Stuwell2

If Aberdeen come out attacking and leave space at the back it could be a high scoring game but if both teams sit in and try to hit on the break it could be a turgid affair.

Would you have been a different age if you had went to a different school?

Regarding the free season tickets post Covid, can anyone give a definitive answer to this? It’s been said a few times and I’m sure it’s correct but other insist on calling it a load of bull. Was there ever an official statement from the club, something said at an AGM or is it just an urban myth?

Refusing to watch that display of OF bias by a referee - it’s probably used today as a referee training video.

Trouble is when someone quotes them you see it or if someone replies to that person and others chip in you end up reading stuff and not understanding the context. Best to just scroll past their posts

The bogeyman says it’s from a Nigerian prince, all we have to do is give him all our bank details and he will transfer the money - think he’s worked with Accies before.

Rangers were asking around £20M for Morelos but the closest -rumoured- offer was around £10M which they and their fans thought derogatory, I wonder how many now think they should have taken the deal. On another note a bogeyman I know says Aberdeen have a deal to sell Miovski for £4M and Burrows has done a deal with McMahon to buy Bair for a fiver.

Theo will be 25 at the start of next season and only about a third of the way through his career. According to transfer market website his value is €750k (roughly £646k). Salary sport have his salary at £31200 - I’m assuming this is without bonuses. So if they are to be believed £750k isn’t that bad a deal and would mean that for an outlay of probably £50k max, the club would get a return in the region of £700k. Now I’m not saying we sell him but from a financial point of view £750k doesn’t look that bad. Personally, like most of us I’d rather we offered and he accepted a new contract on better terms and continued to develop/improve with the view to selling him for more next summer but to a certain extent that would be a gamble and I could understand selling him if he doesn’t want an extension or if SK and his staff think he can be replaced and have someone lined up. No point in hanging on until the transfer window is about to close and then scrambling about.

Given Clark’s obsession with player’s he’s worked with SOD’s the man - hope he’s not booked his holidays yet

I’d say every club that is our contemporary has the same issues including the arse cheeks to a lesser degree. Potentially what makes us different from most is that we don’t have an owner who could just pull the plug and watch us go down the drain as they draw out as much cash from the club as possible. Not a warning about outside investment but something we all need to keep in mind.

Now there’s two of the bogeymen under steelboys bed, which with the amount of bogeymen he sees must either be a very big bed or very crowded under there.

Simplest way I can see it - if I’m correct - is at the moment the society owns 71% of the current shares (for easy calculations let’s call it 100 shares total and the society owns 71 of those with private shareholders owning the other 29) so if they issued another 39 shares making the total shares 139 then the society’s 71 shares would then be approximately 51% of the club shares instead of 71% at the moment and the existing private shareholders shareholding’s would drop to 21%. The new investor would then be given the new 39 shares in return for their investment giving them approximately 28% ownership of the club. Edit: I hope my sums are correct but since I left school 43 years ago (and it’s a Friday night) please forgive me if there not and don’t be too harsh on my.

Just seen this quote from Richard Foster on the BBC website talking about us missing out on the top six and thought the bit about Aberdeen could come back to bite him on the arse next week. "When you're having to rely on other teams to do you a favour, it's never great. Especially when we were having to rely on Aberdeen to win at home. It's never going to help us.“

Initially there were two potential investors/partners the Australian one - which had a football background but would have wanted total control - has either withdrawn or was rejected as not being the type of model thought to got with our clubs ethos. Leaving us with the one with limited football acumen but a very good business/media acumen which leads me to believe there is something about our club that they feel they can work with to get value from for the good of both parties (was going to say exploit but that would have gotten certain folk excited) without requiring full control. All will become clear shortly but I feel that it’s good that after being here last week (and possibly is still here discussing things) we haven’t heard that they have walked away or things are not good.

You did point out my understanding of the players wage bill was wrong last week - which I accept but my figure was from memory of what I’d read possibly on here - best figure I’ve found since is £2.3m. As for what other clubs are spending if we ignore Celtic, Rangers, Hearts, Aberdeen and Hibs who all appear to be well above us, then I’m talking about the other premiership teams and Dundee Utd - apart from Livingston. In 2023 Kilmarnock and StJ appear to have wages of just above £2m, StM £1.7m, RC £1.5m and Livingston £1.3m. I couldn’t see the Dundee clubs on my quick search but given they have backers I’m guessing (forgive my guessing and correct me if you know them), Utd will be spending as much if not more than us and Dundee will be slightly behind us. Given that these are the teams we will be competing against next season and they all have backers who - choosing my words carefully here - potentially can add money out-with turnover to the budget which would make keeping our position sustainable. Hopefully that clears up what I thought was a simply statement. If you know better since you appear to disagree with my statement please let me have your figures / forecast of spending over the next few years and explain why you disagree.

Agree that what’s been done is impressive but I have concerns - and I believe that most would agree - that we are not sustainable at the current level with what other clubs are spending and what we will need to spend on more ground improvement over the next few years. This is why I’m happy to look at any proposals and options before deciding. Although it would have be be an outstanding proposal with cast iron guarantees before I’d be willing to give up the society’s majority shareholdings. As for David’s post above I don’t agree that we are being drip fed info via the media designed to get us to give up control. As for the WS will need to give up control narrative, again I disagree as the clubs not a loss making enterprise - our profit/losses over the last 7 years pretty much even out but future ground improvement’s are needed and will put us into loss more over the next 5-10 years no matter player sales - and although could survive without investment all be it probably in a poorer fashion. The question is how is he going to get a return on his investment? The options I can see are either through a % of player transfer fees, some sort of media involvement or a combination of both. These don’t require total control of the club but more a clear contract which states where and on what his investment can be spent, what % of transfer fees he gets (if this is even on his agenda) and what is expected from the club and society.

Going to make things tighter for 11th

Probably a load of crap but I’m sure I heard someone at the game yesterday saying Slattery was leaving but didn’t hear where he was going.

Sorry but if we’re being honest I’d say the Collum fucked up by not sending Spittal off. Wasn’t just a wee push and then gets involved with others merited a red card I thought - I’m surprised Ross didn’t get involved. I had a good view of the incident and if it was the other way round I’d have been raging at a yellow.

I think that most on here would agree that if it was all down to finances then year in year out the top six would be Rangers, Celtic, Hearts, Hibs, Aberdeen and A.N.Other between us, STM, STJ and Killie (and DUTD when they get back up). I don’t think us making top six is punching above our weight but at the moment outwith the old scum and Hearts it is down to manager/squad and a slice of luck which teams make it, unfortunately this season we fell short.

With some of the posts on here over the last few days, this thought gives me the fear.

I’d argue that any investor who doesn’t invest in his target customers will lose them and his investment.

Did Les get his money back? From memory there was an initiative where he matched fans cash with his up to the £1m he had put in initially. Was a bit of a gimmick to encourage fan to join the society. From my point of view having the community trust means we engage with our potential support which in the long term brings in income through youngsters asking to be taken to games and local businesses giving something so they are seen to be helping the community. Also I think that the CT gets grants from the governments and other agencies as long as they can invest a % which is where the WS helps out when there is a shortfall. Folk might see this as wasted cash but I think the indirect return to the club is probably more than what the WS pays to the CT.

I find it quite puzzling that folk talk about the WS (as main shareholders)needing to stop putting money into the club at the same time extolling the virtues of Bowie, Budges, Gilmour and other investors at other clubs. I’m sure that if a rich Well fan was willing to do to same - or Boyle had been able to find a buyer willing to do that - then the WS would keep the cash it raises through membership or wouldn’t even exist. Unfortunately or possibly fortunately this hasn’t happened so the WS, as owner of the club, has a responsibility to keep the club going and put money into things deemed by the club board as important to the clubs future. I’m sure the the WS board look at every request and the case put to them by the club board before handing over any cash.

My understanding of it is that the WS board elect two members to be on the exec board to protect the interests of the WS so there will always be two members who are on both boards. Understand your concerns regarding potential conflicts of interests if they are also private shareholders but as the society needs to put any proposal to the members and they will have the final say then if - and it’s a big if (more like bullshit) - that they are out to line their own pockets, then no matter how it was dressed up, I’d hope that there are enough society members smart enough to tell them to GTF. Edit: I’d also point out that these people are only two of the society’s board and for anyone to believe that some sort of a shady deal is being done and will be presented to members by the board as a good deal and asked to accept it, then there would have to be more that those two in on it which I personally believe is, like the rest of this theory, a crock o shit.