BeardyGuts

Is it just me or is the statement a bit odd? Goes into more detail than normal for these sort of things and the formatting seems weird taking new lines when not necessary..... might be looking for something genuinely gutted if MW goes

After the 4th went in I decided to watch Man City.

To think I thought they played shite the last time at Tynecastle.

Apart from Hyndman the rest were a disgrace.

When Hyndman was hooked i couldn't believe it, he was the only player that showed any real spark all night. I couldn't for the life of me understand that substitution.

I like miller but last night it was clear it just wasnt working with him up front. Halliday and Kiernan were liabilities.

Dont know if its just me but apart from Wallace i dont think anyone is in same planet as McKay... he seems to get into dangerous positions consistently but no-one, except for Wallace, seems to make good runs for him.

The past few games i can think of at least half a dozen times he gets to the byline but there is never a run to the near post and they expect him to dink the ball over 3 defenders to someone.... probably nit picking due to the crap result but surely they watch the tapes and see where we are missing chances and should make changes. Frustrates the hell out of me we have a guy that can beat players and get them on the back foot only to have zero support when he does it.

Thought i would share this since after seeing Hogan move to Villa for 12m i thought i would check how MW other transfer dealings got in in his time at Brentford.

Like a few others i think some of the signings he has made the past 2 windows are a bit suspect... after seeing this eitherMW is incredibly lucky or he is bloody good at picking out a future player. I know it means nothing to us right this minute but should give confidence that he knows what he is doing.

Andre Gray - Bought from Luton for 500k - SOld to Burnley 1 year later for 10.5m

Moses Odubujo - bought from Leyton Orient for 1m - Sold to Hull 1 year later for 4.25m

Scott Hogan - bought for 750k from Rochdale - sold to Villa 2 years later for 12m

James Tarkowski - bought from Oldham for 500k - sold to Burnley 2 years later for 3.4m

In total MW brought in 13 players in his time at Brentford. 4 were undisclosed fees so i cant see how much he spent on them (McLeod was meant to be 850k) , but 3 of them are still at the club and the 1 that left was sold to Sheffield United after being brought in from Oldham so i think its fairly safe to say they at least broke even.

The other players not listed were brought in on a free and still at the club or brought in on a free and left for free.

Anyway from a transfer spend of 3.6m he brought in 30m ultimately to Brentford... that is one hell of a return.

The money we paid for Garner we could afford all the players that MW brought in at Brentford... so looking in the lower leagues of England there is certainly good finds within our budget.

To answer the January sales question I still say a good speedy CH is a must. If we are going to be camped in our own half then you can put Messi in as striker he will still not get a sniff of goal. We need to have confidence in pushing up that we can still defend. If we can box our opponents in their own half we will create far more chances

I agree though that a goal-scorer would also be nice and all I have seen Garner do until now is wrestle with players, he doesn't even get near to looking dangerous.

That 1.8 mill looks a little flattered to say the least his old club must be pissing themselves. Still it is still early days for him I suppose.

There has been games where we have dominated the ball and not sat deep but still cant score I think that's why I favour a striker. But the problem with buying strikers I guess is that they don't come with a guaranteed number of goals. My firm second choice is a speedy centre half.

When we look at the squad assuming all fit we really do have 2 for most positions. Even at goalie which is something I never understand... why waste wage money on a decent second string goalie... but that's another topic.

If we all were to pick our best team right now how many new signings would be in it? Gilks probably... apart from that I think I still pick the same 11 as last years best.

To do that you need money Rab , and we simply don't have any , free transfers and cheap imports will be our future until we get all the off field shit sorted , and God only knows how long that will take

Apart from Sinclair going by what is reported they never spent a fortune on players. Wages is a different story but look at Dembele (free transfer) Toure (Free transfer) both players you can safely say would have improved our squad.

Never thought I'd see Warburton put out a team that was too negative but that was simply damage limitation today,there was simply no belief that we could have won that today.

 

Playing Hodson (who I thought had an excellent game) and Tavernier to negate the threat of Sinclair and Tierney certainly worked but also neutered the attacking threat of Tavernier.

 

Our passing was simply atrocious all game long. Midfield sat too far back and offered no assistance to the forwards, most of the game we seemed to be playing 4 1 4 1, They pressed us high up the park and stopped us playing it out from the back while we sat back and left Miller to chase shadows when they were playing it out the back.

 

Thought Kiernan had one of his better games in a Rangers shirt but once again one of his all too common lapses in concentration cost us dear but Wallace was at greater fault than him for their goal.

 

Windass is a talent with real potential but today he was woeful hardly found a blue shirt though he most certainly wasn't alone in that respect.

 

Still don't think we're as bad as results seem to indicate (I know, I know!) but our wastefulness in-front of goal this season is simply lamentable and has to be addressed as a matter of urgency.

 

I'd be inclined to try O'Halloran through the middle but only if we play the ball in front of him, in the little game time he's had we stick him on the the wing and tend to play the ball to him when he's facing his own goal the result of which more often than not results in him hitting it back first time to whoever passed it to him.

 

Another noticeable aspect today was how we seemed to take an eternity to take throw ins for a team that likes to take quick free kicks and quick short corners to try and keep the tempo up that is quite bizarre, Wallace was by far the worst culprit in that respect today.

 

Can't get the fact that MacKay is the new whipping boy round my head, yes his standards have slipped but he's still the only player we have that could do something out of the ordinary in order to change a game.

This is absolutely bang on.

Also I cant believe I am going to say this but after the start to the season agree with Sutton that we are miles behind them. They were better on the ball, better are pressing, created far more chances and also seemed to simply want it more than we did. Whilst I would never want another 5-1 defeat from that lot I would rather lose 5-1 playing good football than lose 1-0 barely getting a sniff. granted in the first game we didn't play well and lost 5-1 but you know what I mean.

After last season I said that the players Warburton brought in were excellent... this year though is the total opposite. I mean ok Hodson played well when I have seen him Gilks too but there hasn't been one player brought in that took us up a level. Windass shows promise to be that player but yesterday he looked like a dear caught in the headlights too much.

The squad is quite big now but would be interested to know what you guys thought about Jan signings? Say we had the cash to make one big signing what position would you go for? For me it has to be a centre forward. Simply not enough goals and the defence seems to be getting better.

the whole team are rank just now so singling people out is pointless

 

but putting players in and out of the team this early in the season is farcical, how on earth can they be needing rotated already?

I dont think his style of play suits the way we play. I recall one or two occasions he actually won a long ball up top and no-one ran in behind. He never made runs in behind that i can remember. Easy for Aberdeen to defend when you only have 1 striker.

Kenny Miller had an almost instant impact in the game because he was making runs in behind and stretching the Aberdeen back 4. Garner just doesnt play that way. I see him as a more Boyd or Ally type forward which i struggle to see how that will work for us. I would expect if he was playing to go to a 4-4-2 rather than the 4-2-3-1 we normally play.

There are 4 games in the SPFL Prem this Saturday, and draws for Ross County (at Tynecastle - quite possible after Saturday at Ibrox) and Motherwell (at Thistle - perfectly reasonable to expect at least a draw for them) coupled with a win for Dundee at ICT (again quite possible) would see us going into an always difficult to get anything out of game at Dolly in 8TH POSITION.

 

Talk about putting pressure on us to get a result up there, can you imagine the pressure on our side if we kick off at Pittodrie in 8th spot? Never mind the orgasmic nature of the media who will be in overdrive, not that I personally take any notice of them but sadly still plenty do.

 

We wouldnt be the first Rangers side to get beaten at Pittodrie, and when you add in how bad our record in tough away games is under MW (1 in in 6 away games against the playoff sides in the Champ last year and defeat at the piggery this year), it doesnt take a stretch to see us finish next weekend in 8th place.

 

For a bit of balance, if we get a win and other results go our way we can be in second place 1 point behind the scum.

 

Thoughts?

I think in the players and fans mind if we are not first then the pressure is on. Slightly less so in second position but 3rd down brings with it the same amount of pressure/scrutiny imo.

For us i think if we're not first or second we're last in a lot of peoples eyes and even second will feel like that to a lot of people even this season.

The Aberdeen game is going to be tough. Not the sort of game we want to go into needing a result.

Plus I always feel that Pittodrie has a really narrow pitch which i dont think helps our style of play.

However if we do get a comfortable win then it can be a huge boost to everyone and i think most importantly get some confidence in the fans towards the team/manager.

I agree and would add that he probably thought they were the best we could get with our limited resources. Let's not forget he persuaded Barton to join us rather than playing in the EPL (probably on lesser money but possibly with the lure of a two year contract) and also persuaded a man with 80 caps for his country to give up the easy life in the US second division.

 

For what it's worth I still believe that Kranjcar will come good, his early passing down the left to Wallace and Mackay before he became embroiled at Parkhead and his fabulous footwork on the edge of the County box in his cameo role on Saturday, being just two examples of what he can do. But the manager will need to give him games (starting tonight?) if he is to get back his match sharpness and the other players will need to give him the ball back when he passes and moves into open space so he can play the killer passes or shoot at goal.

Krancjar for me just doenst have the pace ... looks like he is running in treacle. Especially in the role he was expected to play against Celtic he just couldnt get up and down the pitch quick enough to be effective.

In games where we truly dominate the football yes he can be an asset but it comes at the loss of protecting our fragile back 4. And in games against decent opposition that is a big risk.

Just to add i thought he was a damn good signing at first.

Of course they do but signing him when we already had 4/5 players that could play there does seem strange. Especially when it was clearly evident that we needed to prioritise defenders

Agree with the defender comment however you would be hard pressed to find someone who didn't think before the season started that Barton was a quality addition.

Also it was clear at the end of last year we suffered from some serious lack of squad depth... i mean look at the SC SF when we didnt even have a full bench.

In hindsight its easy to criticize but in reality the vast majority of us were v.happy with Barton signing.

 

Another thing that is alarming is that we no longer are pressing the ball high up the pitch. Saturday we allowed ourselves to sit very, very deep and put nigh on zero pressure on the ball in the opposing final 3rd. And I dont think that has much to do with Celtic' play. We looked like it was a deliberate tactic to not pressure the ball high, which was a mistake in my opinion - it allowed Celtic to play out from the back with no pressure and also meant their wingers didnt have to even think about assisting defensively.

 

If you look at the game on Saturday where as you say we weren't pressing them at all and giving them an age on the ball... but in reality the first two goals came from a corner and Kiernan's bloody awful distribution.... so the plan was working going by the score up until half time.

My biggest concern is that everybody always talks about the core of the team: Goalie, Centre Halfs, Centre mid. This needs to be strong but for us this is our weakest combination,. I have yet to see Barton play a decent game. Centre Halfs are not good enough in any combination that I have seen so far. But all the players have the ability of that i am sure maybe it is just taking longer than anticipated.

I didnt expect us to romp to wins in all of our games at the start of the season I was half expecting this to be honest. The first match against them definitely came too early and i still think we weren't 5-1 bad. Lots of new players to get settled into our way of playing. Using Barton as an example going from a counter attacking Burnley side to a team where you have all the possession most of the time is a big change.

For me the manager & team deserves our support until the end of the season then we see where we are at.

Sky should call out an All British League with invites from the various countries. Make that 3 British Leagues with the rest getting the chance to qualify through national competitions. ... and some consolation payments along the way. Inviting the Old Firm into a 5 tier "English" League, probably at the bottom, is just not on. (Then again, who knows what they'll earn down there ... as compared to Europe)

I'm interested to know what would Sky's push for this be based on?

I had a look at the figures... the last time i can find a weekend to compare w/e 27 Dec 2015. Both matches were on SS1

Hearts v Celtic got 250k viewers where as the Super Saturday match in the EPL got 1.5m viewers on the same weekend. In terms of ROI... the SPFL costs around £500k a match assuming the printed numbers are correct so £2 per viewer.

The EPFL matches cost Sky £11m per game so that is just over £7 per viewer. So in terms of value for money the SPFL is a much better investment for Sky as it stands now.

I had a check on BT viewing figures it works out the same... 6 to 1 ratio in favor of the EPL game.

So what would adding Rangers and/or Celtic to the EPFL do for Sky? i mean in the UK anyone willing to pay for Sky to watch Ranger or Celtic now will already be doing so you would think... surely it wouldn't add that many subscribers if we were in the English setup.

If anything it would be worse for Sky, the cash cow of Rangers viewers will now be lumped into the EPL deal and will just drive that price up for Sky.. not down.

That lot on a trip to the US 3/4's through the season, just before the split... surely a good thing for us?? I'm not an expert but surely this would have an effect on them this late on in the season. At the very minimum it would be a mental distraction in the couple of weeks leading up to it.

But also agree with GS and others who said that you shouldnt just be allowed to select an away game to play at a neutral venue...

As someone who is a regular contributor to RF and now C1872 have to say this is worrying to read.... think i may have to cancel my contribution until the truth of the story is uncovered. Fucking brings me to despair the thought that after all the crap our club has been through some apparent fans are using a vehicle which is meant to protect the club for the long term future for short term gain (if that is the case).

I feel at this stage in our redevelopment they have , until we get on a firm financial footing I just don't see how we can justify spending millions on transfer fees , to be honest I don't think we need to given the state of Scottish football .This season coming will give us a much better indication of MW and his player recruitment , at the moment I'm more than happy

Agree with this. I mean what we seen last season is the current squad isnt far away from competing for the title. What we are missing is experience and some depth and I would also add in a striker. So from what i have seen so far the only thing we havent done is signed a striker but i'm sure i read MW has said there maybe one more to come.

Can't wait for this season, i think Windass, Crooks and Rossiter are ones for the future already at a good standard. and Barton will be great in the SPL imo.

To be honest when I read this i just thought whats the point? If anything it just stirs a reaction from both sides... or maybe that was the point..

Media have a lot to answer for, they stoke the fire on both sides by publishing inflammatory articles and then are own hand with their pen and paper to report the fallout.

You are partially correct but you are also missing or ignoring my last sentence "to increase its shareholding beyond a rights issue".

 

In a rights issue if someone doesn't take up their rights they can be taken up by another party. Club 1872's shareholding is easy to deal with. If there are unallocated shares then they could purchase them at that point. If all shares are allocated and the desire is to still see an increased shareholding then they can purchase some shares from King to increase that shareholding.

 

There are many ways to skin a cat !!

Maybe there is someone who does not want to maintain shareholding... Easdale for example but the likelihood is I would assume the vast majority will maintain. And can you just offer those that are not taken up to whoever you want?

So you won't be buying a ST as you don't know where they will spend the money then ? Sounds like a very strange stance to me. Seems that you just don't trust the current custodians, as is your prerogative.

 

That 75k has now left the Club one way or the other. And that is NOT good.

 

There is absolutely NO NEED at this point to be purchasing shares from 3rd parties. Between King, T3B and the fans groups along with other friendly investors the Ashley/Easdale bloc has been largely neutered. The chances of that changing is remote in the near future.

 

You knee asserting that Club 1873 would be "giving" the money to the Club but not one person who disagrees with you here is saying that. They are all saying that the 75k is lost to the Cluvlb because the purchase was outside of a share issue. Mentioning the disabled facilities is a red herring because Bluedell's point was that had they waited to invest that money directly into the Club then the Club had an extra 75k to use on infrastructure. With this love it is money lost to the Club.

ST comparison is not relevant at all... i know what i am getting for my money... i buy a ST and I see the games. I give a contribution to C1872 and they buy up shares....

I dont want to argue back and forth all day because we clearly have a difference of opinion on this one. We obviously both want what is best for the club i feel the best way to achieve that is to get a significant fan shareholding to protect the club long term rather than giving money or not doing anything which will achieve short term goals but do nothing to protect the club for generations. Our club shouldnt be relying on the fans to donate money to improve infrastructure, this should be budgeted for. We have had a number of years where the previous regimes left our stadium to go to ruin but now with the current board we should start seeing this gradually improve. If we dont then maybe we have the wrong people at the helm.

Club 1872 don't need to "give" the cash to the Club though. They can sit on it till there is a share issue and then get their shareholding that way. King is a believer in fan representation and partial ownership anyway so in the event of a share issue he would find a way to allow Club 1872 to increase its shareholding beyond a rights issue.

I'm not a financial expert by any strecth of the imagination but in any share issue, the shareholders (as far as i understand) need to be given the opportunity to maintain there same shareholding level. So assuming I am right on that, then after a share issue nothing changes C1872 will maintain there 6% shareholding and money has gone into the club. Which is great but it still doesnt get C1872 closer to the goal of being a big shareholder.

75k in the clubs hands is still better than ZERO in the club's hands and 75k in the hands of a disinterested 3rd party. It may "only" be 75k, but what if Club 1872 do the same thing 10 times for 750k ? The quantum isn't the issue here, it is the principle.

 

18 months ago we had charlatans running the Club so purchasing on the open market made sense. Now we have good custodians looking after the Club's best interests - therefore there is little need, at this point, to purchase in the open market - better to have that money going into the Club when a share issue is made.

 

If it is "only" 75k then why even bother making the purchase ? Why not just wait if it is no big deal ?

 

It wouldn't be handing money over to D. King and co - it would be an investment into the Club - surely you see the preference of that rather than the money going to a 3rd party with no emotional interest in the Club whatsoever ? And you are, by deduction, saying that you would rather Club 1872 bought the shares on the open market rather than give the money to King ?? Which means that Club 1872 increases its shareholding (which is great) but that the Club get ZERO of the funds used to purchase (which is terrible).

 

Just looking at your "20%" number - you do realise that by purchasing the way they have been, Club 1872, if that 75k was equivalent to 1% shareholding (which it wont be, that is VERY conservative) then getting to 20% is another 14 such purchases - which is 1.05 million.... not quite so small now huh ?

 

You are arguing on the one hand that this isn't much of a purchase and the Club couldn't do much with it - and then arguing that Club 1872 should look to increase their shareholding..... which automatically means, right now, that the 75k becomes a far bigger number.

 

Every single penny that is invested should end up in the Club's hands IMHO - not the hands of outsiders. The Club isn't in the same danger from "investors" therefore the urgency isn't there anymore - so this was a purchase that wasn't necessary.

Sorry spotted Bluedell's reply before yours. The bulk of my reply there applies in this case too.

The first point is moot, they didnt buy 750k of shares, they bought 75k so the point remains. What would the club do with 75k if handed over? Who decides? Who has control over it? This is my issue here, sure if the disabled facilities need upgraded i would happily give money to a vehicle that was setup to collect money for such an improvement... but this isnt the point of C1872. Its fair enough that you dont like that the 75k was given to a third party... and i agree that ideally we want this money in the club. But again this is not the point of C1872. I want the supporters to have a big say in the future of the club and as history has shown us that simply being supporters means little. In the future when that position is secured sure use the money for various initiatives and set up something that allows at least some control on where the money goes but for now, at least for me which appears to be the minority, i would like to see a big fan position on the board.

We are nowhere near being in a position where we can be blasé about £75K. What could we do with it? Improve the stadium? Help meet our obligations towards the disabled regulations?

 

 

 

Why wait? Why not get the cash into the club now? Surely it's better in the club than in the hands of someone where it's of no benefit to Rangers?

 

 

So again give away the cash and not give it to the club?

 

I really don't get this logic.

Have to admit to being ignorant to the problems with the disabled facilities. And i cant really disagree with anything you say, you are bang on about 75k being more useful to the club than some unknown entity that sold 300k shares. But having seen what has happened the past few years i like taking this defensive approach by building up a decent shareholding that should prevent these things happening again in the future. To be honest if C1872 decided to change tact and start giving the money to the club then i for one would stop my contribution. I cant really explain it well with words to rightly defend myself for this decision. Like i said this is a long term game for me and I like the idea in the future of having a significant portion of the club fan owned.

I agree entirely. At the moment the club is in safe hands so the need to get shares into the hands of bears is not as urgent as it was 18 months ago. As such Club 1872 should be waiting until the money raised by fans can be invested directly into the club, and not paying off 3rd party investors. Very poor decision.

Disagree with this - the value of this purchase of shares is approx 75k... the club couldn't do much with that if it was handed over... to be frank that is a drop in the ocean compared to buying players or doing anything with a football club really.

The way i look at is this is a long term game now. Build up a decent shareholding, get into the position to be a real influence (i dont know what % that is... say 20%+ or something) then we can start to use the money that is hopefully still being given to 1872 on a monthly basis to fund various initiatives be that players or facilities or coaches... whatever. Whatever the number is a nice addition to the budget every year for the manager and keep some aside for a rainy day.

As much as i trust D. King and co I would rather not hand a penny over to them for a number of years so we can get C1872 into a place of being a big influential member of the board.

We are Scottish club but also a British club, so there's no reason why we shouldn't play in England guilt free. No matter how we tinker with the leagues up here it's not an attractive feature for the big money advertisers or sponsors.

 

What have these fookers SFA and SPl or it's other disguise the SPFL, done for our club over the last few years, apart from trying to fine us into oblivion?

 

If an opportunity should ever arise where we can move to England or an Atlantic league, let's leave this backwater of hate and agenda against us, to rot in their own bile.

Despite the fact one of the main perpetrators behind all the hate and agenda would be tagging along for the ride? Out of the frying pan and into the fire.

I dunno about that BG, back in the late 19th century bus companies laid on football omnibuses at special rates to take advantage of the first football boom, I could see the likes of Easyjet organising flights to Stockholm or Amsterdam (even more cheaply than usual) if they could be guaranteed filling the seats. Would likely see some serious policing though.

Yes that is a fair point but even if they fill two planes that's still around 200 people (depending on the plane size ). Plus it would be no fun to travel anywhere via plane for a day trip with the hassle of securitym trasnfers etc then if you stay over the costs will multiply big time. I'm sure there will be fans that will do it but i just cant see it on any sort of scale when its a week in/week out business unlike the Euro cup games.

Just imagine if our next 4 fixtures went something like this:

Anderlecht (a)

Porto (h)

Feyenoord (a)

Malmo (h)

 

How much more appealing is that than the likes of Alloa, Livi or Morton? Or Hearts, Hibs and Keltic even? We'd be able to attract top players and have decent competition to raise our standard. Sod England - we'd come back in ten years and thrash them for refusing to let us join their league.

Personally i feel we are a Scottish club and therefore thats where we should play. Dont get me wrong playing the likes you mention would be more appealing in the short term but really think about the long term. You will literally have no way support for one. Cant imagine many fans could afford away trips like that to make a decent turn out Think about the away trips we have all had over the years in Scotland... that will be effectively gone for the vast majority of our support. Second how long would it be before these games became a chore and we are dreaming about playing Barca, Man Utd, Bayern etc? Because that is what will happen eventually. Maybe not in 5 years but 10-15 years time the next generation will become just as jaded with those games as some of us do with the current fixture list.

Personally that feeling when you are walking up to the ground on match day, it doesnt really matter who you are playing... but you feel the excitement the anticipation of whatever is about to happen on the pitch. For your armchair supporter, something i have become more of over the years unfortunately, for sure it will be nicer to watch Gers v Porto than Gers v Livi but really thats not who we should cater for anyway.

Just my two cents but really we should focus on becoming a club built for the scottish league and setup.