dunning1874

They were already operating at the bare minimum, operate at break even and put no money in budget. I genuinely don't see where you're coming from here; there's no tap for Golden Casket to turn off. In terms of MCT funding for the first team budget, it's true that they may decide to divert some of their subscription income to building up a cash reserve rather than putting it all directly to the first team budget, although they've also been clear that could only be decided by a vote of the members. However they've already had an increase in membership of 110 in under three days since announcing the ownership deal, and they announced back on 22nd May that they'd accumulated £25K over the course of lockdown, while they aren't contributing anything to the club due to furlough. That was seven weeks ago so they must have a considerably larger amount now. It's feasible that they could build their own cash reserves and continue to contribute to the first team budget. It would be sensible to hold something in reserve anyway given the uncertainty around income for next season.

GC were already cutting back to avoid running up more debt. It shouldn't make us any worse off in that regard - GC's position in terms of avoiding debt is the exact same as it was when setting the budget for 19/20. Obviously every club is going to have to make cuts this year due to the Covid related loss of revenue, but that's a separate issue.

Updated Q&A in response to some of the questions they've had: https://mortonclubtogether.com/question-and-answers/

No idea if it updates automatically or someone does it manually, but going by the membership counter on the website it's gone up about 30 already since the announcement. That's pretty impressive and you'd expect another boost today as word gets around and it's picked up by more media outlets.

The stadium is the big downside of this. I'm not at all comfortable with Cappielow passing out of the hands of the club, but if the lease agreement ensures Golden Casket can't either raise the rent to an exorbitant amount or sell it from under the club's feet then those are good safeguards to have in place. Questions about the costs of any future redevelopment do need an answer. Frankly I'd still prefer to wait a few more years to get to the position of community ownership and have to raise a significant sum to buy GC out with the stadium remaining in the hands of the club than have MCT getting the club for £1 or whatever the tiny nominal fee is without ownership of Cappielow. However I also don't think those valid concerns are a reason not to support this. We've known for years that the club is effectively in a managed decline with the Raes in charge and ownership had to change. Now we've got that opportunity. This is a chance to build a more sustainable club and possibly a more successful one - fan owned doesn't mean fan run and overhauling the culture of the club from top down with new and above all else competent faces could be exactly what we need for the club to progress.

He was apparently mince at Stenhousemuir so that's no big surprise, and there are clubs in the new West of Scotland leagues throwing around some serious money for that level. Tier 6 Darvel have signed Ian McShane, Liam Caddis and another ex-Morton player in Jordan Allan. Tier 7 St Cadocs (Mark McLaughlin on the coaching staff) seem to be just spending enough to sign from bigger ex-junior clubs rather than players you'd expect League 2 clubs to be in for, but have Stephen Grindlay who we seemed to be linked with every summer when McInally was in charge, and more ex-Morton players in Kenny McLean and Dylan 'fucking' Dykes.

I wouldn't object to having him back, seen as he might be a perfectly competent centre back. As long as he's not coming back to be anywhere near right back.

So, Hamburg.

Signed up for the webinar as soon as I saw that, no idea what it is but clearly significant. Without speculating too much on what it is, probably a reasonable guess that they're announcing what their plans are beyond the initial two year period and fundraising target? Can't think what else would merit that much hype.

Another reason to bump this fine thread. Look at the state of this: https://www.falkirkfc.co.uk/2020/06/26/gary-deans-interview/ Absolute gold. "Are Falkirk the forgotten victims in all of this? That’s how it feels.'"

Everyone will be aware that Jim Duffy was in hospital after a heart attack a few days ago. Dumbarton have announced that he's now back at home and recovering.

So does this forum upgrade mean we can upload images as normal now? Just checking.

Buchanan, Doyle and Johnstone released by Falkirk. Terrible wee shame.

Iredale is a rare case among the many players who've had the 'he's a good attacking full back so put him on the wing!!!' argument made on this forum, in that his good attacking play wasn't based entirely on coming from deep with someone in front of him occupying the full back already, so it's not as obviously daft as the incessant calls for Russell to play on the wing, which saw his form nosedive and never recover as soon as Duffy did it. I wouldn't be surprised if Iredale ended up doing alright if he got stuck there as a last resort at some point in his career, whereas a player like Russell was always going to bomb there. However, we already have the best winger in the division in Cadden, who has played on the left for most of his time at the club. We also have Nesbitt, McGuffie and Salkeld, as well as Orsi as an option. Assuming all of them are at the club next season, and Muirhead might still be here as well, we shouldn't be signing anyone at all to play on the wing with the number of options we have, never mind signing a defender to try there on a hunch. Hopkin obviously likes a versatile player and if he wanted to bring Iredale in as someone who's played both centre back and full back then good, but 'maybe he'd be a good winger' shouldn't enter it. Did people always suggest full backs should be moved up the park or is this Gareth Bale's fault? Were people crying out for Davie Murie to be moved up the park when Kevin Twaddle left?

Mods.

Not that the club will really be thinking about signings at the moment, but whenever we are back round to new signings you wonder how he'd do at centre back seen as we've no need for a new first choice left back. If he could cut it at centre back, Strapp - Iredale - Gunning - Tumilty as a back four with a couple of cover options would do fine.

Supposedly it was top flight only, but even at that they've picked players who wouldn't make a worst 500.

Seriously trying to claim that some of those players could possibly feature in a worst ever XI tells you all you need to know about that podcast. Select four people at random from forums like this across Scotland to do a podcast and you might get some absolute cretins, but you'd not end up with any less knowledge of Scottish football.

Mark McLaughlin has been appointed a first team coach at St Cadocs, a youth club from Newton Mearns who are forming an adult side for next season to join the new West of Scotland League.

Stopped reading here. In all seriousness I can understand criticism of Kelty’s overspending or not wanting the likes of BSC or Caledonian Braves to be getting promoted, but the idea of feeling sorry for the likes of Cowdenbeath in previous years or fucking Brechin this season because they might get relegated for being absolutely shite is a mental proposition. If you’re going to consistently assemble terrible squads then why should anyone have any sympathy when you get relegated? This is what happens to crap football teams and they’ve no one else to blame if they end up with three successive relegations. I’d rather Brora or Bonnyrigg make it up this season than Kelty, but for the pyramid to properly get going we need the SPFL sides to be relegated consistently with bottom spot becoming an automatic relegation place soon. If the clubs going down are from towns with no train service and crap pubs then all the better.

The other difference being that Gunning didn’t have his decision to leave blow up in his face with a career trajectory akin to Carlo Monti or Stefan McCluskey, another reason one deserves to be pointed and laughed at while the other doesn’t.

Going to be fucking tremendous when Bonnyrigg win that league.

Aye, League 1 & 2 are allowed loan signings to the end of February.

I think they’re just attaching the thank you to MCT for the contribution to the budget in every player we sign. You could take the view that a set number of players in the club are being covered by the budget the club set before including MCT money and every player signed beyond that is covered by MCT money, but I think they’re viewing it in terms of x% of the budget comes from the club’s usual revenue, y% is on top of that, so MCT are covering y% of every player’s wage and therefore contributing to everyone. I get why they feel it’s useful for PR to do the ‘thank you for the contribution’ with every signing and contract renewal, but looking at this thread I feel it’s creating confusion about what MCT’s for at this point. It’s the route to clearing the club’s debt, creating the conditions for either someone else to take over from the Raes without the debt hanging over us or to build to taking over the club themselves, but either way the end game is the Raes out of the club. The first team budget is irrelevant to that, it’s a sideshow which is besides the whole point of the exercise, but instead people are being put off the far more important bigger aim because they don’t like what signings we’re making.

Robbie Muirhead got a two match ban after initially being booked for his tackle against Dundee at Dens, so you’d imagine the three separate red card offences Cardle committed in the space of five seconds would surely see him suspended for violent conduct for each offence.