d0nald0n1

Didn't realise Brown brought him as a replacement for Maguire.....

Good news for me. Not with these arrivals I'm really hoping we can move ifil and velicka out asap.

In better times for our club without doubt. In fact we'd show him the door. But as it is right now we have very few football players with any sort talent contracted to the club. Almost none in fact. Which make the lad one we could do with keeping. However do agree I won't lose any sleep over it, just a shame to see we still haven't worked out how to manage contracts for younger prospects. Somehow you have to convince them that they will get their big money move in good time and the club can get a fee too if they sign a decent contract and the get their head down and work.

I must be think today, don't get it?

I think Paton's on ok squad player for us at the current leve. I'm a bit surprised Brown hasn't given him a little run out to keep his chin up so wonder if there is some other reason he's not had a chance and Magennis for example has. If you think about it we might need Paton should Maguire leave in the window - I know its unlikely but Brown is good a keeping everyone happy and I've have expected to see him give Paton a chance from the bench at some point.

The mention the bbc site was fairly vague so not 100% sure this is a done deal yet. Really hope we get it sorted as he does look like a good player, comfortable and composed at CB.

Potential. In itself "worthy" of a longer contract to protect the clubs investment.

Says it all realy. Your denial of reality is stupifying.

Contrary to 1 or 2 posters constant bitching about Maguire losing him for nothing or buttons WOULD be a bit of a financial blow and probably (less) a blow to the team. We are just starting to see some performances come from him and he could well turn out to become a key player in the next few months. See we've gone through all the churlish, childish ego driven shit from him and now its time we should be seeing what he can really do. This isn't the time to give up on him and throw him to the wolves. If that was the plan we should have done it years ago and spent the time and money developing other players. We didn't. So lets back him while he's in the team and hope the club can convince him to stay and if it happens he leaves without achieving anything at the club we'll all have forgotten about him very very quickly.

LoL That and kelts "SFA go fck yourselves weekly reminder" 2 of the best quotes on here I've seen. I'm thinking of starting a Scottish Football X blog and these could be my 2 taglines.

I'm going to through something else into the mix here as its clearly more than just a question of how many teams. I strongly feel we need to adopt a bundesliga style financial audit system where every club has to lodge fully audited accounts with the league before the start of the season and these have to show the clubs are paying their debtors and reducing their debts/managing the debts correctly before they are allowed entry in the following seasons competition. Clubs should not be allowed to buy players, pay bills or wages directly out of an "investor"s pocket. This may prevent so many clubs going further and further into debt and facing administration. In the initial years allowances could be made for clubs which have debt accrued before this system comes in and they would be measured on how well they are managing and reducing that debt. Once clubs are breaking even and in the black they would be expected to stay there. I also think all the top clubs should be obliged to spend a percentage of their income on youth development and be able to show that in the accounts too. This would ensure a good conveyor belt of talent coming through which is what is important. Its time we all woke up and realised football doesn't have to be about money all the time. We need enough income to pay the bills, develop players and bring in some additional talent. No scottish team really needs to be spending megabucks on chumps from all over the world if we were running the game properly. If we are simply structuring our game around getting more money we are wasting our time because financially we will NEVER compete again with the EPL or even the Championship. We have to realise there is another way to have an exciting game in our country and its about more depth at the top, greater competition and young players. When these players are snapped up by the EPL or Championship we shouldn't see this as a bad thing - its what we have to realise will happen and we need to have the next young talent ready to come through. All the clubs could be doing this.

Yep I think 14 sounds messy, but perhaps its no worse than 12 with a split? Not sure on that. I think they have a MASSIVE problem here. 10 is too small, 12 and 14 wont work without a split of some sort, 16 is simply too few games to pay the bills, forget if they are against the OF or anyone else there's just too few of them. 18 seems to get dissed because they quality isn't good enough. Is it just me or should they be looking at this with a MUCH longer term plan and perhaps they need a road map that has us move to 14 asap along with pushing more money down to Div 1 then 3 years down the line move to 16, work out how to create a few extra games (perhaps a split at the top again :-( ) then finally 3 years after that move to 18. Does this allow team to help the other clubs improve their set up over a 7 year period before we go to 18 teams?

Don't know if we can release him but I'd love to see us send him back. We don't need him and he doesn't by all accounts want to be here.

I've seen nothing to make me think Goodwillie is better than Maguire and to suggest Maguire cannot improve is nonsense, particularly if your criticism is application and devilvery, probably 2 of the things that can most easily be rectified/improved. Its not as if he lacks footballing skill or confidence which would be much harder to try and suddenly bring out of a player. See Mackie. I assume you've seen Goodwillie quite regularly and speak to Dundee Utd fans who see him every week? or is this based on the good things that we hear about him once every few months?

He clearly has been given more money to spend and I suspect its down to Brown and Knox demanding it as part of them signing contracts. Fair play its win win for the fans in that regard, decent management team and they've already managed to persuade the board to spend a little. Not sure if McGhee would have been given the same money or not and also unsure he could really be trusted but don't really care to be honest. Irrelevant now. As for McGhee's signings overall, well they were mixed. Folly, Hartley, Vernon and McArdle are all decent signing at our level. Ifil has not worked out and a couple of the others look poor but most managers have a few mistakes in the transfer market its just noticed much more at a small club with a tight budget.

This.

Looked like he always wanted the ball against Hamilton and tried to take his man on which basically not a single other player in the team seemed willing to do. I think he gets too much stick based on attitude problems when he was younger - lets give him a chance and see if he can start to fulfil a bit of potential under brown. As for the positive comments from Brown, well he's not stupid, i'd guess he is paying the guy a public compliment and keeping him happy while the club try to persuade him to stay?

No convinced we need him but presumably he is better than we have so fair enough. Might see Paton, Velicka, Magennis drop down the order even more.

oh and while i'm here... no one noticed what i did with my 18 team league suggestion huh? and secondly why do most people think a 16 team league is best? Surely any argument you can make for 16 can also be made for 18 but with the added advantage of 4 more league games a season (2 more at home) and hence more cash for all the clubs and more choice to televise. Surely if you want an expanded league 16 is too small and 18 is what we should aim for as well as being more financially sound? I find the SPL's argument using 16 teams as the example all the time - which is pish because thats the fewsit possible number of games and therefore the weakest fincancially (by there argument) they are not discussing 18 or 20 publicly and explaining any financial argument for that?

Yep I think that needs to be calculated in. I'm not convinced by the argument that 10 team is the best for TV either. Are we saying that currently Sky televise every single game between hearts, hibs, aberdeen, celtic, dundee utd and rangers (supposing those are the top 6 teams). I'd guess if we went to 10 teams playing four times they won't show all four aberdeen vs dundee utd or even all 4 aberdeen v celtic games. so whats the big deal if they show 2 aberdeen vs dundee utd games in a league that has 2, or if they show 2 in a league that has 4 but they chose not to televise the others. Surely as they broadcast a limited number of games there is a limit to how meaningful this argument for TV really is.

In fact here is a suggestion for Doncaster, Topping and the SPL Chairmen. How about: 18 team SPL1 Aberdeen Hearts Hibs Dundee Utd Kilmarnock St Mirren St Johnstone Inverness Motherwell Hamilton Dundee Falkirk Dunfermline Raith Rovers Queen of the South Partick Thistle Ross County Morton The rest below this can regionalise or do whatever but must form a pyramid including the juniors, highland, amateurs leagues etc.

So have we finally reached the stage where its just jack in scottish football completely because its only being run for the benefit of 2 teams? Or is it just me on my period today?

Coopy, I think you are correct but they are trying to tell us this is being planned with the best possible long term objectives for scottish football. so to simply vote to split the money between a handful of teams with 2 of those getting 50% between them doesn't ring true with the stated aim here. if this is a case of the OF making the decisions again and the weak chairmen of the other teams simply going along to protect what they have then we really are wasting our time. This is how the SPL was formed and it has been shit since day one and driven loads of fans away. We should all pack in our scottish SPL teams and start supporting local junior, highland or lower league sides instead.

I thought he looked really comfortable against Hamilton until he went off. Plenty of pace, decent in the air, can tackle, takes up decent positions and most of all seems very composed unlike our other CB's. If he stays i think he can hold down a CB spot next to whoever.

Not sure where this pish is suddenly coming from. Watched him against Hamilton and can't see him being a player who dives.