The St. Mirren FC 2016/17 Thread.

[flyingscot]

It probably is the best run we've had at Greenhill Road. 

Also for the Saints fans that criticise the stadium as having no atmosphere, it seemed fine on Saturday. The noise at Mallan's goal was one of the loudest I've head in a while. Turns out that if there is something on the park it's not a bad stadium! 

[KingfaetheSooth]

Former St Mirren player Sean Kelly looks likely to leave AFC Wimbledon and head North  as he has a deal agreed with Scottish club. Any clues where he might be heading? After a slow start, he bulked up and did OK without setting the world on fire and would probably have got another contract at AFCW. 

[Coventry Saint]

1 hour ago, KingfaetheSooth said:

Former St Mirren player Sean Kelly looks likely to leave AFC Wimbledon and head North  as he has a deal agreed with Scottish club. Any clues where he might be heading? After a slow start, he bulked up and did OK without setting the world on fire and would probably have got another contract at AFCW. 

I'd imagine he'd get a shot in the Prem, TBH. He was yet another Saints player that got whinged about when he was here, then was missed in the face of significantly worse successors.

[Stevie88]

Former St Mirren player Sean Kelly looks likely to leave AFC Wimbledon and head North  as he has a deal agreed with Scottish club. Any clues where he might be heading? After a slow start, he bulked up and did OK without setting the world on fire and would probably have got another contract at AFCW. 

He's joining his good friend and former St. Mirren team mate....

[djchapsticks]

Wonder what our season ticket uptake will be if we stay up. It will almost certainly increase quite markedly given that we advertised pretty heavily to get good crowds for the last three home games given the importance of them. This boosted the crowds from around 2500 home fans at our lowest point to 3500-4500 over the space of these games. In light of higher footfall, I wonder how many of these fans will be tempted to come back on a regular basis next season given what they've seen in those three matches. 

If we sold around 2500 season tickets this season (as is our norm, really), I'd be optimistic to see that breaking the 3k mark over the summer. Goals draw punters and 12 goals in 3 games will hopefully bring several back who have stayed away. 

[elvis]

Wonder what our season ticket uptake will be if we stay up. It will almost certainly increase quite markedly given that we advertised pretty heavily to get good crowds for the last three home games given the importance of them. This boosted the crowds from around 2500 home fans at our lowest point to 3500-4500 over the space of these games. In light of higher footfall, I wonder how many of these fans will be tempted to come back on a regular basis next season given what they've seen in those three matches. 
If we sold around 2500 season tickets this season (as is our norm, really), I'd be optimistic to see that breaking the 3k mark over the summer. Goals draw punters and 12 goals in 3 games will hopefully bring several back who have stayed away. 

[Coventry Saint]

Another 'sell on clause' could be activated this summer if McGinn gets his always-inevitable move to Celtic.

http://www.scotsman.com/sport/football/competitions/premiership/rumour-mill-celtic-to-bid-1-5m-for-mcginn-guidetti-reveals-celtic-offer-chelsea-interested-in-celtic-kid-1-4437754

I was hoping for more than the 1.5m quoted, but £450k would provide an excellent basis for our promotion push next season.

[Div]

10 minutes ago, Coventry Saint said:

Another 'sell on clause' could be activated this summer if McGinn gets his always-inevitable move to Celtic.

http://www.scotsman.com/sport/football/competitions/premiership/rumour-mill-celtic-to-bid-1-5m-for-mcginn-guidetti-reveals-celtic-offer-chelsea-interested-in-celtic-kid-1-4437754

I was hoping for more than the 1.5m quoted, but £450k would provide an excellent basis for our promotion push next season.

If we brought in £450K for McGinn a hefty chunk of that would be loaned to SMiSA to accelerate the payout to the selling consortium and SMiSA in turn would then be paying that back to the club. All part of the sale agreement.

[Coventry Saint]

20 minutes ago, Div said:

If we brought in £450K for McGinn a hefty chunk of that would be loaned to SMiSA to accelerate the payout to the selling consortium and SMiSA in turn would then be paying that back to the club. All part of the sale agreement.

Ah, fair enough. I clearly haven't read all the small print for my £12 a month. It's a sensible approach: is this deal affected in this way because it was struck before the club sale? I assume the McAllister fund can be used for squad strengthening.

[Stu]

11 hours ago, Coventry Saint said:

Ah, fair enough. I clearly haven't read all the small print for my £12 a month. It's a sensible approach: is this deal affected in this way because it was struck before the club sale? I assume the McAllister fund can be used for squad strengthening.

It came out at the SMiSA AGM last week that any money from player sales would lead to payments being accelerated to the old board. This could have happened in January but they agreed not to activate that clause.

I noticed the e-mail that came out during the week said this only lasts until summer 2018 which makes me wonder how much the old board is still owed. I thought the idea was SMiSA paid them a bit up front and Gordon Scott paid the rest and it's really now GLS we're paying back rather than the old board.

[btb]

That Was The Season That Was - for a long time it looked like it was going to be a car crash of a season but like the cavalry JR's new team's form arrived just in time.

I knew we were in trouble after the second league game against RR back in August with the Quinn recovery period starting to drag out and no competent back-up at DM. Should have gone into shitfest mode then and accepted this was not going to be our season. Crazy, stubborn persistence with tactics that weren't working by AR got him the boot and then we were left rudderless when Billy Davies did not jump at the chance GS offered him.

What can you say about JR - a difficult start with games against Hibs & Dundee Utd. then throwing away our 17 year unbeaten run against Morton with an extremely tepid performance. This was a watershed game and we should have been going into it with bottles and knifes but it seemed to set the tone for what was a pretty lacklustre Nov, Dec & Jan. JR getting a bit of a free ride IMO with some people absolving him of all blame as the poor results continued.

Despite being told at the AGM that we had replacements identified we went into the game against QotS on Jan 7 with no new faces - they'd done their business early and thumped us 3-0 pretty much ensuring their safety in the division that day while we took the rest of the month to complete ours altho' admittedly we had a lot more work to do.

Things did start to pick up as defeats turned into draws and then eventually victories and we began to bridge the chasm between us and safety. We finally started to play with a bit of style in the second half of the game against TNS. A couple of glorious cup defeats interspersed with good league form and some sparkling performances we eventually secured 7th place on the final day. I suppose the big question is whether we can continue this form into next season, let's hope we can keep the bulk of the squad although I suspect "wee Stevie Mallon" has done enough to earn himself a bumper move down south.

Although we finished on a high note overall the season has to be considered depressing as it was a fairly weak division with a mediocre Morton team making the play-offs and the p/t outfits Ayr/Dumbarton offering little more than organization and commitment.

*******************

2017/18 - Let's hope JR has as good a summer window as the January one and that we can put in a challenge for the title...............

[Coventry Saint]

I think you've rightly picked out the home defeat to QotS as the bleakest point. It very much felt like they had done their business well, and we were failing to act. Obviously we now know what was to come, but we looked hopeless.

[djchapsticks]

Think this season will ultimately be remembered as one of underachievement, frustration and some awful performances punctuated with 3 absolutely fantastic months of redemption where we pulled it from the mire. 

Glad we can finally put this one to the history books. No more false dawns next season. We've had four years of them and this time it feels like we're going to be in a strong place going forward. 

[sergie's no1 fan]

As Jack Ross has been saying for weeks, we aren't celebrating mediocrity in the league. We have managed to turn round a shitty looking situation with many fans, myself included feeling disillusioned with the club and the state of affairs.

JR turned the fortunes round, brought in players who would run through brick walls for the club, got the fans back onside and from the victory at Somerset park when we won 2-0, we never looked back. Week after week, the bond between the players and fans grew, atmospheres at the games ramped up and everyone pulled together and we dragged each other out of an impossible situation that we hope we'll never be in again.

As for next season it's too early to talk about title challenges. We could be losing Mallan, Morgan, MacKenzie, Loy & Smith will be going back to their parent clubs. If we can keep the majority of the squad, mainly the youngsters we should be up there.

Will also need a new goalkeeper, at this level they can be very hit and miss. Wouldn't mind seeing O'Brien back.

The main thing is we have all fell in love with the club again, I can't wait till the new season to see what Jack Ross can achieve.

[ayrmad]

10 minutes ago, sergie's no1 fan said:

As Jack Ross has been saying for weeks, we aren't celebrating mediocrity in the league. We have managed to turn round a shitty looking situation with many fans, myself included feeling disillusioned with the club and the state of affairs.

JR turned the fortunes round, brought in players who would run through brick walls for the club, got the fans back onside and from the victory at Somerset park when we won 2-0, we never looked back. Week after week, the bond between the players and fans grew, atmospheres at the games ramped up and everyone pulled together and we dragged each other out of an impossible situation that we hope we'll never be in again.

As for next season it's too early to talk about title challenges. We could be losing Mallan, Morgan, MacKenzie, Loy & Smith will be going back to their parent clubs. If we can keep the majority of the squad, mainly the youngsters we should be up there.

Will also need a new goalkeeper, at this level they can be very hit and miss. Wouldn't mind seeing O'Brien back.

The main thing is we have all fell in love with the club again, I can't wait till the new season to see what Jack Ross can achieve.

Is that not what every diddy. fan is looking for

[NorthBank]

24 minutes ago, sergie's no1 fan said:

As Jack Ross has been saying for weeks, we aren't celebrating mediocrity in the league. We have managed to turn round a shitty looking situation with many fans, myself included feeling disillusioned with the club and the state of affairs.

JR turned the fortunes round, brought in players who would run through brick walls for the club, got the fans back onside and from the victory at Somerset park when we won 2-0, we never looked back. Week after week, the bond between the players and fans grew, atmospheres at the games ramped up and everyone pulled together and we dragged each other out of an impossible situation that we hope we'll never be in again.

As for next season it's too early to talk about title challenges. We could be losing Mallan, Morgan, MacKenzie, Loy & Smith will be going back to their parent clubs. If we can keep the majority of the squad, mainly the youngsters we should be up there.

Will also need a new goalkeeper, at this level they can be very hit and miss. Wouldn't mind seeing O'Brien back.

The main thing is we have all fell in love with the club again, I can't wait till the new season to see what Jack Ross can achieve.

Cammy Smith is out of contract at the end of the season. Hopefully we can persuade him to stay. Loy still has a year on his contract and maybe Dundee's new manager will want to asses him first. O'Brien allegedly wants to sign and he is out of contract. Mallan and Morgan are both under contract so it depends on what bids come in for them. MacKenzie has been great so hopefully we can also work something out with him.

[BuddieInDundee]

Probably the best feeling around the club I've ever experienced. Can't wait for next season now, having said that I'm sure we were all very optimistic prior to Murray and Rae's campaigns and that didn't really work out to say the least!

[flyingscot]

I think the way we're got out of trouble was remarkable. Most teams would shitfest their way out. We scored 6 v Ayr, 5 v Raith, 4 at Morton in crucial matches.

[paisleysaints]

I think the way we're got out of trouble was remarkable. Most teams would shitfest their way out. We scored 6 v Ayr, 5 v Raith, 4 at Morton in crucial matches.

And looking at the table at the end of the season those pumpings we dished out saved our skin.

[Coventry Saint]

1 minute ago, paisleysaints said:

And looking at the table at the end of the season those pumpings we dished out saved our skin.

Yep. +12 goals in those games, along with huge damage to Raith's gd.

As for next season, I'm relaxed about the rebuild job that Jack and James need to do. I know we all want Davis, Stelios, Gary McK, Smith, Loy, etc, but if they don't pan out, I have complete faith we'll find replacements. 

Same goes for Mallan and Morgan: we'll get fees for them, to add to the McAllister money, so we have the funds to build a very decent Championship squad.

Chuck in the season ticket sales, almost certainly boosted by the feelgood factor we now have, and it's shaping up to be very exciting.