Stu92

Not necessarily. Hibs may have agreed a sell on with Columbus, and Columbus may have agreed with us to give us any money they receive from Hibs.

Insightful as always. Any other clues?

From memory, Rangers had the option to recall him in January. Which is different to us being able to send him back. I’d suspect that we are playing a smaller percentage of his wage if we are not able to terminate the deal.

I'm sure in the MLS clubs own the 'rights' to players, or something like that. When Andy Rose joined Vancouver from us, they also had to pay Seattle money as he had played for them previously and they owned the rights. I reallyyyyyy hope that the on-going economic rights don't rely on Cadden moving back to the MLS, as I'm sure we'll be seeing no return from that one.

Hartley was apparently offered silly money to go to India, which I can quite believe. Tait supposedly sat on a contract offer for months, not sure anyone knows 100% why but likely to try and negotiate a better deal (pretty sure it was improved terms from the initial offer we made). Then covid happened and the club took the offer back off the table, Tait tried to call the club out on the radio and ended up with a bit of egg on his face IMO. I may have remembered some of the details wrong, but think that was the jist of it.

Losing O’Donnell at this time would be terrible IMO. I get the whole ‘better bang for your buck’ argument, but it sort of flies in the face of those saying we need to spend cash on quality improvements.

If it is for business continuity and ensuring jobs are not lost, as Stuwell2 says, then fair enough and no objections here. I'm not sure that's entirely what is going on though, given they are openly and actively in the transfer market at the moment. As you say G&F, is that them gaining a sporting advantage over those not needing the loan due to astute management? I am pleased to see that we have just turned a healthy profit, with a 21/22 profit also expected given the Turnbull money (albeit reduced due to lack of fans through the turnstiles). I suspect that most other clubs will continue to feel the effects of this for a while, so happy of the position we're in financially. Just need to make sure we stay in the league now. Events of the last few months have turned me into a bit of a cynic of all things Scottish football. I don't think the SPFL/SFA points hokey cokey has helped that. But I just can't quite fathom how clubs are continuing to maintain or increase their playing budgets in these times. Aberdeen and Hibs both spending 6-figure transfer fees; both Dundee sides signing the likes of Adam, Shankland, McNulty et al on reportedly hefty wages while also imposing wage cuts; Hearts continue to recruit way beyond the means of a Championship side after their spiel last season of what relegation would do to them financially; St Mirren seemingly blowing their wage budget out of the water in another push for the top 4/6; Celtic going on winter trips to Dubai despite also putting their youth team on furlough. Conspiratorial hat firmly on here, but I would not be surprised in the slightest to hear a coordinated "we're aw skint cus you wouldn't let fans in to grounds, gies more money" bailout plea to the Government in the next year or so, despite elevated spending across the board. I got a bit off topic there, apologies. Fuck Killie.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CKT_-ecFKio/?igshid=19lt0a6svb1uw Wherever he’s been for whatever reason, he certainly appears to be back in training now.

Is this said with any knowledge of who is in the youth set-up at the moment?

I don't think we'll change from the team that started against Rangers (maybe Lawless in for Seedorf) but would imagine we'll set up to impose ourselves a little bit more on Aberdeen. Given the injuries they currently have I don't think we'll be standing off and looking to defend the box like we did on Sunday.

Was he not on a similar slump earlier on in the season, before absolutely dominating in the 3-0 Pittodrie game?

Interesting read, maybe it's just a sign of supporting Motherwell but wasn't aware that we made money from our players playing at a tournament. Also positive that he is saying the right things in terms of focusing on Motherwell, even if his agent is allegedly saying otherwise behind the scenes. With regards Long's demeanour, it reminds me of Roy Keane's postman analogy. His job is to score goals and help us win games (which he has done when played in his position), not look happy.

Of my green-minded friends, I don't know anyone that supports Celtic's position on this. I'm quite surprised more hasn't been made by them over St Mirren/Killie getting to rearrange games, possibly would've had the league been closer. He actually looked like he was mid-meltdown in that press conference today.

1 year ago today was Long's hat-trick in Dundee. Doesn't look bridges have been burnt going by the club's social media.

I’m maybe in the minority here but don’t think we need another striker. Cole and Long will score goals at this level, and Watt will contribute through goals as well as assists. There’s three strikers that I’d argue walk into most SPL sides, certainly those around us in the league. Unless White were to leave, any new additions start making our squad quite top-heavy. We really need midfield reinforcements. I stand by the sentiment that Donnelly will be like a new signing once fit again. If we were to sign a replacement for Polworth, or at least someone in that creative mould to provide competition, I’d be fairly happy. A new defender would be a nice to have, if not only to cover ourselves for when O’Donnell/Gallagher leave, but don’t think it’s necessarily critical given how we defended on Sunday with just one week of GA training in the bank.

It was quite obvious I felt that we were happy to let them cross. One of Rangers’ key strengths this season has been their wide men and getting their full backs forward, nobody has dealt with that this season so I thought letting them cross and crowding out the box was actually quite clever. The goal came from possibly their deepest cross of the match, which we hadn’t packed the box for, which I thought was quite telling of how well our strategy had worked. All in all I was quite pleased with the performance. We sat deeper and deeper as the game went on, which you’d expect given the lack of confidence and our record against Rangers of late, but in the first half I thought we played pretty well and moved the ball about with rushing or panicking. Certainly steps in the right direction.

I asked the question of what happens with a pre-contract a few weeks ago when the clause was first mentioned. To my understanding, when a player signs a pre-contract, they're saying "I agree to sign this contract, at a later date". Any clause in his current contract, unless worded to say that it's nullified should he sign a pre-contract elsewhere, would surely trump any agreed future signing of a contract?

I too liked him, and think he was unfortunate with us in that he didn't suit the system we were playing at the time. The tongue-in-cheek point I was making is that while some are discussing the strike rates of Smith and Rooney and how 1 in 5 isn't going to get us out of the quagmire etc, we let go of Johnson who has scored almost as many goals this season as Harry Smith has in his entire career while playing at a similar level. I'm not suggesting that we try and re-sign him, or that if he were still here that he'd be the solution (he might've been), but I don't think it's fair to judge any new/potential signings on what they have done before. You can use statistics to tell whatever story you like...

Oh what we'd do for Danny Johnson these days.

The SPFL (via independent panel) gave the decision in our favour. It was the SFA that overturned it. I’m not sure how much ‘blame’ can be aimed at the SPFL here. The process of having the independent panel adjudicate in the interests of fairness was the right one I think and the decision was pretty clearly justified. They wanted executive powers to try and sort these things out before the season even began, and weren’t given them. I don’t think they’ve done much wrong. I know that the SPFL and the SFA are separate bodies, but they’d surely be on a similar page on matters such as this. By cancelling one another out they’ve just made the game in Scotland into a joke, which makes the end outcome much more infuriating than if the initial punishment had just been the slap on the wrist and token fine. As others have said, I don’t think the club should be saying anything on the decision publicly. I would expect Burrows et al to be following up in private however, for all the good it will do. I doubt that stipulations over what players can and can’t play would had to have been outlined as part of the decision.

The cynic in me thinks that the socially distanced team photo was to emphasise that some clubs are taking things seriously...

The official site has him returning in February. Updated just before Christmas, so you’d hope just a few more weeks. Realistically won’t be contributing to game as we’d like him until into March/April I think, as you’d expect after being out for as long as he has.

The "didn't cut it last time" chat is a bit misleading. How many players need to take a step down as a young player to then make the step back up again? The captain of the national team springs to mind.

Lawless appears to fit within our current financial model as well, which is good.

Agreed. I always remember thinking that he looked pretty decent, and wondered why he had been let go.