numpty

Can't say I'm actually all that fussed whether Gow or Fitzpatrick stay or not, but the intention is pretty clear and fair play to JB for getting right onto it.

McAllister's said more than once that he wouldn't be interested in coming back to manage a cash-strapped Motherwell, so can't see why he'd change his mind now when we have even less money to spend than ever.

Not interested in Butcher thanks. Our team is capable of playing better football than he ever seemed capable of marshalling.

So even if the 'allegedly' bit is true, he's signed *one* of the *many* youth prospects we've had over the past few years, who for all we know might have been gagging to join Celtic anyway? Hardly a serial offender. I'd be more than happy to see McCart back at Fir Park in some capacity.

Let's hope so. And now that he's gone, they do a Broonie and "change their minds"...

Doubt it. At his age, he's nothing to lose, however it turns out.

Did cross my mind too, but I don't see why the club wouldn't just have said so in the statement. Wouldn't have reflected at all badly on us, given they way they've arsed us around the past couple of days.

"Our management team" surely suggests Knox as well.

Departure confirmed on fishel site. http://www.motherwellfc.co.uk/index.php?op...&Itemid=133

Can't really see how, tbh. They have a vacancy, CB is obviously top of their list, and they're entitled to speak to him as often as they like until either he or somebody else accepts the job. If he goes, CB will have a lot more explaining to do to JB and the 'Well fans than Aberdeen will.

Makes Broonie's words in the first interview with Chico seem all the more carefully-chosen -- "if we're not going to Aberdeen, you can take it that we're not going anywhere else unless Motherwell get rid of us" (or words to that effect).... i.e. if he does go now, I don't think we can actually accuse him of going back on anything he's known to have said (rather than anything he's reported to have said).

Not until the speculative "he is certain to contact Milne today and tell him he will not be coming" becomes "he has contacted Milne today to tell him he will not be coming", surely

The impression I got at the time was that if we'd insisted on a contract, they wouldn't still be here anyway. Can't see that changing now.

It was disappointing, but I don't have nightmares about it. We certainly made enough chances to win the tie, but you just can't squander as many as we did against experienced European opposition and expect to win. If we played them half a dozen times, we'd probably have one once or twice, and unfortunately that night just wasn't one of them. I do fear that it's the best chance we'll have to qualify for the group stages for a very long time, though.

We played better football more consistently before "the O'Donnell situation" than after it. While I wasn't there to see it, from what I've heard, our performance in that Dundee Utd game was pretty much the peak not only of that season, but of the past several seasons.

Pretty standard tabloid style -- the Rancid's online articles are much the same. It doesn't look quite so stupid in print because the columns are narrower, and the paragraphs aren't separated by a blank line. But they obviously don't bother reformatting the copy for the website.

Can't think of anyone in the Scottish game off-hand, but no reason it needs to be somebody from the Scottish game, in theory -- the laws of the game are the same everywhere, and maybe bringing in somebody from outside with a less parochial perspective wouldn't be such a bad thing. Who knows, maybe it would even give the OF one less thing to be paranoid about, but I doubt it.

If they were required to police them every time they opened for business like they are football stadia, they probably would.

Presumably because those don't legally have to be policed.

Seems a bit unlikely. Wouldn't they have wondered why we weren't sending any referees over in exchange...?

They've already done that, surely?

Not that it applies to everyone on your list, but "furthering your career" doesn't necessarily mean "going to a bigger club" or "earning more money". Moving to a smaller/lesser club at which you'll be one of the most experienced and/or senior players could also be a good career move if you've got your heart set on being a club captain, or moving into coaching, for example.

Nope. Just think how bad some of the refereeing decisions were in the World Cup, and they were supposedly the world's best.

Only the individuals involved can decide that. Just like the rest of us in 'ordinary' jobs, for some the most important thing is just finding the most enjoyable environment for doing whatever it is they do, for some it's all about the money, and for others it's about trying to make a name for themselves and rising to the top of their chosen profession.

Worth a try perhaps, but I'd have thought infrastructure was the main issue. With eBay all the bid management and payment collection is done for you (albeit at some cost). If MFC were doing it on the fishel website, you'd have to pay somebody to add some extra functionality. If they were doing it here, you probably wouldn't be paying much short of a tenner's worth of somebody's time to administer the threads, figure out who'd won what, chase up payments etc. anyway. And a lot of people who might otherwise see it probably never would.