dunning1874

When Luke Donnelly returned to the Championship he continued to be shit, which confirmed that League One is level. Maybe that will be the case with Lyon too, it's up for debate and we'll find out next season whether that's as a Morton player or another Championship club, but I also don't think it's obviously a terrible signing in the same way that signing Darren Hynes just because he's an ex-youth player would be. I competely agree with the gist of yiur point 1 and especially point 2, but don't agree that either of those points being fundamentally correct necessarily make Reece Lyon a bad signing in 2026. There is no evidence that Lewis McGregor or Alex King are better players than they were when we released them, and even suggesting signing either of them could only be put down to being desperate for a Morton academy product to make it at Morton. There is evidence that Reece Lyon or to take another example Josh Cooper are better players now than when they were punted. They're in different categories, one of which could only be put down to the subjective bias you point out which absolutely exists among the kind of weirdos who think it's still the 90s so we can sell teenagers for half a million every summer if we just try really hard , and so berate managers and potential investors about that fantasy at public meetings. The other can be put down to the well established phenomenon of some players who've previously not been good enough to play in the Championship becoming better footballers over a period of several years.

This reads a bit like cutting your nose off to spite your face; either a player who once didn't cut it in the Championship has improved in their time playing at a lower level and is now considered good enough for another crack at it or they aren't. If they are good enough (which remains to be seen with Lyon) then not bothering with a worthwhile signing just because they played for you already and left 4 years ago would be an odd approach to recruitment. In the last 3 years alone that would have ruled us out of signing Ali Crawford and Lewis Strapp for second spells, who were both very worthwhile signings with the former being massively improved on his return after being piss poor in his first spell.

Maybe he's only taking buttons out of the playing budget besides the coaching role, but it's hard to maintain much hope of Murray being ruthless and having the clearout needed when the 35 year old fourth choice winger is hanging about. He was far better than expected when we feared getting another Niall McGinn, but ultimately he's not good enough to start games in the Championship.

Among others, Gillespie, Quitongo, Muirhead and Blues had blotted copy books at this level (or lower) and were still part of our best season in the last 13 years. There are players who've had poor Championship seasons in the past without being Ally Roy, Steven Boyd or Gregor Buchanan levels of obvious dud signings.

I know you're joking but in case anyone from the club is reading this, I would demand a refund of my season ticket and cancel my MCT subscription if this happened.

Yeah we're all familiar with youth players being overrated just for being youth players and I've been guilty of it myself, but there's maybe the opposite effect with Lyon that we're still judging him on the player he was at 21 when he's now 26. If we were linked with a player who'd never played for Morton before who was widely agreed to be the best player at the club finishing 3rd in League One, who'd scored 9 league goals/13 in all competitions from midfield, was considered to be one of the best players in the division by fans of other League One clubs as well and had already turned down a new contract with his club because everyone knows he's going to have offers from the Championship, I don't think anyone would be looking at that as an unreasonable signing. Far from an obvious marquee signing that anyone's going to be doing cartwheels about and demanding we build the team around, but still a logical gamble for a club with one of the smaller Championship budgets to take on a player who's shown they're probably too good for the league below and might have it in them to make the step up again. If that player had been punted by Partick, Ayr or Raith four years earlier, with concerns about attitude expressed by some managers at those clubs, we probably wouldn't care and would think there's a reasonable chance they've improved both as a player and in their mentality in that time. If they had an increased end product over their seasons in League One and had already made their way back into full-time football having gone part-time initially that would be an easier argument to make. Plenty of players have made the step down to League One after flopping and come back to the Championship as better players, even without resorting to ridiculous examples that were almost entirely down to attitude like Shankland or Nisbet. Dylan Easton never had as prolific a season in League One as Lyon has just had, for example. Of course, there's every chance that the only reason this rumour has started in the first place is the youth player connection and he's not on Murray's radar at all, but I don't think Lyon is in the same category as players who've done nothing to suggest they've improved since leaving Morton like King, McGrattan or McGregor.

Easy to interpret that as an encouraging indication that Murray is deciding to be ruthless and the big clearout will happen. I'd also take this as confirmation that the first team budget is set regardless of Estrella and he knows what he's working with:

While I prefer a big update with everyone offered and released, I think it's fair enough keeping it quiet with the players as well. Clubs don't want to bare their arse by saying they've offered contracts to 6 players only to end up with 5 of them going elsewhere. Think Raith & Ross County are the only clubs who've done the whole squad update so it's not like it's been standard across the division to do the full update, although obviously you'd have nothing from Partick & Dunfermline yet as their seasons aren't over.

Aye, to be clear I don't think we should be breaking the budget structure (whatever it is) to keep Wilson or anyone else, if another club comfortably outbids us and we can't afford to compete with the offer then so be it. When saying I'd make him the best offer possible I mean I would be comfortable with him getting the largest wage possible within that wage structure, even if he misses half the season injured he makes enough of a difference when fit to justify it. While I like Blues and would keep him, I don't think he could be considered a marquee difference making player in the same way so that's why I'd make a distinction between the two of them.

Aye, that's a good point. When it comes to someone like Blues who I'd definitely want to keep, I also wouldn't want to make him the highest earner at the club to keep him which might be necessary to compete with other clubs, whereas with Wilson it would be a case of making the best offer we possibly can.

Really happy to keep Ballantyne, that's a good start. He's definitely the better option between him and Comrie and realistically we can't do much better. While we've had Jamie Brandon and Liam Grimshaw recently, having a right back of that calibre means they're gone in a season and needing to recruit one every summer means you'll eventually end up with a Tyler French level donkey, whereas Ballantyne is still a good Championship player who could feasibly be here for years.

As they acknowledge themselves it's just words and the only worthwhile response that will actually count for anything is to stop being shite on the park next season while making improvements off it, but that's still a good statement which accepts that things haven't been good enough; at least they've not got their heads in the sand about that.

If we do have the correctly ruthless clearout of around a dozen players and Wilson & Blues both take offers elsewhere then we would go from still having the core of a solid starting XI if we kept the players we want to keep, despite clearing out the majority of the squad, to pretty much needing an entirely new midfield. If it was to be Imrie taking them to Raith then at least we'd probably find out very early in the summer as those offers would be on the table already and it could inform Murray's decisions on others; personally I wouldn't change my mind on either Gillespie or MacPherson based on Wilson and/or Blues going, but I suspect Murray will try to keep them both regardless and it would make that a bit more palatable, although you absolutely cannot be expecting Gillespie to start games next season. Finding the talismanic Wilson replacement who holds the midfield together would be the most important signing of the summer, not that Murray has actually had him doing that anyway. I had a look at the stats with and without him in midfield over the three seasons of his second spell here and while it's not quite Allan Jenkins level, there's still a stark difference. If I've counted correctly it's actually 54 games each way as well. 23/24 to 25/26 league games with Wilson starting in midfield: P54 W17 D22 L15 F63 A58 PPG 1.351 (48.6 points over a 36 game season) 23/24 to 25/26 league games without Wilson starting in midfield: P54 W15 D13 L26 F58 A88 PPG 1.074 (38.6 points over a 36 game season) The difference in goals conceded and the draws turning into defeats is wild.

We only gave him the new contract at the end of February, he'll definitely be part of the squad.

Only listened to Murray's post-match interview today. Stunned at his brass neck. "Our bench at times has been so depleted, options so limited that it feels like I've been tweaking something every game and I don't really want to" You've tweaked nothing in any of the last five absolutely abysmal games! You did everything possible to maintain your obviously shite formation no matter what players were on the park! The two games where we did actually have so many injuries that he had no choice but to change the shape are funnily enough the only two wins in the last 11 games of the season.