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The St. Mirren FC 2023/24 thread


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7 hours ago, AlbionSaint said:

My fear is that there's so much pressure on us to sign someone, that we'll sign anyone and tie up another wage. I literally saw a Tweet, which was clearly not serious, but which stated (paraphrasing, btw) "Pleeease! Just sign someone. Anyone!" My fear is that's exactly what we're doing.

The reality is that 95% of NZ players who make it to their national teams take this route of starting amateur and moving between 18-22 years old. 

Chris Wood, Chris Killen, Winston Reid, Sarpreet Singh of Bayern Munich.  They all went this route as well.

Elvis has totally jumped the gun here by thinking amateur = shite. Wouldn't be like him to be a screaming halfwit about something though. 

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10 hours ago, GAD said:

I could be wrong, but do New Zealand not only have one professional football team? I suppose it might not be that easy over there to break through and there may be some decent players left behind in the amateurs and semi pros. Anyway, it's just a trial, it's really hard to see the harm, though I suppose it should never really be a surprise these days just how utterly fucking pathetic our fans can be.

Wellington Phoenix play in the A-League and are fully professional. They do have a domestic league called the NZ Championship as well. Auckland City are fully professional and, when I saw them last, Cameron Howieson came off the bench for them to give a rough idea of the level. Of the other teams in the top flight most are a mixture of pro/semi pro. They have a fairly strange league system where the top flight, separate from the rest of the pyramid, is a summer league and the rest of the leagues plays in winter. The teams below the Championship will mostly be amateur but the better teams at this level will also have a few players on semi-professional deals and the odd full time player scattered about if the sponsorship is there and these will, usually, be guys who play in the Championship in summer and play for a local club over winter. I know a boy over there who plays what is, basically, Sunday league football but Alex Rufer (current NZ international and Wellington Phoenix captain) played with him for a few months over winter for a couple of seasons.

Basically someone could be getting signed from an "amateur team" in NZ because they happen to hold his registration at the minute even if he's playing for a professional club 75% of the time.

(ETA - They changes the set up this year actually. So I dunno if players can move between summer/winter leagues any more. FWIW the guy you lot are looking at was playing for Waitekere in the Championship last season and they've went bust which is why he's at an amateur club the now and not playing semi-pro in the top flight)

1 hour ago, djchapsticks said:

Chris Wood, Chris Killen, Winston Reid, Sarpreet Singh of Bayern Munich.  They all went this route as well.

Not to be a pedant but Chris Wood and Chris Killen were playing semi-pro in NZ before going to England as teenagers, Winston Reid was raised in Denmark and Sarpeet Singh came through the Wellington Phoenix set up. Yer right most will play amateur football before leaving NZ but it's usually alongside a professional youth set up.

Edited by AsimButtHitsASix
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14 minutes ago, AsimButtHitsASix said:

 

Not to be a pedant but Chris Wood and Chris Killen were playing semi-pro in NZ before going to England as teenagers, Winston Reid was raised in Denmark and Sarpeet Singh came through the Wellington Phoenix set up. Yer right most will play amateur football before leaving NZ but it's usually alongside a professional youth set up.

I mean fair enough, I'm seeing these guys coming from literally the same league as the lad we're looking at. 

Singh moved to Phoenix at 16 from an amateur club.

And yeah, Reid left his NZ team at 10 years old for Denmark, fair enough on that one! :lol: 

 

The point though was that the route for NZ players generally is a well trodden path. In an absence of fully professional clubs, players will be amateur for part of their careers in the hopes of being picked up.

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So here's the problem and it's sort of the fault of the club although I feel this is more due to circumstances than intent.

Of the things we know there are three of them.

- We know players need to be brought in.
- We know players are likely to leave.
- We know we'll likely take players of indeterminate value on loan.

Fans will always be interested, so naturally discuss these points ad infinitum. The problem arises when nothing is happening on the first two, and the only thing left is to talk about the last. This would be fine if the player involved in the latter had a bit of mystery, possibly and the chance of "unearthing a gem", in this case though, and looking at the videos, the lad looks at best just a decent raw pub league player, admittedly not helped by the surface the highlights show. I have no problem regarding the club taking this guy on loan, and I can understand why they didn't make any public comment in case he is snapped up by another club. However the problem comes when there is no news coming from the club, fans will naturally focus on what is known and, in this case, the idea of some loan player who looks pretty pants in the highlights video is the only thing on the radar is going to get some fans riled up.

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4 minutes ago, Ric said:

So here's the problem and it's sort of the fault of the club although I feel this is more due to circumstances than intent.

Of the things we know there are three of them.

- We know players need to be brought in.
- We know players are likely to leave.
- We know we'll likely take players of indeterminate value on loan.

Fans will always be interested, so naturally discuss these points ad infinitum. The problem arises when nothing is happening on the first two, and the only thing left is to talk about the last. This would be fine if the player involved in the latter had a bit of mystery, possibly and the chance of "unearthing a gem", in this case though, and looking at the videos, the lad looks at best just a decent raw pub league player, admittedly not helped by the surface the highlights show. I have no problem regarding the club taking this guy on loan, and I can understand why they didn't make any public comment in case he is snapped up by another club. However the problem comes when there is no news coming from the club, fans will naturally focus on what is known and, in this case, the idea of some loan player who looks pretty pants in the highlights video is the only thing on the radar is going to get some fans riled up.

Elvis is permanently riled up to Black & White army levels of knickerwetting. It’s normal for all clubs to take players on trial during the window period, or indeed throughout the season.

 

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6 minutes ago, glenburn bud said:

Elvis is permanently riled up to Black & White army levels of knickerwetting. It’s normal for all clubs to take players on trial during the window period, or indeed throughout the season.

 

Wait, does @elvis actually support St Mirren? I had presumed they had changed their team after promising never to post on here again.

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49 minutes ago, djchapsticks said:

I mean fair enough, I'm seeing these guys coming from literally the same league as the lad we're looking at. 

Singh moved to Phoenix at 16 from an amateur club.

And yeah, Reid left his NZ team at 10 years old for Denmark, fair enough on that one! :lol: 

 

The point though was that the route for NZ players generally is a well trodden path. In an absence of fully professional clubs, players will be amateur for part of their careers in the hopes of being picked up.

Yeah none of the professional clubs, apart from Pheonix, have a youth set up. It's almost like their entire league system is filled with Bonnyton Thistles and Rossvale type clubs that only exist because of the youth team rather than the other way round. So everyone comes through at an amateur club until they're 16 at least.

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12 minutes ago, AsimButtHitsASix said:

Yeah none of the professional clubs, apart from Pheonix, have a youth set up. It's almost like their entire league system is filled with Bonnyton Thistles and Rossvale type clubs that only exist because of the youth team rather than the other way round. So everyone comes through at an amateur club until they're 16 at least.

Is that just kind of the way sport works in New Zealand then, because it seems rugby is quite similar with players having to do their time at school/amateur/semi pro and only really making it when they hit one of the 4 pro super League clubs, or go to Europe? I know Glasgow Warriors have signed players from the NZ semi pro rugby teams that have been very good players. It seems to be quite a sporty nation in general, more about participation than spectating.

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3 hours ago, djchapsticks said:

The reality is that 95% of NZ players who make it to their national teams take this route of starting amateur and moving between 18-22 years old. 

Chris Wood, Chris Killen, Winston Reid, Sarpreet Singh of Bayern Munich.  They all went this route as well.

Elvis has totally jumped the gun here by thinking amateur = shite. Wouldn't be like him to be a screaming halfwit about something though. 

Fair enough!

I have never known Elvis to be a 'screaming halfwit' on BAWA (I can't speak for his conduct on here), and is actually one of the more reasonable posters. I think he exaggerates his pessimism, but I have always assumed that's for comic effect, e.g. his prediction for the Celtic game: 'I hope Celtic will ease of at 6-0.'

 

1 hour ago, glenburn bud said:

Elvis is permanently riled up to Black & White army levels of knickerwetting. It’s normal for all clubs to take players on trial during the window period, or indeed throughout the season.

 

I don't agree. See above.

 

1 hour ago, Ric said:

Wait, does @elvis actually support St Mirren? I had presumed they had changed their team after promising never to post on here again.

Well he's been on BAWA for almost fifteen years and posted more than 5,000 times there, so I'd hope so.

845303636_Screenshot2022-01-1311_21_14.png.a43d13bdf5df297d43313ee7a44685d8.png

 

He's comically pessimistic, but always happy when we win. :)

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10 minutes ago, AlbionSaint said:

Well he's been on BAWA for almost fifteen years and posted more than 5,000 times there, so I'd hope so.

845303636_Screenshot2022-01-1311_21_14.png.a43d13bdf5df297d43313ee7a44685d8.png

I hope you are not judging the level of a persons' support based on the join date and number of posts on B&WA, because if you are I'd love to see where this user fits in...

cCyrHrB.png

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1 hour ago, Ric said:

I hope you are not judging the level of a persons' support based on the join date and number of posts on B&WA, because if you are I'd love to see where this user fits in...

cCyrHrB.png

 

😂

BAWA is a strange place, totally different from other similarly sized clubs, but then I quite like the eccentricity. Besides a few people whose motives are genuinely questionable, and whom seem to relish causing division and magnifying any problems the club has, I think the posters on there are okay.

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My fear is that there's so much pressure on us to sign someone, that we'll sign anyone and tie up another wage. I literally saw a Tweet, which was clearly not serious, but which stated (paraphrasing, btw) "Pleeease! Just sign someone. Anyone!" My fear is that's exactly what we're doing.
The "pressure" is all on here I very much doubt if the club are feeling pressured into signing any old dud when we are barely a third into the transfer window.

The way folk are pishing their breeks you would think the window closed tomorrow.
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3 hours ago, Billy Jean King said:

The "pressure" is all on here I very much doubt if the club are feeling pressured into signing any old dud when we are barely a third into the transfer window.

The way folk are pishing their breeks you would think the window closed tomorrow.

I have it on good authority from the Scottish Government that the window must remain open, even if its freezing outside.

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4 hours ago, Billy Jean King said:

The "pressure" is all on here I very much doubt if the club are feeling pressured into signing any old dud when we are barely a third into the transfer window.

The way folk are pishing their breeks you would think the window closed tomorrow.

I go on Twitter for the first time today, and this is what I see. Notice the first reply:

 

 

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On 13/01/2022 at 07:37, elvis said:

There an Amateur team for fucksake only fucking St Mirren would look at an Amateur player be as well going down the race course for fucksake.

Auckland City who play in the same league are professional and compete in the World Club Championship. At worst his team are semi- professional.

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46 minutes ago, Insaintee said:

A Shull alias obvs

I believe Dickson is a real person, at least there have been reports of his existence in the wild, as it were.

As for shull, would he need an alias, they have  nigh on 60,000 posts and seems like the sort of person who would just say what they felt rather than needing to spin it through an alias.

That said, if Dickson was an alias, fair play to whoever kept up that "long game".

Edited by Ric
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