Motherwell FC - A Thread For All Seasons

[Lukovic]

4 year option, when was the last time we had something like that.

[StAndrew7]

Just now, Lukovic said:

4 year option, when was the last time we had something like that.

Longest I can recall we handed out recently was Kelly and Slattery; they got 3 year deals, I think. No options though.

[ropy]

Tierney was fairly long

[boozyBJ]

Just need to find someone that can cross a ball now

[StAndrew7]

3 minutes ago, ropy said:

Tierney was fairly long

Aye, forgot about him. 3.5 years.

[Vietnam91]

18 minutes ago, eliphas said:

On that note, and echoing part of what @Dan Electro mentioned too. It still slightly annoys me (unless I've missed it..entirely possible) that we basically are happy with Feely sticking about even though he voted the way he did. Surely his position is untenable?

Not suggesting we e get rid of everyone, and maybe Feely provides some handover until the next set of nominations,  but are we essentially settling into the narrative that McMahon/Dickie = Bad. Everyone else on the exec board just got hoodwinked and can stick around because they are nice people?

Two schools of thought I guess. While he did defend his position and showed up to the WS one-on-one meeting his logic and reasoning were both flawed and inconsistent, no issue with someone having views different from the majority, it's healthy after all but this was also a judgement call on a very poor offer.

When asked to vote on the proposal by the club board both WS reps should have asked for a postponement to take direction from the body they represent, which both did not, they voted as per their own views. Let's be honest McMahon would never countenance that so the right thing to do would be abstain. However, despite the WS not voting in advance of the club board, to suggest you no idea of the feelings of the other seven members in advance of a vote doesn't carry water.

Second, as a board member he would have been aware of two clubs from two top five European leagues tabling seven figure offers for Theo. That alone changed the complexion of the takeover massively and made defending a "player sales are inconsistent and they could get injured tomorrow" argument in late June a massive eyebrow raise.

In short if it was having a different position alone fair enough, but points two and three make further participation a pretty hard square to circle in representing a fan owned democratic entity.

[Ill Ray]

This signing has made me consider speech therapy. 

[steelmanic]

30 minutes ago, camer0n_mcd said:

 

There he is!

We've gone from having the best social media presence in the country to lacking basic grammar. Appreciate that mistakes will happen but there have been a couple of big clunkers in the last week. Feels like it's being written by kids. Is a second check too much to ask for? It just makes us look small.

[Handsome_Devil]

22 minutes ago, ropy said:

Tierney was fairly long

Just felt like it.

[YassinMoutaouakil]

I thought he was quite short, if anything 

[Handsome_Devil]

18 minutes ago, Vietnam91 said:

Two schools of thought I guess. While he did defend his position and showed up to the WS one-on-one meeting his logic and reasoning were both flawed and inconsistent, no issue with someone having views different from the majority, it's healthy after all but this was also a judgement call on a very poor offer.

When asked to vote on the proposal by the club board both WS reps should have asked for a postponement to take direction from the body they represent, which both did not, they voted as per their own views. Let's be honest McMahon would never countenance that so the right thing to do would be abstain. However, despite the WS not voting in advance of the club board, to suggest you no idea of the feelings of the other seven members in advance of a vote doesn't carry water.

Second, as a board member he would have been aware of two clubs from two top five European leagues tabling seven figure offers for Theo. That alone changed the complexion of the takeover massively and made defending a "player sales are inconsistent and they could get injured tomorrow" argument in late June a massive eyebrow raise.

In short if it was having a different position alone fair enough, but points two and three make further participation a pretty hard square to circle in representing a fan owned democratic entity.

That's it for me exactly...to make myself sound very hypocritical, there are some differing opinions which can be tolerated - encouraged, in fact, as @StAndrew7says - but others are just so fundamentally contradictory to basic principles of an organisation, in this case the WS, there needs to be consequences.

I certainly don't see the need to call an EGM to bin him but he along with the other two need to go as soon as timing allows with a new structure and people in place.

Re the are we happy now with Lindsay and Caldwell remaining in place - short answer is yes. Club employees actually running the place as professionals have a different status to others and as long as we trust them to operate in good faith, we're not going to go to the considerable expense and reputational risk of firing them.

[capt_oats]

30 minutes ago, steelmanic said:

We've gone from having the best social media presence in the country to lacking basic grammar. Appreciate that mistakes will happen but there have been a couple of big clunkers in the last week. Feels like it's being written by kids. Is a second check too much to ask for? It just makes us look small.

I mean, it's been an issue for a while since the Executive Board seemingly made the choice that the Head of Comms role wasn't worth the investment and it's been covered enough in this thread that it's not really worth re-litigating but it's actually painful.

I've been encouraged by a lot of Caldwell's takes recently and I realise there has been a *lot* going on but hopefully this is an area that he looks to address because it's an absolute mess.

[MurrayWell]

I think you have to say fair play for managing Apostolos Stamatelopoulos without any typos but being tripped up by the basic grammar of announcing him. Tremendous commitment to the bit. 

[Rod]

Welcome Stamatelopoulos (Hamstring)

[Guest]

17 hours ago, Busta Nut said:

Not my job to suggest anything. I go along to support

Meh, seems most of your posts discourage the team and management, but you're support for Indian food, has to be commended. 

[DerekWatson]

Given the above posts re board structures, it's probably as good a time as any to remind Society members that our Annual General Meeting which will take place on Monday 12 August 2024. All members should have received an email on Friday 19 July which contains information on how to register. I'd encourage everyone who can to get along, especially if you have strong opinions on how we move forward. 

 

27 minutes ago, capt_oats said:

I mean, it's been an issue for a while since the Executive Board seemingly made the choice that the Head of Comms role wasn't worth the investment and it's been covered enough in this thread that it's not really worth re-litigating but it's actually painful.

I've been encouraged by a lot of Caldwell's takes recently and I realise there has been a *lot* going on but hopefully this is an area that he looks to address because it's an absolute mess.

I hope I'm not speaking out of tongue but given you mentioned the Exec Board comment which was made in a video posted through the official club channels that referenced that "the Society board would rather we invest X in our media team", I thought it may be appropriate to reply to that.

Firstly, the time and effort that Scott and Ally (and now Euan) do to deliver consistent media output shouldn't be sniffed at. I think we've got a great team there who are working long hours and do very very well - Ally is incredible at what he does and has produced excellent content for MFC over a number of years now. That said, I was previously vocal about the need to recruit a replacement Head of Comms following the departure of both AB and GR so I didn't necessarily appreciate that public comment which felt like a slight dig. That said, my opinion hasn't changed and again, that's not a dig at the current crop.

In my opinion the Head of Comms is one of the most important roles at a football club, away from the playing squad and CEO. Our media team, in my opinion, needs more people. Our social output, again in my opinion, is one of the biggest opportunities we have to grow commercial income. Without sounding like a previous potential investor, with an effectively implemented social media marketing strategy we could drive growth both locally and globally, but more importantly we could develop deeper relationship with our fans and local partners. There's huge potential there and it wouldn't be fair to put more work on an already stretched team. I feel previously we had a very good content plan that resonated with our target audience and aligned with the club's values and brand. We've still got that to an extent but it could be better with someone a more strategic and targeted focus. For me it's not that the content we're putting out that I think could be improved, but how we better monetise that output or how we attach more commercial opportunities to it; player sponsors showcased each time said player scores, match sponsor logos on the starting 11 graphics, etc. etc. 

Edited July 30 by DerekWatson

[Doctor Manhattan]

1 hour ago, steelmanic said:

We've gone from having the best social media presence in the country to lacking basic grammar. Appreciate that mistakes will happen but there have been a couple of big clunkers in the last week. Feels like it's being written by kids. Is a second check too much to ask for? It just makes us look small.

Welcome to Pedants' Corner. A brave first post there, setting a very high bar for all your future comments which will now need to demonstrate absolute grammatical perfection.

Now, shall we discuss the correctness (or otherwise) of the possessive apostrophe above? 

[MP_MFC]

Just saw Killie are charging away fans £30 this year for an adult. 

That's mental. I believe we've frozen our prices but curious to see the rest of the league's pricing. £30 for any league game is scandalous.

[steelmanic]

2 minutes ago, Doctor Manhattan said:

Welcome to Pedants' Corner. A brave first post there, setting a very high bar for all your future comments which will now need to demonstrate absolute grammatical perfection.

Now, shall we discuss the correctness (or otherwise) of the possessive apostrophe above? 

The number of times that I checked that post...

 

As with all things,  I'll allow a pedants' corner or pedants corner (just as I don't begrudge it being called a kids club), as long as it's consistent and justifiable. I'd take more issue with the title casing, but I'm new here. 

[David1979]

5 hours ago, Handsome_Devil said:

That said, the expectations have now changed - which is not to say eighth or ninth is an automatic sacking but if he's signed the entire squad, including a hefty fee or two, he needs to produce something in terms of at least fighting for sixth, a run in a cup or enough youths playing regularly we can point to a strong 25/26 or transfer windfalls. He has credit in the bank (for me at least) but future expectations matter more, especially when he himself is ooc next year.

I agree with much of that.

There's a lot more that goes into the appraisal of a manager's performance than just league position. As you mention, bringing in younger players from the youth setup is important, as is being able to coach our current players to a level where at least one or two of them can bring in a few million quid in transfer fees.

Kettlewell bringing in Bair and developing him to a level where we could move him on for the money we received is a huge positive for him. He also worked pretty well with Van Veen, and his performances under Kettlewell helped secure a decent fee as well.

League position is obviously the most important measure of success, even if it isn't the only one. For me, we should be pushing for the top six every season where possible. Sure, 10th place is a minimum finish, and while I can accept that maybe once every five seasons or so, we shouldn't be making a habit of it.

Kettlewell has seen 7th and 9th place finishes thus far. Certainly not too bad, but I'd be looking for us to push on this season and at least challenge for the top six. A 7th or 8th place finish is acceptable if we've been in the race for the top six in the lead-up to the split.

The thing with the top six is that, by rights, we should see Celtic, Rangers, Aberdeen, Hearts, and Hibs take five of the six places. I'd throw Dundee United in there as well, but they've been a bit inconsistent at the top level of late.

By my reckoning, that leaves one place open to the rest of the league, barring a bit of a collapse by one of the Edinburgh two or Aberdeen, which has been known to happen. There's no reason why we can't be challenging for that.

St Mirren, Killie, and Dundee United will also fancy their chances.