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Dean’s letter is so much better thought out and worded compared to our rant

Forever and ever, we'll follow the Jags, the Partick Thistle, the Harry Wraggs, For we have a promise, that we shall fulfill - to bring the Scottish Cup back up to Maryhill! Now we can't be quite sure when our fathers or grandfathers first made that promise, but what we do know is that still we ache for the second coming of that beautiful old trophy, 100 years on from our sole success. Unravelling the legendary historic journey, we'll uncover the background stories, get to know the players and discover which national records we broke along the way. This is the story of how the Cup was won, a herculean struggle, the likes of which had never been seen before in the National Cup - and has never been seen since. Hope you can join us this coming Wednesday for part one... (thanks to PTFCShirts for the colourization)

St.Mirren and Kilmarnock have had their appeal against forfeited matches upheld. The 3 matches will now be played. Suspended fines of £40,000 each have now been reduced to £20,000 each, with half suspended. So 2 teams who broke covid protocol/rules have got away with nothing more than a slap on the back of the hand. St. Mirren described the original sanctions as "excessive and inappropriate" while calling for a common sense approach. Really, demoting teams before the season is completed is what i would call excessive and inappropriate.

Is an 18 game season (plus play offs) a viable possibility? Even if the re-start was not until (say) 1st March 2021, there would still be reasonable time to fit all the games in. It has the benefit of fairness, as all teams play each other twice each, one home and once away. Would be tough, but still within the bounds of possibility, to aim at first place. A play off place should be achievable (not saying it would necessarily be achieved). If we could not finish in the top 4 in an 18 game season, we would have little excuse for complaint.

Over £1600 donated since the announcement of the suspension of our league. Well done to everyone,but special mention again to David Thomson QC £600 donation.

The website is now live and you can sign up: https://thejagsfoundation.co.uk/

I'd worry about our players getting injured Taking the Knee

They are working on the 4 stage strategy:

Might not be popular but I’d like us to borrow a lot of the mentality that has went on at Livingston. Getting promotion from league one to the premier league 2 years running - not only have they more and comfortably stayed in the division but pretty much been verging on challenging for top 6. There has been a winning mentality throughout their team, a complete team togetherness, team spirit and drive for success that is the complete opposite in every way from us since the day we made top 6 in the premier league

Ran out of likes. Also add some of the so called elite teams have broke protocol/rules and think they should not be punished.

If we hadn’t messed up last season we would have got that £500k too and wouldn’t be stating we were hard done by. The predicament we are in isn’t the league or government or SFA’s fault it’s ours and ours alone, 3 and a half seasons of crap and bad management have put us on the brink of collapse

This shutdown will allow us some time to get more players injured.

Funny you should say that, this excerpt from 'Willie Paul – The First Partick Thistle Giant': Thistle reach the summit of Scottish football amidst talk of a Willie Paul statue Sat-04-Sep-1897 Heart of Midlothian [h] W3-2 Scorers: Robert Gray, Willie Paul, Willie Paul Att: 7,000 Venue: Meadowside, Partick. Surely, one of thee most momentous occasions in all of Partick Thistle’s history? If I could hitch a ride in the Tardis I would, with a heavy heart, skip past 1971 and 1921 and set the co-ordinates as per the above. What a starter we had been given; Heart of Midlothian were the visitors – and they were the current Scottish Champions! The Second Division flag (unveiled in a friendly match with Rangers the week before) was flying high above the new main stand, and Meadowside hosted a huge crowd for the second week in a row. Big gate receipts were very welcome – there was a new ground to pay for after all. “The reaction in Partick to the victory was unbelievable. Residents who had hung out of tenement windows watching the large crowd throng the streets before the game now watched them leave Meadowside singing and dancing. The newspapers were full of the story of a well-known Thistle follower who announced he was going to start at the nearest close and insisted he was going to visit every tenant in the entire burgh to shake their hands. There were rumours that the Thistle committee had commissioned a statue of Willie Paul to commemorate his goal.” And so it came to be that Thistle prevailed in a famous battle of the Champions. Top-Flight Victory # 1 was secured on day one of our entry into the arena. With no goal-average system in place, Thistle fast-forwarded straight to the joint-top place in Scottish Football. The SFA called this one right; foolishness from West Calder I think. Every chance they could have beaten us if they'd played the game.

Signed up. The future starts today. Given where we are in all respects, the only way is up!

sign up https://thejagsfoundation.co.uk/

Championship about to go under the bus to save the top league as expected - consultation in name only? Talk of null and voiding - h*ns don't get same asterisked title as the green filth did, hearts don't get promoted and brechin get saved again - cue much guffawing and backslapping, malt whisky and cigars at the green-leaning SPFL/SFA Fawlty Towers HQ - they'll only be disappointed that they couldn't get us again.

Admittedly, I know next to nothing about the BLM or the organisations involved, but isn't the knee thing empty symbolism, like clapping health care staff instead of paying them properly? When does it become redundant, or is it now a set behaviour that must be adhered to in the way that grace before meals is to the religious?

But not surprising! We as a club and to a lesser degree, Hearts and Stranraer, received more support during last summer from articles written by Tom English. He did not spare the the football authorities and in particular, the SPFL. The 'closed' meeting format described by the Chairman of Stenhousemuir is consistent with the general approach of SPFL Chairman, McLennan and his CEO, Doncaster. English in fact wrote a very good article about an interview the former did with himself. Says it all. I bet more than a few lower league clubs (clyde excepted) are now wishing they had supported the demoted 3 or at least the proposed enquiry into the conduct/operation of the SPLF senior management! More to come on this I suspect, hopefully!

Think you're making the mistake of thinking that they care at all about the lower leagues completing their season.

Technically correct answers but it starts from the basis of how the proposal to the clubs was processed. The SPFL and clubs could have sought more inclusive proposals sharing the impact of covid across all members rather than choosing to force demotions and award titles to teams who were not certain to finish there after the complete season of games. They could have tabled a proposal that both awarded final placings but also put in place a temporary league reconstruction so no club was demoted and therefore suffered or they could have voided the leagues or they could have suspended the leagues and finished it before starting the current season. I know none of those were deemed to garner sufficient support however that to my mind was because the SPFL and key clubs insisted on a vote finalise standings first rather than a single vote to finalise and reconstruct. Dundee's 'vote' was to my mind symptomatic of this manipulation. Dundee wanted reconstruction but niaively fell for a promise rather than a guarantee. It is clearly incorrect to say the SPFL and SFA acted in the interest of all clubs just because they were found to have processed the proposal legally. I agree with @exiledjag that the club should take every opportunity to remind the SPFL, SFA and other clubs that they failed to act in the best interest of all clubs and that what they did was unfair on us, Falkirk, Stranraer and Hearts. Our circumstances are perhaps the most unfair of all when compounded by the decision to suspend the lower leagues. One other thought - This thread was started on March 11 2020 and we have all discussed not only what happens if they shut down season 19/20 but also discussed the strong likelyhood that season 20/21 would not complete. We as a group of fans have for season 20/21 known for months it was likely and that there were various ways of dealing with it. However the SFA and SPFL seem to have suspended league 1 and 2 with no real plan for the knock on effect of that decision. It surely can't hae been a surprise to them that this might be required as it clearly wasn't to us so what exactly is the advice from the SFA on how lower leagues deal with the transfer windows? Where's the support for lower league clubs? Why aren't the SFA/SPFL able to tell us how long the suspension lasts before the season cannot be completed? In short why are highly paid individuals such as Maxwell and Doncaster not been able to produce a contingency plan when its been known for months that one was needed? Surely they've not been sitting on their rear-ends hoping the pandemic would go away before they would have to act?

This is the point I was trying to make, probably not well. There are several different factors and obvious discrepancies, like Falkirk having a larger average attendance than several Championship clubs. That is why the "one size fits all" approach taken by the SFA was , at best, another example of lazy thinking.

Really like this boys attitude and he comes across as confident without being cocky. Well done to all involved at Thistle for cutting through the red tape and I'd love to see him succeed as he's truly passionate about the game.

Correct

There is also the question of footballers taking up testing resource at the expense of the general population and whether that is justified.

The statement is full of self entitlement and playing the victim. It states "At the season start, the SPFL made it clear that clubs who were unable to play at any point would be penalised. Yet here we are, prepared to play but unable to do so as we are in a league of predominantly part-time clubs" We haven’t been able to get a game on at Firhill last few weeks despite having undersoil heating, which appears we didn’t use (perhaps rightly) for financial reasons, should based on the statement from our chair, we be penalized for being unable to play based on a financial decision? ”Once demoted, we fought for a restructure of leagues to allow us, as an ambitious full-time club, to continue playing” The same ambitious full time club that has barely been able to fill a bench all season against part time rivals who have. “We warned last week that the football authorities’ distribution of monies, which penalised Thistle by £350k, could come back to bite us” Perhaps not overspending our income by nearly £400k last season would have cushioned that blow, we also got the same as every other team in our league, why should we have got more? Because we grossly outspend the majority of teams we are competing with? “The final straw is the impact that this may have during the transfer window.” only last week we basically issued a statement stating we were skint yet now we we’re going to splash the cash in transfer market to turn our season around.

Personally I think the statement is poor, plays the victim card, brings NHS into it, and blames all for the predicament we are in bar those that got us to 27th place in Scotland from 6th a few years ago. We have barely cut wages, squad size or back room staff size since leaving premiership, stating we should have got more money cause we are full time yet part time clubs got more than us, these part time clubs are above us, in leagues with higher crowds and higher admission fees. We are doing ourselves no favors with the “Poor us” statements, we are where we are because of results on the park and piss poor decisions off it over last few years, not because a vote, not because distribution of Government funds (Remember Premiership clubs only get a loan, we actually receive £150k more in fee money than Livi or Accies). Ending the season last year in the way it did, diverted us away from the shambolic affairs on and off the park, our financial results show that with COVID only impacting for 2 months on those figures. We should never been in the situation of being basically bottom of the leagues for nearly 3 complete seasons, and even dropping down yet another level we are struggling to keep up with the leaders.

No idea when or if the competition will resume. Here are the iterim standings based on the 8 completed Round 2 ties.

I don't have a problem with suspending the leagues, but it should apply to all of professional sport. That's the only fair way to do it. Football is not essential but the favouring of the so called elite teams is sickening

The club will be refunding everyone who bought a pass for the Cowdenbeath game. I know where my £10 will be going: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-the-jags

I make it a point never to disagree with a lady. Going way back to when this was all being discussed I could not get my head around why we had to start a season rather than finish one which had already started.

When you factor additional time for play offs it's difficult to see the leagues being completed. And if that be the case, albeit in hindsight, it's gonna look silly not completing last season's fixtures thru last autumn. Two incomplete seasons instead of one.

1. Its not affecting the Premier league SPFL don't care 2. See answer 1 3. See answer 1 I can see everything below the Championship being voided. Only decision the SPFL need to make is how to shaft Thistle again.

It’s maybe something that needs to evolve. After a while it just becomes a habit and the reason for doing it is forgotten.

If it had a function and purpose when it started, surely it still does now? It’s not as if the problems and wrongs being highlighted have been fixed and gone away. The whole point of continuing with the knee is to keep the issue visible and in the forefront. Otherwise the whole thing is forgotten about for most people and we go back to how things were, as usually happens when a racism issue makes the news. It’s debated, people say it’s terrible, someone may get punished and then we continue as if it never happened without doing anything significant re the core problems and reasons. Obviously I’m not saying it’s a solution in itself, or anything near enough, but keeping the issue visible is important, I believe

The military should be given complete control of the logistics, they have the manpower, resources and most importantly they won’t be profiting from it or lining friends pockets to help

To be fair we decided to concentrate on care homes first more time consuming and logistically challenging but which are probably just about done now it was 80% by Thursday .....England didn’t so different approach

Back and middle rows, third left: Now THAT's what I call a shed!

Well at least it won't affect us much at Firhill. Nobody could really describe recent seasons as entertainment.

Impeach Doncaster!

I've just sent you a reply e.mail, using the Archive reply e.mail system. You were looking for info on the death on George Allan (ii), a serving soldier during WWI, and a Thistle footballer. I've quoted details from "scotlandatwar.co.uk", which in turn quoted from a Dundee newspaper article on the inquest into George's death. If the e.mail gets lost in transit, (a Scottish football failing) or you need any further info, please let me know. The same article on Partick Thistle players who fell during the war, also includes information you need on Tom Callaghan, initially enlisted in the Somerset Light Infantry, but subsequently transferred to the London Regiment. It only states that Tom was killed in action on 20 February 1917 at Ypres. Ditto George Elmore, killed on the first day of the Somme offensive. Willie John Gray, born Inverness around 1882, died the Somme 18 November 1916. (Seaforth Highlanders.)

For me, the difference is that we warned the SPFL of the consequences of their actions(or at least claimed to have done). Falkirk waited until it was too late. The SPFL have a lot of explaining to do. Money was given to the SPFL by the guy Anderson to allow lower league clubs to test players and keep playing. The SPFL in their wisdom ? decided to allocate it across all leagues. Now they force div 1 & 2 to stop playing because they aren’t testing ?

OK i will say it. First time for everything @Dick Dastardly

Nothing would surprise me with the clowns that run our game and the self interest of all the clubs, especially the wee diddy clubs that proliferate the 3 lower divisions. Of course we have been dreadful in the last few seasons but rewind 2 or 3 years and St Mirren could have been in our position. My Buddy supporting pal wouldn’t be so pompous. We’ve been very unlucky to be in this position and the way we’ve been treated by most of our peers and the miscreants at the SPFL, every step of the way, threatens our existence. If they wind up the season and go to the playoffs, we shall again be disadvantaged in a similar manner to last year as if we win our game in hand we’d have been in the play off positions. Surely they can’t decide the season after 10 games played. Or can they?

If Dundee log in 3 days late will their opinion still count?

That looks far too close to the truth. Its even worse when you think back to Doncaster and Mulreany on Sportsound saying the decision by SG to not allow fans return was a political choice. If it was, as those 2 clowns suggested, a political choice then not to allow fans to return then the decision to put a partial closure in place can only be seen as a very political choice by the SFA and SPFL. At every point in this pandemic the SFA and SPFL have sought to pass the buck and hope someone else makes the choice for them. They are utterly unfit for purpose and completely incapable of leadership.

Bollocks. You just can't see the fact that we have been an utter shambles for the past 3 and half years. Been on a steep decline. It was within our control to stop it. But off the field shenanigans, poor appointments, poor player recruitment has put us where we are. So are we UTTERLY blameless? Have a look at the real story behind this shambles.

They were not out of our control at the end of last season. With the players we had, we should not have been bottom when the league was called

Round 3 draw Forfar Athletic v Airdrieonians or Edinburgh City - /A2 Dundee United v Partick Thistle or Cowdenbeath - A3/A4 Livingston v Stirling Albion or Raith Rovers - A4/A2 (Camelon Juniors or Brora Rangers) or Heart of Midlothian v Stranraer - (H2/H1)/A3 Peterhead or Stenhousemuir v Kilmarnock - H2/H3 Rangers v Cove Rangers - A4 Celtic v Arbroath or Falkirk - A2/A3 Ross County v Buckie Thistle or Inverness Caledonian Thistle - A5/A2 Queen of the South v Hibernian - H1 Dumbarton or Huntly v Aberdeen - H2/H4 East Fife v Greenock Morton or Dunfermline - H1 Hamilton Academical v St Mirren - Dundee v St Johnstone - H1 Elgin City or Ayr United v Keith or Clyde - A2/H1/A5/A3 Formartine United or Annan Athletic v Motherwell - H4/H3 Fraserburgh v Nairn County or Montrose - /H2 No need to get your predictions in yet. Hopefully most of the vagaries will shake down over the next few days.

Far from spectators returning, I can't see the leagues running for very long before they are forced to close again. Celtic, Hibs and Kilmarnock all have current outbreaks and these are from players being tested regularly. At our level there is no requirement to test, so players are going to carry the virus into games, not knowing that they are going to infect others on the pitch. It is going to spread like wildfire. I can't see our league lasting for long in the current climate