Maboza

Most clubs run matchday lotteries / 50:50 draws in normal times. Is this not something that the club could do during this period to help raise some revenue? Not sure if there are gambling restrictions that would rule it out but surely worth considering. Given that fans are not spending money of tickets, pies, programmes and merchandise I’m sure many could be tempted to to part with say £10 a ticket each week. Say we can get 1000x £10. £5k to the club £5k to the winner Hold the draw at 3pm on a Saturday to give everyone something to look forward to. Must be easy to spin something up online to sell/purchase tickets online.

A bit of perspective required. We got scudded by one of the Old Firm. Not the first time and won’t be the last. The last 7 days feel like a disaster purely because Hamilton and Hearts have picked up points. By contrast - only a week and a half ago we were on top of the world after winning away to 3rd place Motherwell. It’s tight at the bottom and we’d all love to be picking up more points but there’s 4, possibly 5 teams in the mix. Huge run in coming up starting with a massive game against Hearts. We shouldn’t be letting any single result let our heads drop as there’ll be ups and downs in the run in. Time to rally!! Come on Saints!!

P. McGinn's deliveries were dreadful. It's all well and good getting up and down the line but he put 4/5 into the stand. He was by far a better defender than Hodson though.

Absolutely. The response at the Q&A was that Smisa would have first refusal on the shares at what was paid. No mention of adjustment for inflation or anything - which I thought was strange - so will be important for this to be nailed down to mitigate the risk of sale to a 3rd party. Also raises the question of how do Smisa finance in that scenario? I.e. Kibble say you have 1st refusal but you have 3 months to buy or we go elsewhere. Suddenly Smisa need to carry a much bigger ‘rainy day fund’ otherwise they can’t purchase in that scenario and Kibble can go off to the highest bidder.

I think now that the outcome is settled we need to get behind it. However, we need real strength of leadership from Smisa going into the new model. We need people with a wealth of experience to lead the club and to not allow SMFC to be dominated by Kibble. I’ve concerns that Smisa could have been overly influenced to date by GLS. Some may agree or disagree with that. I think we have a challenge to try and ensure that doesn’t happen with Kibble as a minority shareholder. I’m all for Kibble bringing business expertise to the table. In fact, one of my main concerns with fan ownership was that we may not have the people, skills and experience to operate effectively. If Kibble can help with that then great - but it’s supposed to be a fan owned club so Kibble can’t be allowed to dominate proceedings. If we have a fans rep acting as a bystander, in awe of £30m turnover partner who has a big voice, then what’s the point? We’d have been been better just allowing the club to be sold into private hands in that instance. A challenge for all involved. I hope it all goes well - and mostly to the benefit of SMFC.

Nope. It doesn’t seem to have been. I also asked some relevant questions (i.e. what’s to stop Kibble sponsoring the Kibble Arena at a discounted rate) but these questions also went ignored. Unfortunately the people defending the deal are only really operating with vague statements and a complete lack of detail.

I watched the Q&A session last week and it answered some questions but was still a bit vague on detail IMO. One thing I’d like to know is will whether Kibble will pay the market rate for any additional (new) services they take from the club? They stated that they spend approx. £50k p.a. to SMFC and seemed to state that would continue. Which at face value is a positive. I’d like assurances that they can’t/won’t benefit from cheap shirt sponsorship, stadium naming rights, facilities, etc. And what safeguards are in place to ensure that the club is getting best value commercially? Is this covered anywhere?

Sorry Ricky but that's far too simplistic an argument in my opinion. There's got to be a tipping point where it becomes so counterproductive - as you actually alienate home fans from not only avoiding those matches but also from attending other games where they would normally - due to an increasing disillusionment with the club. Aspiring to compete financially and on the park through the old firm filling your stands is simply short-termism and that sort of lack of vision isn't good for any organisation - company, government or football club.

Is this where we are heading? .... St Johnstone will give Celtic and Rangers supporters three stands for the remaining Premiership games at McDiarmid Park this season. The trial move will see home fans housed solely in the West Stand, which holds in excess of 3,000. It follows a reduction in the number of season ticket holders attending games against the top two. The club hope the move will lead to a "partisan atmosphere" from the home support, and increased income. Saints host Celtic on 29 January, while Rangers are due to visit Perth on 23 February, with Tommy Wright's side currently five points off a top six place. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/50985399?intlink_from_url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/scotland&link_location=live-reporting-story 'Partisan atmosphere'. 😭 lol

It's got to be encouraging that we're achieving good home form and clean sheets. What we would have given for that in many previous seasons?!! Given the state we were in pre-season I would take the positives from the solid foundations we have built. The challenge is now to improve step-by-step. Strikers getting off the mark on Saturday there was a step in the right direction. We need to improve our attacking game and ultimately to get better results on the road. Overall, I think we're pretty well positioned.

Superb effort from Murray today to cap off a fine and productive week. Did amazingly well to dig in during the 2nd set while a set and a break down and on the verge of losing another break. 3rd set swung back and forth but he never gave up. A remarkable effort to win a trophy given where he's come from. Up to 127 in the world now. He's jumped a huge number of places in the ATP rankings this week.

It's all set up for a grand game on Sunday morning. Looking forward to it.

I can't imagine that there were too many sighs of disappointment when he didn't stay on with us at the end of last season. Must have been on a good few quid as well given the level he'd played at previously and is presumably looking for another payday from Killie who have just lost Brophy to injury?

Yep. All too often when we pick up possession in the middle of the park or on the wings we immediately turn back and look for the safe ball - which takes us back the way and then we’re not good enough to build from the back or pass through the lines. Only for a spell in the 2nd half did we actually have players willing to take a pass in tight situations and be brave. We need to have the balls to do that and to get good at it. It’s the only way to commit players and create chances.

Never turned up in the 1st half which was very disappointing and no surprise to see us go behind. Both full backs were getting too easily beaten by wingers coming inside. Got away with it a few times and Hladky kept us in the game but there was no pressure on the ball when we invited their player to stick the opener in the top corner from 20 yards. A bit better in the 2nd half. Some decent pressure and shots on target but not enough cutting edge. Mullen spent the first half on his arse (see Morias criticism) but his movement and energy was good in the 2nd half. Justified his start. Obika just doesn’t look as if he has enough desire just now for whatever reason. He actually one a few more headers, flick ons and got better as the 2nd half wore on but needs to up the effort and get a bit nastier. Djorkaeff looks like a youngster who needs to be a work in progress. First touch should have been an equaliser but he had a fresh air swipe and 45 seconds later misplaced a pass and its game over. I genuinely don’t think we’re as bad as some are obviously thinking just now but we definitely have a lot of questions to answer in our attack.

Hasn't looked good. Hasn't had much support or service. Hasn't had much of a chance yet - less than 270 mins of football. JG still trying to find a formula that works in attack.

Very good win for Scotland today. Measured start in the first half in which they were in control but suffering from handling errors in the first 20 mins. Adapted their game slightly and got a good first try off of Russell's kick and the 2nd try set them up well for the 2nd half. Total dominance in the 2nd half and stayed patient to get the important bonus point.

As much as it’s frustrating seeing us struggling in attack - I find today’s performance pretty encouraging. We looked absolutely solid. We’ve got very good foundations and are competing in games where for much of last season we were getting swept aside easily. Best goals against outside the old firm? Yes, we look toothless in the final 3rd at the moment. We need to create more chances and the strikers need to get off the mark. That’s the challenge but give it time and I think we’re heading in the right direction.

Fair play to wee Danny today. Came on a did the basics well. That was more than could be said for Morias - albeit that Mullen had Obika for company so wasn’t as isolated. I think Danny has shown the last couple of sub appearances that he maybe should be starting ahead of Morias but whether he should be starting ahead of Obika as a lone striker is a different question.

Is this the guy that couldn't score against EK or Albion Rovers?

7 points from the next 5 games.

Would have been off the mark on Saturday if the linesman/ref hadn't incorrectly ruled offside. Who knows if we'd then have went on to win the game. Hopefully get a goal soon but they need chances and time.

I think we do have a better squad and a better starting 11 than last season. That being said - they still need to make it work. The pressure is on for them to gel and start working as a team and getting results. The longer it takes, the more pressure will come and confidence will drain. 3 points on Saturday would help and I reckon we'll get them. That would set us up nicely for another home game the following week against Hearts. I'd counter that as until we did go on that run there was nothing to suggest that the team were capable of it. I think we were very fortunate with some of those results, sendings off going in our favour, last minute goals, etc. and coming up against a number of teams that had nothing to play for at that stage of the season.

Oh... and it looked like we were robbed of a perfectly good goal from Obika. Looked onside from the Alba replay. The guys up front need a goal to get going.

Just watched on alba. Nowhere near good enough going forward and got what we deserved. In many ways it’s the easy thing to play the big teams when we have no expectation - sit in, difficult to beat, hit them on the counter attack. No major criticism if you don’t take anything. The real test is the games that we really need to take wins from. Livi, County, Hamilton, St.Johnstone, Motherwell and maybe Hearts/Hibs/Killie depending on how good/bad a season they have. Performances so far in those tests - nowhere near good enough. Goodwin has a lot of work to do to build a capable, attacking outfit that can damage an opposition who are quite happy to sit in against us.