douglas clark

Garscube Road End, Just so's you know, your post 3 hours ago is pending moderation. " Report post (IP: 82.132.185.116) Posted 3 hours ago Intially TFL were to purchase the major shares with Colin Weir's money. Didn't happen. Three Black Cats now hold the majority shares. Bought out Propco to take Firhill into club hands. Three Black Cats own the ground. Not Partick Thistle. An interim board appointed ( fair enough) with a space for another director. Now one of the interim has left( last of the old board) and is replaced by a previous director who was hardly on the board before his removal and is there only until March. He hardly knows the club and what does he bring to the club? I suspect he is J. Low's puppet. Buzarre Training ground. It was said that with the takeover this was to gi go ahead. Now we are to piggy back a junior club's ground. We were to have sole use of the training ground, now we are to be tenants. The money for the academy and the Women's team are welcome. But the Academy are only getting back what was withdrawn when Colin Weir spat out the dummy. It all stinks to the high heaven." At first glance it makes statements that require backing up or deleted. If you cannot provide evidence then I'll delete your post. This is a forum which is vulnerable to the wrongful charge that by allowing comments (yours in this case) to be shown the light of day makes us complicit. I doubt, very much, that you want to kill off this forum. You have the ability to delete your post.

admin, Please e-mail me.

Anyone else remember the enclosure? Memory isn't what it was, but I think I saw most of my early days of supporting this club in there. Until we found our own, personal staunchion across the park. We were ahem, 'a tad annoyed', if anyone else took it first. Much like our modern season ticket holders!

eljaggo, Fascinating. It flies directly in the face of the issues. Which, for all their obvious faults, neither party, Jordanhill Jag nor JaveaJag could realistically be accused of failing to address. It is what they do. Controversy is good. It is what a web site expects. It is fuel for further discussion. I kind of doubt that our good friends Jordanhill Jag or JaveaJag have the impact on the media that you imply. This, it seems to me, to be local. I am unaware of why admin ought to close down anything.It is not my call, but why, exactly?

So what happened to the site? I thought it was just me that had been banned for being a crap moderator? Incidentally, the rules I apply come from my friend Callie Arcale who moderated Space.com. for ages. I have very few hero's or heroines, but she is certainly one of them. If you think that this site is controversial, you ain't seen nothing yet. And, sadly, Space.com no longer has a forum, a.f.a.i.k. Because their controversy was 'interesting'. You had folk believing in ET, and you had folk that thought they were crazy. But there were corporate interests that appeared to want the site to be in the pocket of capital, and not having folk talk - often rubbish - which wasn't attractive to folk with a buck to make. I do not want this site to go down that route. Could we please be as respectful on here of others opinions as if we were meeting face to face? There has been aggression expressed on here that would start a fight in a nunnery. I will do my best to moderate that. However, it is frankly down to you to moderate yourselves. The more 'interesting' debates are not free of ad hominems nor aggression. You know who you are. Stop it. You'll get a warning, then a temporary ban then a permanent ban. Is that a route you want to pursue? It is not a road I want to have to follow. If you do not recognise that as your behaviour then you, probably, have nothing to worry about. If you do recognise that as your behaviour then pause and reflect. Peace and mutual respect guys and gals.

May I intervene here? This is all fun and games, but it is not fun and games. It is frankly ridiculous to pretend that TFE were ISIS related. One is the takeover of a football club and t'other is, ahem, murderous. YMMV. It is also a tad strange that everyone see's everyone else as a 'liar'. I go to games, not as often as I would like, but most fans seem to me do not call other fans 'liars'. Please desist. I will, probably, delete posts that describe other posters as 'liars'. It is unproductive and wrong. Could you good people please accept that there is more than one opinion about what is best for Partick Thistle? It is worth remembering that our survival a good few years ago wasn't guaranteed. We are lucky to be here. Please, moderate yourselves. Make my job easy.

Well, we have the other side at Firhill on Saturday, let's hope we gub them too, but com·pla·cen·cy ain't a good look! You do know I hope we win?

It seems so. Congratulations on 14,000 posts here, that is frankly astonishing.

That was pretty impressive.

Don't know about you, but that was pretty emotional. I really, really want him back in some sort of role hereabaouts.

That works for me!

It is quite noticeable that, when it is sung, the volume around the word ' Pope' and the volume around 'Queen' are around 50% less than of the surrounding volume of the piece. It suggests to me that folk see the overall point, but - probably rightly - have no truck with extremism.

Gentlemen, Please stop the ad hominem attacks!

I know it is kind of old but Ken Bates had a controlling interest in Chelsea and PTFC once upon a time.

We have apparently signed two new players. I welcome them. How was that possible? Something is going on...

Ahem. I have no idea where a 140 page thread, which lacks any sort of clarity or illumination actually takes us as supporters of PTFC. Personally. I think that the sale is a done deal. The likes of Jordanhill Jag and others make the obvious point that shareholders outweigh us. This reminds me of a couple of things, 'Save the Jags' and the death of Clydebank. It is kind of obvious that the board machinations are about folk who'd essentially written off their shareholdings in our football club as 'lost money' becoming aware that perhaps they'd get at least as much as they had invested and perhaps more. That their earlier disinterest, y'know money written off, becomes an unexpected opportunity. They awake from their sleep and look to their bank books. Wow! An opportunity presents itself! Instantly reclaim the board. Immediately negotiate. Are they entitled to do so? Of course they are. That is a consequence of our inability to actually win back when you and I 'saved the Jags', We should have had at least a majority of the shares. Perhaps someone can remind me why we didn't? I would love to think that this sort of takeover is going to be astonishingly positive, I really do. But.

I have never been particularily interested in the financial side of running a football club. However with around 2500 paying fans - y'know excluding kids go free and suchlike - at say £20 pounds each, it is £50000 per fortninght or £25,000 a week in gate money alone. That makes us a million pver a 40 week season. This takes no account of all the other money that the club gets and I have no idea how much that might add up to. There are payments for final league position, transfers and move on's. And the pies are dear as. Without all of the latter, it is unlikely that our earnings are much under £1.5 million per annum ( made up of gates over the assumed 40 weeks and the price of the pies) Outgoings are perhaps more interesting. The cost of the player pool and those that put them on the park ought to be the first order of business. Beyond that priority we absolutely require is a way of producing our own talent. And that means all the way from five year olds to potential first team players in a seamless manner. There should be nowhere where the gap is too large to broach, we ought to have teams at every level. Whoever can take PTFC to that would have my support, but, so far, no-one is offering anything like it. At least as a meaningful manifesto for taking our club forward.

The Herald has a 'Board Response' up: " PARTICK THISTLE have responded to claims made around the running of the club with a statement, refuting suggestions that manager Gary Caldwell transfer budget has been altered. The statement read: "The current board of directors have honoured the playing squad budget signed off by the previous board, a major proportion of which was already committed when the new directors were appointed. However, the budget did run at a significant deficit which could not be recouped from the club’s recurring income. This shortfall has been partly covered by the fees to be received following the sale of Aidan Fitzpatrick and the sell on percentage which the club will receive as a result of Liam Lindsay’s transfer from Barnsley to Stoke. The remainder of the deficit will be funded by adjusting aspects of our logistical operations, not by reducing the funds available for the playing budget. “The current playing budget available to the manager is likely to be around the third or fourth highest in the league. As a result of these factors we are able to fully support the manager’s aspirations to challenge at the top of the Championship this season. Any suggestions that the ultimate target is anything other than promotion are false. “The current board strongly refutes any suggestion that £200,000 has been removed from the playing budget, as the figure available to the Manager remains as it was under the previous board.” More to follow... "

I have had to delete one post, Please do the political stuff somewhere else.

Well, not a lot that I can see. The two people that want to take us over are both Americans. There are a lot of places where whether London is Moscow on Thames or not is a legitimate subject. I am not at all sure that this web site is one of them. Please take this 'discussion' elsewhere.

The problem for me is the lack of verifiable facts. Everything around here is rumour built on very narrow foundations. Will probably turn up for the Saturday event.

Fearchar, I think that the two investors are American. Correct me if I am wrong. Linking them to Moscow on Thames seems a bit of a stretch.

Jagsman is asking interesting questions. Is Gary Caldwell about to be sacked? I'd assume not. It is argueable that his 'spread sheet' theory of football is actually very attractive to our potential new overlords. I share his worries that fans are not getting meaningful updates. This is a tough question. There has to be a gavotte whilst the two sides find common or uncommon ground. How that works out matters to fans like you, me and Jagsman. The good, or bad, future of our club is at stake here. And we have inadequate information to determine that, as fans. Our exclusion from that discussion is both understandable and frustrating, equally. I have been insultingly angry about this. Put that down to a lack of up-dates, and a lack of news. It is a heck of a frustrating. What we have seen, so far, is what they want us to see, so far. It is "a riddle, wrapped in an enigma..." Maybe

I expect we are in a mutual 'discovery' period. This might take a while before any decisions are made, on either side. ( This assumes that a deal has not already been done and that both sides are working towards a common objective, which may be true.) So, we sit and wait whilst our club is subject to what? I know not. It is a bit ridiculous to say that it could be 'transformational' for Thistle without spelling it out. (Ridiculous, I know, but being taken over by Elon Musk would also be transformational, but, not, necessarily in a good way. The Firhill Space Port? No room for football?) I, for one, hope it will be positive, but the lack of facts to support that, whether suppressed or not, is a bit worrying. Fans make clubs. We ought to be on the inside loop.

And me