's not pretend that a similar percentage of dons fans wouldn't have been doing similar though. I'm pretty certain there'll be a party or two in the streets of St Johnstone when they win the cup next week.

Ferguson improved in the games since McInnes left, his workrate certainly increased and he was getting in the box far more regularly. In my opinion he was struggling with the extra workload so late in the season and probably the change in training regime. His final ball/shot just seemed to be fairly weak like he was running out of steam (Hayes too). His effort against the Tims was a good example of this after Brown's pass. I think he'll be a much improved player next season with a good preseason in him. I really hope we keep hold of him and he proves himself worthy of a move. I could easily see a team taking an expensive punt on him in the summer, but I don't think he deserves it.

Celtic finished on a higher points total than anyone outside the scum ever has. There's nothing loser-ish about the mentality at all, that's shite. You can afford to buy a team that can get to 80+ points or you can't. We could probably just about afford one, but it would require zero recruitment errors. Would you call your neighbour a loser cause they couldn't afford a Ferrari? When every single league in the world is bought, why would you expect AFC or Hibs to manage to overcome that? Are the various Portuguese, Italian, German, Belgian teams who don't win their leagues losers too?

Did well in his second spell. If he'd been a new signing without the baggage of his prior stint, we'd have been disappointed to see him go. Good luck to him.

Worth a read of you haven't already. It was China

But Brown has never been that type of player, he's nae exactly pirlo. He needs to be at people and in their faces and he's noticeably not been doing that this season which detracts from his game. We don't need another midfielder that can pass the ball ten yards sideways. I don't believe his discipline will hold up in the face of his waning legs either. Hopefully he'll prove me completely wrong. Either way, I don't think it tells us much about Glass' ability to recruit or show a progression in that area from McInnes. An area where we were extremely lacking.

I think Brown will be the next Hartley, good for a couple of months then a wee injury sees him unable to recover. I didn't see anything about him in our last encounter that suggests he could do a job for us, but hopefully as a coach he'll give us something. Jet is a player who converts his chances against us. Gallagher has had a poor season but otherwise should be a good signing. If McInnes had been making these signings we'd be questioning them (correctly). Like all the signings in our catchment they'll be borderline hit or miss. Much of it is down to luck. Jet would be an error probably.

Main, Taylor and Wilson were all signed early in their windows, as were Gleeson, Forrester, Tansey and Ojo. McInnes regularly signed players early in the window giving himself plenty of time to recruit further when he realised his signings were absolute horseshite.

Agree with this. We haven't had anything from the bench that caused confusion and made life difficult for defenders since magennis. That said, I don't think jet really bothered anyone with hold up play, it was more when he got turned and facing the goal when he caused problems. He barely won a header against Considine but he was half decent when shifted onto McKenzie. I'd like to see us do better.

Thought there was a fee due? According to Martindale.

Because "optics". It's made to be a thing because football is analysed to an absolutely insane degree and for some bizarre reason held to some ridiculously high level of social responsibility (I'm more than guilty of that too of course, see the Scott Brown thread for my hypocrisy in action). You normally would never hear who the offender in Russell's situation was, other than a brief mention perhaps, it's only his association with England that gets it in the news. If he'd been the driver, there'd be more of a case here. To be honest, I didn't even know that "letting someone drive your car" was an offence.

Meh, sounds like an absolute non-story to me (not to belittle the injured party) as far as Russell's involvement. The insurance thing is an irrelevance, it has zero bearing on whether an accident occurs or not. If my brother told me after two pints (double the limit) that he was fine to drive, I'd just believe him. I'm always a bit wary over stories like these, where the effects of alcohol are possibly overstated (I think the drink drive limits are correct). A 39 year old man after two pints? Probably about the reaction speed of a 70 year old, or perhaps someone older than 50 on medication. Or someone testing their eyesight after a bought of coronavirus. We've created a society based around driving 1 tonne metal objects to carry single occupants, we're going to get accidents. You can very well imagine that Russell is the type to drive a two tonne 4x4 for his 3 mile commute.

Been released by Shrewsbury....

They had no idea when the season would start, but had to assume early August or earlier depending on Europe (1st August in the end), with players returning start of July. April to June would have been the additional cost, so 3 months would have been the assumption. They did have the foresight too, as they addressed it at the time and said that they'd rather players did "work" for the community trust. It was a political decision really to be seen both to be working in the community and also be seen not to be taking hand outs in what is a well paid entertainment industry. I agree with their decision too, I think it was the right call. I backed that up, as I suspect just about every season ticket holder did, by not taking a reimbursement for the missed games. Had the players been furloughed I might have taken the club up on their offer. The players were fully employed this entire season, I just don't think the furlough would have made the difference financially that would allow them to do anything radical with the season ticket sales. That's not to criticise Motherwell's approach of course, which is really good. I haven't checked it out but I'm wondering if fans have the option to buy a ticket regardless? Some might still want to give something this season knowing the club will struggle with signings etc.

Will more than likely tune in for the last home game of the season, so we can give Logan a virtual applause for his service (assuming McGinn will get another year). Hopefully we'll tank them. Be interesting to see if Hedges starts, he looked a bit off the pace against Livi despite his goal. Hopefully another week will get him fit enough for the first hour.

Was it three months they were out of training for, four maybe? It would have had zero effect on the season ticket decision. Those salaries were, in effect, baked in to last season's costs already. We only missed out on four games' worth of gate receipts compared to a normal season, probably the equivalent hit to finishing in the bottom six. I knew there was no guarantee of seeing a match, just as there will be no guarantee this season. I'd rather the club was kept on a stable footing if possible and not in huge debt to Cormack or whoever.