The Ultimate Super Ayr Thread

[Jeff Venom]

Our best spell surely coincided with Sandy Stewart coaching? McCall was great at charming the players to Somerset but as I understand was barely ever involved in training.

[Highlandmagar]

8 minutes ago, diegomarahenry said:

He played Crawford and Murdoch out wide most weeks for us. He seems to sign a quality player when he gets the chance, regardless of whether he needs them or not. 
then rearranged the whole team to accommodate them.

I don’t think McCall will take Thistle up, or if he does, keep them there. But he will get them to be a top 4 championship team. The key will be who you replace him with and don’t be fooled by the stability he creates. It’ll all fall apart within weeks.

he is a great manager at this level, like Dick Campbell, he can get players to run through walls for him but he’s never managed the next step. He maybe peaked at Ayr and didn’t have the interest to rebuild and he’ll maybe do the same with thistle if a better job comes up. 

I think he is hoping that Thistle will be his last job and he moves upstairs.

[diegomarahenry]

46 minutes ago, Highlandmagyar Tier 3 said:

I think he is hoping that Thistle will be his last job and he moves upstairs.

He hinted at that at Ayr and the talk was that Kerr would be first team coach under him. 

If he is planning to put his feet up and let Archibald or Scally take over, he might leave with them 8 months later. 

[Trogdor]

2 hours ago, Jeff Venom said:

Fucking f**k me Malcolm Tucker gif

[Trogdor]

1 hour ago, Finlay21 said:

I believe Mathie now has the authority to fire 

Have a word in his ear Robbo. He needs to use it ASAP.

Edited December 16, 2021 by Trogdor

[itzdrk]

3 hours ago, Finlay21 said:

I believe Mathie now has the authority to fire 

Good, unlike the rest I'm not looking for him to fire Duffy immediately.  Duffy isn't our future but he's here just now, turning up and immediately sacking him rather than trying to work with him wouldn't be a great look regardless of the poor job he is doing at present.  If you can't work together, then he goes.  

As an aside I'm not bothered about Duffy's comments about playing style, without further elaboration he could well be meaning with the squad we have you can't play good football which I offer no argument against.  

[No_Problemo]

8 hours ago, itzdrk said:

Good, unlike the rest I'm not looking for him to fire Duffy immediately.  Duffy isn't our future but he's here just now, turning up and immediately sacking him rather than trying to work with him wouldn't be a great look regardless of the poor job he is doing at present.  If you can't work together, then he goes.  

As an aside I'm not bothered about Duffy's comments about playing style, without further elaboration he could well be meaning with the squad we have you can't play good football which I offer no argument against.  

It would look fine, Duffy’s record is appalling. Why hinder himself and his recruitment, by working with an awful manager. 

We might not be able to play good football, but when Duffy doesn’t even attempt to play football he gets less out of this side than is possible. 

[diegomarahenry]

There are things you can say in football as a chairman or MD that can have a knock-on effect.

if you come out and say you have cash to spend, then clubs up the price of the players you want to sign.

For Mathie to come in and sack a manager may look from the outside that he is difficult to work with and the creative freedom of managers would be limited at Ayr because it’s Mathie, who has never been a manager, who dictates that.

The Spears interview, he didn’t sound like he was about to sack Duffy.

With Mathie being here long term, it will allow him to oversee the January window perhaps with the future in mind rather than to the end of the season. 

[Trogdor]

If Duffy is retained through January I expect we're even more likely to finish bottom. The option is sack him now and give ourselves a chance to salvage the season or strap yourself in for a shitfest and a relegation battle which will make last season look like a cake walk (at least Alloa were cut adrift last season)

If he stays I genuinely think he'll relegate us. It is that bad, 1 win in 11 league games. Just over 1 point per game (that includes his 3 games as caretaker). By any metric that's simply not good enough. Yet he stands there totally disinterested and spouts football clichés in every interview and deflects blame on everyone else. He's an imposter and needs emptied pronto. 

It's actually amazing how far standards have slipped because of the binfire Hopkin instigated. Mark Kerr was sacked for less and that's a fact. I don't quite understand why Duffy is playing by a different set of rules tbqh.

[Hawk89]

For all we know Smith and Mathie may have a line in the sand. i.e Duffy needs to win x games over a set period. I would assume lose the next 4 with no sign of improvement and he's toast. It is absolutely in the players interests to up their performances if they want to stay in full time football. They may or may not have realised this but we are currently very near the bottom of the pile when it comes to full time sides in Scotland, so their options for next season are incredibly limited unless they pull the finger out. 

Duffy is 62, he's in the twilight of his career and could probably happily retire from football tomorrow. There doesn't seem to be much incentive for him to improve things as he didn't seem interested in managing again until he strung a couple of results together as caretaker. 

[diegomarahenry]

Most folk are aware that we are mid table bye to the fact other teams are just as bad as us. 
if Morton and QOTS win the next two and we lose, it’ll put a different complexion on our situation. We will be the worst team in the league.

The anger coming from the support has been focused on trying to stop this happening. Off field changes this week have partially addressed this.

The next step is getting players in, we need guys in on January the 1st rather than the the 31st. If we are still pish after players come in, then I don’t see Duffy surviving. 

[GaryMc93]

9 hours ago, itzdrk said:

Good, unlike the rest I'm not looking for him to fire Duffy immediately.  Duffy isn't our future but he's here just now, turning up and immediately sacking him rather than trying to work with him wouldn't be a great look regardless of the poor job he is doing at present.  If you can't work together, then he goes.  

As an aside I'm not bothered about Duffy's comments about playing style, without further elaboration he could well be meaning with the squad we have you can't play good football which I offer no argument against.  

Would agree with that. Highly doubt Duffy will be in charge next season but Mathie will want time to suss out a few different candidates and any immediate decision to sack Duffy might end up being knee jerk if we panic and go for the first available manager.

As for the playing style comment it probably did need more context as it was only mentioned for about 20 seconds. Hopefully it was more a case of Duffy saying we struggle to play good football as we don't have a CM to dictate the play and this should be a priority that needs addressed in the upcoming window. If he was suggesting that even if he had the Barcelona team from the 2000's that he'd still play Duffyball then I'd be more concerned.    

[ayrunitedfw]

Tomorrow is our final of 4 games against the clubs in our mini league. We have taken 2 points out a possible 9 so far. Anything other than a win tomorrow and Duffy should be fired into the sea. With a circuit breaker looking more and more likely it’s probably a perfect chance for a managerial change and we go again in the new year. 

[Jeff Venom]

Yeah I jumped on that style of football knee jerk style yesterday. Easy to do when we're in the mire.
For the record, I like Jim Duffy, always have, but he just oozes heart not in it. Which is fine I suppose; he's had his health battles and perhaps he thought he could give it one last spin after coming out the other side. I still feel like we can be okay this season if we bolster the spine of the team appropriately, but whether Duffy is the man to action this, pfff who knows.

[North British]

35 minutes ago, diegomarahenry said:

Most folk are aware that we are mid table bye to the fact other teams are just as bad as us. 
if Morton and QOTS win the next two and we lose, it’ll put a different complexion on our situation. We will be the worst team in the league.

The anger coming from the support has been focused on trying to stop this happening. Off field changes this week have partially addressed this.

The next step is getting players in, we need guys in on January the 1st rather than the the 31st. If we are still pish after players come in, then I don’t see Duffy surviving. 

Think there might be something odd in my coffee this morning but Henry’s post above is bang on the money . I think the third paragraph is very interesting as well as correct , if we can get four in place and grab three or four points before the Killie game then that game on the 2nd could be come pivotal in our recovery this season . Mathie mentions that he needs us to be at the other end of the table next season . So going by his statement he doesn’t seem to entertain a trip to L1 in May . However talking the talk is a lot easier than walking the walk . This window has to be our Willie Jamieson moment . 

Duffy and the team upgrading our survival chances buys time for the correct long term appointment . By the sounds of it ,it won’t be some obscure wildcard , as Mathie want to sell the club to the wider community in south Ayrshire . A recognised manager and even one or two names in the team known to most , would start to move the project in the direction needed .

[Trogdor]

32 minutes ago, ayrunitedfw said:

Tomorrow is our final of 4 games against the clubs in our mini league. We have taken 2 points out a possible 9 so far. Anything other than a win tomorrow and Duffy should be fired into the sea. With a circuit breaker looking more and more likely it’s probably a perfect chance for a managerial change and we go again in the new year. 

^100% the time is nigh.

[BukyOHare]

Bringing in a top recruiter in Mathie doesn't suddenly mean Duffy's turning into a hybrid Guardiola / Klopp maestro in the dugout. 

We're very fortunate to have brought in Mathie but its definitely cart before the horse for me. 

There can't be an alignment in thinking from the boardroom and the dugout while Duffy's in charge.

He isn't seen to be the long term appointment we need to be able to properly plan for the future, that will always hamper proper planning, so its still a case of limping through to the end of the season while he is managing the team. 

Interested to see how tomorrow actually goes (through partially covered eyes no doubt), will players be bouyed by the new appointment, will Duffy take the handbrake off? We obviously have no right to expect to win. 

It's never dull. 

[Hursty]

So what was the impression everyone had from the Hub open nights? Surprised to see little chat about it. 

All I got from my old man was that the stuff on the walls are cracking but he is raging that it's Fosters instead of Tennents and thinks service might be really slow if busy as there is only 1 pump for each draught option.  So I guess that's a hit and a miss.

Edited December 17, 2021 by Hursty

[AyrExile]

9 hours ago, Hursty said:

So what was the impression everyone had from the Hub open nights? Surprised to see little chat about it. 

All I got from my old man was that the stuff on the walls are cracking but he is raging that it's Fosters instead of Tennents and thinks service might be really slow if busy as there is only 1 pump for each draught option.  So I guess that's a hit and a miss.

Didn't go myself but your last point is to be expected. Could take a month or two to get it right on match days particularly when a rush of customers. Will probably give it a miss myself until the initial excitement calms down 

[Rugbypark]

Listened the the Mathie boy on Graham Speirs. Can these people not hear themselves? Journey, synergy, aligned, vision, skill set. It’s not just him, but any football CEO I’ve heard recently. They’re a parody of themselves.