fizoxy

Oh man, you've just enraged 90% of motherwell twitter. Tierney is the current beneficiary of the "less you play the better you get" rule :-) Not saying I don't like him, but we will struggle to carry a physical lightweight in a team of mental lightweights. If we can get a midfielder with a set of nuts, it would probably allow Tierney to play.

If we get Morris and Sol off the books, and considering we also have the wages for Penney to use, I'm expecting at least two signings by the end of the window, if not three. I seriously doubt that we are paying all of Maguire's wages, and the same will go for shields if we put him out on loan as well, (as there is absolutely not benefit to us putting them out on loan otherwise) so we should have the funds available. Longer term, with carroll, Goss, Mcginn and sod's contracts being up in the summer, at least we won't be stuck with a bunch of bad contracts should the worst happen.

I'm sure at the AGM they said that the annual cost of maintenance will drop from 125k to 20k. As for spending money on players to keep us up, I'm all for us having better players, but look at what hibs, Utd, and Aberdeen are paying, it guarantees nothing.

I have an armchair I'm not using.

If we get money for Sol, maybe the gods haven't abandoned us after all.

Only thing I can think of is that we had a plan for KVV and Mandron playing together, so we've just slotted shields into mandron's spot.

Well, that's a depressing lineup. As per the clubs tweet: -Danzaki still awaiting clearance so misses out - Mandron unavailable after picking up an injury in training on Friday - Miller out after picking up an injury in the reserve match - McGinley, Carroll, Mugabi and Efford still ou

That's a fair point, I'll pull something together that's more constructive.

The well society website is poor, and they hardly make it easy to sign up or increase your membership. The incentives should be a no-brainer. I would increase my donation, but I'd rather see a professional effort to improve things first. It also worries me that the current stewards of the club are taking on the job of finding big donors, and we don't seem to have someone in charge of that who knows what they're doing. I work for a large non-profit, and we have teams of folk that cultivate and engage with donors and work on large donations and bequests and the like. I'm concerned that we might be just sending out letters.

I don't normally buy lottery tickets, but I'll go ahead and get one today. I'll also put a bet on the royal rumble.

Non of this is a surprise and, while not ideal, it's nowhere near as perilous as some are making out. We're a selling club, so you have to imagine that player sales will make up for the shortfall most seasons, as well as a half decent run in the cups. What does a normal home game earn us? How much of a "cup run" moves the needle financially? As for the ground. If we've taken our maintenance costs from 120k per season down to 20k ish, then it was totally the right decision. We can also hold home friendlies and internationals again now that the pitch is more reliable. I'd rather be in our position where we don't need to pray that Mr Moneybags doesn't change his mind or get bored. Mind John Boyle? Hopefully we actually get our finger out with the work to secure other income sources though.

Flow confirmed on twitter that we're waiting on the work permit, and it should be resolved by tomorrow.

The club learned their lesson a long time ago about not announcing a signing until it's complete. Medicals can fail, visas can be refused, etc. I'm sure other clubs are the same but you won't be refreshing twitter every minute to see the progress of a Celtic signing. The "announce" patter gets right on my tits.

With no real footage or reports on our youth and reserve teams, it's hard to gauge what our current crop of prospects are like. Anyone have any insight? I saw a hammell quote about Ewan Wilson (left back) being close to the first team.

Can Brazilians play for England C?

That was the guy from Leeds, right? he had played for 2 teams already.

Over 2k motherwell fans I think.

A win is a win. Many had our match as the likely upset in the round, but we got it out of the way and managed to get game time for our new guys, so no complaints. I'm all for drawing the easiest possible team at home in the next round. I'd put my money on it being accies though.

https://www.motherwellfc.co.uk/2022/12/05/new-charity-third-kit-launched/

Any ideas how we're lining up?

I assume that because bbc are filming there may be a dodgy stream going somewhere? It's weird thesedays not having a legit way to watch from here, I've been spoiled.

The fact is that football transfers are always going to be a mixed bag. We only notice when other teams get it right, so we get a skewed perception of how successful we are/should be compared to others. The contract length is going to depend on the player. Some players will want a short contract because they feel like their current club is a stepping stone, others want long term security. Then you have the opposite from the clubs perspective, as they will want to keep good players tied up for as long as possible, but only offer short term contracts the the riskier players. You then have multiple clubs competing for a player, so they have to make concessions, by either offering more money or a more favourable term. That's a heavily simplified version of what goes on, as theres a million other factors such as location, agents, league position, playing style, what the facilities are like, etc. Signing shields, woolery, Kelly, Tierney, et all to 3 year deals was looked upon favourably by most at the time. A longer deal gives players time to settle, and protects the club in that it prevents other clubs from pinching our players immediately after a purple patch. You never know how it's going to turn out, but hope that more work out than don't.

He's been "head of youth" since 2018, so seems like a fair appointment. Chances are he's been filling in the role in the interim as well.

If someone can cover his wages and give him regular games then we can take stock in the summer. We're not going to get a fee so I'm not sure we'd be in a rush to sell instead of a loan. Morris will probably be the same, with a year an a half on his deal I can see a loan being the likely option.

Surprised Martindale wasn't running around with a hairdryer trying to fix it.