Thistle Weir grassroots teams gone

[Norgethistle]

5 hours ago, milhouse said:

I don't think PTFC ever received any sort of transfer fee for Kevin Nisbet but I'm happy to be corrected on this.

Most parents and children will be Old Firm fans, I think the "next generation of fans" is a negligible effect. I think we'd be more likely to be successful signing first team players released from elsewhere who are a bit disgruntled and want to prove themselves.

To me the success and failure of the academy is solely based on whether it benefits the men's first team of PTFC, whether with good players directly from the Academy, or with money from sale of players put directly back to the playing budget. There is little evidence of success of Thistle Weir on this basis.

It's nice having wee kids in red and yellow tops running around on the pitch at Firhill at half time etc., but there's no evidence that it's going to get PTFC in the top flight of Scottish football and help to keep us there. Academies are a luxury not applicable to PTFC.

Nisbet was a product of the Hibs youth team till 16.

The grassroots part of the academy first and foremost actually gives kids (and their parents) an attachment to the club, this could be your future season ticket holders, or a future Academy player if they shine. 
As a club competing in a city with the Old Firm we need to be in the community trying to entice the next generation of fans through.  Kids go free is no longer walk up, so local kids won’t just appear to see a game and catch the bug, they’ll spend the fiver elsewhere. The grassroots shambles will just add to the difficulties of getting young fans to ignore iPads, TV games and the Old Firm and come and support the Jags

[laukat]

I get the comments about is a youth system worth it or not. However I think that's probably not the biggest problem in what has happened here.

From what I have seen in my comments from the parents effected the club have ended a couple of teams for 13 year and 12 years old without any warning. That's really poor and I would hope some journalist is asking Jlow to explain.

Even if you take the statement at face value there is a paragraph in there that worries me

"Following a review from the start of this season, it was agreed that the grassroots programme no longer represented the best use of funds by the Academy paying for a part-time grassroots coordinator to oversee just two teams. Therefore, that post was made redundant last week on amicable terms."

So if the fund are going to be used elsewhere then what for and why is that more important? Was ending the teams really about getting a person off the wage bill? 

Its not the first time a club has chosen to cut youth teams because they can't afford them and in the current financial climate they could have quite easily have released a statement saying 'due to cost pressures we had to make a hard choice, sorry for those children effected we'll try and get them some tickets to games to soften the blow 

So why issue a statement that looks like a lie? Is there actually a bigger financial problem at the club that Jlow et al want to keep hidden whilst the mess they have made of fan ownership is still rolling on? What's next to be deemed as no longer representing the best use of funds?