bazil85

I don't need to after reading your second paragraph. If you genuinely think holding off the vote for an extra week or so would have changed the result then fine (that's likely what the FCA will look at when making their decision), if you are a stickler for detail fine, if you think BTB is best avoided because you don't like the short-term decisions over a small fraction of the money fine. But in the grand scheme I don't think it's anything that can justify going in a wee huff about, it's done now, won't matter in 7-9 years when we have the club and it's secured with the people that care most about St Mirren FC, the fans.

If you think strict adherence is so easy to achieve then you don't understand the aspects of legislation and regulation. If it was easy why should we even have an exception process? It's funny you support the essence of fan buyout but not willing to back it for something so short-term. Said it before. There is a good amount of 'tail wagging the dog' when it comes to the £10/£23 element versus the £2 a month. The people that will run our club (the fans) in years to come if we are fan owned are different from the people you might disagree with right now. BTB is a long-term, great opportunity for our club and it baffles me that people will use the £2 as an excuse not to back it... But hey, each to their own.

Better for who? Sometimes it's not practical and it's certainly not always possible in every situation. There's not a regulated medium/ large sized company in the country that won't need to use exceptions (that's why they exist) at some point. I used the example of GDPR recently. What I would say to fans worried about the governance of this vote is, do they really think the outcome would be any different? There's concerns about process and there's just being a tiny bit pernickety. So yeah maybe they could of done it differently, I don't know but if the outcome is very likely to be the same, what's the issue?

Trust me Stuart, I'm not struggling with it in the slightest, I've dealt with several submissions to regulators in the last two months. The FCA will sign-off on the deal if they're happy with it. Exceptions to legislation/ regulation happens on a daily basis. If they feel SMISA have acted in a fit and proper way that reflects the will of their members I doubt there will be any problems. We'll see though, they might very well reject it. I would be very surprised if that happened though.

You make the massive mistake (continually) that paying members haven't looked at the various proposals rationally and felt they are fit for purpose and a good use of funds. Believe it or not people can see what's happening and are perfectly happy with it. Oh democracy.

Yes, believe it or not there are a number of differences between a multibillion pound media organisation, a multimillion pound retail industry and SMISA There is very few comparison between ring fenced pension fund and the SMISA funds. They say things come in three's eh? the Mirror, Bhs and now SMISA

All ifs and buts, same as last year when people were saying 'Celtic would buy two players and over pay on the other.' (Load of nonsense) Scott Allan might go in the deal but McGinn is still worth a few million quid. He's up for player of the year this season.

No it wouldn't. We are owed 33% if Hibs sell him, regardless of how many new contracts Hibs give him. What people aren't sure is if it's profit of next sale or 33% of the value. Did that ever get clarified? My concern is, with him going into the fourth year of his deal, could he invoke Webster's ruling and walk away from his contract for a substantially reduced fee? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webster_ruling

I can think of another player absolutely immune from criticism

Like you for example?

Okay to say this in an ideal world but if we can't fill our other three stands and it means six figures more income for the club, it's a decision that has to be made. I don't know if any of the other teams will take more than 1,600 fans to the stadium next season right enough and what we should do if they request more tickets.

They have a 'skint Thursday' deal going and the drinks are also much cheaper on Friday compared to Saturday. Likely a loopole being used somewhere. Another nanny state law by the SNP unfortunately.

You get some nightclubs that do deals on doubles like £3 a double or £1 to make it a double, that sort of thing. It just shows the unbelievable mark up in places like Viennas. Also if you go in on a Thursday it's less than a quarter that price. Taking advantage of the very little competition they have in Paisley. Ironically business plans like that is likely why so many other clubs have went under and they're down to only opening three days a week.

1. I'm afraid I don't accept we are in a completely unique situation, of which I feel I've provided ample evidence in regards to other clubs having similar expenses and additional expense requirements we don't have (older/ bigger stadiums for example). 2. I'm also afraid I have never said it 'was needed' need and something being helpful/ beneficial are two very different claims which I'm sure you'll agree with. 3. I don't think that was me. I posted a table showing average wages in the SP after someone incorrectly said £50k wouldn't pay a players wage for a season 4. I'm not sure if I've explained this correct as the point seems to be continually missed. To make it as clear as possible. St Mirren DO NOT 'need' this £50k. Not for next seasons budget and not for Ralston, they could pay for Ralston and form a budget for next season. However £50k, as much as it isn't earth shattering money to our club, it still is... £50k and as I demonstrated, could be the difference between getting a couple of players in or not. That COULD (not will) be the difference between staying in the league and not staying in the league. I don't have a crystal ball, I'm not going to say it WILL involve us getting relegated. I used the example earlier of 'What if the previous SMISA £8k was the difference between Gavin Reilly coming in or not? Cammy Smith or not?' All ifs and buts, it would appear you're claiming I stated aspects as very likely to happen. 'Relegation would be the most likely option' 5. My understanding is this debate on training grounds, parks and player budgets is a sideline to the actual legality of taking the funds? I feel we have discussed this legislation point to a dead end. We can talk about it more but probably better just to let the FCA sign-off on it (guarantee they'll need to in this instance) 6. I'd completely agree it would be disappointing, everything I said about 'ideas' is purely speculation on what they could do. The only aspect I remain confident in is that a fan owned club would in some way, shape or form be able to budget for said pitch. Hopefully not at additional fan cost. 7. Nope I don't think that and have never said that. I was making a comparison between us and other clubs that rent out facilities. One of your arguments that other clubs are different from us is that they rent out facilities. I was wondering why the Dome doesn't count for St Mirren like rented facilities count for other clubs? I thought my tongue in cheek comment about 'a few hours' maybe highlighted that I didn't think it would fully cover costs. 8. Yeah possibly, don't think there's any debate that would be a good approach. Saying that doesn't mean funding the projects that have been funded is a bad one. Again we have to be aware that surveys are points in time. I'm sure a few paying members prioritise changed very quickly when we were staring L1 football in the face. Others possibly voted out of the nicety of money going to youth and community but in the cold light of day, St Mirren Football Club is king for many St Mirren fans.

Stick them in a corner with a couple of buckets. Job done

I have never said it was 'vital' I've said we can use any help we can get considering how difficult the league will be. I fear you're mixing me up with someone else here in regards to the next two highlighted points (and the first for that matter), never have I said 'relegation would be the most likely outcome' if this £50k was rejected. Do you means SMISA will come back after completion of the deal? I've never said that either. They might, we'll own the club after all but who knows. I haven't said I 'think' that will happen. Last highlighted point, again we have the Dome that gets rented out (Why doesn't that form part of our facilities to rent out out of interest? Do these other clubs rent every inch of available playing surface?), we have other larger income streams and other means to cover the cost. They would ultimately come out of our budget as with the majority of clubs at our level when faced with one off costs. Given we can estimate when the park will be replaced, we can easily budget for it. I'm really struggling with how making this request now means we can't budget in the future as a fan owned club... I'm really not sure what your point is in all of this because you haven't answered it. Is it that St Mirren are in a unique situation where we have facilities (Assuming facilities relates to training ground, stadiums and any other facilities - See my point on clubs with much larger older grounds to worry about) outside our means and categorically can't budget for the replacement of said facilities without reliance on a membership financial commitment model?

I've found several at our level or slightly above that have similar or better (which you'd assume would come with more one off costs) facilities than St Mirren. I've also noted several clubs (including Scottish clubs) that are in the process of developing similar/ better training facilities and pointed out surely they would have the same problems. You seem to be hinging on St Mirren being in the unique position of having training facilities above our means or that we don't have rental income for our training facilities. I could point you to our Dome which probably brings in a wee bit of money similar to other clubs that rent out facilities. It may shock you but renting out a pitch for a few hours a week won't be a big ticket income for the majority of football clubs in England or Scotland. Indeed if finance was an issue in this area, could we not just start renting the pitch out for a few hours a week when it's not used in the evenings? A lot of your concerns and turning our training facilities into a negative assume that the fan owned club will be sitting on their hands until one day someone goes 'Oh god we need to put down a new pitch at Ralston, where did that come from?' That won't happen and it hasn't happened this time. The only difference this time is we have an opportunity to cover some of the cost through BTB. Again it does not mean we'll be in big trouble in 8-12 years time when that comes around the next time. We can easily budget for it the same way as it can easily be budgeted for now. All thoughts aside if they should be using BTB rightly or wrongly, there isn't really a debate saying 'what about next time?' Because next time will be the same as we would do it this time if there was a no vote. I feel £50k is a lot for a club our size yes, but in the SP realistically it would be maybe one players wages or some adjustments to overall wage offerings. Might even mean an extra £2 on shirt prices or some ticket prices to cover the cost, who knows but it won't be do or die about replacing the pitch. I've said previously, we're going into a league where the majority of teams will have a bigger budget than us, regardless of prize money, crowds and player sales this season. Having the opportunity to save £50k does not mean we won't be able to afford this without a massive detriment to the player budget. It just gives us a wee bonus.

Like how SG had good 'business sense' but SMISA don't? Cool I won't hold my breath

Would still say that's pretty short-term thinking.

Okay what about Kilmarnock who are set to open a new state of the art center after agreeing a location? Should they be scrapping the idea because they won't be able to replace pitches? By all accounts it'll be bigger and more expensive than ours. Will they encounter the same problems and are they considerably much bigger than us? Sounds like we're just on the cusp of being too small a club for our facilities... Dundee are also heavily involved in a new £17 million project in the city. Is it just St Mirren that haven't got the ability to meet our needs for our training complex? Come on Stuart, you can't make this into a negative. You also can't claim that we won't be able to maintain facilities in 10-15 years time without a negative impact on the first team budget without any proof. The same people won't be in charge of the club at that time so how can you make such a claim? Some would say the return should be in the players developed with over £1 million in transfer income already from players developed for all or part of their youth career. Potentially double that figure if McGinn moves in the summer.

Why don’t we look at a model where the fans will be in charge of our club for generations to come and financially back said model? now I’m not saying there won’t be teething problems and a steep learning curve but if we all stick with it through the tough ti...

So what are you saying here Stuart? St Mirren are in the unique position in that we have a training ground/ facilities out with our means? Any proof of that at all? I’m sorry but it very much sounds like you’re splitting hairs. What about the similar sized clubs up here with some big old fashioned stadiums? Surely they’ll have more to worry about in the shortterm with one off costs? I wouldn’t like to be a Dunfermline or Dundee United in modern Scottish football. To say Stevenage and Accrington Stanley are bigger clubs than St Mirren is also pretty baffling. Even with grants and renting a park out for say £100 a pop, we still take close to treble their fan numbers and all the benefits that brings. I think it’s time to cut your losses on this one. You said some time ago ‘I’m not letting you away with that and wanted examples’ I have provided plenty. Want me to check the conference? Haha st Mirren will likely budget for one off costs down the line as we have done this time. (Again GLS has stated it would be paid out the budget) the only difference is right now we’ve had the chance to support through BTB. It in no way suggests we won’t be able to raise appropriate funds without detrementing the team in 10/15 years.

Don’t see the irony about shooting down my opinion this time in your post? Again tell me how this is a poor business decision for SMISA? You talk about Gilmour without even seeing the point that destroys your argument smack you right in the face. As a business man do you think Gilmour would of touched St Mirren FC if he wasn’t a fan? Of course not, Gilmour did not make his money from the club, he saved us from the brink at personal expense and is only now seeing some money back from the sale. (And not close to as much as if he sold us to some of the interested parties) The naievity in your argument is so very staggering. ‘Invest in a business we will one day own’ bad business practice ‘save a club at personal expense and guide it back to a level platform for little to no personal game over rougly two decades.’ Good business practice. Oh my EK maybe time for a sleep.

I said they had an Astroturf park at the ground as well. Owned or not, I'd be very surprised if whoever they pay rent to would just fund it out the kindness of their heart, I'm sure the rental cost would contribute to it over the years. I am still baffled you're trying to turn our training facilities into a negative but I can go further down the line if you want? Crewe Alexandra seem to have impressive facilities, L2 club Accrington Stanley have just submitted plans for a new training ground featuring two pitches, wonder how they'll cope? Stevenage FC another league 2 club with state of the art training facilities? I have looked very quickly at half a dozen teams. I'm sure you'll be able to pick holes in some of them but the fact of the matter is training facilities like Ralston are not just for the bigger teams. For a club our size, we do not have the best facilities in the country.

haha why doesn't a comment like this surprise me from you? Accept what you want buddie, off you trot to the FCA with your 'evidence'. I'll wait here for their response.