Dibbles old paperboy

Quite disrespectful of Jack 'SMTID' Ross to broadcast his discussions with St Mirren about Paul McGinn before a deal has been concluded... here's hoping Paul does a Goody, talks to Hibs and then decides to stick with the Buddies and Jack is left looking a little less gallus.

FFS guys, give it a rest.

Goodwin was asked if Morgan was available would he be intersted. Of course he said yes. He didnt just come out and say we were after him. 

Available to download here if you are interested;
https://www.blackandwhitearmy.com/downloads/accounts-may2019.pdf
 
Summary
Turnover up to £4.1m from £2.8m

Showing the value of Premiership football over Championship. The extra £1.3m was made up of c£500K in gate receipts, c£600K in prize money and increased advertising and commercial income.
  Over and above that turnover increase we also got £1m from the sale of John McGinn from Hibs to Villa as our sell on.
  We've since had another £330k from that deal, which was a third of the £1m kick that Hibs got when Villa got promoted. That money is NOT in these accounts.
  Our wage bill went up pretty much exactly in line with our increased turnover (point 1). We spent £3m on wages as opposed to £2m in the previous season. That's probably to be expected in the top flight but it does represent a wages to turnover ratio of about 75% which is well above the widely recommended level of 60%. The settlement of Alan Stubbs and Darren Jackson will be in there along with the paying off of all Stubbs duds. Not sure if the Kearney settlement is in there or not. I'd suggest not.
  The wages of £3m were included in an over all "Admin Expenses" total of £4.5m. That combined with a cost of sales of £500K meant we spent £5.0m last financial year.
  The income of £1m from John McGinn, plus the turnover of £4.1m meant we brought in £5.1m, spent £5.0m, so thus recorded a £100K profit.
  We also invested a chunk of money in the new pitch at Ralston and other projects such as the new lighting, the sound system and other bits and pieces.
  In short we've spent the £1m we got for John McGinn on exiting the Alan Stubbs debacle, repairing and rebuilding the squad, a new pitch and some lights. That £1m offset what would have been a £900K loss.
  £310K of the operating loss was a depreciation charge
  Our transfer income last financial year ending May 18 was £728K (Mallan & Morgan), ending last financial year May 19 was £1m and as I said we've actually already banked £300K this financial year. Ralston has delivered.
  We had £700K in the bank at the end of May (up from £500K previous year)
  We had 38 players and 36 staff last year (total 74). Previous year was 43 players and 34 staff (total 77)
  I don't know what prepayments and accrued income is but we had £600K of that this year as opposed to £140K last year.  
Think that is all the big points. I'll leave everyone to make their own mind up.
For me it's certainly a worry that we have spent £1.8m in transfer income and not really have a whole lot to show for it other than being in, and retaining, a place in the Premiership which is not to be sniffed at.
The real concern is that there's no obvious assets left now. Magennis isn't going to go for big money and Vaclav will walk for nothing so we're going to need to need to stop sacking managers and rebuilding whole squads in January.

Lewis has been a Celtic player for almost 18 months. The only time he started every game during that time was when he was loaned back to St Mirren FC in the Championship. He's heading for being a third of the way through his Celtic contract now. He started a decent number of games for Sunderland but had mixed reviews there. If Celtic have most of Forrest, Hayes, Sinclair, Johnston, Shved all fit then Lewis doesn't even make the bench. He's started a grand total of 6 Celtic games. 
Since Lennon and Hibs didn't part company on the best of terms we might have a better chance of landing Lewis, but if clubs like Aberdeen or Killie were also in for him I would guess they would be seen as a more attractive option than us.
Last year when Brendan Rogers was still around you could see the logic of staying and fighting for his place and then going to a big club like Sunderland. A year further on we might not look like such a backward step when most weeks he isn't in the Celtic starting XI or on the bench. If he goes on loan, Celtic might want to see what he can do at Scottish premiership level week in week out up until the summer when he'll be halfway through his contract.

Lewis has been a Celtic player for almost 18 months. The only time he started every game during that time was when he was loaned back to St Mirren FC in the Championship. He's heading for being a third of the way through his Celtic contract now. He started a decent number of games for Sunderland but had mixed reviews there. If Celtic have most of Forrest, Hayes, Sinclair, Johnston, Shved all fit then Lewis doesn't even make the bench. He's started a grand total of 6 Celtic games. 
Since Lennon and Hibs didn't part company on the best of terms we might have a better chance of landing Lewis, but if clubs like Aberdeen or Killie were also in for him I would guess they would be seen as a more attractive option than us.
Last year when Brendan Rogers was still around you could see the logic of staying and fighting for his place and then going to a big club like Sunderland. A year further on we might not look like such a backward step when most weeks he isn't in the Celtic starting XI or on the bench. If he goes on loan, Celtic might want to see what he can do at Scottish premiership level week in week out up until the summer when he'll be halfway through his contract.

Lewis has been a Celtic player for almost 18 months. The only time he started every game during that time was when he was loaned back to St Mirren FC in the Championship. He's heading for being a third of the way through his Celtic contract now. He started a decent number of games for Sunderland but had mixed reviews there. If Celtic have most of Forrest, Hayes, Sinclair, Johnston, Shved all fit then Lewis doesn't even make the bench. He's started a grand total of 6 Celtic games. 
Since Lennon and Hibs didn't part company on the best of terms we might have a better chance of landing Lewis, but if clubs like Aberdeen or Killie were also in for him I would guess they would be seen as a more attractive option than us.
Last year when Brendan Rogers was still around you could see the logic of staying and fighting for his place and then going to a big club like Sunderland. A year further on we might not look like such a backward step when most weeks he isn't in the Celtic starting XI or on the bench. If he goes on loan, Celtic might want to see what he can do at Scottish premiership level week in week out up until the summer when he'll be halfway through his contract.

A lucky boy that Danny Lennon came into our club
He since went strength to strength

Lewis has been a Celtic player for almost 18 months. The only time he started every game during that time was when he was loaned back to St Mirren FC in the Championship. He's heading for being a third of the way through his Celtic contract now. He started a decent number of games for Sunderland but had mixed reviews there. If Celtic have most of Forrest, Hayes, Sinclair, Johnston, Shved all fit then Lewis doesn't even make the bench. He's started a grand total of 6 Celtic games. 
Since Lennon and Hibs didn't part company on the best of terms we might have a better chance of landing Lewis, but if clubs like Aberdeen or Killie were also in for him I would guess they would be seen as a more attractive option than us.
Last year when Brendan Rogers was still around you could see the logic of staying and fighting for his place and then going to a big club like Sunderland. A year further on we might not look like such a backward step when most weeks he isn't in the Celtic starting XI or on the bench. If he goes on loan, Celtic might want to see what he can do at Scottish premiership level week in week out up until the summer when he'll be halfway through his contract.

Are you looking for a St Mirren-related present for Christmas? This Saturday (23rd November) at Oakshaw Trinity Church's Christmas Coffee Morning and Sale (10am - 12 noon) there will be a mini-auction during which 2 signed footballs from St Mirren FC will be up for auction. The first ball is a signed matchday ball used in the game against Celtic on 3rd April 2019 (and has been signed by players in last year's team like Popescu, Dreyer etc) and comes in a presentation case. The second ball has the St Mirren club crest on some of the panels and has been signed by this season's squad. We can't accept online bids from social media sites so please come along and bid in person if you are interested. The mini-auction will be held around 11.30am at Oakshaw Trinity Church, 6 School Wynd, Paisley, PA1 2DB.
Photos of the two autographed footballs have been posted on the St Mirren Supporters and St Mirren Fans pages on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10162877868496337&set=pcb.10162877877281337&type=3&theater&ifg=1
 

Murray's second full season season at Dumbarton should have been looked at by the SMFC board. They even got hammered by a Cowdenbeath side who finished bottom that year.

Murray's second full season season at Dumbarton should have been looked at by the SMFC board. They even got hammered by a Cowdenbeath side who finished bottom that year.

That was the point I was making; i.e. if he was fully fit why did he only play 5 or 6 games in half a season and in 2 or 3 of them he looked as if his legs had gone well before the end of the game. This season he has played 1 whole 90 minutes (almost) and we're midway through November.
Would love to see Kyle do well for us - even if he got his confidence and fitness back and played for 60 minutes, 25 league games a season he could make a big difference. So far he hasn't looked as if he has been fit since the summer or confident.

That was the point I was making; i.e. if he was fully fit why did he only play 5 or 6 games in half a season and in 2 or 3 of them he looked as if his legs had gone well before the end of the game. This season he has played 1 whole 90 minutes (almost) and we're midway through November.
Would love to see Kyle do well for us - even if he got his confidence and fitness back and played for 60 minutes, 25 league games a season he could make a big difference. So far he hasn't looked as if he has been fit since the summer or confident.

What facts would that be?
He was pain free and fully fit when he was on loan with us before the summer and yet how many 90 minutes did he play for us then. (Answer... 5 or 6 full 90 minutes in half a season!) He was clearly struggling by the end of the season again in the double-header against Dundee United and a couple of games a week towards the end of the split and extra time in the play off final second leg (just checked he was subbed before extra time due to looking well and truly goosed)... and he only started playing 90 minutes after Dreyer got injured with a handful of games left!
Given that this season he has had 1 game where he played for 87 minutes (Livingston) I would say the jury must be out on whether he is past all his historic injury problems.

What facts would that be?
He was pain free and fully fit when he was on loan with us before the summer and yet how many 90 minutes did he play for us then. (Answer... 5 or 6 full 90 minutes in half a season!) He was clearly struggling by the end of the season again in the double-header against Dundee United and a couple of games a week towards the end of the split and extra time in the play off final second leg (just checked he was subbed before extra time due to looking well and truly goosed)... and he only started playing 90 minutes after Dreyer got injured with a handful of games left!
Given that this season he has had 1 game where he played for 87 minutes (Livingston) I would say the jury must be out on whether he is past all his historic injury problems.

Strange then that when Oran "had no input into planning for the season ahead" (GLS) that we began our pre-season preparations with games in Belfast and against the very side who GLS said it was an open secret from April than Oran would be rejoining - likewise our linking up with a team in Northern Ireland. Strange also that 10 days before Oran was sacked Oran and GLS gave interviews to STV discussing the season ahead and quashing speculation that Oran would return to part-time football with Coleraine.
None of Oran's priority targets were made competitive offers by the club, but GLS landed his own top target... Kyle McAllister.
I think it is a lot more likely that Oran and GLS had a rammy about this season's budget and Oran feeling that the board weren't going to back him in the summer window to bring in Popescu and others and disagreeing on signing targets for the season ahead. After the rammy the working relationship had broken down and a parting of the ways became inevitable.
In the final 3 months of last season we began to look like a mid-table team form-wise and in terms of results. Oran had raised expectations that if we built on that finish we could be in or around the top 6 this season. Fitzpatrick and GLS also spent much of the close season talking about the top 4 or 6 being our aim this season. With the budget being reduced and Oran being over-ruled / not backed on summer signings he perhaps thought we risked another season of battling to avoid relegation again. I think Oran felt that if the board were going to keep setting an aim of top 4 or top 6 while season tickets were being sold that to reduce the budget behind the scenes and ignore his signing targets was a recipe for us being relegated and had that happened people may have thought he had been lucky to beat the drop last summer and had been found out this season.
 

A bit like yourself then! [emoji38]

Strange then that when Oran "had no input into planning for the season ahead" (GLS) that we began our pre-season preparations with games in Belfast and against the very side who GLS said it was an open secret from April than Oran would be rejoining - likewise our linking up with a team in Northern Ireland. Strange also that 10 days before Oran was sacked Oran and GLS gave interviews to STV discussing the season ahead and quashing speculation that Oran would return to part-time football with Coleraine.
None of Oran's priority targets were made competitive offers by the club, but GLS landed his own top target... Kyle McAllister.
I think it is a lot more likely that Oran and GLS had a rammy about this season's budget and Oran feeling that the board weren't going to back him in the summer window to bring in Popescu and others and disagreeing on signing targets for the season ahead. After the rammy the working relationship had broken down and a parting of the ways became inevitable.
In the final 3 months of last season we began to look like a mid-table team form-wise and in terms of results. Oran had raised expectations that if we built on that finish we could be in or around the top 6 this season. Fitzpatrick and GLS also spent much of the close season talking about the top 4 or 6 being our aim this season. With the budget being reduced and Oran being over-ruled / not backed on summer signings he perhaps thought we risked another season of battling to avoid relegation again. I think Oran felt that if the board were going to keep setting an aim of top 4 or top 6 while season tickets were being sold that to reduce the budget behind the scenes and ignore his signing targets was a recipe for us being relegated and had that happened people may have thought he had been lucky to beat the drop last summer and had been found out this season.
 

So, out of the 12 league games so far this season in how many games so far would you say that Kyle McAllister has played well, or even managed to look fully fit?

I haven’t seen the goals but I highly doubt Jack was to blame for all 7 goals.

About a week before they had their massive fall out GLS and Kearney both gave interview to STV on the same day. If memory serves me correctly Kearney spoke about his top targets being Popescu, Muzek, Hodson and Dreyer and said he hoped we'd get at least some of them back again this season. None of them re-signed and we didn't make serious offers for any of them. We did however land Gordon Scott's top transfer target for this season... Kyle McAllister (who has barely contributed anything so far this season).
In their STV interviews there was nothing to suggest that there was any doubt Kearney would be in charge again this season.
What happened next?
Could it be that Kearney was told our budget was being cut and all his priority players to re-sign for this season were too expensive and he would have to rebuild the squad with the remnants of Jack Ross's squad and without most of the quality additions who made the difference to us from January to May last season (apologies to LJB for discussing a previous manager)... but not to worry Oran we are confident we can bring in McAllister on a 3 year deal!
Following on from Oran being sacked Goodwin's budget will have been further reduced to help pay off OK.

About a week before they had their massive fall out GLS and Kearney both gave interview to STV on the same day. If memory serves me correctly Kearney spoke about his top targets being Popescu, Muzek, Hodson and Dreyer and said he hoped we'd get at least some of them back again this season. None of them re-signed and we didn't make serious offers for any of them. We did however land Gordon Scott's top transfer target for this season... Kyle McAllister (who has barely contributed anything so far this season).
In their STV interviews there was nothing to suggest that there was any doubt Kearney would be in charge again this season.
What happened next?
Could it be that Kearney was told our budget was being cut and all his priority players to re-sign for this season were too expensive and he would have to rebuild the squad with the remnants of Jack Ross's squad and without most of the quality additions who made the difference to us from January to May last season (apologies to LJB for discussing a previous manager)... but not to worry Oran we are confident we can bring in McAllister on a 3 year deal!
Following on from Oran being sacked Goodwin's budget will have been further reduced to help pay off OK.

About a week before they had their massive fall out GLS and Kearney both gave interview to STV on the same day. If memory serves me correctly Kearney spoke about his top targets being Popescu, Muzek, Hodson and Dreyer and said he hoped we'd get at least some of them back again this season. None of them re-signed and we didn't make serious offers for any of them. We did however land Gordon Scott's top transfer target for this season... Kyle McAllister (who has barely contributed anything so far this season).
In their STV interviews there was nothing to suggest that there was any doubt Kearney would be in charge again this season.
What happened next?
Could it be that Kearney was told our budget was being cut and all his priority players to re-sign for this season were too expensive and he would have to rebuild the squad with the remnants of Jack Ross's squad and without most of the quality additions who made the difference to us from January to May last season (apologies to LJB for discussing a previous manager)... but not to worry Oran we are confident we can bring in McAllister on a 3 year deal!
Following on from Oran being sacked Goodwin's budget will have been further reduced to help pay off OK.

Just because we gained more points doesn’t necessarily mean we are better. It doesn’t stop the fact that we were bottom after the first round of games. There is no cannon fodder akin to that of ourselves, Accies and Dundee from last season. With Hibs and Hearts likely to pull away in the next few games, we will be left adrift. If we are lucky, the Fakes won’t get any better, and hopefully Accies or County can be kept down. But it doesn’t look like the same battle as last season, and as a result we need to be targeting 35+ points. If things don’t improve soon we aren’t going to be getting anywhere near that, and we haven’t got a Dundee this time around to bail us out.