The Greenock Morton Thread - It's Better Than Yours

[Mr.Blue]

Although Duffy has his faults Id be disappointed if he left as I think we'd genuinely struggle to bring someone else in who could get as much out of this current squad than he has. I also think the club has benefitted from some much needed stability over the past few years.

[Colkitto]

2 hours ago, Randy Giles said:

And even your own opinion seems to admit he's not a "very good" manager given the amount of clear faults you believe he has. Unless you set the bar really low on what actually makes someone very good.

Every manager has faults and none are perfect. Duffy's biggest failing this season was in the close season transfer market, apart from that he's got the team playing well and scoring goals. Good manager!

[Colkitto]

39 minutes ago, Mr.Blue said:

And your absolute wankfest over him isn't?

Yawn... 

[Mr.Blue]

3 minutes ago, Colkitto said:

Yawn... 

I'm sorry am I boring you? 

[Colkitto]

Just now, Mr.Blue said:

I'm sorry am I boring you? 

Don't apologise, it's okay.

[Toby]

5 minutes ago, Colkitto said:

Yawn... 

Textbook Colkitto response there. Criticise others and then dismiss a perfectly valid point that's a criticism of himself as boring.

[SpoonTon]

A very good manager who has been very fortunate all over the place? Is he actually good or just lucky then? I was really beginning to like Duffy, I'm not so sure now if there's so much luck involved. 

[Wren Road]

Aye, at the start of the season we were in relegation form and it was reasonable to question Duffy's position, after three wins in four since that it's reasonable to hope we've turned the corner and get behind him, with an outstanding performance at the weekend and our cup form also giving reasons to be positive.

Football fans are regularly accused of being fickle for changing their minds, but it's far better to change your mind in the face of the available evidence - results - and be called fickle than stubbornly insist on keeping your original position on managers or players regardless of performances and results.

This is a perfect and accurate summary of Duffy. He isn't a messiah , he is having a purple patch after a horrendous start

[Mr.Blue]

12 hours ago, Toby said:

Textbook Colkitto response there. Criticise others and then dismiss a perfectly valid point that's a criticism of himself as boring.

Aye. Happy to dish out criticism and tell others its all about opinions but when someone else offers their opinion he doesn't deal well with it.

[Toby]

11 minutes ago, Mr.Blue said:

Aye. Happy to dish out criticism and tell others its all about opinions but when someone else offers their opinion he doesn't deal well with it.

Yep, on more subjects than just Morton I hasten to add. A quite loathsome individual, the Morton forum's a better place since he spat the dummy and stopped posting on there.

[Bluenortherner]

On 08/06/2015 at 14:03, Scosha said:

Good to be back. Looking forward to trips to Easter Road and 4 games against St Mirren. I saw somewhere that the play-offs were the aim, but I'll happily take 8th place in our first season back.

I think we need at least 4/5 players in - preferably with a bit of experience.

Not anymore!

[Colkitto]

6 hours ago, Mr.Blue said:

Aye. Happy to dish out criticism and tell others its all about opinions but when someone else offers their opinion he doesn't deal well with it.

No problem with opinions. Even if they differ from mine.

[Colkitto]

6 hours ago, Toby said:

Yep, on more subjects than just Morton I hasten to add. A quite loathsome individual, the Morton forum's a better place since he spat the dummy and stopped posting on there.

Glad it's a better place now that I've left because when I was there it was horrendously bad. Probably why more like me left in their droves

[Scosha]

As each game goes by I get more worried we're going to lose Quitongo for nothing in the summer. Not usually keen on offering players daft money but I think this is an exception. He'll be off in the summer no matter what, I think we should be offering him a lucrative contract and a 3 year deal, and tell him if anyone comes in for him we won't stand in his way as long as the price is right.

[TonMan]

7 minutes ago, Scosha said:

As each game goes by I get more worried we're going to lose Quitongo for nothing in the summer. Not usually keen on offering players daft money but I think this is an exception. He'll be off in the summer no matter what, I think we should be offering him a lucrative contract and a 3 year deal, and tell him if anyone comes in for him we won't stand in his way as long as the price is right.

I'd agree. Arguably becomes even more likely now after today, us being on BT would've gotten him a fair bit of exposure, especially since he put in a very decent performance. Will probably only serve to add more clubs to the list of interested ones.

[vikingTON]

I don't think that we can lose him for nothing so long as we offer to renew his contract. The decision is whether a package that an English club (almost certainly) offers in January to secure his signature tops what we could expect in training compensation, plus however much he could earn the club over those last six months. He's been a major factor in earning half a million or so from the League Cup run - if we are well placed to progress in the Scottish Cup or in play-off contention then that decision would be difficult.

He's already earned the club more than you'd expect from selling most youth prospects due to his key role in the cup run though: we're really discussing a potential bonus on top of what we've already earned without selling him.

[Scosha]

1 hour ago, vikingTON said:

I don't think that we can lose him for nothing so long as we offer to renew his contract. The decision is whether a package that an English club (almost certainly) offers in January to secure his signature tops what we could expect in training compensation, plus however much he could earn the club over those last six months. He's been a major factor in earning half a million or so from the League Cup run - if we are well placed to progress in the Scottish Cup or in play-off contention then that decision would be difficult.

He's already earned the club more than you'd expect from selling most youth prospects due to his key role in the cup run though: we're really discussing a potential bonus on top of what we've already earned without selling him.

 

Is there not some thing about youth players going down south for pennies on compensation? Whereas if he went to a Scottish club we'd be entitled to more? You're right about him already earning us a good amount of cash through the league cup and he could yet get us higher up the league. 

It's a nice problem to have. Ideally he'll sign a new contract then we can get a bigger fee in the summer.

[vikingTON]

We're already quids in if you look at the bigger picture. Obviously we should still be aiming to earn something from his legal contract though.

These 'peanuts' claims are often made, but then Bradford had to give something like £200k to Falkirk for Mark Stewart IIRC so it's difficult to assess how it would pan out. His higher profile should help our bargaining position IMO but the refusal of that clueless failure Scott Gemmill to give him under 21 caps behind inferior dross like Ryan Hardie counts against us.

I doubt we'll be dealing with just one interested party in January though, so securing a deal with the club itself would appeal to interested parties, by closing off competition for his signature.

[madton]

If the clubs mentioned are serious about signing him, they prob won't wait until the summer and will look to secure his services in Jan. A couple of 100k is peanuts to them.

ApparentlyJai will get a much bigger signing on fee if hes not in contract so i think that is why he hasn't committed to a longer deal with us.

Either way, we are bound to get a healthy sum for him when he does eventually move on.

[Jamie_M]

18 hours ago, Scosha said:

As each game goes by I get more worried we're going to lose Quitongo for nothing in the summer. Not usually keen on offering players daft money but I think this is an exception. He'll be off in the summer no matter what, I think we should be offering him a lucrative contract and a 3 year deal, and tell him if anyone comes in for him we won't stand in his way as long as the price is right.

What's the incentive for Jai to sign a new contract if he's likely to be leaving? A few months on a higher wage? That's likely to easily be dwarfed by any signing on fee he would receive from his new club (a fee that is likely to be higher if they don't have to pay a transfer fee to us because he's out of contract).

The only reason Jai would maybe agree to a contract extension would be if he wanted to ensure Morton got something back for his services. Would he really be that attached to the club to want to do that having only been here a few years? He, and Jose, have always talked about Morton as a stepping stone anyway - doubt signing an extension, making his possible transfer more difficult, would be high up his list of priorities.

He may also feel that he has already given back, ensuring Morton make a bit of money, with his goals helping us to about half a million from the cup run. That's likely to dwarf any transfer fee we receive.

I'm sure I read someone on the Morton forum saying any developmental fee if he went to England was likely to be in the region of £25k. Not sure where they found that figure so could be bollocks.

Our best bet, with several teams rumoured to be interested (Doncaster, Swansea, Palace and others), would be that one of them wants to step up to secure his signature without the battle when he's out of contract - by offering a decent fee sooner rather than later to jump to the front of the queue.

If this is in the January window, hopefully a loan back can be agreed.