TRVMP

It's not a matter of timing at all. It's a matter of them hauling the buckets out with absolutely zero clarity over the stakes and the needs. If we get to October having raised, let's say for the sake of argument, 30k via the fighting fund, what does that sum actually mean for us as a going concern? If everything else remains pretty much equal - no new major sponsor, no new investment via a share issue - how much time does that buy us? What's the next deadline? Without answers to these questions, my assumption - and I think it's a fair one - is that we've got our head above water for one big gulp of air before sinking back under, and the best case scenario from there is that GMFC enters administration. At which point we've already launched a fighting fund and it's old news and people will wonder what was done with the money they already put in.

This is very much absent from the 'fighting fund' statement. I have USD$2,500 ready to go. I'll send it directly to GMFC's bank account as soon as I see someone from Morton's BoD face a camera/interviewer and say that this is do or die and we're insolvent in October unless a specific amount of money is raised, and what that amount is. This isn't contingent on them doing anything else to forestall it other than asking for money. This isn't contingent on anyone resigning or anything like that. It isn't contingent on knowing what the next 'deadline' is or the amount required to meet that one. I just want to know the actual amount in pounds sterling, give or take a few grand, that we need to survive into October without the club going insolvent. Dumbarton's fighting fund was set up after they entered administration and it had a specific amount of money earmarked for it. Morton's fighting fund was set up in a post-AGM fugue because someone asked them to, and it has no specifics attached to it at all. It's absolutely not good enough. And they asked us to vote for that period of exclusivity, by the way.

The ringfencing was known at the time of the vote, as was getting John Laird waddling around the place. We have to take the rough with the smooth here. I went for it because I thought Bonar and Dalrada had more nous about them than turned out to be available to us, and that they'd whip us into shape a bit. Instead he was completely hands-off and Laird had the run of the place, to completely ill effect, unsurprising in retrospect but what good is hindsight when it comes to these votes?

I'm glad Estrella have walked. It was a nice idea but it was clear it would never work out long-term.

If it was the Estrella money that would be a total of 600k, with 100k at the start and the next 100k in January. How much are we expecting the fighting fund to raise in multiples of 100k?

If someone from the club wants to put their name to words like 'without x pounds raised we will go to the wall by y' I'll donate a four figure sum, by the way. But they're not going to do that because it's obviously not true!

Do something positive for the club? Like buy it? Contribute to it every month? Like over a thousand of us are already doing? Barr himself said last night the outstanding Dalrada monies are a drop in the ocean - his exact words - when it comes to keeping Morton operational. So how much are you aiming for with the fighting fund? 2x what Dalrada owes? 3x? When does the cloth-cutting start, exactly? Today? You're OK with not signing any more players?

CS, see the post from CHC above. He's not the only one who thinks it's unclear. Graham said last night we're not in imminent bother, that the situation isn't existential. But is it aye? Is the club going to say out loud that the fighting fund is what we need to keep the club alive? Am I the complacent one or am I going off what they said in plain English last night? Am I the complacent one or is it the guys responsible for the club's income thinking they can just ring a bell and have the fans put their hands in their pocket on command? Because I promise them this: this will only work once. You won't get five grand in a couple of hours if you're pulling this stunt again in 18 months' time. I think it's completely inappropriate for the club to be asking for this without an "or else". What happens if we don't? What is the actual outcome here? What is the exact shortfall that needs to be met - is it in excess of the outstanding Darada monies? What was the plan to deal with that prior to last night?

I don't think the club should be doing this. It's the wrong approach at the wrong time, and if and when we truly are in existential trouble - when the lights will go off without an injection of money from Morton fans and the wider Scottish football community - we've burnt a bunch of goodwill. I wouldn't put money in a bucket for a club like Livi or Dundee that's been in trouble several times over the past 20 years because they've burnt that goodwill for me. I probably would chuck a couple of quid at a club that's lived within its means but had a bad year for an unforeseeable reason. I think that, on the current trajectory, we're closer to the former than the latter.

I've been a paid-up member of MCT for seven years and I've increased by monthly donation twice in that time. If that's not being part of the attempted solution, only contributing to the black hole of the Midfielders Fighting Fund is, then so be it.

We're debt-free. We're told on the one hand that Dalrada will meet their commitments and that Estrella were exaggerating the scope of the problems, but we're also told we're going to face a very lean autumn. OK. Then try making money in a way that's not begging, perhaps. Cut the budget, stop signing midfielders. Are we going to live within our means, even if that means relegation, or are we going to do a Clyde and rely on the Scottish football fraternity to fund our squad until their patience runs out?

People can downvote this if they want but it's not completely untrue, is it? Dalrada were welcomed to the club with an overwhelming mandate from the ownership. I certainly voted for them.

I won't be putting a penny into this. Absolute riddy. I subscribe to MCT, I get a new kit every season, I often get some other miscellaneous tat when I'm over, I have a brick at Cappielow, and I now sponsor a kit as well. I sub to MCT because as club owners we need to subsidize the club, same as every other team in the Championship is subsidized by its owners. I buy things from the club because the club means a lot to me and I want to help it, plus I like the kits and the tat. I've sponsored a kit both to help the club and because it's good to show players that they're valued on and off the park. But just throwing money into a black hole should be reserved for when there's absolutely no other option. And we haven't even scratched the surface of options yet. This is a complete embarrassment and I'll have nothing to do with it. Hell mend us when we truly do hit an existential crisis. May we not live to regret crying wolf.

I've heard enough from Xander. Time to get this clog-wearing windmill-humper to fuck.

If another club in our division had the begging bowl out because of issues like these I'd be telling them to ram it. This is entirely of our own making. We relied too heavily on one sponsor, we didn't make adequate preparations for their winding down their sponsorship, we're still sticking our head in the sand about the incoming funds, and we're apparently reaching out for soft loans without the knowledge of the membership. This is about 25% hard luck but 75% complacency. And we've signed a boatload of shan midfielders with what little money we do have. If we ever do face a serious doomsday scenario for unforeseen reasons then I certainly hope we haven't blown all our goodwill on the current situation.