Rudolph Hucker

Don't know, don't care. Branch Ton is definitely heavily prejudiced though.

Re that first paragraph - that's exactly what was happening under Gus, except that the platitudes were all along the lines of "we're doing ok" instead of "we must do better". I really don't see why you have a problem with Imrie upping the ante and I hope he's being even more forthright with the playing staff. And re the second para - a month ago the writing was on the wall. I'd much rather it was on Imrie's arms.

This just in………... ……………nobody cares.

After the past five months I think it should be called the MANAGER bounce (if it happens!)......

Fair comment.

Excellent. Win-win, in my opinion. Thank YOU.

If it IS Imrie who gets it I'll be reasonably happy with that. Yes, of course it's a gamble, but as things stand right now it's a gamble worth taking IMO. One thing is certain though - some attitudes among the playing staff are going to have to change if they want to get a game under Dougie.

Thank you both for your valued input, which has been safely consigned to the round file where it belongs. Moving on..............

feck....... Hopefully they'll keep that particular elf on the shelf.

If there was anything of note in the post above this one could someone let me know please? I skipped over it when I saw who was posting. Thank you.

(for the benefit of the po-faced and the hard of thinking on a Saturday morning, yes I'm pointing and laughing again)

Yep, the total bodying we got from the only team with a worse league record than we had at the time made my mind up that things were not getting any better and Gus would have to go……. but should only go only as and when it suited Morton. I’d argue that that was also the game that made the BOARD’S mind up - it’s a much more likely scenario than them suddenly deciding in the 40 minutes between the end of the drawn match against Ayr and MacPherson storming out of Cappielow. The right decision, but at the wrong time. Sack him if Ayr had won, but they didn’t, and therefore I’d rather we’d kept him on until they’d done at least SOME work behind the scenes towards finding his replacement, rather than leaving the team in the hands of The Three Stooges for at least three games. I’d contend that had Gus still been here we wouldn’t have shipped six goals last weekend against Caley Thistle; it would've been a closer game, as nearly all of them were under MacPherson. Given how few goals we’ve been scoring, losing 6-1 instead of say 3-1 is like losing an extra point as we will struggle to make up the negative impact on our goal difference. On the Ayr game,, we didn’t, as you say, “chuck away three points”. We gained one point instead of gaining three, which is very different, and stayed within touching distance of the pack. There was therefore still no need to hurry re sacking Gus immediately after that game, especially as we’d been daft enough to give him a two year deal - which as I’ve said before was the main reason I thought we’d give him till the end of this year unless we were at least three or four points adrift at the bottom. Which we may be by 4.50pm on Saturday, but if we’d started the groundwork for a new boss two weeks ago we could’ve binned Gus tomorrow and maybe announced the new man on Monday. Games only become “crucial” as teams begin to run out of games towards the end of a season. Going by the post quoted, you’d class every game against the teams we’d be expected to be finishing close to to be “crucial” from the very first day of the season. I can’t agree with that - they’d be important games, sure, but not crucial. The Ayr game couldn’t be classed as crucial, neither in the buildup to it when there remained precisely half the season still to be played nor in the aftermath when a point kept us close to the rest. Just my opinion, yours may be different - but I'd say that our penultimate game of last season against Arbroath was a crucial game, tomorrow against the same team is merely important. Going back to your first point, I’d agree that people should respond to the post rather than the poster. I’ve long thought that there would be much more reasoned debate (well, everything’s relative ) if the poster’s name only showed at the end of a post, ie after it had been read, rather than being the first thing the reader sees. I genuinely try to judge every post on its merits or otherwise, and ignore or respond accordingly regardless of who is behind it……. but by Christ, some folk don’t half make it hard not to just point and laugh.

Two things: 1. Morten is or was the singer in a group called AHA.. 2. There is no such word as “knitten”. Now, off you pop.

Honestly, this is like pulling teeth……. The game against Ayr was the 16th league game of the season. Therefore there were 60 points to play for after it, regardless of the result. In no way, then, can that game be described as “crucial”. Important? Yes, of course, as are all the games when you’re in our position; especially the ones against the other four teams in our mini-league of relegation candidates. But it would only have been “crucial” if it were one of the last games of the season and we were still in danger of going down. We’re in agreement that he had to go - but we should’ve been further down the line in terms of replacing him before we gave him the bullet. The situation after the Ayr game wasn’t great, of course not - but it wasn’t so dire that we had to leave ourselves in the hands of two guys with no managerial experience (and Andy bloody Millen) for at the very least the next two league games.

So scroll on by…….…… ……but read the edit to my post first, maybe you’ll feel better. I don’t.

A match threat, eh? The only threat to us is that the match might take place……. It’s an open forum, mate. Scroll on by if you’re not interested. But if it makes feel better - your club are having a great season. You’re third in the league and are currently 14 points ahead of Hamilton in sixth. For a part-time team in this league that’s phenomenal, but without the slightest disrespect intended the five teams from Hamilton down to Morton should be thoroughly ashamed. PS - anyway, there’s no room for this on the Morton thread right now. They’re all busy on there discussing the Ayr United manager………….. go figure…………..

Are you guys being deliberately obtuse here? Hamilton were “relatively” comfortable at that point. I would rather have been in their position after sixteen games than in ours - who wouldn’t? - but they would’ve been looking at us just as we were looking at them and we were all thinking “a couple of results and that could be us…….”. As were Ayr, Dunfermline and Queens. Question: after 17 games, Hamilton remain sixth on 17 points; Morton are bottom on 13 - whose staff and fans will be feeling SLIGHTLY more secure at the moment? None of the teams or supports involved are anything close to putting their feet up and getting the cigars out - that’s not what I was saying at all and I’m sure you know that. There is absolutely nothing illogical in what I said. For the third and final time - Gus had to go. It was just a question of when. But he had kept us within touching distance of safety, and we still are - we’re four points away from sixth, with 57 points still to play for. My feeling is that we should have kept him in post until we had one or more realistic replacements in mind, not sacked him and then invited applications for the post. It’s hardly rocket science. You don’t have to agree with my opinion, but don’t twist it to suit your own.

Christ, BARP, don’t YOU start using vt’s tactic of twisting things to suit yourself……. As far as I was concerned Gus’s long term future was “anywhere but Cappielow” after that game against Queens. Queens were the only team below us in the league at the time, yet they outplayed us. Better individual technique, better organised and they just wanted the result so much more than our bunch of, with very few exceptions, wimps. Doesn’t matter about the pitch or the tournament, we were absolutely dire. Even after the Ayr game, though, we were still within touching distance of what would have been a safe position had we maintained it, that’s a straightforward fact - but I wouldn’t have been concerned had they bumped Gus after either of those games, so long as we already had a replacement in mind. But we didn’t.

Not only is it not a clever argument, it isn’t what I said. To borrow from “The Virginton Anthology of Hackneyed Phrases & Keyboard Warrior Insults”, try reading for comprehension next time. I want Morton to win every game they play, regardless of the competition, though like all of us (well, all of us who are realists at least) if I had to choose a fixture to lose it would (out with the semi and the final) be in the Challenge Cup. Nor am I in any way, shape or form what you refer to as a “happy clapper” - another bland phrase trotted out from the anthology. In the very post that you were commenting on I referred to the “gutless, shambolic display” the midweek before he was bagged. I’ve said often enough recently that were painful to watch and that the long punt upfield only to see it come straight back at us wasn’t working and had to change. To explain my original point one more time since you’re obviously either hard of thinking or, more likely, deliberately ignoring it - we all want the team to be at least 5th, 6th or 7th if not higher. 8th is too fine a margin - squeaky-bum time. Like it or not, when he was sacked MacPherson had us within 2 points of that (relative) comfort zone. Had results not improved by the end of December, or had we found ourselves adrift at the bottom by 3 or 4 points before that, I’d have expected him to be .gone - I’ve said so before on the Morton thread. However, to bin him when we did, obviously with absolutely no idea of who would replace him and when that would be, smacks of disorganised panic.

It also didn’t change the fact that, when he was sacked, we were well and truly in the pack of five teams in our own wee mini league. Yes, we were crap to watch, but we weren’t bottom and we were only a couple of points off sixth - in other words he was pretty much on target for fulfilling his remit of finishing in no lower than eighth place. Not like you to be very selective with the facts……. Personally I think he had to go on the evidence of that gutless, shambolic display against QoS in the Wee Diddy Teams Cup, but to sack him days later without having a potential replacement in mind was a mistake. I’m pretty sure we would’ve lost last Saturday with Gus in charge, but I very much doubt it would’ve been by such a margin. Yes, indeed you are. Surprising to see you display a little bit of self-awareness……. but I suppose it’ll be quite some time before we see a little humility from you.

Contain yerself.

…….and on yesterday’s evidence we don’t have better players than ANY team in the division. Nor do we have a manager right now. We’ll be going into 2022 supporting the weight of nine teams above us.

Not very high on our list of priorities right now, and nor should it be when the attendances at around 95% of games can be accommodated under the existing roofs. ( I almost said “COMFORTABLY accommodated” but since that would’ve led to resurrecting some of the perennial moans about main stand legroom I’m glad I didn’t )

Aye, a long night! Ferguson would probably be worse than Young......

It won't happen, but imagine the seethe out Dunfermline way if we managed to get Petrie....... Back in the real world, Darren Young is available after taking East Fife to the bottom of their division..... How Morton-ish would THAT be?