Toby

“No other club would take the wee rancid chino-clad self-obsessed piece of shit, so we need to sack the wee pathetic fucker to rid the club of his development player hater, old pals’ lover mentality, before it’s too late. Although IMO it’s already too late as the wee addictive rat has already royally fucked up our club structure,and from where I’m looking, has taken great relish from doing so. Get to fuck ya wee puny imposter!”

Agreed. I understand his frustration and desire to set the record straight, but it only goes to provide validation in the tiny minds of such people for their insufferable trolling when they’ve already been put firmly in their box by their fellow posters.

Being told to wash Hugh Scott’s motor because he was a paid employee couldn’t have helped his form, in fairness.

Another belter from the stewards at the turnstiles already. Guy going in beside me with his boy was pulled for bringing a flag in and the flag searched for an offensive message. The flag had been bought minutes previously from the club’s official merchandise van! These people are beyond parody.

David O’Brien was never the same after he was injured the night we bodied those tramps in their own rancid bin.

It’s not really about what I like though, is it? I’ve already said in this thread that I was inside the ground in sufficient time as I anticipated problems yesterday. But I’m familiar with the procedures (or lack of) at Cappielow on a match day. Given that the crowd yesterday was roughly 75% higher than the season’s average, there would have been an awful lot of folk who weren’t as familiar with them as I am. I don’t disagree with your point that encouraging people to turn up early would have been the easiest step they could have taken, and they should have, but my point is that we should be well beyond that stage by now, and the reason we’re not is because not enough has been done to address these issues over a six and a half year period. Of course, the best step forward they have taken off the park in recent years has been the move to Fanbase, making the purchase of tickets seamless, but it’s a bit like VAR. There’s no point in having an all-singing-all-dancing system if people don’t know how to operate it, or you don’t have the capacity to operate it. Also, a blind refusal to acknowledge that the club themselves could have done things better doesn’t sit well. For all the expectation of turning up en masse at 2.55 and expecting to be in for kick off is unreasonable, it’s equally as unreasonable of the club not to accept they have to work on improving things, especially when they are the ones taking the fans’ money for 70, rather than 90 minutes of football.

We’re well past the stage of telling people to arrive early being the starting point, though. That was maybe acceptable in 2017 when the turnstiles were first installed, but in 2024 the onus in finding a solution is being sat squarely at the feet of the paying customer, rather than the club. There is no sign of the club taking feedback on board from the fans about this, no acceptance of their own culpability, no noises made about any plans going forward, just an explanation that it was the fans turning up late. Of course, plenty would have turned up around five to and can’t really expect the be getting in at a reasonable time if they do that, but there are far too many folk who appeared to turn up around twenty to or quarter to citing their own problems for their complaints to be considered as invalid or untrue. And therein lies the problem with folk who are unfamiliar with the system having to use them at the gate when there are time constraints. This isn’t their fault though, nobody just jumps on a bike are rides off into the sunset at the first time of asking. But how well are they being trained in how to use them? How patient or helpful are the stewards? Is this done at the expense of holding up others? You can’t go issuing “bring a friend” calls like MCT did yesterday and then absolve yourself of all responsibility when folk bring friends and it all goes to shit.

Further examples from replies to the club’s social media: Facebook: Brian Renfrew 20 minute wait in queue for me. Tam Leisk Fukn haf 3 before we got in !!!!! Absolute shambles Stephen Spencer The ticket system has not worked properly when needed since day 1 and it probaly cost a few quid got to be a better system imagine what sort of time you will have to wait if there was 5000 turning up Jonathan Mungin The club asked fans to turnout and support the team which they did yet this was the queue at Sinclair Street at 3pm kickoff time with queues for the 4 cowshed turnstiles still going up the Street. On asking the head steward why a request had not been made to delay kickoff I was told it wasn't her job to do so The inadequate number of turnstiles to service an area that can accommodate circa 7k spectators might not be the stewards fault but the management of crowd safety absolutely is. Ps I was queuing from 2.40pm and didn't get in until 3.08pm Greg Metcalfe Every week. EVERY WEEK. Mick McMenemie They have hand held scanners for the away end. Why not get a few more for the home end when they know it's gonna be busy? Open the big gate and scan folk in that way? Greg Metcalfe We need an express/bespoke gate of the 4 back as Season Ticket holders only. This was always an advantage of buying a season ticket, and is now gone. This would also take around 1000 people off the main queue. This would give season ticket holders the advantage they used to have, while also naturally managing the queue better. At the moment it’s just a rabble of people eventually filtering into 4 random queues. Also possibly have a parent/child gate, that slows everything down with the unmanned gates, the parent having to scan their kid(s) through first and then wait on the other side is a big delay to the main queues from what I observe. 1 season ticket express turnstile with regulars who know how to use the scanner. 2/3 general admission turnstiles for the rest of them. Possibly 1 devoted to families. This could be easily managed and stewarded with a little effort. They need to try something new. If this isn’t fixed for next season I’ll not be renewing my season ticket. Fraser Pollock It’s mental there are Morton fans on here claiming there isn’t an issue. The ground wasn’t even near half of its capacity. When there are fans still streaming in beyond 20 past 3 there’s obviously an issue that goes beyond just “folk spilling out the Norseman at 5 to expecting to walk in”. The queue was up to the bridge at 20 to 3. The turnstiles are obviously a hangover from a previous era but need to be prioritised by the club. We lost a lot of money and goodwill today and this should serve as a warning moving forward. Greg Metcalfe Craig Conway you shouldn’t have to go to Cappielow half an hour to 20 minutes early to get in, the place is a tenth full! Have a dedicated season ticket turnstile, maybe a family one, rest for general tickets. The queue will fly Down Jack McQuilkin 4 turnstiles for 2000 odd supporters isnt enough. whats it going to be like if we draw rangers or celtic at cappielow never mind playing partick thistle. John Borthwick 4 turnstiles is a joke. what would it be like for a 5-6 thousand crowd. Danny Groot Morrison Just not good enough. John Morgan Didn’t delay the kick off though, despite being large crowds outside? Including me. I didn’t wait, and walked off. Not good Morton, get it sorted. Instagram: mcgbaz First impressions count to the new fans therefore standing outside. Missing first 15 mins of game. Not good PR. I’ve. Said for years the stewarding and turnstiles is an issue. Yet nothing changes Twitter: StuCam Turnstile management really poor, advertised all week to bring crowds in then couldn’t manage. Better planning required john.buie Need to sort out them turnstiles or risk turning the increased support away tinhatwarrior Can you think of a plan to make entry more smooth for the fans the amount after 15:00 outside is outrageous, you wanna keep fans then fix things like this . Harold Goodfortune Seeing Qs up Sinclair St at 315pm, Sir, is a dreadful look. Easily sorted. Over to you #Monehton Alan Collins Should have a season ticket gate Sammy Mcfarlane Turnstiles are a farce. Thanks Warren Christopher McEleny Big bad fans to blame? Seems easy solution is risk assess using the flood gate as an overflow with hand scanning QR codes for entry. There’s no point having a fancy mobile device app if you don’t bother to utilise it and instead rely on turnstiles fit only for a crowd of under 2k 1874 Ton You should have ended your tweet with this rather than putting the blame on the fans. “We apologise again as we should have anticipated this and planned accordingly.” 1874 Ton How many fans entered the terracing through those 4 gates? What is the average time taken for 1 person to enter the stadium? Really simple to workout that we don’t have nearly enough turnstiles for a game where there’ll be a bigger than normal crowd. Wee Harry I knew it was going to happen, so left the pub early. Looked like the 1996 game against Dundee United out there lol graeme ross Lads you need to sort this Lewis McLeod Tiny wee team couldn’t handle 2k plus home fans GJ I.e. “there was a problem but we aren’t taking any ownership of it.” Poor. BinPin_Scot missed 20 minutes Murray Gray Not acceptable. Stewards only interested in going throught the waiting queue taking stuff off of people. Asked about alternatives to the queuing system deployed no answer was give. Lack of control and responsibility Thomas Smillie Hawkes legacy. We've replaced 9 gates that could filter the crowd (season tix, parent & child etc) for 4 selfscan gates where its pot luck if the code is read. The issue is exacerbated by the stewards that seem to think an acceptable level of service is just shouting at punters Cameron Translation: We haven't got nearly enough turnstiles, our stewards are useless tw*ts, and as such couldn't get you in for the full 90.

I’ve just pulled five examples from this thread that contradict what you’re saying, and haven’t looked across any other social media platforms, where I’m pretty sure I’d find a few more. At which point are you going to accept that your interpretation of what happened yesterday appears fanciful at best? Your point about fans being realistic and turning up so close to kick off doesn’t cut it when we’re talking about fans turning up a full 15-20 minutes before the game starts. At £22 a skull, or as part of a £300-odd season ticket which about a third of that crowd committed to months ago, and with the third-lowest average crowds in the division, Morton aren’t in the position to be telling folk to take an extra half hour out of their leisure time to make things easier for the club, and they’re certainly not in the position to come onto social media after the match and blame the folk who so generously put their hands in their pockets to support them. I entered the ground at 2.30 yesterday- quite deliberately as I anticipated a shit show at the turnstiles and it still took me five minutes to get in, but with so many accounts from different folk differing from yours, the only conclusion that an objective observer can come to is that you’re talking shite. I don’t understand whether you see this as playing devil’s advocate, or are sticking up for your old pal Hawke (who doesn’t, and never did give a shiny shite about anything you had to say at any point in the past, never mind now), but given that this has happened every time we’ve had a relatively big game since 2017, there has to be a point that even you will concede that drastic action needs to be taken, here. For a club that is so dependant on folk turning up at the gates, this simply can’t go on, and your stance on this isn’t just unhelpful, it is in fact damaging to the club to take onboard such stances if they wish to find a resolution to this.

Embarrassing whataboutery from irnbru, here. There’s a massive difference between turning up just before kick off and expecting to stroll in without any issues and arriving in good time and not seeing kick off, or arriving before kick off and missing 15-20 minutes of the game. It’s not really good enough to say “just turn up earlier” when, six and a half years after these turnstiles were installed, we’re still getting issues whenever the crowd exceeds 1300. I agree this is Warren Hawke’s folly in the first place, but there has to be some sort of contingency plan put in place for events such as this. With most tickets sold in advance, the club should have had an idea of the crowd, and for so many to turn up after 2.45 is not uncommon. How did they deal with that? They did nothing, and then blamed the fans in a tweet after the game. That’s shite. I suggested the last time there was such issues (probably against Partick in August) that handheld scanners at the exit gate could be one way of clearing the congestion, but there seems no real desire to do anything to help with the problem. We saw MCT moving away from calling Arbroath mascots “wee cuties” to issuing rallying calls to “bring a friend” this morning, and that General Manager saying he wants more big crowds in the future at Cappielow this evening. Well I’m sorry, but you’ll have to make Cappielow more accessible for that to happen. I can’t imagine any folk who wouldn’t normally bother deciding to go to the Montrose or Arbroath games when they have to finish their pint for 2.30 before making the 90 second walk from the Nosrseman to get into a big game, 2.40 for a game with a smaller crowd. Blaming the fans for recurring problems when you’ve done fuck all to address it yourselves is nonsense. And while we’re at it, a young lad in front of me was refused entry to the ground and told his ticket had been cancelled, much to his bemusement. I can’t expect to be privy to everything going on at Cappielow, but not since those two racist fuckwits were booted have I known of bans. Is there anything serious enough that has gone on in recent times to justify banning fans? It’s hardly as if we’ve had an incident like that at the Fife derby the other week, so why are boys getting banned from Cappielow?

Perhaps if they didn’t concentrate their social media on criticising fans for having the temerity to object to standing out in the pissing rain, credit the club who made them do that for belatedly relenting and waste their time describing that club’s fans as “wee cuties” they may have a bit more faith from their existing members.

You just can’t help yourself, can you?

I suspect you posted this around the time of yesterday's game in the hope that I'd barely notice it and you'd appear to have gotten the last word in, hence "won" this argument, but here we go. 1. I refer you to your post on 7th October on this very thread. You stated; These assertions are quite the opposite of a manager being prepared to give anyone a chance. You've actually gone as far as to suggest he's kept a player on in order to cover for his deliberate attempts to hound other players out of the club. While we're here, it's great to see you asking if Iain Wilson is an upgrade on Reece Lyon. That's worked out tremendously for you. 2. Yet, as he doesn't share what is said between himself and released players, you have used this to speculate as to how he has treated players as he isn't in the position to disclose those conversations. I didn't say that you said he should be sharing confidential information, but it's irresponsible at best, and vindictive at worst of you to throw allegations of mistreatment of players at him when he doesn't have a right to reply. 3. See my answer to (2). Imrie has to remain professional and can't bite back at unhappy released players. But you know that anyway. 4. Perhaps if you do agree, you'll understand that, having brought in far more quality in the middle of midfield in the form of Crawford, Wilson, Gillespie and Power, while Cammy Blues has kicked on, there is a reason that Reece Lyon, who appears to be the main character other than yourself in this wee soap opera, was deemed surplus to requirements. 5. The questions Imrie had to answer were to his employers, not to you or I. Not because he was neglecting the club's academy products, because it's part of his job role. However, you are intimating that Imrie has only recently started answering these questions. This isn't the case, as he has introduced academy graduates in the form of Davidson and Keay before in the midst this campaign of yours. 6. So, onto Davidson and Keay. Your response to this has really fucked me off. I pointed out that these players have been introduced from the bench and you're asking me to clarify how much gametime they've had because you lost interest for a while? This is information that is quite readily available, do you think I'm just making things up? Ignorance is not an excuse for you to throw the onus of proof onto myself. I will, however indulge you against my better judgement. Davidson came on against Elgin on 9th September as an 80th minute substitute. Keay was introduced six minutes later. In the next round against Kelty on October 14th, Keay came on as a 75th minute substitute. O'Boy came on as a 76th minute substitute against Bo'ness on 25th November, scoring in the 89th minute. He also came on as an 83rd minute substitute against Ayr on Tuesday. So far as I can see, Davidson has been an unused substitute on five occasions, Keay four times and O'Boy five times, including yesterday. Young goalkeeper Sam Murdoch has made the bench four times. I suspect you'll argue that being an unused substitute doesn't constitute being given an opportunity- I would disagree, and see it as a positive that these young guys are involved in the first team squad.

Didn’t have much time to do anything other than pepper DreamOakTree with red dots for his nonsense yesterday, but it looks like everyone else has covered any questions I may have had doubts over. There are a few things that just don’t add up. Imrie stated himself in July as he gave Brandon Diau a trial that, given his own career path, he’s prepared to give anyone who shows a willingness a chance, and if they’re not good enough, then that’s unfortunate and they move on. That just doesn’t align with the persona that DreamOakTree’s painting of him before his supposed change in policy. There’s also the confidentiality issue. If I were released from employment in any industry, I’d expect a meeting to be held in confidence and if details were to be shared by anyone it would be myself. Surely that’s standard practice? We, as fans may have an interest in why player X has been released, but ultimately it’s between him and the club, or at most shared with his parents and agent. In Reece Lyon’s case, he still had a year of his contract remaining. In what parallel universe do you release someone from a contract, agree compensation and arrange alternative temporary and then permanent employment without explaining the reasons to move them on? It just doesn’t happen. Contrary to what I see are DOT’s complaints (I could be wrong, there’s a lot of shite to delve through), the club’s policy on confidentiality regarding released players is entirely correct- it’s none of our business, and if a player wishes to complain to the press about it, that’s their choice, but being a product of the youth system gives nobody a divine right to play for Morton for any extended period. If they don’t progress as everyone had hoped, that’s a shame, but football’s a cut throat industry. Finally, while Imrie’s the first team manager, he’s got his own bosses. I don’t imagine Morton want to be seen as anything other than responsible employers who look after their staff, in all departments. If Imrie had treated young players in a way that is being implied, surely he would have questions to answer? The guy’s not untouchable, as was emphasised a few weeks ago when some (DOT in particular) were absolutely out of order in their treatment of the manager. I’m sure he’ll skirt round the subject like he did with the introduction of Davidson and Keay, but eating a bit of humble pie and accepting he’s been in the wrong from day one here would be a far better course of action than continuing to dig.

The most recent daft rumour I heard was that they were lobbying Edinburgh City Council to boot Tynecastle out of Meggetland so they could move in, and swap homes. With Meadowbank Stadium being beside Easter Road, and Tynecastle’s locale being pretty self-explanatory, it strikes me as another Broomhill case of a club with no roots just wanting to flit about and aimlessly and get lucky. If true, and they’re happy enough to see a non-league club uprooted from their catchment area for their gain, they deserve what they get. They’ll not be long to this world.

There was a rumour that had Spartans failed to win promotion last season they’d have bought over Edinburgh City’s league place (this was mooted on The Terrace podcast a few months ago), so I suspect the writing’s been on the wall for a wee while. I visited for their last game of the season, firstly to complete the 42, and secondly to get myself out the house after our game at Cove the previous night- it was a grim place, and I can’t pretend I didn’t think then, when there were no rumours of impending doom, how on Earth they made ends meet. They must have easily the smallest support in the top four tiers, with a massive neighbour on their doorstep, presumably large rental costs and no real home to call their own. You might be right about them making it to the end of the season, but I don’t see them surviving far beyond that.

Signs for Stenhousemuir. I wonder what the chances are of Edinburgh City failing to complete their fixtures this season? My Twitter feed seems to be full of lower league clubs signing up all their players. Would be just typical if their demise was to save Clyde from the Lowland League, but on a positive note, Hamilton dropped points to them earlier in the season, so if results were annulled, it could rein in Falkirk.

Guess what colour of dot this post is getting?

Good to see he’s got a Dundee United fan absolutely rattled on Twitter, too. What a couple of weeks he’s had!

The absolute fucking nick of this… https://x.com/partickthistle/status/1730527162468327803?s=46&t=mPi-CBP2m1lKxRNMQCkJuA

Given that Wilson was allowed to play against Bo’ness though, I doubt Queen of the South have any plans to recall him.

Aye, I hate it when clubs slightly higher up the food chain expect to roll us over. We’ll rightly be going in as favourites, but a team at the arse end of the Championship has no right to expect to bludgeon their way past one of League One’s better teams.

Full time, Luncarty 0-1 Bo’ness United. Went to the game to get another ground ticked off, and because we had a vested interest. I wasn’t impressed with either, although Bo’ness’s extra quality showed in the end. Bo’ness started well and could have been about 3 up after half an hour or so but gradually Luncarty grew into the game and gave as good as they got for most of the latter period of the first half and long spells of the second half, before Bo’ness finally got their goal with about 15 minutes to go. A minute later, Luncarty got a player sent off for denying a goal scoring opportunity after being caught on the half way line and the game was gone. In spite of our troubles, we should be taking care of them with minimum fuss.

A point of note ahead of tonight’s game- I hope we’ve denied Clyde permission to include Alex King in their squad.

I saw both Bo’ness and Luncarty last season. Obviously things will have moved on but Luncarty were a horrible mob. It was last Christmas I saw Bo’ness beat Cowdenbeath 3-1 which was great because, Cowdenbeath. It was courtesy of a hat trick from a boy that’s since moved onto Tranent though, but they’re currently sitting 5th in the Lowland League and I expect them to get through the tie with a bit to spare. Later on in the season I saw Luncarty lose 4-3 at Newtongrange Star and they made Airdrie c.1991 look like a Sunday School picnic. How the Raith fans would put up with playing a team like that after their whining about us earlier in the season would be worth seeing. As well as kicking Newtongrange about the Park, their intimidation of the referee (who only had officials from each club as his assistants was quite a throwback. Not often I take something so memorable from a game that I’m not too concerned about the result of, but whenever I see Luncarty’s name mentioned, my immediate thought is “gang. Apparently if we’d got Luncarty away it would have been moved to St. Johnstone (citation needed) which would have been proper shite, so maybe a good thing it’s at home, although Newton Park for Bo’ness would have been great. Very much a hills-have-eyes sort of a town.