The St. Mirren FC 2016/17 Thread.

[Coventry Saint]

It's a disgrace. We could have rushed out a shit strip, staged an embarrassing u-turn in the face of public pressure, then opened up the strip selection to a public vote, held in a corner shop, by now.

Makes you wonder what kind of cowboy outfit we're running, TBH.

[djchapsticks]

It's a disgrace. We could have rushed out a shit strip, staged an embarrassing u-turn in the face of public pressure, then opened up the strip selection to a public vote, held in a corner shop, by now.

Makes you wonder what kind of cowboy outfit we're running, TBH.

Black and white army is great this time of year for folk shitting their breeks in indignant rage about everything from the strips to the lack of signings.

As it stands, relatively few clubs have unveiled their kits for this coming season and the transfer window doesn't even open until the middle of next week. JD Sports are shite, granted but they are under contract. I really don't see what else we can do in terms of that.

[Silvio]

I've got both the home and away pinstripe effort from the mid 90's at home. Both medium and in decent nick.

Didn't realise there was such a market for old strips. Better get my eBay account reactivated.

Found the old Ac Milan style 3rd strip as well. From the season where the home shirt was half and half. At least the club tried something different back in the day!

[djchapsticks]

I've got both the home and away pinstripe effort from the mid 90's at home. Both medium and in decent nick.

Didn't realise there was such a market for old strips. Better get my eBay account reactivated.

Found the old Ac Milan style 3rd strip as well. From the season where the home shirt was half and half. At least the club tried something different back in the day!

I bought the AC Milan style kit for £6 off eBay about 5 years ago. But paid the same again in shipping as it came from Washington of all places.

Imagine my delight when it turned up not as some moth eaten, flea ridden rag but was actually still in its original Core plastic packaging, labels attached and clearly brand spanking new some 17 years after release.

Was a great buy and probably the last of its kind.

I also bought the black away shirt from 1992 in as new condition for £50 a couple of years ago.

[Stu]

Interview with Ian Murray - some interesting points mixed in with the usual stuff from a manager who was booted/resigned.

 

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/sport/14527776.Ian_Murray_on_his_troubled_time_as_St_Mirren_manager___quot_Relegation_sucked_the_life_out_of_the_club_quot_/

[ulysses]

Interview with Ian Murray - some interesting points mixed in with the usual stuff from a manager who was booted/resigned.

 

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/sport/14527776.Ian_Murray_on_his_troubled_time_as_St_Mirren_manager___quot_Relegation_sucked_the_life_out_of_the_club_quot_/

 

Seems to be admitting his mistakes, fair play to him. Looks like it was too big a job too soon in his career. He's still really young for a manger, so he has plenty of time to come good. Definitely needs to lose his stubbornness though. 

[sergie's no1 fan]

Seems to be admitting his mistakes, fair play to him. Looks like it was too big a job too soon in his career. He's still really young for a manger, so he has plenty of time to come good. Definitely needs to lose his stubbornness though. 

 

He probably didn't realise the state the club was in until a few weeks into the job.

 

Alex is obviously better at keeping on the field issues and off the field issues seperate but the same pressure will be on him at the start of next season, rightly or wrongly. 

[NorthBank]

Interview with Ian Murray - some interesting points mixed in with the usual stuff from a manager who was booted/resigned.

 

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/sport/14527776.Ian_Murray_on_his_troubled_time_as_St_Mirren_manager___quot_Relegation_sucked_the_life_out_of_the_club_quot_/

 

'We had a lot of young guys in the squad and many weren’t ready to play at that level through no fault of their own.'

 

He inherited only six players from the previous season - Goody, baird, mallan, kelly, naismith and Ridgers. Only 4 of them were young and besides Baird the other 3 had played  in the Premiership. Murray signed loads of young players that were useless and a couple of over-the-hill players. No decent journeymen. His squad was garbage. I agree that while the Club is up for sale we are a mess and the sooner it is sorted one way or another then the better. But that is no excuse for his signings.

[ulysses]

He probably didn't realise the state the club was in until a few weeks into the job.

 

Alex is obviously better at keeping on the field issues and off the field issues seperate but the same pressure will be on him at the start of next season, rightly or wrongly. 

 

Aye, definitely more of a disciplinarian, which is probably what we need. 

 

When he says that some players weren't buying into his ideas, I wonder who that could mean - initially, you'd think the senior players. There had been rumours of that kind of behaviour before from some of them. 

 

Bit about the budget is a tad concerning, if true. 

[ulysses]

'We had a lot of young guys in the squad and many weren’t ready to play at that level through no fault of their own.'

 

He inherited only six players from the previous season - Goody, baird, mallan, kelly, naismith and Ridgers. Only 4 of them were young and besides Baird the other 3 had played at least a year in the Premiership. Murray signed loads of young players that were useless and a couple of over-the-hill players. No decent journeymen. His squad was garbage. I agree that while the Club is up for sale we are a mess and the sooner it is sorted one way or another then the better. But that is no excuse for his signings.

 

To be fair to him, when he says

 

"“Looking back I signed a few players that I wouldn’t sign again. And when you see the amount of guys Alex is letting go now it shows we were probably of the same opinion.â€

 

 

I think that's basically him saying admitting he cocked up in that department. 

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

Murray's ego got the better of him. As did his bizarre negative tactics, despite attacking football being what brought him success with us.

By the end up he thought he was far too big for Dumbarton and jumped at the first full-time job that came his way. I'm led to believe that when Hibs appointed Stubbs he thought he was a shoe in for it.

It's no surprise he failed at St Mirren, as we've all mentioned numerous times, his last 6 months were horrific. The dummy spit after the 3-0 loss away to Alloa in which he publicly questioned his players committment had alarm bells ringing. Despite his success with us, I knew at that point he had to go.

Continuing to stick with yes men like Spalding was a horror decision on his part. As soon as I seen that appointment I knew it was going to all go tits up for him, and pretty rapidly at that.

[buddie06smfc]

Making Alan Gow his first signing was a sackable offence. Then to follow that up with Carswell.

 

Interesting that he had a go at those leaking information out of the club at inconvenient times. This seems like a consistent problem at Saints, as fans we will always find out when the time is right and I hope that Alex Rae manages to keep a tighter grasp on information being leaked out. I suspect this problem comes from higher up the ladder.

 

Murray signed some decent players who didn't perform. Shankland & Webster looked much better players under Rae, there were obvious gaps/weaknesses in the team that Rae did well to fill. Too much emphasis was put on Mallan in the first part of the season, it was reminiscent of McGinn the previous season. Tactically having a goosed Thompson as the lone striker was a horrendous idea. I think Clarkson, Irvine and Quinn were pretty crucial for our (kind of) revival in the second half of the season.

[ulysses]

Carswell was one of those signings that looked alright at the time. Played loads of games for Motherwell, got young player of the year awards, etc. I think a lot of the fans saw him as the heir to Goody's throne, but it never worked out that way. He didn't look interested most of the time, but did have a few good performances. 

[glenburn bud]

Murray comes across in that interview as someone desperate for another shot in the managers chair. Unfortunately he made such a mess of the job that his reputation remains in tatters. The manner in which he hung Spalding out to dry was despicable, he should have walked with Spalding.

[djchapsticks]

See Aaron Mooy is on the verge of a move to Belgian champions, Club Bruges (Despite Sevco being adamant that he'll end up there).

This after Melbourne knocked back a $2m for him from a Saudi team last week.

Yet there are still armchair experts over on BAWA who claim that he's 'mince' and 'wasnt and still isn't good enough for us'

Fucking delusional or what?!

[ulysses]

B&W stresses me out. 

 

Not nearly as bad as the St Mirren Supporters facebook page. Holy shit, the wallopers that post on there. 

[Jan Vojáček]

B&W stresses me out. 

 

Not nearly as bad as the St Mirren Supporters facebook page. Holy shit, the wallopers that post on there. 

Every club's Facebook page is the same. You should see the nick of ours at times.

 

Just last week - after we signed Andy Stirling - this was posted completely seriously. 

 

STOP SIGNING PLAYERS FROM THE LEAGUE BELOW. RELEGATION IMMINENT.

 

All football Facebook pages should be closed down

[djchapsticks]

B&W stresses me out.

Not nearly as bad as the St Mirren Supporters facebook page. Holy shit, the wallopers that post on there.

Yeah. It's full of morons, the Facebook page. Think this is pretty much the norm though when it comes to that sort of page. Insular types, mixed with lack of moderation and no quality control in the content posted definitely makes it a pain on the senses.

Most dafties who come onto a forum are usually hounded out and get fed up sooner or later. But every daftie, every single fucking moron has a Facebook page to shower others with their ill-informed, poorly spelt opinions.

Football magnifies the shite opinions tenfold as well.

[Stu]

I think Murray is kind of right about the young players, even if he didn't use particularly many of them. When we were getting relegated the chairman said we should be fine on the basis Hearts had won the league with youngsters and we also had youngsters. It was a rather odd theory that concerned me at the time. Murray could argue that Baird wasn't really ready but he'd looked decent enough at the end of the season before. Guys like Cuddihy, Morgan and McLear weren't ready but he barely used them.

 

As NorthBank points out, nearly all of the squad was signed by him or offered a new contract by him, so it's his fault if the players weren't good enough, although the stuff about the budget will be his mitigation for that one. Would be surprised if Raith, Queens and Morton had bigger budgets than us to be honest - although on the flip side it wouldn't surprise me if our board set the budget based on finishing third bottom!

 

I always thought Mooy was a decent player who didn't get a decent run in the side and most of the time not in the right position.

[paisleysaints]

See Aaron Mooy is on the verge of a move to Belgian champions, Club Bruges (Despite Sevco being adamant that he'll end up there).

This after Melbourne knocked back a $2m for him from a Saudi team last week.

Yet there are still armchair experts over on BAWA who claim that he's 'mince' and 'wasnt and still isn't good enough for us'

Fucking delusional or what?!

Yeah a wastes talent with us. I can only remember him playing that rangers game really. Is his Mrs not from here so he could end up a greyskull. If this is the case.