Kmcalpin

Seconded Andy. I've been following the Well for over 50 years and never seen us play a Highland League team. Looking forward to it.

In general terms I'd agree with you - £5.00 would be a reasonable charge for a bog standard SPFL Premiership game, if I had my way. The problem is though that every club in the senior professional ranks charges more, as do some clubs in the lower echelons . Formartine United, for example, charge £8.00 for their normal games and so I really don't think £5.00 is anywhere near a realistic price.

Neither side should be considered to be a pushover... lets do the business on the park first. As far as Formartine's finances are concerned surely they are not sustainable. Their average gate income over a season (net of VAT) will be about £80-90k, which is just over 50% of the transfer fees paid out and mentioned. There may well be other transfer fees. Ok they will have some commercial income from a social club perhaps or advertising or sponsorship but it won't be that much. They will then have a pretty substantial wage bill for a club of their status, plus other running costs for the stadium, taxes, etc etc. they must be getting subsidised by some kind of benefactor. If that was us, much of our support would be up in arms. It would, equivalent to us forking us some £2 million on transfer fees.

Surely the SPFL isn't responsible for distributing Scottish Cup cash? If so, I'm happy to admit I'm wrong.

Didn't know that Iain. Not only that, its payable within 3 days!! In my view whats sauce for the goose should be sauce for the gander. Now why can't the SFA stump up monies due to clubs within 3 days (as opposed to several months).

Maybe. It was Stewart Robertson who told me there was a 3 way split - perhaps just a rule of thumb division?

So its not just senior and junior clubs that are completely irresponsible with money? Unbelievable.

A good draw for us and I'm quite happy with that. As far as the gate is concerned, I always understood it is split 3 ways: 33% to cover costs, 33% to home side and 33% to away team. Given that season tickets are not valid we should make a modest profit or, at worst, cover our costs.

Presumably the Directors will be quizzed about this next Monday evening, Iain. Maybe matters will be clarified.

Budgetting for a football club is a very difficult exercise given that there are so many uncertainties and unknowns. When the issue of budgetting for a top 6 finish has been aired at previous AGMs, Directors have emphasised this but added that if you budget for a bottom 6 finish then that is, more than likely where you'll end up.

Yes, Dan Twardzik just seems to have disappeared off the radar.

I agree in general with the point you're making, but originally you said "Exactly what I said? No?". I also set the point in a wider context of Scottish football where most clubs experience short term cashflow problems in January. In other words our cashflow problems in January are typical of those of most cots clubs. Am I splitting hairs - yes maybe. Your point about other clubs on smaller budgets outperforming us is well made. Clubs like Inverness and St Johnstone have gone down a different investment route from us. Rather than acquire talented ostensibly talented individuals, as we have seemingly done, they have put more accent on teamwork, hard work and organisation and its paying dividends for them.

Not quite.

I wouldn't read read too much into Partick's performance at the weekend. Yes, winning 5-2 away from home is an exceptional result but by all accounts Killie were appalling.

Seconded, the pitch looked to be in first class condition. Credit to the ground staff.

From a very selfish perspective, an away tie against a team whose ground I haven't visited before. But for the greater good a home tie against a small side from the lower leagues or outwith. We don't get many home ties though.

Just watched the TV highlights to watch key moments in detail. They show what a great goal Johnson scored, by beating defenders and hitting the net from an acute angle. The Heats defenders did little wrong. The challenge on MacDonald - looked a red card. Up front I thought Moult and MacDonald worked like Trojans all day and the former was rewarded with a goal. Johnson had a decent game although service to him at times was poor. Grimshaw had a decent, but not great game, and you certainly couldn't fault him for lack of effort or tenacity. Pearson had a decent game but put in some rash tackles at times and I'm not sure we played him to his best use. Didn't think Lasley played well - too often outmuscled and passing was poor but given his recent absence can't be too hard on him. It was worrying the way our central midfield just disappeared in the last 20 minutes as Hearts put us under the cosh and I doubt if MMcG will have been too impressed by that given his liking for a competitive engine room. We didn't play well at the back although I have a degree of sympathy for Kennedy. He's a big lad but met an even bigger lad who was always going to cause trouble for our central defenders and keeper - we just didn't play him and his annoying sidekick, Delgado, well. Maybe lack of preparation? McManus struggled too. Didn't think either our full backs played well. Stevie Hammell was guilty of bad decision making and gave away too many stupid fouls and a potentially costly and entirely avoidable corner in the late stages. Against a side like Hearts you simply cannot afford to do that - he obviously forgot Jim Gannon's advice. All that said, I don't know who else would have played any better at left back. Both Hearts goals were avoidable as Mark McGhee will be pointing out to his charges this morning. For the first Kennedy was outmuscled not surprisingly but Mcmanus and Hammell looked all at sea with Ripley not covering himself in glory. For the second, a great shot but just look at the space and time the lad had to pick his spot. I counted 5 players round about him but not one made an effort to close him down as they backpedalled - a typical goal that we lose. Overall though not a bad result. I think we have the makings of an 8th/9th/10th placed side if McGhee can instill more organisition and harder working ethos into the players. Some mates I spoke to independently of each other said that at Dingwall last week the home side weren't any more talented than us as individuals but were far better organised and worked far harder off the ball than we did. That also applied yesterday I'd say.

Overall I was pleased with a point, which was the correct result. We certainly played better today but the performance was very mixed. On the plus side we created a lot but were somewhat wasteful and yes we played some decent football. On the debit side our defending and midfield play wasn't the best at times. A physical and big Hearts 11 proved to be a real handful as we knew they would. Man for man we matched them for skill but couldn't match their work rate or physicality. Their off the ball play was clearly better than ours and as the Traveller (an acquaintance of several years standing who sits beside me I discovered today) said to me they could throw 3/4/5 bodies in front of the ball to block goal efforts where as we could hardly muster one. It was the first time I've watched the new Hearts and was left somewhat deflated. They're very physical and cynical which they don't really need to be - maybe the Craig Levein influence. I'll watch the highlights before I comment further.

I think you're right about that. From memory, at the recent Well Society evening MMcMG said something like "Jack Leitch wasn't ready to start" in a passing comment. Maybe someone else who was at the meeting could verify that.

Financial losses aside, there will probably always be a need for short term cash injection around January. This is when cash flow is at its lowest and most clubs need some kind of buffer at this time of year. That doesn't mean to say they'll make a loss over the year though.

I agree Ian but there are fans who were against it from the very outset and will not change their minds no matter what. I guess that in the middle there's a "grey" element who could be persuaded to join and those are the ones the Society is rightly targetting, but don't ask me to quantify them.

Thats it in a nutshell for me. If we accept that fan ownership is not the road to go down and that there is no wealthy white knight on the horizon and that Les Hutchinson does not want to own the club long term what do we do? Simply close the club down? We have to be realistic here - the Society is not for everyone, it never has been and never will be. Nothing will change that fact.

The club's accounts are quite separate from those of the Society - only shareholders receive the club's accounts.

Agree with most of that but think Laing or Johnson would replace Leitch in the starting line up, going by MMcG's comments last week.

My thoughts exactly, in hindsight my use of the term "cover" was wrong. I wouldn't be unhappy if Ripley went back to Middlesborough and we used that cash to source a defensive central midfielder to play alongside Pearson. We also need 2 replacement first choice fullbacks. The question as to how much Stevie Hammell can give us is fast becoming academic given his injuries.