Greacen2000

The question as I recall was 2-fold, more along the lines of “is it true that Xander stepped down after months of protests against him, and has MCT reached out to Zwolle or fan groups for more details on this?” There was an awkward silence in the room & Xander said something like “Emm was that a question for me?”, then the MCT reps advised that the answer to their part of the question was “no”, before moving on. So from my perspective he did not answer it at all. Maybe a more specific question aimed at him would be useful along the lines of “how do you reflect on events that led to the fan protests prior to your departure?” Or something like that. If the answer is that they had to make a business decision and unfortunately upset a lot of fans as Bram van Polen was a club legend, and looking back could maybe have done a better job on how the situation was managed & communicated to Bram & the fans or something like that, then I would be absolutely fine with it (I don’t want to put words in the guys mouth and have just made this up as an example) Ultimately I would just like to see some acknowledgement of it from Xander and get his side of it, as without this it’s a bit of an elephant in the room. Seeing photos of Zwolle fans brandishing banners calling for Xander to leave could understandably make some people wary of him so better to address it. There’s every possibility that it was a tiny minority of vocal fans and that most of them were fine with him - I have no idea (which is why I would quite like more information on the matter)

Yeah that’s pretty much in line with my own findings & how I see the situation, but I would still like to hear how Xander reflects on it as it felt like the question was dodged (or maybe he didn’t understand it) at the Q&A. Ultimately a CEO has to make tough decisions & not every one of them is going to satisfy fans. It’s hard to argue with results on & off the field during his time at the club.

I believe the vote was due to close last night so hopefully we will see an announcement of the results at some point today. I have heard enough at this stage to vote yes/yes, but before going all in on this, I would like the following details to come out during the exclusivity period (assuming we proceed) 1. the reasons behind & timing of Czaikowskis departure from Zwolle 2. assurances around what happens in the event of Estrella defaulting on their financial commitment to the club (eg shares being transferred back to mct) 3. confirmation that there aren’t any tax issues arising from a sale of shares 4. exact details of how & to what extent EFG can exercise veto rights over financial decisions (eg setting first team budget) if those points are answered I would be happy to see us go forward with the deal

We charge £150 for a season pass & £80 for a half season, so it actually works out a bit cheaper than £20/month, but I do appreciate that means opposition fans who might otherwise fork out for a months pass to watch a single game won’t do the same for a half season pass. On the other hand the club has to get the balance right between providing a service that generates revenue vs potentially cannibalising other revenue if it leads to decreased gate numbers. I buy my tickets week by week because of my work & family situation, and know for sure that there have been a few times this season that given the option I might have streamed the game instead of attending so at £20/month there’s a chance this could end up costing the club money. Maybe the answer is to allow pay per game for “overseas fans” and price it the same as a match ticket. Not sure if there are maybe rules to prevent this?

The £500 thing is to stop people in the UK from buying them as there is a broadcast blackout for Saturday 3pm games (overseas subscribers get a code they enter at checkout that removes the £500). Any attempts we make to update our streaming offerings would be limited by this unfortunately, although I do think some clubs offer audio commentary

They have about 40k followers on YouTube & Instagram, and about 20k on TikTok. Those numbers are so impressive that I am actually inclined to wonder if they have come from click farms/bots but maybe I’m just too cynical. I think Xander did mention that they have attracted 100k people to watch their match streams but the only way I can get to this number is either by combining their total # subs across the 3 platforms or maybe by taking the total # views combined from all their historic match streams (which usually get about 1000 views, with a handful of exceptions that had much more)

Taking the clubs I mentioned above, even with decline in population Inverclyde is comparable to Paisley & Kilmarnock so I still think there could be scope for us to increase attendances if we got things right on & off the park for a sustained period. In terms of online engagement & attracting international interest via social media & merchandise etc, it feels like it’s a bit of a free hit if the guys have stuff in place to let us try & do that without having to take any big risks

Very positive meeting with the exception of a few times it went off track with stuff like Easdales chat & disagreements over disbanding of the u18s team I thought both guys spoke very well and their footballing CVs are impressive (as are those of the others involved in the group). I am actually feeling less concerned about the exit strategy now than I was before. They were clear that a 3 year deal doesn’t mean 3 and done - they are looking at it as a long term partnership and there’s every chance it will continue beyond the 3 years depending on how it works out. Others have raised concerns about the comment that at some point in the future they could sell the group to another investor (meaning their share in the club would be sold to another party without our oversight). From my point of view this makes complete sense - these guys believe that by collecting a group of partner clubs, they can improve the performance & value of the clubs via their investment, expertise & technology. If this is a success then they could sell this group on to other investors and walk away with a profit. I don’t see the problem with this - it answers the ”what’s in it for them?” question, and is only going to have a chance of happening if they are successful in improving the teams in the group. It sounded like Xander was open to having clauses in the share transfer that would revert shares back to MCT in the event of Estrella going out of business or failing to meet their financial commitments - again, answering one of the big concerns I had over the deal. There were quite a few questions/comments (both on here and in the room) about their plans being unrealistic/over ambitious due to the size of our club, general malaise of our performances in the last 40 years & ability to attract more fans due to proximity with the big 2 in Glasgow. Personally when looking back at the past 40 years i see clubs like Kilmarnock, who were only getting 1500-2000 fans as recently as the last time we were in the top flight and more recently St Mirren, who as a fan-owned club have managed to establish themselves in the top flight through being well-run on & off the field. Both of these clubs are closer to Glasgow than us & for most of their existence would have been considered similar sized clubs to us, so I don’t think it’s unreasonable to suggest that we could attract more fans if we had a sustained period of improved performance. This of course takes time, but represents an opportunity nonetheless. There were quite a few cries along the lines of “aye but this is scottish fitba, it’s different up here” etc. I actually think having input from guys with this background who aren’t shackled by perceptions of what is/isn’t possible in Scotland is a positive thing. If we are going to reject their ambitious vision & accept that we are the size & level we are, then at best will always stay exactly where we are and never improve.

I took that as meaning that rather than just being a “sponsor your local team” deal with local companies(or relying on the goodwill of fans like Brian), having a more robust approach to how they handle data would allow them to approach a wider range of sponsors by being able to provide stats on the levels of engagement & demographics that our outreach would give them. But yeah I get that at one point he uttered words along the lines of “we give sponsors the fan data”. Clearly they couldn’t share personal information due to dpa/gdpr etc (something these guys are definitely aware of) so that part of the answer was maybe poorly worded.

I think the risk of this happening is very low. It’s been made pretty clear that it’s the clubs decision on whether or not to use the products on offer(and with regard to the analytics stuff it was stated at the meeting that it would be up to Murray & his staff). If we do start using some or all of these services, a decision not to renew in the future wouldn’t require a special resolution by the board so Estrella would have limited/no power to force us into doing so. With them having 2 board appointees there are also legal responsibilities to be considered - I’m pretty sure it would be against company law for a director of company A to try and push them into an unfavourable contract with company B when the director has a stake in company B and the deal is unfavourable to company A.

Having read & re-read the document a few times I am feeling pretty positive about it. I think the money involved is fair in terms of valuation of the equity they would receive. Having a significant share in the club gives them some skin in the game and an incentive to make a success of it. I would definitely like the deal to be structured in a way that their shares are vested over the 3 year period as the payments are recieved, or if the share transfer happens up front then have some sort of reverse ratchet in place to return the shares to MCT in the event of Estrella not meeting their commitment. In terms of what happens after the 3 years, I would expect that will depend on how the club and EFG have performed over that time - I certainly wouldn’t expect them to just be walking away holding on to their shareholding while putting no more into the club - that would be in nobody’s interests including theirs. Having some sort of clause in there to cover any potential exit strategy would be good - maybe setting terms that give MCT first refusal on buying back their shares, or even just a portion of them to take us over 75%. The thing I’m most impressed with is the clear strategy to modernise how the club operates rather than focusing on short term investment on the field. Looking into the backgrounds of the guys involved in Estrella also gives me a lot of comfort that they are the real deal and aren’t from the Ketan Makwana school of made up LinkedIn spiv fantasists. On top of the cash investment and potential value of any tech we use, there is actually value in having guys of that calibre & expertise being involved in the running of the club.

Info pack went out with tonight’s MCT update. Definitely worth the wait to get so much detailed information in there. Absolute night & day in comparison to the document that we were sent by the interim board with details of this seasons Dalrada proposal. Great work by Toby & team thanks for your efforts guys

Not sure where he is fitness-wise but I noticed Stuparevic was released by Motherwell in January - could be a good option to offer him a deal til the end of the season if he has recovered from his injury. Murray said there was a possibility of bringing in more players if the right ones were available and we can still sign free agents if I’m not mistaken.

Same article suggests Brophys injury nothing serious - he was taken off as a precaution & Murray expects him to be available for Saturday which is great news too.

Dominant performance for the majority of the game - 5-0 would still have flattered Dunfermline. It’s hard to believe just how big an improvement we have seen under Murray (notwithstanding stenny) in such a short space of time. The entire defence deserve massive praise - Ballantyne & Delaney have somehow transformed into Cafu & Maldini, White has looked very solid (albeit with 1 or 2 dodgy moments we got away with), and Shug -just wow…what a player. I was worried when I heard Storer was injured, but Johnson has looked really assured. Mental to think that a makeshift defence with a CM at CB, and young loanee keeper & CB can have performed so well in the last 2 games. It gave me the fear prior to the Raith game, but my fears were unfounded. Garrity & Moff were both excellent, but again often lacked the final ball. In particular Moffat repeatedly got into good positions only to balloon a cross out of the park. He needs to just simplify things a bit & go for an easier pass instead of trying to float it in. Gillespie & MacPherson excellent in midfield too - Gillespie looked done under Imrie, but now he is playing 90 mins twice in 4 days. Brophy took his goal well but was breathing out his arse by about 55 mins and should already have been hooked by the time he went down injured - hopefully he is ok. Main looked better last night than against Raith - he kept pressing right up til the end when the rest of the team looked to have run out of steam. Nothing really came off for him but I’m glad to have him in & think he will be a useful player to have in the squad. Game management at 2-0 up and against 10 men was poor, and we could easily have let them back into the game. Maybe a combination of tiredness along with just naturally taking the foot off the gas when 2 in front. Definitely need to work on that. I never thought I would be saying this but I don’t miss Imrieball in the slightest. edit to add - not sure if any of you stand in the middle back area of the shed(dunning?) but someone in front of us was dropping the worst farts I’ve ever smelled for the entirety of the game. It was so bad that I missed the incident leading to the 2nd penalty as I was literally bowled over & reeling from the stench of a fresh one he had just dropped. Absolutely howling

Thought at the time it was a stonewall penalty Watching the highlights & seeing it from the other angle I thought it looked like a good tackle Slowing it down and watching it frame by frame VAR style, he went in with both feet, taking the ball cleanly with his left leg while catching Gillespie with his right. The sort of decision that could go either way and whichever call the ref makes about 50% of people will disagree with it.

Biggest cheer of the afternoon & well deserved. Definitely the highlight of the day

Shaw was always going to come on if we were still looking for a goal, considering the lack of other attacking options on the bench. He was ok - there weren’t any “WTF SHAW” moments and he did some good defensive work as hamcam said so fair play to him for that. Im surprised so many on here are saying McPherson was shite - I thought he had a good game. Quite a few folk around me were shouting for Gillespie to be hooked too - he did misplace a few passes but overall I thought he was excellent too.

Ref was absolutely dreadful. Allowed Raith to get away with persistent fouling and gave us nothing the entire game. On the balance of play it feels like we should have won that but you can’t win games without scoring and we didn’t really give their keeper much to do. Lopota-white had a good game and looks like he will be a solid signing. Imrie took a bit of abuse from the shed when things were getting heated near the end so I though it was a touch of class that he still came over to applaud the Morton fans with his hand on heart after the match.

I’m a wee bit concerned about our defence here. Assuming shugs filling in at CB blues is going to need to put in some shift if our midfield isn’t going to be overrun. On the flip side it’s a very attacking lineup and good to see the new boys getting a start.

Accounts from whom? Are you suggesting that he is back down at wolves playing for their u21 as opposed to being injured, or do you mean that the injury occurred when playing for them?

are you talking about people figuring out who this guy is, or are you suggesting that this is part of something bigger that’s going on? How is this related to MCT? Sorry I'm not being disingenuous here I’m just finding your posts about this a bit vague and would really like to understand what you are getting at

Might be easier if you told us or even gave us a clue. I’ve looked on LinkedIn, companieshouse, FB & X, can’t see anything out of the ordinary. Looks like he has previously had a couple of coaching roles (with sfa and st Mirren women’s team). Assuming it’s the same person he has made a few appearances on the sammons pizzeria podcast too. What are you getting at?

I think we need to be very careful about naming anyone on here regards to the legal action. We can all search back and see what has been said by certain people in the past, but whoever is behind the legal action, I expect they wouldn’t be able to comment (for the same reasons MCT didn’t give any comment on the matter). We don’t want to open the forum or ourselves (or by extension MCT if any posters are members) to allegations of cyber bullying/witch hunt type behaviour.

Difficult to say without knowing the specifics of the case, but in more general terms I assume they could stand to make some financial gain if the case goes in their favour. Maybe also a moral victory if they feel they have been somehow wronged. The flip side of it this is at what cost would it come? Once the details become known I would expect the individual to become a pariah who would not be able to show their face at Cappielow again.