Greacen2000

Sportscene just showed Hopkin in the stand watching Queens Park v Dunfermline. The commentator said he has been brought in by QP to “help out” but didn’t mention in what capacity. I can’t find any info on it on P&B or anywhere else either - anyone heard about this? Hoping he will be taking over as manager

Ah ok so “issues” = “being notified of their release” thanks for clearing that up

What are these issues that come out after players have been released?

It could be that or it could just be in support of his friend? I know Strapp has attended several games as a fan since being let go so that wouldn’t suggest bitterness towards the club(although the same isn’t neccesarily true about his feelings towards the gaffer).

Any chance of a bit more info or a bit of a hint as to what this relates to? I thought that there might be some info on the podcast but there was no mention of it when they were discussing the AGM. I missed the meeting as was at a gig on Monday

yip I was thinking the same thing. Stack in Newcastle was brilliant too before it got shut down. There is a lot you can do with shipping containers and it needn't necessarily be temporary. With the proximity to Clydeport I would like to think there might be scope for some sort of a partnership/sponsorship deal with Peel Ports to provide the containers if we were to go down that route

Absolute legend - hopefully he did somersaults in front of their fans

Nothings been warped apart from maybe in your own mind. I think I’ve been pretty clear in stating my belief that having a productive relationship with the tele would benefit the club more than cutting them off would. The reason I asked the question is because I do not agree with your assertion that cutting ties with the tele would be any sort of meaningful punishment to teach them the error of their ways. They could still publish multiple Morton stories per week just by lifting stuff from the clubs own output.

Do you genuinely believe that if we cut off access to the tele that they won’t still be able to maintain their current number of Morton related back pages? Thereby proving what we already knew about the teles headlines this week I expect one of the 2 he mentions will be Oakley (I’ve heard he had to get an operation). I would be very concerned if (as I expect) the other one is either Crawford or Gillespie

How much of the teles Morton related content is dependent upon them having special privileges & access to the club? By my reckoning (based on browsing the last 10 or so on their website) I would say it’s less than 30%. Certainly the match preview & match report stuff could still run even if we cut them loose - all it would take is for them to buy a ticket for their correspondent, and keep tabs on our social media output. So your idea of punishing them by denying the ability to publish their precious Morton content is a bit of a non starter really. And as you said - Senga isn’t interested in it anyway so maybe they don’t need it? Again - all I’m saying here is that it would be better for the club to try and make an effort to guide their relationship with the local paper in a more productive direction. Burning bridges will do the precise opposite of that with absolutely no upside to it

I did add the caveat of “who might not be active online/on social media”. It’s also worth noting that our home attendances as well as subs on the main social media outlets are between 1-2k, while the tele has daily circulation of around 5.5k so let’s not underestimate the reach that it has within our target area. Again I’m not defending them - I’m on the same page as you in terms of the tripe they have been peddling. Nobody is saying they should have free reign to continue publishing this sort of shite, but what you are proposing wouldn’t stop it. Something needs to be done about it - I just don’t think that burning our bridges with them is the best course of action.

This being the case, you could probably give him a pass for the one about us having no money to strengthen the squad (since the article itself was literally just a series of quotes with nothing else added). Not so much with the more recent one he posted after the club statement. That article contained some hum dingers such as " in urgent need of significant investment to strengthen off-field operations and not the team after running up consecutive six-figure annual losses" and "in the wake of financial losses in the region of £200,000 to £300,000" - both of which would suggest to the casual/uneducated reader that the club is currently(or has recently been) running at that sort of a loss and in financial dire straits, when in fact this is something that was the norm under the previous regime, and something which (so far at least) we have been able to avoid under community ownership. The unaccredited quote about "a source" saying we had farmed Garrity out to raise some extra funds sounds a bit fishy too - clearly he is not a high earner, and the gaffer has already stated that he has been sent out to get game time under his belt because we are well covered in his area. Having said that, I don't think that this should just be about the journalist who wrote the copy and certainly wouldn't want any sort of witch hunt against him - the responsibility for everything printed lies with the editorial team. This is a Morton & Greenock Telegraph issue and shouldn't be about individuals

What gives you that idea?

Of course I understand the distinction you quite rightly make between the BBC & the Greenock telegraph, but a similar comparison could be made about the relative size & supporter base of the 2 clubs. As such, I still think its a point worth making. In other words, if we banned the BBC, it wouldn't make much difference (since we already get little to no coverage from them). Likewise if Rangers banned the tele, it would be utterly pointless since it is not at all dependent on such a small town rag for coverage & publicity. Morton, on the other hand are a small local club and are somewhat reliant on the small local rag to provide coverage to people in the local area (who might not be active on social media/online etc). A match preview or a feature in the telegraph during the week could potentially attract a few more punters through the doors, and keep us in the hearts & minds of the people who we want to be attracting to the games. For that reason, it is definitely in the clubs best interests not to burn any bridges

Maybe you’re right, but to me it would just feel a bit like the way rangers banned the BBC from ibrox and stopped doing any press with them for a few years - they did not come out of that looking good at all. Much as the tele are guilty of shoddy clickbait journalism, it still might be better for the club to try and be in a position to influence the coverage as opposed to cutting them loose. At best, it could lead to the tele seeing the error of their ways and trying to make amends (which I find unlikely). At worst, it might increase the teles propensity to publish negative articles about the club, no doubt including more shite along the lines of “TELE REPORTERS BANNED FROM CAPPIELOW” (a far more likely outcome IMO). So yeah, the tele is a dirty rag and deserves to get emptied, but if we are taking an outcome based approach, I don’t think that would be the smartest move for the club to make.

While I agree with your sentiments, I’m not convinced this would make any difference(and could possibly make matters worse). For example, if the club had already taken this step it wouldn’t have stopped the tele from printing the articles this week (since they were both put together by selectively lifting a few snippets from content the club had released anyway). Much as the tele is definitely veering into fake news territory and probably deserves to be cut off by the club, I don’t think this would be in the clubs best interest and could be a case of cutting of the nose to spite the face. I would much rather that the club reach out to the tele, make these concerns known & try to build a working relationship that will hopefully avoid this sort of crap finding it’s way onto the back page. Fans making their feelings known to the tele might also help - either through the comments section on the articles online, or via letter/email if they don’t want to have to sign up.

More clickbait nonsense from the tele. Like it or not, this has potential to influence peoples perceptions of the club (who might not keep an eye on our social media content etc) and certainly won't attract any extra fair weather punters along. It also has potential to be picked up by other news outlets and impact the wider perceptions of our club (although I am less concerned about this part). I know that we can’t reasonably expect the club to be able to have any sort of editorial oversight on what the tele prints, but I do wonder if this sort of garbage could be easily avoided if there was closer collaboration between the clubs press office & the sports desk at the tele. I’m not criticising Gareth or anyone else at the club here - I do not know enough to be able to say exactly where the disconnect lies, but the way this SHOULD work is that the tele contacts the club to advise of the story they will be running, and ask the club for comment. Either this hasn’t happened, or the club haven’t been responsive. Twice this week the tele has run with misleading headlines to sensationalist nonsense articles that have been 100% based on lifting quotes - first from a post match interview and then from the press release - and publishing them out of context. Total gutter journalism. If proper journalism had taken place (including engagement with the club beyond simply lifting a few quotes), these same stories could easily have been more along the lines of - ”Imrie plays waiting game as no deadline day signings expected” and “Club prioritising long term improvements over panic signings” or something like that. At this point I really hope that the club contacts the tele and does the following - 1. Offer something like a weekly meeting/presser where Gareth gives Chris(or whoever) the relevant updates for the week, positioning them within the proper context as well as fielding any questions 2. Politely suggest that before publishing sensationalist clickbait nonsense stories, the tele contacts the club for comment & input. This would be win/win as the club would hopefully have less damaging & misleading content published about them, while the tele could claim “exclusive” and actually write properly researched articles as opposed to the hatchet jobs we have seen in the past week.

Nothing new in that Tele article - just a bunch of lines lifted from the post match interview thrown together with a sensationalist headline. He (quite rightly) said that we don’t have the funds to run with a squad of 25 players - that’s it. I would be amazed if we don’t bring in at least 1 or 2 players on loan before the end of this month. Anyone who has watched us (including the gaffer) can see that the squad is incomplete, and he has said more than once that he will only bring in players who will improve us, and isn’t willing to bring in guys just to make up the numbers. The nicker wetting on here has been unbelievable.

Much as I like Strapp & would have loved us to keep him, we have signed Waters and there is no way are we about to use up another wage on a position we are already covered for. "could play on the right if required" doesn't cut it for me. Lewis Strapp is a left back, and there is nothing to suggest he would be more effective at RB than the other players we currently have.

I thought he was a shoe in to be signed once recovered, but Dougie said again during the week that he wouldn’t be offering Doyle a deal. Strange decision unless he has something else in the pipeline. Saying he was just offering training and wouldn’t be signing him was one thing back in the summer when presumably he had other targets in mind for that position. In our current situation where clearly none of those targets have come through, it would seem like a bit of a no brainier to at least offer him a deal til January (if he has recovered from the injury)

Would definitely fit the bill if Oakley is going to be out for a while (as long as we’ve still got enough left over to bring in a right back!)

I was thinking that vague statements about interest from unnamed "Scottish Premiership & EFL clubs" sounded a bit familiar so I looked up who his agent is. Turns out he & Robbie Crawford are both represented by the same one. Read into that what you will. So bringing him back might not be out of the question after all

At this stage I would be surprised if we don't end up offering Doyle a deal at least until January once he is fully fit (assuming we don't manage to source another RB in the meantime). You know what you are getting with him, and after the support he has had from the club I think he would run through brick walls for a chance to repay that faith. I doubt he will have many other offers on the table so I don't have any issue with us giving him a short term deal if we don't manage to bring anyone else in. I don't want to see us send King out on loan - he has shown that he is worthy of his place in the squad, can cover a couple of positions, and has never let us down. For a lad of his age he shows a lot of maturity in his game & I would hope to see him continue his development here as opposed to out on loan in the seaside leagues. Only way this would make sense for me is if we were to sign another 3 or 4 players(which clearly isn't going to happen) and he went right down the pecking order. I agree with what a few others have said above about us possibly benefitting from another option up front, although clearly this is less of a priority than a RB & defensive cover. In an ideal world I would like to see us bring in (in order of importance) RB - Either Doyle or someone else (although I am running out of ideas as to who) CB - (ideally who can cover LB) - Lamie would be great but might not be realistic. Filling this position could alleviate the RB problem as O'connor has shown he is more than capable in that position but ideally I would like us to bring in both and allow O'connor to play in his strongest position. Striker - Maybe a youngster on loan as no way are we signing anyone to come in ahead of Muirhead or Oakley

I suppose anyone else who was at the game today could have seen the same thing, but when the players came over to the fans after the full time whistle my eyes were trained on Robbie Crawford the whole time and there wasn’t even a hint of a wave from him, only applause. Im going to hold onto that and hope that it means he isn’t about to leave us

My thoughts exactly. Plus he would be wanting to take over left footed free kicks from Muirhead so for that reason alone I would pass on it