Leaderboard

I'm not sure there was an attitude problem there, and he did say this wasn't a slight on the players involved. Instead he said he needed a squad of players that all think they can get into the first team. When players aren't fitting into a system or are clearly out of contention for a place, they're not going to be as motivated, and that's natural. I'm not good with the level of vitriol the likes of Danzaki, Shields and Maguire are getting. I dont know why some folk take it personally, the players didnt put the contracts in front of us. The didn't join us or re-sign just to piss about the place, or "steal a wage", they have been unable to force their way into the managers plans for one reason or another, and they'll move on and find their level somewhere else.

None of the players mentioned are "stealing a wage." That kind of pish is ridiculous. There's players in our squad who simply don't fit with what the manager is looking to do. That's not on them, they're available for selection (if fit) and would most likely be happy to play if given the chance. Players like Shields can be accused of many things, such as not being up to the level needed, but of "stealing a wage"? Not for me.

Far too many variables in emerging talent. Protecting the club interests is wholly different to the ‘can’t force anyone to sign’ theory of some. On Maguire, his last contract award was the issue. At the magic age around his 22nd birthday in development terms, we’ve offered security and it certainly hasn’t worked for both parties with a career stalling. Some have scoffed at another recently who wanted to challenge that outlook. Doubt I’ll be the only one of the opinion that it wasn’t a risk to offer him extended terms good enough to get him to sign - he was highly regarded as the next big thing even when Turnbull was still cleaning the boots of senior players. Simply put, we’ve paid lip service to our player pathway for too long. Understand we drop development players in and out and there’s a plethora of reasons for doing so. Also well aware the approach doesn’t favour each and every prospect but, being allowed to make and learn from mistakes around the first team environment let Hibs with Doig and Aberdeen with the kid who folded twice in front of the East Stand realise multi million pound transfer fees - those who seen them in development (bearing in mind he can play either flank) would agree our player was better than both. Feel Kettlewell has alluded to this in pre-season and last weeks’ interview. More power to him if he progresses on that front.

This time against Celtic at their Paradise 19/12/2015 .

I mean, is it not normal for people to to hand back wages when they feel they are not one of the best 11 people at their work? There's always going to be squad players, changes in form, changes in tactics, injuries, etc. Ideally you want 12-25 to be players that could seamlessly switch into the first team, but that's just not going to happen.

See the answer in the other thread

I had a wee look at the flux capacitor and fixed the problem it was a case of a fat finger causing a mistake on the mobile phone device but it will still be the 16th down here. Thank you for your help and interest.

Looking forward to this one. Making the journey up mostly because its another League ground to tick off the list, but also the brother in law stays up there so free digs! No excuses here. Our squad may still be threadbare and it is early season, but we still have more resources than them and they havent played any competitive games either. Just win.

re Johnston I don't see an outcome that the club would have won or been able to tie him into a contract. He came through the ranks and got some first team exposure. He went out on loan came back, still wasn't ready . Went out again and came back ready. So with captain hindsight goggles the narrative is the boy needs to sign an extended contract with us or we don't let him go out on loan. Really, why would he do that ? He could still sit tight and leave or asked to be released early. He had very good football people around him who knew exactly how to look after Max J. I struggle to see how we'd have been able to force his hand on this one, particularly without repetitional damage. It's overly easy to criticise the club. When all said and done we've got a pretty decent wedge for a guy who played a dozen games. He may go on to the next big thing , he may not. When all said and done it's another example of us producing a promising youngster, which works nicely for our model long term.

Why is that lucky? Isn't that down to good planning, coaching, and spotting of talent? They tell the only story we need to worry about though. Lucky for us, predictions of relegation from pundits or fans means absolutely hee haw when it comes to what actually happens. The fact is, over the course of those seasons we put more points on the board than the teams below us. That's all that matters. You don't know that though. When we signed Van Veen very few on here were excited by his goalscoring record. When we signed Watt no one really thought it would amount to much. The truth is, we'll do what every other team outside the top five city sides do every season and work with what we have, make some signings, and see what happens. Some of those signings will be utter gash, but I guarantee you, if we revisit this conversation in a season or two we'll be having the exact same discussion about how we will be unlikely to replace X,Y or Z who have come in post-Van Veen and done a good job for us.

I totally agree with that,johnstone was highly rated by folk behind the scenes for a while,none more so than hammell,to not have tried to tie him up on a new deal before now has bit us on the arse,if we're happy to bring a Japanese player over from australia on a 3 year deal then we should be making every effort to get our young players tied up especially when the club is talking them up as having potential.kettlewell seems to be pissed off that johnstone is off and all we will get is compensation,were not always going to get our young players to stay but hopefully we have learned a lesson here.

That's fair comment re signing the new contract and we would still be where we are now, but it still should have been offered, recognising potential in our Academy players and maximising the fees generated when they inevitably move on is something we have not been particularly good at over the years, except maybe Turnbull. It's something the club could improve on, but I get the impression that the current board are not as financially astute as they could be on matters like that.

SOD I was ok with but Mugabi and Maguire definitely. Have said before that big Bevis is an absolute diamond and the kinda guy you want to succeed but tbh just isn't good enough, last game of season v utd said it all

I'll say this, for a club that has supposedly brought in "for the most part, at least five years of terrible close season signings" we've done not too badly during that period. We've finished 7th, 5th, 8th, 3rd, and 8th again in that five year period. We've also reached Europe twice. But I guess those seasons accomplishments are mainly down to other teams being terrible and us "getting away with it" and being lucky, right? Absolutely nothing to do with the players we've brought in. The truth is, a club of our financial standing is very rarely going to be able to recruit players who can be considered a safe bet to succeed. We just aren't in that financial position. Most of our signings are going to be a risk. But, we've managed to unearth some real finds during that period as well.

Love all the armchair Director of Football types who are claiming they knew all along that Danzaki was a waste of space. It's a shame the club doesn't bring some of you in to sort out the transfer policy. In all seriousness, it's quite simply a case of one manager signing a player, and the next manager not liking the look of him. He was always going to take time to settle in, but he was deemed worth the wait by the management team at the time. When he signed it looked like a risk worth taking. Top goalscorer during his time at Brisbane Roar, and only played four times for us, so it's hard to say what he could have done. But, the new manager didn't like the look of him, and that's how it goes. He'll move on, and we'll move on. This kind of situation has happened to far bigger clubs than ours, and it's happened to far better players than Danzaki.

Probably in minority but I feel he never got a proper chance. Was coming to new country and culture so was going to need time to settle. But maybe he wanted to leave. I just hope it hasn't cost us money