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Relegation for Motherwell would be an unmitigated disaster on so many levels it’s difficult to know where to begin. But I’ll try.... First of all the financial implications. I’m not sure how much we get from TV money from being in the top flight but it’s got to be a significant proportion of our income. Then you have the money from the league placing money any the advertising you can charge when appearing on Sky etc. No revenue from old firm away support or the larger supports that premier club can bring. Everything really! That would be gone overnight! Our player/staffing budget possibly/probably could remain the same for the first season down but if we are disappointed with the standard of player we can attract and afford as a well established premier league club then you have to shudder to think about what we might “enjoy” as a championship club. Any Turnbull, Scott, Kipre we unearth or produce would be lost for a fraction of what we got for them from being a premier league club also. I’m struggling to think of a team that has went down and came straight back up recently and we don’t have the money to chuck at a promotion campaign the way Hearts, Hibs and Utd. Even then, Utd took 3 attempts to get back up! There would be a real danger of becoming another Dunfermline, Falkirk, Raith or Patrick and spend years in the wilderness often just bobbing along in the championship hoping you might get a sniff of the play offs. You could pretty much kiss goodbye to ever being any sort of credible or respected club for a generation, if not longer. Livingston were down for years, St Mirren were down about 10 years then up for a season then down for 5 or 6., Dundee were up for 5 years I think there but have spent something like 14 of the last 20 in the championship.Dunfermline have had 1 season in the last 15 in the premier league and that quite possibly could be our future. At best! Absolutely terrifying stuff. I think as a fan base we would find in particularly tough. Despite being on a Motherwell roller coaster it has yielded 35 years, by hook or by crook, or top flight football. As a poster above said, we’d need to adjust our expectations very quickly and that’s what asker said than done. Motherwell fans under the age of 40 will never have seen us play anything other than premier league football and I’m sure plenty of our friends and colleagues who support other teams would waste no time in reminding us of our predicament! Losing to Alloa and Morton etc and sitting mid table after 6 games would be 100 times worse than anything we’re going through right now and the panicking among the support as the reality hits would be unbearable. Any Motherwell fan who is blasé about it being a bit of a laugh and a jaunt round new grounds is deluded.

Relegation, how bad would it be? I dunno, like winning an all expenses trip to the Seychelles, get to the airport and find out due to lockdown it's been cancelled so as an alternative you're off to a Caravan Park in Girvan. You get there and Steelboy is head of customer service, and milo is entertainment director. It would be that bad. Awwww FFS, now Lasley's just shown up in a white trackie and a bumbag to take the Mrs off for her massage.

I disagree. Even under fan ownership we are always going to have a top 10 budget and advantages over other clubs of our size in bringing in players. There is no reason why we should be relegated from a league with Accies, Livi and Ross County. Look at our squad just now. Money isn't the issue it's the fact that we have signed dozens (no exaggeration) of shite players who have contributed nothing while letting our captain and vice captain leave. If fan ownership has any problems it's not being ruthless enough. Robinson completely hobbled us and the board were still telling him to stay then when he quit anyway gave him a golden handshake instead of trying to get him out the door at minimum cost and telling him to take his boy with him. If we finish below Accies or lose to a Championship team in a playoff heads will have to roll.

Mo Ross has been firing a catapult at players knees, it has taken until now to identify him as he has been wearing a mask.

I've seen Motherwell beat Celtic with Jamie Dolan in goals.

Let's be honest about this - Motherwell FC have had a very charmed life. We really should have been relegated before and I think under fan ownership it's only really a matter of time before we are relegated. A club of our size and budget just isn't going to survive in the Premiership indefinitely. Even if we escape relegation this season (I think we will) it's bound to happen sooner or later. I just can't see us surviving, say, another 10 seasons in a row in the Premiership. So while relegation is more bad than good, I think we need to think of it as a strong possibility in the immediate future of the club and something we need to be prepared for as supporters and as an organisation.

If you looked at just the stats Watt is a player who'd be slated for his lack of goals . The simple fact that he works his backside off and has the ability to hold the ball and pass means he's our player of the year , despite. a lack of goals. We need more lads to care the way Watt does. Still don't think he's a striker but a great player to have just behind the front 2

It's not nothing. It's taken Kilmarnock 10 matches to acquire their last 4 points and they only have 8 matches left. And assuming they did make up the 4 points in the next 8 we'd have to not take a single point for the rest of the season which, even by the most negative forecasts, seems unlikely, for them to catch us. Out of our four fixtures going to the split we have't lost ANY of the corresponding fixtures this season (1 win, 3 draws) and I think it's nonsense to say we are in worse form now than the rest of the season. In fact if you look at the last 8 matches of the relegation candidates it's as follows - Motherwell 10 pts, Ross County 10 pts, Hamilton 5 pts, Kilmarnock 0 pts. We might get relegated but let's put it into perspective. Right now, we have the best chance of surviving of any of the bottom 4.

I'm known to go and watch lower league football so that aspect of it is fine by me, a game of football is a game of football and actually the quality and entertainment of lower league matches is often higher than the Premiership. The big problem is financial and how that can affect the overall running and decision making at the club. If you look at similar sized clubs as Motherwell, say Dundee, Falkirk, Dunfermline or even Partick Thistle they have gone through some depressingly tough times since being relegated. Simply put it is very difficult to run clubs of that size on lower league incomes without massive cost cutting and reductions and I think Motherwell are particularly vulnerable being fan owned. Perhaps we could sustain current investment levels for a season or two but if you don't get back to the top level in that time frame then I think you are looking at a very different type of Motherwell FC. Even then, think about the quality of player we've been able to attract to the club as an established Premiership side and then imagine taking that drop in level into consideration. That alone would be a big cause for concern although it might re-focus our misfiring transfer policy. So for the question 'would relegation necessarily be a bad thing'? I think it would certainly require supporters to recalibrate their expectations on a medium to long term basis and I think it would be more likely to be an existential threat to the club than the rose tinted glasses view of 'romp it and go straight back up'. That might happen, but I think it's less likely than the other scenarios.

Given how we played a school team would have looked good in that game, I think accies luck will finally run out this season, but in fairness I don't care who the bottom 2 are as long as we are not one of them.

Thats not in dispute but wasnt the question posed.

I don't know how much the current parachute payment amounts to. but no way would it offset the areas of funding mentioned in Milo's post. And Season Ticket income could well be much reduced as well if current Holders take up the CoVid deal. We would need to create a team capable of securing promotion, probably with a bunch of journeymen senior pros and a smattering of untested kids.. Could we afford to run any sort of fruitful youth programme? If not, there goes another source of income. And then if we do succeed in bouncing back up, how on earth do we build a new team capable of keeping us up? Just look at how much Hibs, Dundee Utd (and probably Hearts) had to invest in new players and wages to achieve safety following promotion. But coming straight back up is not a given. The fact the play off structure is weighted to benefit the PL team means actually winning the Championship is essential. So to my mind relegation would be a disaster and at best I could picture us being a yoyo club for years. At worst I could picture us sitting mid table and getting used to that station in life. In truth I would enjoy visiting all sorts of exotic new grounds and playing in Cups with crazy names...but only for a wee while. Much better to survive this season and invest hard earned monies in building a new team to keep us in the PL for another 30 odd years. hopefully with players that want to play for Motherwell. Believe me, I have tried to convince myself that relegation might prove beneficial. So far I have failed miserably.

That was one of my favourite seasons supporting Motherwell, outside of all the dross there were some great moments, i was young and naive, and I think that was my first and only season where I made every game. I think that was also the year I sent Alex Mcleish a letter recommending that he sign players from Africa, perhaps inspired by Tony Yeboah, and he replied to me on a post it note.

Maybe he had an extension clause in his contract that kicked in after a defined number of feet used to take corners was met?

That team had players with character in it. For Wednesday, and going forward, I'd be going 352. We have no wingers that offer anything and with a defence as porous as it's been in the last couple of games, having another body in there couldn't do any more harm than we're already doing to ourselves. Problem will be the number of available (competent) players to play centre half. God knows what the lineup will be...

I have a friend that is a Falkirk supporter. He's always saying that the club lost it's heart when they scrapped their youth system. For me the youth system has been massively beneficial to Motherwell down the years and perhaps my greatest fear would be that if we found ourselves outside the top tier for any length of time we would cut back or scrap completely youth development.

I would go further and keep young Johnstone at RB and play O'Donnell in right midfield, that way both full backs have got protection in front of them and our midfield is instantly strengthened.

Can't believe I was hesitant when we signed him coz he might be a wee ned. A great player and a great guy.

Tony watt has missed a dozen chances easier than the one smith had at Celtic

Sticking with the short bye kick routine, and the fact that the opposition have all sussed we aren't very good at it, is actually reminiscent of Gannon's determination to stick to the routine where the 'keeper had to roll the ball forward to Hately (facing his own goal) to build play. The opposition knew that by pushing a couple of players on to Hately when the 'keeper had the ball they could put us in trouble. All very well if you then push the ball wide instead and take those 2 players out the game but it appeared we had to stick to that instruction no matter what.

given the team can't get out of our own half of the park - can't say I'd give any of our strikers a hard time. If they were missing loads of chances then yes. The issue with Smith is we don't cross the ball - therefore his height isn't any advantage at the moment

coatsy , lad, you be no f....ing good in the trenches

not a world beater but he was never the donkey portrayed on here ...I would suggest offered more than Long and didn't go about like he was doing us a favour playing

Devastating is exactly what it is. It's in our own hands, but you'd expect Celtic to pump Ross County every time. The fact they've taken 3 points from a game they should be taking 0 from is pretty devastating, especially given how pish we are. If teams around us start pulling out wins like that and we are managing one shot on goal at home to St Johnstone it's time to start worrying.

It's the incontinent incompetents on the park you're needing to have a word with. I'm no sure when a fans forum ever relegated a club.

Spelling mistake aside, what do you think a hamstring is?

Jock Brown for his optimism that at 0- 3 we might find a way back into the game.

It was literally 7 months ago