Scary Bear Posted April 2, 2014 Share Posted April 2, 2014 Shiels seems pretty sure that he'll still be here next season, even going so far as laughing off Rae's comments in yesterday's paper. http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/sport/spfl/shiels-staying-at-ton-for-long-haul-158036n.23853402 If you're Rae, it must be a nervous time. He gave Shiels the funds to bring in several players and on the whole those players haven't managed the results to avoid relegation. O'Connor was a massive gamble. How much is Vine on, given he moved from Hibs. Now Shiels is talking about another big rebuilding job. Rae must be bricking it that he fucks this up and signs a load more duds. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Homer Thompson Posted April 2, 2014 Share Posted April 2, 2014 If you're Rae, it must be a nervous time. He gave Shiels the funds to bring in several players and on the whole those players haven't managed the results to avoid relegation. O'Connor was a massive gamble. How much is Vine on, given he moved from Hibs. Now Shiels is talking about another big rebuilding job. Rae must be bricking it that he fucks this up and signs a load more duds. I wouldnt trust Shiels to build lego. Rae must be getting pretty close to giving Shiels reason to walk and claim constructive dismissal! Maybe Rae reckons comp through that would be less than just sacking him? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jagfox Posted April 2, 2014 Share Posted April 2, 2014 Maybe Rae's desperate alligning with the Easdales is to put the frighteners on KS, allegedly 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevie Aitken's Love Child Posted April 2, 2014 Share Posted April 2, 2014 (edited) If you're Rae, it must be a nervous time. He gave Shiels the funds to bring in several players and on the whole those players haven't managed the results to avoid relegation. O'Connor was a massive gamble. How much is Vine on, given he moved from Hibs. Now Shiels is talking about another big rebuilding job. Rae must be bricking it that he fucks this up and signs a load more duds. Shiels has stated on a few occasions that he did not recieve any additional budget when he came in as manager, and would have to work with what he had. He shifted out 4 players that were already out of contract in January (Nacho Novo, Craig Reid, Jake Nicholson and Stephen Stirling) together with Mark McLaughlin, Tomas Peciar, Michal Habai and Jonathan Page who had deals until the summer, and then Kabba-Modou Cham who would have been the most expensive I would have thought with him having 18 months to run. He stated in the press that the contracts of Habai and Peciar were cancelled at no cost to the club, so the combined contract payouts wouldn't have been quite as crippling as you would have thought. We have then brought in 8 players, of whom only David Robertson, Garry O'Connor and Rowan Vine were over the age of 22. The likes of Ben Sampayo, Jamie McCormack and Darren Cole hadn't played in a while, so would probably have been cheap enough wages-wise, while Findlay and McKay are both young guys in on loan. I actually wouldn't be surprised to hear that our wage bill is a little lower than it was prior to Shiels coming in. Edited April 2, 2014 by Stevie Aitken's Love Child 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scary Bear Posted April 2, 2014 Share Posted April 2, 2014 Shiels has stated on a few occasions that he did not recieve any additional budget when he came in as manager, and would have to work with what he had. He shifted out 4 players that were already out of contract in January (Nacho Novo, Craig Reid, Jake Nicholson and Stephen Stirling) together with Mark McLaughlin, Tomas Peciar, Michal Habai and Jonathan Page who had deals until the summer, and then Kabba-Modou Cham who would have been the most expensive I would have thought with him having 18 months to run. He stated in the press that the contracts of Habai and Peciar were cancelled at no cost to the club, so the combined contract payouts wouldn't have been quite as crippling as you would have thought. We have then brought in 8 players, of whom only David Robertson, Garry O'Connor and Rowan Vine were over the age of 22. The likes of Ben Sampayo, Jamie McCormack and Darren Cole hadn't played in a while, so would probably have been cheap enough wages-wise, while Findlay and McKay are both young guys in on loan. I actually wouldn't be surprised to hear that our wage bill is a little lower than it was prior to Shiels coming in. Do players just walk away from a contract? I would have thought their contracts would have to be paid up to some extent. Are signing on fees a thing of the past in the lower leagues? How much was Vine on at Hibs? I would have thought it was fair bit. How much of a wage cut, if any, did he take to come to Morton? How much did fat Gary O get offered to sign? I suppose it'll all come out in the wash, with the club accounts, unless there are some cash in brown envelope shenanigans going on. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpoonTon Posted April 2, 2014 Share Posted April 2, 2014 Do players just walk away from a contract? I would have thought their contracts would have to be paid up to some extent. Are signing on fees a thing of the past in the lower leagues? How much was Vine on at Hibs? I would have thought it was fair bit. How much of a wage cut, if any, did he take to come to Morton? How much did fat Gary O get offered to sign? I suppose it'll all come out in the wash, with the club accounts, unless there are some cash in brown envelope shenanigans going on. I can only imagine that Hibs are still paying a large proportion of Vine's wage, that's how these things often work. I think McLaughlin agreed to leave at no cost because he got a deal at Dumbarton and it also freed him up to take another job. The two Slovaks also found other clubs, as did Page - as said previously, I think Habai and Peciar agreed to leave at no cost, and I don't imagine that Page would be much different. Kabba, on the other hand... I can only hope we struck a good deal there. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tonsilitis Posted April 2, 2014 Share Posted April 2, 2014 Do players just walk away from a contract? I would have thought their contracts would have to be paid up to some extent. Are signing on fees a thing of the past in the lower leagues? How much was Vine on at Hibs? I would have thought it was fair bit. How much of a wage cut, if any, did he take to come to Morton? How much did fat Gary O get offered to sign? I suppose it'll all come out in the wash, with the club accounts, unless there are some cash in brown envelope shenanigans going on. The players who were still contract who left: Mark McLaughlin has his own company and is a successful businessman. Going part time suited him given he is at the tail end of his career and I don't think he would have taken a big wage drop to go to Dumbarton Tomas Peciar, I would have loved to have kept but was getting married and his finance could not settle in Scotland. He went to a Swedish Club which apparently suited her better. Jonathon Page was a fringe player at Cappielow and had an offer from Dunfermline where I think he has appeared pretty regularly. Again, there was probably not much difference in wages and first team football beckoned. Not sure why Habai left and went to Livi where he will almost certainly be on less money. Cham is a young lad with not much English living in a cold and wet West of Scotland and with virtually no chance of getting in the team. The chance of going home appealed, I guess. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cowden til i die Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Didn't Vine sign for Morton as opposed to a loan deal? Regardless of whether these guys found other clubs I would be shocked if they walked away from a contract for nothing. I mean, would you? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevie Aitken's Love Child Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Didn't Vine sign for Morton as opposed to a loan deal? Regardless of whether these guys found other clubs I would be shocked if they walked away from a contract for nothing. I mean, would you? I think in some cases, yes you would, especially if you could find another club to take on your contract until the end of the season, like in the case of Jonathan Page at Dunfermline. Vine signed on a permanent deal yes, until the summer. It was all but agreed that he would come in on loan, but that fell through for some reason, but he managed to agree to his release from Hibs so we were then able to sign him. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cornbeef Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Tonsilitis - I'm just curious to know what business big Marco is in ? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Broken Algorithms Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Vine got the same as Fraser Mullen did for ourselves in leaving Hibs. He was meant to sign on loan, before it fell through and Butcher has said "Well, you're not going to get a game so you'd be as well heading off anyway". 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scosha Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Well, it goes from bad to worse this week for us in the press. Today Rae has blamed the fans for the mess we are in. Get this guy to f*ck. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpoonTon Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Who's getting excited for Rae's next outburtst, to be revealed later today? It seems that the stayaway fans are getting it today, as well as a particular player. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevie Aitken's Love Child Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Garry O'Connor is getting more stick in today's paper. “Have I been disappointed with Garry O’Connor? Yes, hopeless. My view is he has been totally unsatisfactory. He has not been able to get himself back mobile enough to play in the Championship. “Garry is only 30 and he’s just left himself go. In the time he’s been here he should have been able to get himself back to a level of fitness that, in my view, he doesn’t have. “He’s been disappointing, he really has. I think he has lost interest in football and if I had been the manager I would have dropped him before he actually was. I would have told him if he doesn’t get fit, he doesn’t play. The worst thing you can do to a footballer is to keep him from playing. Oh, and his comments regarding the budget cuts this season “Listen, our budget is still the fourth biggest in the league. I heard I had reduced it by 50 per cent – that’s a joke! It really is a joke. It was reduced by about 10 per cent.“The supporters have got themselves to blame. The average gates last year were appalling. They fell last year by about 350 – and these are the figures given by the SPFL I might add. “The fans have always said: ‘Give us a good team and we’ll support it.’ Where were they? Our average gate when we were in the Second Division was 2,860. “Our average gate at the minute is 1,751. Look at the loss: for each game that’s 1,000 people. Call it an average of £10 per person, that’s £10,000 a game. With 20 home games, there’s your £200,000. “It was unsustainable to keep the budget as it was, and that’s the whole point. I’m not rolling my money down a drain. http://www.greenocktelegraph.co.uk/sport/morton/articles/2014/04/03/493834-morton-chairman-blasts-hopeless-oconnor/ 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sergie's no1 fan Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 And to think there are some Saints fans pissed off that we never hear from Stewart Gilmour. Can't help but think Rae loves being the centre of attention. Should make for some good entertainment given Shiels is exactly the same. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AberdeenBud Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Offt, Wonka getting the Morton fans telt. Sure this'll end well. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jagfox Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Morton chairman blasts ‘hopeless’ O'Connor Jonathan Mitchell Social networks... Facebook Twitter Published: 3 Apr 2014 11:30MORTON chairman Douglas Rae has launched a scathing attack on one of the club’s big name players. Share this imageMORTON chairman Douglas Rae has launched a scathing attack on one of the club’s big name players.As he vigorously defended his decision to slash this season’s wage budget in the face of growing criticism from fans, the boardroom boss savaged striker Garry O’Connor — branding him ‘hopeless’, unfit, immobile and ‘totally unsatisfactory’.Rae says that the club still has the fourth-highest budget in the Championship, but he believes players like O’Connor have not been anything like value for money.Sources had suggested that the Cappielow chief had cut Allan Moore’s allocated player funds by approximately 40 per cent of the 2012-13 expenditure.However, Mr Rae has refuted those rumours, stating that it was only a 10 per cent reduction and that it meant Ton should still have been highly competitive this term.The Golden Casket owner also stood by his original judgement and insisted a rollback was more than necessary due to annual losses and last season’s low turnouts despite a title tilt.He told the Tele: “Do I not have the right to reduce the budget? I certainly have. I own the club and I run the club.“Last season we lost over £200,000. Am I just to repeat that? Who’s going to pick up the bill? Me. And I’m not going to run the club on an ongoing way with large losses. I’m not; I’m not prepared to.“Listen, our budget is still the fourth biggest in the league. I heard I had reduced it by 50 per cent – that’s a joke! It really is a joke. It was reduced by about 10 per cent.“The wages are only about 10 per cent different from last year, and of course I had to consider the £200,000 loss when setting the budget.“The supporters have got themselves to blame. The average gates last year were appalling. They fell last year by about 350 – and these are the figures given by the SPFL I might add.“The fans have always said: ‘Give us a good team and we’ll support it.’ Where were they? Our average gate when we were in the Second Division was 2,860.“Our average gate at the minute is 1,751. Look at the loss: for each game that’s 1,000 people. Call it an average of £10 per person, that’s £10,000 a game. With 20 home games, there’s your £200,000.“It was unsustainable to keep the budget as it was, and that’s the whole point. I’m not rolling my money down a drain.“There are fans who can tell you how to run it. They know better than anyone what you should do: ‘You need to get the chequebook out again; you need to increase the budget.’ It’s a joke.“They don’t realise the extent of the running costs and things of that nature. I don’t object to criticism if it’s fair criticism. That’s healthy. But it should be reasonable and based on fact.“One guy wrote into the Telegraph and this fellow said that there is only one man who is responsible and he has been very silent. And that was me.“Now if you examine the thing closely you see what a stupid comment that is. Who picks the players to sign? I don’t select them. I don’t pick the team. I don’t play in the team. I don’t do any of that.“I don’t have any say in who plays for the team and nor do I want it. With his responsibility you have to give your manager authority.“If the team does badly it’s the manager who has done badly. He stands and falls by his level of success.”As well as coming in for criticism for the budget from some sections of the Ton support, Mr Rae has been maligned for his decision to stick by manager Moore in the face of poor results.The former Stirling Albion boss was eventually fired straight after a 5-1 home loss against Livingston on 23 November. However, there were fans who felt he should have gone earlier, in particular after suffering the same scoreline at Cowdenbeath over a month before.Rae explained: “Well the whole thing is you’ve got to have trust in the people you engage. Allan Moore was a very good manager for us.“He worked hard, the players liked him, everything was right about him except that he made an error of judgement in the team that he assembled for this season. Now the fact is he made an error of judgement by bringing in four players from overseas and it regrettably took them a bit of time to settle.“He was maybe too loyal to some of his players too, but that’s not a bad thing. And I had a loyalty towards him. You have to appreciate that managers are like everyone else: they make mistakes from time to time, and I certainly would not say one word of criticism against Allan Moore.“I think he was a good manager for us. He made a few mistakes but who doesn’t make mistakes? Step forward those who haven’t made a mistake.“I’ll tell you this, if the 10 best teams in Europe were in a league together, one of them would still finish at the bottom. It doesn’t make the manager a dumpling.“I’m not saying that I’m not disappointed not to be at the bottom, but we don’t have a divine right to win. Manchester United have been relegated. Now, if they can be relegated with all their resources, Morton can be relegated. It’s our turn as it happens and we just have to take it on the nose.”As well as being critical of the squad assembled by Moore, the Golden Casket owner has been left unsatisfied by Kenny Shiels’ dealings in the transfer market.Former Scotland striker O’Connor’s contribution, or lack thereof, has been a real source of consternation, with Rae branding him ‘hopeless’.He said: “Allan brought in 10 new players and Kenny Shiels brought in nine or 10 new players, and when you do that you’ve got a job to make them gel. During the window in January you’ve only got the players no one else wants or the ones who are creeping back into the game from injury.“There’s only one window that is worthy of being called a window for signings and that is in the month of July. It’s the only one that counts.“No club is going to give away good players. Unless you are paying money for players, you are only going to get the dregs, as a journalist put it in a magazine I was reading.“Have I been disappointed with Garry O’Connor? Yes, hopeless. My view is he has been totally unsatisfactory. He has not been able to get himself back mobile enough to play in the Championship.“Garry is only 30 and he’s just left himself go. In the time he’s been here he should have been able to get himself back to a level of fitness that, in my view, he doesn’t have.“He’s been disappointing, he really has. I think he has lost interest in football and if I had been the manager I would have dropped him before he actually was. I would have told him if he doesn’t get fit, he doesn’t play. The worst thing you can do to a footballer is to keep him from playing.“It’s a financial commitment to bring players like Garry to Morton - it is - and that’s the sad thing.“Players get paid irrespective of how they play. That’s something I’m addressing. In future what I’d be doing is getting a fitness company to take a player and judge him at the beginning.“Then if I wasn’t satisfied after say four or five weeks I would send him back to this place to see if his fitness levels had measurably improved. If they hadn’t, then he could be freed.”After having his fingers burned by big-name signings such as O’Connor and Nacho Novo, Rae insists he will not throw money at trying to get out of League One at the first time of asking next term. He concluded: “We’ll be trying to get back the Championship by the end of next season. I cannot promise that we will but we will certainly be doing everything in our power to get back.“We have to take decisions which are aimed at getting out of the division. We’ll be trying to get back to the Championship by the end of next season. The one thing I will not be doing is throwing a lot of extra money at it.“I’ll be setting a realistic budget based on how many I think we’ll get through the gates and that’s the truth.” 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aftershocker Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Morton fans may not like that, but its actually hard to argue against much of what he says 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scary Bear Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 I love Dougie Wonka. His interviews are terrific. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scary Bear Posted April 3, 2014 Share Posted April 3, 2014 Fat Gary O is a complete mess. He deserves to get pulled up for wasting his talent. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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