StAndrew7

Agreed, thought he came across really well and as turgid and as difficult as this season has been at times, you can clearly see from his responses to questions just how much he's working with the team to improve. His comment re: Bair was particularly interesting. Essentially saying that the level of one-to-one coaching, video analysis and other development opportunities he's had at Motherwell (as well as playing opportunities) are streaks ahead of what he had at St Johnstone.

There's a few details I think it's worth adding to this, particularly given some folks' concerns (on here and on P&B) re: asset stripping etc. The two bids that are furthest forward are: An American who "made his money in streaming" and now owns his own documentary company. His vision/strategy is to increase global exposure of the club and increase opportunities for further sponsorship, growing the fan-base and generating other revenue streams. An Aus/USA/Middle East group who are primarily looking to transform the recruitment side of the club and use more advanced data analytics, machine learning etc. to bring in players across the age-groups of the club to create a culture, style of playing etc. and sell them on for profit. Both parties have spoken with both the Club and Well Society Boards and at least one did it in person from what I picked up, although both may well have. Neither of the bids are philanthropic; they will be looking to make a return on their investment via their own business plans and strategy The investment will be made by buying shares, not in loans (like Hutchinson) or other guarantees that can be secured against the club; however these might be a special category of share that allows them to take some % of profits etc. (I missed the name of these) The share purchases will not be instant, nor will the investment be "transformational" straight away; one bid is proposing the WS go down to "around 50%" and another is wanting a controlling stake, but the % was not mentioned One of the groups would be looking to appoint their own CEO; "someone who played for Benfica and is running an Australian club" was mentioned (based on a quick Google, I believe that's this chap: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaz_Patafta) Transfer fees recouped for players will remain within the club (I'm not sure how that will work with the second investor I mentioned; perhaps through their specific type of shares they'll be able to share profit rather than taking away directly from transfer fees) One of the reasons for the urgency/speed around this is that one of the parties wants to be involved in planning for next season; both are looking for exclusive negotiating positions There is still a long way to go with negotiations, analysis of club finances by parties, addition of potential clauses etc. still need to take place which will then result in a final offer The interested parties might come back based on the results of any vote of the WS membership and accept that a 51/49 split with WS retaining ownership could work for them and that would be part of their heads of terms/initial agreement with the club There is potential to negotiate with investors clauses etc. in the final proposal(s) that would allow the Well Society first refusal on any investor's shareholding, in the event they wish to sell their stake in the club so the club would return to being fan owned, should the Society have the necessary funds to purchase the shareholding Equally, a "No" from the WS re: the red line on majority fan ownership could will be enough for the two current front runners to back out In total there were 4/5 "serious" groups (of 8 who expressed interest) looking to invest in the club; I asked how those were progressing and the simple answer was "not as quickly as these two". At least on of the other parties are investing in other areas of sport (a golf team in LA was mentioned) and the board are trying to get to things developed without having to use a corporate finance consultant as far as possible. Another is an American who Derek Weir had spoken with, who was interested in developing an academy system in the US for developing players but not much more was said on that one. The Chairman did state last night that if this is something which does progress forward, he would absolutely propose bringing in experts in corporate finance to ensure nothing is missed in the minutiae that could come back to bite us. Also, we have interviewed 3 or 4 candidates for CEO by both Club and WS Boards. The issue we have is that with potential investment and at least one group looking to appoint their own, it's a difficult spot to be in. Normally this kind of appointment and negotiations for investment would, ideally, be years apart. So we run the risk of appointing a CEO who brings their own structures and ideas, to then potentially have them removed by any investor. The Well Society have asked for the opportunity to provide a strategy/plan that means they'll be more able to continue funding the club and any shortfalls and create a business / fundraising plan of their own for the club, along the lines of the investors. I also want to point out that Derek Weir stated that was his preferred option; that the Well Society is able to provide the funding required for the club to continue before difficult decisions (i.e. slashing playing budgets etc.) need to be made. Ultimately, the Society needs to be in a position in October to tell the accounts auditors that they have the funds available to support the club for 18 months; if not, that triggers a warning to the SPFL regarding our financial situation. Also, to be absolutely clear, the Board are in no way making recommendations to shareholders or the Society to go or not go for the investment from either party. That will be decided when bids are submitted and shareholders and WS members have their vote. They are exploring all their options to ensure the financial safeguarding of the club, which is their job as Directors. As I said above, that also includes the WS continuing in its current role and increasing its input to the club. Time, however, is of the essence. I would expect WS members to be polled/asked to vote in the coming days. Exactly how that will be put across is key and it'd be interesting to see what is sent out (I'm not a WS member, I have private shares in the club).

Perhaps on the odd occasion but that was the exception more than the rule for me,. 4-2-3-1 most games 4-5-1 at times that season too. Anyway, we won. Yaldi.

Recent memory for me would suggest we did when Higdon played with Law, Ojamaa, Humphrey and McFadden in behind him, with Lasley in the anchor role.

Tanner's out for the season, I'm afraid.

Not one gets pass marks today, I'm afraid. How Grimshaw stayed on the pitch for the whole match I'll never know.

Yeah they'll have to be, otherwise they'll be blocking an evacuation route from that end of the stand onto the pitch if anything happens.

How do you know we've left it late? The fact we've made 4 offers to him would suggest to me we've not left it late at all but have been working on it for some time now - I would imagine the negotiations have been going on since the summer. I agree with your other points and given the information coming from the AGM we've made him an offer that will pay him a similar amount of money to a player who has full international caps and has played a significantly larger number of first team games (I would imagine that might be Bigi?) - I'm not sure what else the club can do here, other than to provide Cadden and Campbell as the examples of how staying here can do you much more good than disappearing to Leeds, Burnley or Celtic...

Only stuff I would add are a couple of points: The nature of the success we had over the last year effectively means that we have no cash flow related worries for next 2 years; this isn't going to result in complacency and the club are looking at how best to continue to secure our financial position and budgeting "correctly" for low placed finishes in the league and so on, To confirm there's ball stopping nets being installed at the Cooper stand (I was nearer the front ) to protect the crowd during warm-ups (which should happen during the January break), Some of Robbo's comments (indirectly) about the squad/players hinted that he thinks there's a fair few freeloaders at the club who are only interested in picking up a wage - he also said that you'd be surprised at who there is interest in from a transfer out point of view, We continue to look after our injured players and make sure that we're keeping them engaged; Robbo is taking Carson and Tanner out for dinner this Thursday (I know that doesn't seem like much, but it's a nice insight into how the club operates) and Burrows stated the club's policy has and will continue to be that we will only ever release a player who can pass a medical - effectively in the same condition as they were when we signed them, He also recognised that we're really lacking in wide players and would look to rectify that; we have 3 or 4 targets but as above, we need to let players go before we bring anyone in, The Ravenscraig thing is an interesting one - Fir Park will become increasingly difficult (and expensive) to maintain and the new standards for public stadia coming in will result in several of the modifications (like the PA) being a necessity. I didn't hear a figure being banded about for the PA system other than 8 to 10 times the cost of the scoreboard - I don't know those costs off the top of my head so someone who does could work that one out. I'd meant to try and ask about the money we're putting into Project Brave; there's obviously been an increase in costs relating to being one of the 8 "elite" clubs as part of that - I do wonder if we're going to have to increase that money year on year to remain one of the 8? Although, I would imagine there's a significant case for the investment paying off in future revenue for the players we develop as a result of our involvement. It would be interesting to evaluate those total costs against those of a full time Colts team mentioned above.

He still can?

I'd be expecting them to at least match the £800k. Not sure they'd be willing to part with that much cash but you never know, I suppose. Would prefer to see him go south tbh.

Centre midfield in a 3 with Campbell + another, but not as a #10, because as you pointed out, it's not suited to his game. Driving runs from deeper in midfield are where we'd get the best out of him in a 3-5-2 if that's what Robbo is going to persist with. I'd love to see us try a 3-4-3 with Cadden at RW but I doubt that's going to happen.

Non-starter for me I'm afraid. Cadden plays best wide of a front three or as an out and our right midfielder/winger. He's also not a wing back, whereas Tait can play there.

I'm not contesting that bullying can happen anywhere. Just sharing (from personal experience, might I add) that discussing anything that could have a legal implication for other persons on a public forum, even if it's speculation or otherwise can cause problems for people.

Having Peter Lim as your majority shareholder won't hurt, either.

I would suggest from the tone of that there might be ongoing legal issues in the background... Probably best to leave this topic well enough alone for now.

Domino's. ;-)

Bigi.

I would imagine it'll be a fairly lengthy job that one, particularly if the cabling/data routes need to be re-run etc.

I was watching some of the highlights from this season the other day and looking at a lot of the goals we scored (particularly earlier in the season) were from creative midfielders driving at the opposition's penalty area and sliding in a striker for a finish. We then tended to lose that as the season progressed, as the formation of having 3 combative midfielders in a 5 across the middle became the staple. Whilst I agree we need a goalscorer (which as you point out will be difficult) I think our biggest need is a proper box to box midfielder with a bit of creativity to feed Main and Bowman's feet in and around the box, as they're both powerful enough to either take it into feet, turn and get a shot away, or out-muscle a defender to get on a through ball and finish. Now, my dream is that it may well be Campbell next year as I think that's the next step in his natural progression; you can see glimpses of what he can do (goal against Rangers for example) but I also don't think we should be putting that kind of pressure on him and let him develop at his own pace. I'd love it if Bigi got a chance but I just can't see it as you'd have to kick out one of the other midfielders to accommodate him. We didn't really get to see a lot of what Tanner and Main could do together this season because of Tanner's injury. I think that relationship will be crucial to Main kicking on and scoring more regularly next season.

From what I've heard (reliable sauce, like) EPL and top end Championship clubs are chasing him - so not beyond the realms of possibility.

Carson. He gets a lot of mentions but (in my eyes) not the full credit he is due. He's been our player of the season and the reason we've gotten so far in the cup competitions. Everyone will remember Carl's goal (and Moult's in the semi-final) but won't remember the 15+ crosses, 4 world class saves and countless others he's made in those games. Easily our most consistent performer this season and my POTY by some distance.

I just took a look at them there and other than the 1st half of the Dundee game from October they're all from last season and before (going back to 2015). Quite unfortunate as I would've loved to have heard Hartley's Imrie chat.

Kane Hemmings seemed to fit the bill. Right league, unsettled...

You're such a beacon of hope and positivity in these dark times.