StuartA

Alloa will win the play-offs.

Beaten ever other club home and away, scored at least three against every opponent, top scorers in the country…

The 20 wee guys in the main stand should get a refund. They missed most of the game staring at us. Bless ‘em.

They would have included all ST holders in that, half of whom would have been brushing up on their Gaelic.

Genuinely not having a go. There was never 800 there, half that at best. I don’t want to see any club go down the tubes but Accies have a stench of death about them.

Joking aside, there couldn’t have been more than 3-400 Accies’ fans there. That’s pretty grim for them. Youth sales can’t plug a funding gap as big as that.

I take it all back. Accies: sack Rankine. You’re awful, that was bordering on abuse in the second half, even after the wee chubby midfielder came on.

Hitting every branch of the “failed OF starlet” tree on his way to Darvel or Johnstone Burgh.

I don’t think we’re desperate for anything regarding Rankin. We’re probably just looking at it through the prism of our own failures in the past half decade, and considering dispassionately how that applies to Accies. We know that the revolving door of managers and players damaged our club greatly before the fans rescued it.

Morton is our feeder club. Imrie seems like a decent manager. If JMcG retires or gets poached, we might need a low cost replacement.

Fair enough. The calculation then has to be that your owner/supremo would get the next appointment right and that he’d make this squad work in season 1. Also - and this’ll be unpopular - that you believe Rankin can’t learn or improve. That’s the bit that lots of football fans never seem to want to acknowledge, that folk change.

I say this as a hypocrite because I probably called for every Falkirk manager who was sacked over the past 5/6 years to be sacked at the time. But the risk isn’t just the player turnover, which is damage in itself, but also appointing a manager who isn’t up to getting your club promoted straight away. Hartley, Mackinnon, Sheerin, probably others my brain has rightly expunged all memory of. If your new owner is putting some cash in to make up for the lack of income elsewhere, then great, but who knows how much he has? All my instincts are telling me that sacking Rankin would be a big gamble.

Fair point, but we went through loads of managers during our banter years, bringing with each change a new squad. It kills the club from within. I’d still bet (and probably will) that Rankin would win next season’s League 1 with a similar squad.

Alloa or Montrose up, ICT or (better) QP down. Good Belhaven pubs in Alloa and Montrose too.

Of course it’ll be really tough. Despite Accies fans’ torpor and entitlement, that’s a decent side who could’ve won the league if we’d have only spent 50% equivalent of their budget this season rather than 67%. Cuntery aside, they’ll probably go up via the playoffs. If not, they’ll skoosh the league next season.

Problem is they’ll double-down now, insisting on grass pitches with all sorts of caveats around drainage, pitch protection etc and sanctions for when it doesn’t work. Idiots.

The club already ran a survey with FSS. All these folk will be on the email database so will be sent ST marketing when it’s ready. I don’t think there needs to be much in the way of further discounts, given the exceptional sales we’ve seen this season. The sales pitch is basically the trophy. If that doesn’t attract fans to stay, nothing else will.

And if you look at videos from railway stations over the past few week, you’ll see younger oldsters getting involved! Truly cradle to the grave.

Bit personal!

Right now, I’d obviously love to see Finn stay, Ross and Tait to sign, and Mackie to stay on. Agyeman is signed, which I’m happy about, and I don’t know the situation with Shanley or Allan (scoring for fun with Clyde and keeping them up). That would be a squad of 16 or 17 champions leaving wiggle room for JM to fill some quality and competition along the spine. Obvs depends massively on budget so I hope there’s a clamour to buy STs and anything with a steeple on it between now and June. This is a real chance.

Once Hartley is sacked, it’ll be exorcised. Though 10/12 pts and 10-1 aggregate is a decent exorcism. Tait was wonderful, sublime footballer. It’s mad that we don’t miss Lang or Hendo, both real POTY contenders. 100 goals is now realistic too.

This should be 10

Nah. It’s about protectionism, not whether or not games go ahead.

I saw it mentioned somewhere that the 7th at Montrose was our 100th competitive goal of the season, but I can count (only!) 96. Happy to be wrong but if not, it’d be nice to hit the century today. ETA: talking out my hole. I missed the DU game. How could I?!

Good investment. We’ll need cover.