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Squad for next Season


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I'm pretty sure if Dundee United had the will to make Imrie their manager, then Imrie would become their manager. They're a big club, relatively speaking, who qualified for Europe last season, and Imrie would back himself to succeed. 

But neither Morton or Imrie are fashionable enough for him to be considered. He'd need to get us promoted for teams like that to start looking at him.

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Dundee United are the one Premiership club I've looked at as a concern for Imrie going. Motherwell were never likely to appoint him due to Hamilton connections, Aberdeen are never going to appoint a manager based on performance in the Championship, Hibs are also unlikely to if they sacked Johnson. No one else is facing even a remote threat of the sack, McInnes and Mackkkay included even if they get relegated. It's the same reason I don't really want Dundee United relegated, because if they're down here and so are we it's the obvious appointment.

The timing of this probably works in our favour though. Imrie's an ambitious manager who'd back himself to succeed but this would be a particularly shite time to take over Dundee United, where a manager could end up with a relegation on their CV through little fault of their own. For someone like Imrie who'd be on his first top flight job and isn't considered as fashionable off the back of his playing career as some others that could set him back several years.

Dundee United are also showing signs of significantly reigning in their spending, having barely done anything in January while the owner's comments at the AGM last week basically amounted to saying he doesn't have a bottomless pit of money and can't keep subsidising losses the way he has been for the last five years. Not only does that raise question marks over quite how appealing a job it is (though obviously a step up from us) it also makes me doubt they'll be going out and paying compensation to get a manager in another job when they're already going onto their third of the season, with the first having been on an expensive and lengthy contract.

They also have an incompetent Sporting Director who seems to be both a total arsehole and as big a problem in their recent failings as the managers, who doesn't look like going anywhere.

Imrie is inevitably going to get a move to a bigger club eventually, but if the daft media narrative around big bad streetwise Morton keeps us unfashionable and leads to the likes of Bullen, Coyle and Murray being looked at instead for the time being then brilliant. It's maybe better having the Dundee United job come up now and seeing them appoint someone to the end of next season, rather than only coming up in the summer after relegation when a good manager could look at it as a great opportunity for a title.

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Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Oh Lord, Brian Wake

 

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25 minutes ago, Charles_Joe said:

The bigger concern, for me, is Martindale taking another job. You’d half expect he’d have an input to his replacement, and Imrie seems a fit. 

When Martindale goes Livingston will sink to their natural level as a Championship/seaside league basketcase. Any manager would be foolish to try and stem that irresistible force of footballing gravity and Imrie knows the score more than most. 

There's absolutely no reason why - with form at the right time and decent fortune - Imrie can't replicate the same level of achievement with us. 

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The site is supposed to be a place for the extended 'family' of Morton supporters - having an affinity with people that you don't know, because you share a love of your local football club. It's not supposed to be about point scoring and showing how 'clever' or 'funny' you are, or just being downright rude and offensive to people you don't know, because you can get away with it. Unfortunately, it seems the classic case of people who have little standing/presence in real life, use this forum as a way of making themselves feel as if they are something. It's sad, and I've said that before..

 

So, having been on Morton forums for about 15 years I guess, I've had enough... well done t*ssers, another Morton supporter driven away. You can all feel happy at how 'clever' you are

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Morton are still a bigger club than Livvi IMO. As soon as our sleeping fan base believe that we’re seriously going for promotion, they’ll return in their thousands. Livvi struggle to top our attendances even now, when that belief takes some amount of shifting sands. I’m hoping Dougie knows he can be (not just part of but) the catalyst for the return of the real Greenock Morton and what that means to Inverclyde. My main concern is that other club chairmen etc. will be watching our live Friday night games and see Dougie’s stellar organisational and man management skills in plain sight. Then to listen to his pre and post match interviews must tell them so much about his character as well as his abilities. I hope they’re not watching or listening.

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47 minutes ago, vikingTON said:

When Martindale goes Livingston will sink to their natural level as a Championship/seaside league basketcase. Any manager would be foolish to try and stem that irresistible force of footballing gravity and Imrie knows the score more than most. 

There's absolutely no reason why - with form at the right time and decent fortune - Imrie can't replicate the same level of achievement with us. 

Agree. There will always be occasional anomalies where certain clubs perform above their natural level for their size, sometimes even for several seasons, but as Hamilton have demonstrated it's not sustainable in the long-term and they will inevitably gravitate back down to a level more commensurate to their size. It's only a matter of time for that to happen to Livi.

If we ever get promoted it remains to be seen if our fanbase would grow enough to sustain us there in the long term, 30-odd years of mediocracy will not be turned around overnight. But we've already seen in the last year some signs that Dougie has reawakened at least some of our dormant support, so we'd at least have a fighting chance.

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1 hour ago, Charles_Joe said:

The bigger concern, for me, is Martindale taking another job. You’d half expect he’d have an input to his replacement, and Imrie seems a fit. 

Not that I'm an avid viewer of Open Goal but I do check out a few of their interviews with particular folk of interest. 

On the surface Martindale seems a bit of a "character", however he pretty much runs Livingston, he makes financial decisions, has personally built a gym and keeps up maintenance of the club. Without him Livingston is nothing. 

I no doubt believe what your saying is true but I cannot fathom a successful Livingston without Martindale involved. 

As pointed out above, I am resigned to losing Dougie eventually but he has a real opportunity to do something special at Morton and have a real legacy as manager. If we are pushing for the title or in the play offs come the end of the season people will flock back in numbers. And if we even fall at these hurdles, it's about having a team that people are entertained in watching and can be proud that they have left everything on the pitch - which is exactly what this team does. That's enough to turn even a couple hundred fans, as proven with recent attendances.

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18 minutes ago, DreamOakTree said:

Morton are still a bigger club than Livvi IMO. As soon as our sleeping fan base believe that we’re seriously going for promotion, they’ll return in their thousands. Livvi struggle to top our attendances even now, when that belief takes some amount of shifting sands. I’m hoping Dougie knows he can be (not just part of but) the catalyst for the return of the real Greenock Morton and what that means to Inverclyde. My main concern is that other club chairmen etc. will be watching our live Friday night games and see Dougie’s stellar organisational and man management skills in plain sight. Then to listen to his pre and post match interviews must tell them so much about his character as well as his abilities. I hope they’re not watching or listening.

We see this argument a lot that we are bigger than Livvy, Ross County, Hamilton etc etc and should be on a par with St Mirren etc but how long can that go on for? How do you measure it? How far back does the history need to go to prove it? 

Look at Livvy in the last 25 years-   10 seasons in the top league and counting, 10k seated stadium which includes offices, training pitches etc,  won the Challenge cup, won the League cup, got to another league cup final,  won the 2nd Tier, played in Europe, been down to the 4rd tier and back up to the Premiership.

Aye their crowds are shit but they've achieved a hell of a lot more than us in the last 25 years.  What we got? 1 League cup semi final appearance and came close to promotion once or twice. Our crowds aren't exactly something to be boasting about these days compared to 15-20 years ago.

It's been 34 years since we last played top flight football. Think we need to get away from thinking we are sleeping giant and are a big club compared to others who have achieved a hell of a lot more than we have in recent times. We are a classic Championship level club these days.

With Dougie and Dalrada, we do have a chance to change that though, time will tell.

 

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24 minutes ago, Madton said:

We see this argument a lot that we are bigger than Livvy, Ross County, Hamilton etc etc and should be on a par with St Mirren etc but how long can that go on for? How do you measure it? How far back does the history need to go to prove it? 

Look at Livvy in the last 25 years-   10 seasons in the top league and counting, 10k seated stadium which includes offices, training pitches etc,  won the Challenge cup, won the League cup, got to another league cup final,  won the 2nd Tier, played in Europe, been down to the 4rd tier and back up to the Premiership.

Aye their crowds are shit but they've achieved a hell of a lot more than us in the last 25 years.  What we got? 1 League cup semi final appearance and came close to promotion once or twice. Our crowds aren't exactly something to be boasting about these days compared to 15-20 years ago.

It's been 34 years since we last played top flight football. Think we need to get away from thinking we are sleeping giant and are a big club compared to others who have achieved a hell of a lot more than we have in recent times. We are a classic Championship level club these days.

With Dougie and Dalrada, we do have a chance to change that though, time will tell.

 

To be fair how many of those seasons were down to them being financially doped out of their eyeballs?  They've also had 2 administrations since we had our own.

From going down to the 4th tier and back up they had the good fortunes of being (finally) run competently and had a good coach that seems to have masterminded the whole rise and has stuck with them.

In all that time we had the Raes whose plans were let McInally have as much time as he wants in the job, spunk as much money as possible on 3rd tier players and "bring a friend".

It really grates on me just where we could be if Douglas Rae had just let someone who knew how to run a football club take the reigns.

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here today, gone to hell

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3 hours ago, DreamOakTree said:

I’m basing my argument on consistent historical trends. When my Dad first took me to Cappielow in the early 60’s we were getting crowds of around 1500. When we started looking like genuine promotion contenders in 64 the supporters came flooding back as they’ve always done throughout our history. This was repeated in the late 70’s when Andy Ritchie arrived and led another promotion charge. Again we went from average crowds of 1500 to around 8000 for home games and 13000 overall, albeit in the Premiership. Similarly when McInnes, Lindberg and Rajamaki led us on another promotion push our crowds rose from around the same historic 1500 average when underperforming, to at least 3 times that number. Even in the lowest tier under Cowboy McCormack then the following season, again from around the same 1500 average, we recorded the record crowd Figures at just about every away ground we visited. For me it’s an undeniable outcome whenever we’ve looked like genuine promotion contenders, and a trend that I’ve no doubt will be repeated.

 

2012-2013 we were top for much of the season and struggled to get 2000 every week, not far off what we are now.

No chance in hell we are going to have fans flooding back in their thousands. We struggled to just over 4k for our biggest game in a generation against Aberdeen at Hampden.

We are right in the promotion hunt this season and we had 1800 on Saturday.

When are you expecting all these extra thousands to show up?

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csacas.png

The long odds on these markets are usually just for a bit of fun but check the nick of this. Yes, "Jim McInally" is going to get the Dundee United job because he played there before decimalization. 

Imrie is noticeable by his absence. I'm sure they'd give you 20/1 if you called and asked.

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9 hours ago, TRVMP said:

Regarding crowds - worth remembering that Inverclyde has shrunk significantly in recent decades and that the McInnes-Lindberg Era, while certainly having a good home support, saw its average significantly inflated by games against Dundee United (near enough a capacity crowd) and to a lesser extent Dunfermline. 

Not saying we shouldn't aim for the stars but there's a danger to recalling these past trends too fondly: they tend to result in overspending. 

I'm sure no Morton board would ever be daft enough to budget for crowds of 4000 when we were newly promoted to the second tier.

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Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Brian Wake my Lord, Brian Wake

Oh Lord, Brian Wake

 

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  • 1 month later...

Not surprised he has given everything for the club and deserves a chance to try and keep pushing himself to the highest level. Bit of a shame with his injury and we might not see him again. Not a massive rebuilding job in the summer but can see quite a few moving on for a different challenge perhaps. 

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