Ancipital

The attacking set pieces are far from the biggest of our worries, so far we've scored from corners or free kicks vs Airdrie, Clyde, Ross County (twice), and from a 2nd ball vs Dundee Utd and the fact we're mixing them up is a good thing. Not defending where we are or the manager or indeed our defending set pieces which is god-awful, but after years of watching Sean Welsh or Martin Woods hit the first man or float it gently into the opposition goalies' arms, we're actually putting thought and effort into these things and I'm all for it. In that particular one above it "worked" in as far as Robson got the ball on the corner of the box with no-one within 5 yards of him. He then duffed it straight to the front post, but that's on him.

Kenny Miller was the next manager from the moment he signed up.

Stuart is Ban-again, as is Gordon. Palmer should be back unless he gets injured with Norn Iron's U21s and Zanatta will be eligible. Palmer for Sena and definitely Zanatta for Robson would be the only outfield changes I'd make. I don't have a strong opinion on the goalkeepers but changing every week can't be good for the team?

We have 7 central midfielders on the books but only Cole is available (Harkins, Slater, & Wilson injured; Bannigan and Gordon suspended, and Palmer away with NI U21s, which would also have ruled out Gordon even if he wasn't suspended) and he only signed on Monday. Would guess one of Penrice or O'Ware -if out of the bad books- will be shoved into midfield alongside him. Presume Kakay gets a start as well and with Links Park being an astro, anyone who struggles physically on that type of surface doesn't start.

More recently away at Tannadice, Conrad Balatoni and ...er... Stuart Bannigan

The whole finances thing would make more sense to me if we did make a whacking great loss last season: Last season - we had quite a large squad by 31st August if not the start of the season - we had to pay off Archibald and Paterson or at least pay their contracts as well as Caldwell and Kerr - quite a few of the duds we signed were let go early, presumably with a chunk of their wages for the rest of the season - we signed half a new team in January - Scott McDonald probably didn't come cheap (personally can't believe Coulibaly did either but that's just me) - we only finished 6th in the league and a home game vs Celtic in the LC and Hearts on TV in the Scottish Cup will have brought in not much -technically we did get a transfer fee for Erskine but assume this was buttons However the JLow board have threatened legal action against anyone saying there was financial mismanagement and Michael Robertson seems adamant the club turned a profit (A) This season - much smaller squad as it stands - no manager to pay off (yet) - anywhere between £600k-700k from Fitzpatrick and Lindsay - On the flipside, reduced parachute payment - Netting off visiting crowds from Falkirk & Ross County vs Dundee and Arbroath as probably small loss but not game changing Yet before Saturday's win and the resultant visit to Parkhead we were projected to run at a massive loss which was only plugged by the revenue from the sales of AF & LL (B). If a player is on £50k a year then a £700k loss would be 14 players too many- I appreciate that's overly simplistic and clearly all the costs aren't on the playing side but that's miles out. Statements (A) and (B) look incompatible- it would make far more sense that we ran at a loss last year and are cutting back this year but if A is true then B makes no sense.

I'm not defending it but the current board statement said a major proportion of the budget had been committed when the boardroom changes took place. Since then we've signed Jones and Austin on a permanent basis and de Vita on loan, so the devil may be in the detail there. I think Caldwell thought he was getting a good chunk of the AF fee but that's had to be used to plug a hole.

So this is it, we're going to be a feeder club to Oxford and Cambridge?

I'm pretty phlegmatic about the whole thing, it's not as if the fans will vote for this or there's a 99% majority wanting it stopped, enough shareholders have already decided to sell and it'll either go through if the SFA allow it, or it won't and they'll have to try another method to sell up. However the budget figures don't make sense to me as a layman. We've had ex-director Michael Robertson on one of the fans Facebook pages saying the accounts to 31/5/2019 "should" show a profit and this article saying there were funds available and £350k also available in January should we need it and threatening legal action against anyone saying the club was failing. We now have the new board saying that even with the F&L money (say £700k) received after 31/5/2019 we were still going to run at a loss for this season, despite the old board closing the Coli main stand for 90% of games, making office folk redundant , presumably getting a few shekels from UEFA for the girls Euros hosting etc. We've got a squad of 19 senior players and a handful of young lads, unless we're paying Kenny Miller £10k a week (we're not) or paying for Joe Cardle's sunbeds (probable weekly cost around the same) , or Firhill is costing far more to maintain than previously let on, that just seems mad as javeajag pointed out above. I get there can be creative accounting I can't see how these two positions square up.

Never trusted Beattie since his refusal to let us know which way we voted on letting newco rangers back into the 2nd tier in 2012, especially after this https://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/news/13234895.jags-chief-david-beattie-its-now-or-never-for-league-change/

Think we'll be 3rd or 4th, the only clubs I think will finish above us are the Dundee clubs & maybe Inverness. Hopkin obviously did very well with Livi but it's easily forgotten he got them relegated first and then had to rebuild a team and the fact Morton have had to re-register a coach that retired a year ago... imagine if that happened to us, would be heads on fire everywhere. I'd be very disappointed if we finished behind Ayr who have lost pretty much all of their best outfield players from last season (Shankland, Rose, Crawford, Smith) and would have finished bottom if you'd started last season from any point from about December onwards. I'm sure there's a precedent for an Ian McCall managed team in this league after losing their best players and I don't remember it being pleasant. Dunfermline finished below us last season (yes they did) and have signed a bunch of untried kids, Paul Paton who is beyond done, and Kevin Nisbet who might make us rue our decision to let him go- but his performances for Raith vs Queens in the playoffs last year and the % of his goals that were penalties vs part time players suggests otherwise. Queens themselves still look to be overly reliant on one man who is injured for the first few weeks of the season, and while Alloa and Arbroath might cause annoyance in individual games- hopefully not Saturday- I think they're a safe bet to be 9 & 10 in whatever order you prefer.

The second Alloa away game last year was probably as comfortable a win as we had all season, maybe the QoS game on the last day.

He's saved two, one vs Cove in Scottish cup 2012-13 and one vs Cowdenbeath in league cup 2013-14. Both at Firhill. He saved one in the shootout vs QoS in the cup final. No idea how many he's faced in total.

If Gary Caldwell plays for Celtic legends will Doolan re-enact Keane vs Haaland / Simpson vs Durrant on him? Surely you can't get sent off in your own testimonial?

Both of those happened after May 31 2019 when the accounts will be up to. However we made £343k profit in the final Premiership season (accounts ending 31 May 2018) under Beattie & co and that included the first fee (rumoured to be approx £350k) for Linsday.

Looking at the players who were freed from Scottish Premiership or Championship clubs and still don't have a club I'd be hoping that the rest of our players are either loans or from outside Scotland (or both).

Forgive my ignorance, and the fact Sheriff Officers have turned up means we've done things by the book but I would have thought something like this would have been put through at an EGM?

I'm sure there must be redacted Screenshots of these PMs kicking about

According to the player himself, Palmer was born in England but moved to Canada at 8 months old. Well, I assume his parents moved and took him with them rather than doing it off his own back.

OK I could have phrased it better, the financial mess that was likely post relegation after Beattie had made his statement about slashing budgets being a false economy and I assume running a championship team on a premiership budget. I'd be genuinely intrigued to know what some of the "nonsensical financial decisions" made last year were, I don't doubt there were but I'm keen to know what. There seems to be certain people "ITK" about the ruinous state of the off field side of things at Firhill over the last 12 months but I would wager the vast majority of fans, on here, social media, and certainly the ones who aren't wouldn't have a clue. When you add it to all the rumours of folk being told things by directors or other folk receiving private messages on social media from club staff then it's a headf*ck and it's difficult to know who to believe.

Whilst I'm broadly in favour of the (seemingly now inevitable) external investment....cynically I would say Beattie has played his hand very well, see the ship starting to sink and jump off, let Low and co take the shit for the financial mess that had been created and then come back in as a white knight figure.

The rumours were that Fyvie 's injuries have put him beyond the level where he can play full time professional football and he was planning on going part-time with Cove and taking up a job in the "real world". What is absolutely true is he was training with Dundee last week (pictures on their official social media confirmed this)-whether that was just as a favour or whether they were looking at him and have decided "no" I don't know.

Only by people on internet forums.

I'm sure there was a running joke amongst the players last time that Fox was so quiet he didn't even shout when he was coming off his line. However, he was 23 the first time he signed for us and he's 32 now with 2 x 2nd tier league winners medals, a League Cup winners medal- didn't play in the final due to injury but saved a penalty(!) from Griffiths in the semi- and also a can of Irn Bru medal earned in that timeframe as well as experience of a couple of Scotland squads (but no caps).

Would think out of those only Cameron would have scored more than against, think he only got one for us and must have got 2 or 3 for Alloa.