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For the first time in years, we have a relatively settled team with only a few tweaks required.

I think we need more than a few tweaks and I hope Houstie has some players lined up.

Last season we conceded 48 goals so I think it's fair to say our defence needs bolstered, I think we need 2 new defenders. The midfield seems solid enough unless we lose Sibbs.

Upfront is another issue, I like Baird's attitude and workrate but he lacks real pace so we need a forward who can commit defenders and can finish when he gets a chance. How we ended up with Boulding and Morgan defeats me.

Hopefully Houstie has learned from his first season where the team only won 14 from 36 games which equates to less than 40%. I am sure the supporters will be looking for a big improvement. Think the honeymoon period is well and truly over.

Edited by bejazz1
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For the first time in years, we have a relatively settled team with only a few tweaks required.

The likes of Raith and Livi sign a new team every season. That's not the way I would wanted.

The season after we went down and lost 18 players whilst signing 9 was maybe exciting for some, but for me, continuity is what's required.

Add to that, I would rather the club advise us of signings once they have signed on the dotted line.

Those needing the club to.tell us we are looking at players need to get a grip. It's blatantly obvious that is what will be happening.

Your opening sentence is correct on the proviso that the Board don't have the for sale signs up again. The previous Chairman stated at the last two AGM's selling at least one player a season is now a must not icing on the cake. If we were to lose say Sibbald and Vaulks for example then that would be over 1/3 of the cup final side gone. Hardly continuity that, again.

Fingers crossed it doesn't happen. However I believe it is inevitable that we will lose at least one this close season and probably more.

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No club with an ounce of professionalism is going to publish "news" about having nearly signed someone. Club websites can only really report what has already happened generally. They aren't going to play out a negotiation in public and they can't give credence to every piece of idle speculation by commenting on it. In the "old days", even as recently as 4 or 5 years ago maybe, this wasn't a problem. Supporters, and usually the media unless it was very high profile, found out about signings or important developments when clubs had finalised them and announced them. Now however we have blanket internet coverage, social media, agents deliberately leaking who their players are talking to and it's very difficult to keep things under wraps. So they come out into the public domain before anything is sealed and the only real difficultly is sorting out the ones that are genuine from the ones which somebody made up for laughs to see who would believe them. And the clubs end up being criticised and looking like they are at the tail of the story when they really can't say anything any earlier as they'd look an awful lot more stupid if they did and the deal collapsed. This isn't unique to Falkirk and you are kidding yourself if you think other clubs are any different. Of course some clubs are sharper than others. Raith Rovers are very good recently at pre-announcing when there will be news and building it up with fan interaction. But none of them are going to report someone signing until there's a signature on a piece of paper if they have any sense.

I don't think anyone expects names or hints. However had you been around Falkirk a mere 4 weeks ago you would not have believed the good will the club had.

It had a one of chance to get a new generation of fans on board and rekindle old flames from lapsed fans.

It is my, and a good number of fans, view we have blown that by the radio silence from the club since then.

The new Chairman stated it was his vision to get back to the Premiership back in January when he took over. So far the fans have seen no actions to back those words up of a fleshing out of those words.

I think had they handled the PR post the Cup final the momentum built up would have continued, not to the same extent, but certainly much better since we were relegated and probably years previous to that.

We must be the first club in many a year that look like selling less ST's than the season just finished, which is very disappointing considering what went on a mere 4 weeks ago.

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We never do our business early. It seems to be the younger/newer supporters that are getting their yfronts in a knot.

Houston as a manager, does his business earlier than most, therefore I hope he has his eyes open. Full time and under physio must be understood

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I don't think anyone expects names or hints.

Of course.

It is my, and a good number of fans, view we have blown that by the radio silence from the club since then.

But if you accept that names and hints aren't up for discussion then what would you like the club to twitter on about ? A 'Fox' breaking into TFS? What the chairman had for breakfast ?

It's the closed season, there's been a few wee stories on the official site but what the f'ck are they going to post?

The club did an outstanding job promoting the cup final - out-fucking-standing - sold more jerseys in a day (or was it a week) than they did for the entirety of last season yet they are getting pelters for not predicting these sales all those months back when they placed the order !

And then they didn't open up to sell key rings on the Monday after the final !!

I'll be fucking glad when the season kicks off.

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Of course.

But if you accept that names and hints aren't up for discussion then what would you like the club to twitter on about ? A 'Fox' breaking into TFS? What the chairman had for breakfast ?

It's the closed season, there's been a few wee stories on the official site but what the f'ck are they going to post?

The club did an outstanding job promoting the cup final - out-fucking-standing - sold more jerseys in a day (or was it a week) than they did for the entirety of last season yet they are getting pelters for not predicting these sales all those months back when they placed the order !

And then they didn't open up to sell key rings on the Monday after the final !!

I'll be fucking glad when the season kicks off.

Read my post.

The Chairman nailed his colours to the mast when he took over. All the momentum has been lost. Why not come out and say how that vision of getting back to the Premiership is going to be achieved and what part they need the fans to play for starters.

As far as the club doing a great job promoting the final I agree however the supporters did their bit too on social media and in and around the town. What the club did badly was take advantage of the seven weeks they had to make a financial killing. Which would help boost budgets. Forget the strips, they can't be blamed for that, however the shop had nothing in it for people to buy in the last three weeks. What they did buy they didn't buy nearly enough of.

I have said I am happy to give Houston time to make his signings. However it is disappointing the the new regime have not seen the final as a chance to really grip the support and get a good few more bums on seats. The club can give us all the falkirk family stomach churning shite they want but a successful club is one that wins games. So far there has been little evidence that is what they want to do. However it is still early, well ish

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The Chairman nailed his colours to the mast when he took over. All the momentum has been lost. Why not come out and say how that vision of getting back to the Premiership is going to be achieved and what part they need the fans to play for starters.

TBH I don't actually know myself what the Chairman said back in January, but I'd be extremely surprised to find anyone associated with the club who didn't view getting into the Top Flight as a primary goal - did he state that he wanted to do it this season ? cause that's a fairly big ask considering the company we're keeping. A few decent signings could see us mount a fairly serious challenge but keeping our finances sensible means Houstie has to get his signings absolutely spot on. What can we as supporters do? back the club!

Now that I know he has a 'vision' I'll be on tenterhooks waiting to find out what it is - why won't he tell us :(

Forget the strips, they can't be blamed for that, however the shop had nothing in it for people to buy in the last three weeks. What they did buy they didn't buy nearly enough of.

Stop the fucking bus

Do you mean to tell me that even if the shop had opened on the Monday after the Cup Final there were no fucking keyrings to sell !!!???

The club missed out on literally pounds worth of profits!!

Can we assume that having no jerseys and no keyrings in stock are related - did the shop perhaps sell more stuff in the run up to our 5th final in 140 years than usual?

I have said I am happy to give Houston time to make his signings. However it is disappointing the the new regime have not seen the final as a chance to really grip the support and get a good few more bums on seats. The club can give us all the falkirk family stomach churning shite they want but a successful club is one that wins games. So far there has been little evidence that is what they want to do. However it is still early, well ish

Aye cool - Mon the Bairns etc.

Edited by Ned Nederlander
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The chairman's two main themes were to get promoted and complete the stadium.

I am almost certain there will be a 16 team league next season so we need to get to the top 4.

I am taking pre cup final my boy about shop stock.

Having supplied a couple of items that sold out quickly turning stock round quickly these days is easy. They just didn't buy enough IMO

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Being closed that Monday is about the attitude and what it says about the club's attitude to retail, not selling the actual merchandise that day.

IMO the club are actually playing at retail. I have never seen the club shop so sparce as it was last season. I'm not going to claim I know much about stock demand and turnover but I would have thought that every piece of merchandise sold would go towards the bottom line, the balance here is getting the stock levels to meet demand. It probably takes some time to get the right stock in place throughout the season and not just planning for Christmas, so it is not surprising there were low levels of stock pre cup final. It's one of these things the club is damned if they do, damned if they don't. I happened to have the misfortune to be at EEP (my son in law is a pars fan) just prior to our cup final. Their shop is full of replica kits, polo shirts, toys etc...in fact, it puts ours to shame, the staff were really friendly and couldn't have done enough for you, stark comparison to ours, although I was impressed by the stock levels and service I was left scratching my head thinking I thought they were skint so why is all that money tied up in stock when the first team are doing so poorly? I would honestly say their club shop had at least 20 times more stock than ours... That is ok if you are selling it... The point I am making here is DAFC would have made a huge profit if they had reached the cup final. Edited by bejazz1
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I wanted 22 Dunfermline pencils from their club shop, they only had 21..... I won't be back

Unbelievable Jeff

I went to Tescos on a very hot day and you would not believe this but they had run out of the type of ice cream I wanted. You would think a company that size could have predicted the demand and stocked more!
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I went to Tescos on a very hot day and you would not believe this but they had run out of the type of ice cream I wanted. You would think a company that size could have predicted the demand and stocked more!

Sack them all. Disgrace of a company. Do you know they were closed on Christmas Day? I'm a man who sometimes forgets to buy my loved ones Christmas presents and has to do it on Christmas Day. WHERE am I suppose to buy cheap and affordable gifts now?

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Jesus wept.

If it's any consolation to the knicker wetters this lapsed season ticket holder will be back in attendance due to a couple of reasons. One is the grand job the club are now making in trying to generate a buzz around the team, and not a fucking summer concert.

Shitting your pants because the shop wasn't open the day after the cup final if a joke. Those who are outraged that there has been no communication on transfer targets have obviously been playing too much Football Manager. We are Falkirk, the press don't give a f**k even when we do sign someone and we are correctly not in the business of alerting our rivals to potential signing targets.

As far as I'm concerned we have 2 already signed up, Rogers and Muirhead. We saw so little of Muirhead last season.

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As far as I'm concerned we have 2 already signed up, Rogers and Muirhead. We saw so little of Muirhead last season.

I think it's a dangerous assumption that Muirhead will be injury free this term, one wrong turn or awkward fall could undo all the good getting fit... How many players have you heard that are just injured constantly?

I don't know but you really have to question why our maestro actually bought Muirhead, OTJ and Boulding in the first place FFS, How unlucky can you get 3 signings crocked all at once. Maybe Mr H takes too many wrong types of gambles... Maybe he should be scouring the country (UK) trying to unearth our next gem or... is this too much hard work or too much to ask?

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Sack them all. Disgrace of a company. Do you know they were closed on Christmas Day? I'm a man who sometimes forgets to buy my loved ones Christmas presents and has to do it on Christmas Day. WHERE am I suppose to buy cheap and affordable gifts now?

I love the satire and sarcasm on this site, ha ha it's brilliant.

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