Dark Blue Dick

Nelms has fkd up again, hasn't he? Sacked or left, Bowyers departure wouldn't have been a secret for Nelms. A replacement should have been lined up and ready to announce. We have a whole squad to rebuild and resign, we need a manager in place now, someone one who already knows what we need and has signing targets for the prem. If Nelms fannys about for the next 6 weeks then appoints the only applicant left (like last year), we're fkd.

While I have sympathy with the club having to deal with covid restrictions, I have no sympathy with the outdated, unfit ticketing process. I bought an electronic ticket for the Montrose game, delivered straight to my phone, with no requirement for a round trip to Montrose, in advance, to pick up a bit of fucking paper. If Montrose can do it, why can't we? I had to go to Dens twice to pick up orient and Brora tickets, back at work now so no chance for st mirren. It's scandalous we don't have electronic tickets. Not only is it inconveniencing fans, it's costing the club by limiting easy access. Electronic tickets could also be traded on secondary markets like StubHub, which would encourage more season ticket sales, and have more bums on seats on match day. Win win. This is so frustrating.

An extra 150K in the bank ........ The old firm always fleece us for our best players. One of my pet hates being a Dundee fan ......

I've made my point, and I can see there is no visible agreement with my opinion on this forum. So I see no merit in continuing the discussion. But if you persist in quoting my posts, don't be shocked if I reply ......... DBD

Quite. My complaint is the when the club is deep in the shit, then perhaps "cutting off your nose to spite your face" maybe isn't the best policy. But I'm sorry that my posts bore you. You know what bores me? Being in the f**king championship next year.

I had a look, let me answer my own question. I think it's fair to say he's had success both with and without Dodds, and he's had failure, both with and without Dodds.

That is certainly data point ….. Do you have his complete record?

My view is that avoiding relegation was the prime objective this year. Others have already expressed the view that not employing Dodds was more important than avoiding the drop. If that's how you feel, then further discussion is fruitless. I still prefer success on the park any day ……. But I agree with your final point - it's now up to the board to make the right choice.

Hi Dele, While I disagree with your opinion, I appreciate your honesty in expressing it. Me? I would have been happy to keep quiet at the time to maximise our chances of survival. Then at the end of the season, I would have expressed my hope that Dodds GTF …….

Hi Jupe, I'm not claiming that Dodds would have made a difference. I'm not claiming that at all. What are the facts? The fact is that JM wanted dodds as assistant. The fact is that the board evaluated JM record based on his working with Dodds. The fact is that by blocking Dodds, we made our new managers difficult job even harder. And that's my complaint - that we made his job harder. You say that there's no evidence that Dodds would have made a difference. Well, compare JMs record with Dodds, and without. Now that still doesn't prove that Dodds would have made a difference, but it is certainly a data point. This season was a disaster. And it's been coming. Root cause for me is the failure to appoint a competent manager. I think we got unlucky with Hartley, but McCann and then McIntyre were abysmal. My complaint is that regardless of what we thought of McIntyre, we fans made his job harder - when we should have done everything we could to support our team in its hour of need.

I get it. I would have been unhappy with Dodds too. But I would have sucked it up to avoid relegation. You prefer relegation to Dodds? yes?

With respect, I think you should see that my comment is specifically about the decision to employ Dodds. it's not a blanket call for fans to be ignored. As I said, "My argument is that the board should put immediate football decisions above fans 'feelings'. Clearly there's a balance, but when we are staring down the barrel of relegation, that's when fans feelings should take a back seat. Disagree?"

Hi Dee Man, How would you define the difference between 'feelings' and morals? because I honestly don't understand the distinction you appear to be making. A clarification would be helpful. I am not saying the board should ignore the fans - where did I say that? You seem to be implying that the board should always consider fans 'feelings' above all else. My argument is that the board should put immediate football decisions above fans 'feelings'. Clearly there's a balance, but when we are staring down the barrel of relegation, that's when fans feelings should take a back seat. Disagree?

Ok, so yes, the board takes most of the blame. Regardless of the financial backing, which in some ways makes it worse knowing that we had funds but misspent them, but my point is that we fans are not blameless either. I'm not on the board. I say to myself, how can I help the club? I buy a season ticket, I buy merchandise in the shop, I buy Dee TV, and I don't boo the team on the park, no matter how pish they are playing. And I don't put my 'feelings' above the potential success of the team. Lets all pull together - the team needs us next year. And we all want the same thing - a successful team on the park.

I agree with much of this. Lets say it was McIntyre and Dodds fired today after relegation - would that have been materially worse? No. We're still down, and still fucked. Football fans are not rational? Some of them aren't, that's for sure.

Well let's be clear, I am absolutely fucking raging at relegation, Dodds or not. The fact is, we are relegated, and management would have been sacked, deservedly, no matter who it was.

There is no doubt that McIntyres appointment was an absolute, unmitigated disaster …...

This is irrelevant to the Dodds discussion, and our role as fans. We can quibble about McIntyres appointment for sure (and I certainly would).

G_man, I don't disagree with any of that. We failed to support the club by putting our feelings ahead of the managers choice of assistant. Regardless of the eventual outcome, Dodds was the preferred choice, and we should have backed it.

Hi RR (great album btw), The argument is not that Dodds would have saved us, the argument is that McIntyre thought Dodds would have helped, but us fans vetoed the idea because it hurt our feelings, My complaint is that us fans put our feelings ahead of what the manager thought was best.

I think the first thing is that we have to remember where we were. We were staring relegation in the face. and needed to turn things round, with the transfer window still months away. My only concern was survival, the background of the potential candidates was last thing on my mind. Were McIntyre and Dodds the best choice? That's irrelevant. (and my opinion was no) But the club appointed McIntyre, and McIntyre wanted Dodds. The point is that the fans feelings should not then have been a factor, but the fans shouldn't have made it a factor. Lets postulate a hypothetical; would you prefer that we appointed Dodds and survived, or were relegated? Which is more important to you? Please remember that I am not saying that Doods would have saved us. Who knows.

The premise here is that he club should have been aware of the fans feelings, and should have made this a more important factor over who was best equipped to save the club from relegation. I reject that premise, The most important factor should have been who could keep us up.

Respectfully, I disagree. We have no idea if Dodds would have made a difference or not, The point is, the manager thought he would and so did the club. Now, lets say McIntyre had requested Basil Brush as assistant, i.e. someone with no football qualifications whatsoever, then I would have been in the front of the protests. But the objection to Dodds was that he had hurt our feelings, not his ability. We fans put our feelings ahead of the survival of the club in the top league. As fans, our job was to support the club. We failed. Out biggest job next year is to get behind the team. It's going to be hard enough as it is …...

You are happier that we are relegated, than we employed Billy Dodds and stayed up? Yes?

I don't think anybody is claiming that Dodds is a great super coach. I'm not.