The Ultimate Super Ayr Thread

[rb123!]

12 minutes ago, Finlay21 said:

Decision due tomorrow I believe , after deducting necessary staff, press etc I think the maximum number of season ticket holders would be around  400 , very tricky position for club to decide who gets in , ballot , online and first come first served , only allowed if you have had 3 jabs  ? really not sure how they would work it 

Is it financially worth it?

[Skyline Drifter]

12 minutes ago, Finlay21 said:

Decision due tomorrow I believe , after deducting necessary staff, press etc I think the maximum number of season ticket holders would be around  400 , very tricky position for club to decide who gets in , ballot , online and first come first served , only allowed if you have had 3 jabs  ? really not sure how they would work it 

I think this is a difficult one and it's undeniably going to be easier and cheaper for clubs to go closed door. A balloted , limited crowd requires extensive work to sort out during a holiday period and will inevitably leave an argument about how it's done. Since they'll all be season ticket holders, at least at Championship level, there's no money in it and it will costly in stewarding and compliance. It would be much easier if the Govt had just said closed doors and be done with it. Now there's a moral obligation to let some people attend since they can but it's going to be a nightmare to sort out. Especially for clubs at home on Sunday. They've got two and a bit working days to sort that out. Midweek next week isn't much better. Thankfully we're away for both but I'd think home teams for Boxing Day may just say it's not practical to sort in time.

[Skyline Drifter]

3 minutes ago, rb123! said:

Is it financially worth it?

Absolutely not, clearly. There won't be a penny in income and there will be loads of costs. But season tickets holders will rightly point out they are contractually entitled to get in if it's possible to do so. It's a really difficult one.

[Guest]

Bartley would be well worth the risk I reckon. He's articulate, intelligent, seems very popular, has a good outgoing personality and is also pretty well connected within the game at the moment. He also has a media presence is attached to the SFA and PFA as equality adviser and generally has a pretty high profile in the game.

He'd also have the very experienced and astute Mathie watching over him and I'd expect maybe an older coach would be brought in to assist ?

As my Dunfermline supporting pal recently pointed out, I DID have high hopes for Duffy and we all know how that turned out, so maybe it's time we tried something new and fresh as opposed to the never ending merry go round of mediocrity and failure ??

I'd also be willing to take a chance on the likes of McManus or O'Dea as obviously they'll be very well connected via Celtic, however the likes of Murray does nothing for me when looking at his previous and current Managerial record and would be a bit of a cheap option also.

I'm happy to leave it up to Mr Mathie though and I'm sure he'll do us proud.

[BukyOHare]

24 minutes ago, Finlay21 said:

I don’t get the point a number of fans are saying we need someone who has been a manager , our best performances in recent years was down to how players were coached during training sessions , they were taking by 2 good coaches in Scally  and Stewart , McCall very rarely took anything to do at training , he got the players to fit his way of playing and left it up to the others to do the coaching , Mathie will likely be taking over some of the roles McCall made off the pitch and give the new coaching team the player’s they want to suit the style of football and let then do similar to  Scally  and Stewart 

There's no right and wrong method of success when buying players or appointing coaches and managers. 

We've all worked in productive, successful times in our own employment and perhaps less so as well.

At the end of the day it's a collection of individuals working as part of a team towards an achievable goal. It should be no different just because it's a sports team. 

Everyone is challenged and motivated to do their part for the collective. 

Getting the right person in as head coach to bring it together and get ideas across is obviously crucial. Looking at Bartley's career he's came through as a player from non league so you would think has had to work hard for everything he's achieved to eventually become a full time professional. He hopefully still has the likes of Eddie Howe in his contact book who he has played under to bounce ideas off of and to hopefully get some excellent loan players in if needed. Contacts can be crucial at this level and having Mathie there brings a huge element of understanding from their time at Easter Road. You'd like to think a senior pro like Bartley would be regularly chatting to the Sporting Director as Mathie was. 

His previous playing experience in the Championship with Hibs can only strengthen his knowledge of what it takes to do well at this level as well and how to survive in the Premier League also. 

I'd also be interested to see who he brings with him, that can often be equally as important as to who the actual head coach is. 

You see the credit Michael Beale for example gets for Gerrard's managerial "success". 

I'm genuinely looking forward to things if the early money proves correct. 

 

[rb123!]

 

[D'Jaffo]

32 minutes ago, WATTOO said:

Bartley would be well worth the risk I reckon. He's articulate, intelligent, seems very popular, has a good outgoing personality and is also pretty well connected within the game at the moment. He also has a media presence is attached to the SFA and PFA as equality adviser and generally has a pretty high profile in the game.

He'd also have the very experienced and astute Mathie watching over him and I'd expect maybe an older coach would be brought in to assist ?

As my Dunfermline supporting pal recently pointed out, I DID have high hopes for Duffy and we all know how that turned out, so maybe it's time we tried something new and fresh as opposed to the never ending merry go round of mediocrity and failure ??

I'd also be willing to take a chance on the likes of McManus or O'Dea as obviously they'll be very well connected via Celtic, however the likes of Murray does nothing for me when looking at his previous and current Managerial record and would be a bit of a cheap option also.

I'm happy to leave it up to Mr Mathie though and I'm sure he'll do us proud.

I'm not sure how Ian Murray would be considered a cheap option compared to Bartley, McManus or O'Dea? 

[Ayr23]

I'm watching the Open Goal podcast with Marvin Bartley. He comes across so well, and I think he'd be great for us. Young, enthusiastic, and has the necessary experience to qualify him for the job.

[davidkennedyshand]

1 minute ago, Ayr23 said:

I'm watching the Open Goal podcast with Marvin Bartley. He comes across so well, and I think he'd be great for us. Young, enthusiastic, and has the necessary experience to qualify him for the job.

Yeah I watched that a few months back. It's an impressive watch. 

They also did a really good interview with John Hughes.

Brian Rice was also on one which is nowhere near impressive.

[Thereisalight..]

Bartley wouldnt have been my first choice but I'd not be against his appointment due to lack of experience. As I said before we could have Jose, Jurgen and Pep as the management team and theyd struggle to get a tune out of our current squad. 

Hopefully we can have some fans for the game on Sunday.  I hated games on streams, even the 500 fans at the Edinburgh City game was better than none and created some atmosphere. Last season they still needed stewards at games so I dont think security costs would rise much with a 500. Probably only need one or two bodies more if only half of the ground was open

[UpInTheAyr]

It's all just a crapshoot at the end of the day with whatever manager/head coach, but with Mathie on board now hopefully there's a bit more stability and accountability with on field matters. Kerr could have done with him in place when he took the job as someone mentioned earlier. Hopkin deffo could, but more to keep him in check.

[Guest]

38 minutes ago, D'Jaffo said:

I'm not sure how Ian Murray would be considered a cheap option compared to Bartley, McManus or O'Dea? 

I'm thinking a Celtic coach would be higher profile than a mid table League 1 Manager but can't say I know for sure.

[itzdrk]

1 hour ago, Skyline Drifter said:

I think this is a difficult one and it's undeniably going to be easier and cheaper for clubs to go closed door. A balloted , limited crowd requires extensive work to sort out during a holiday period and will inevitably leave an argument about how it's done. Since they'll all be season ticket holders, at least at Championship level, there's no money in it and it will costly in stewarding and compliance. It would be much easier if the Govt had just said closed doors and be done with it. Now there's a moral obligation to let some people attend since they can but it's going to be a nightmare to sort out. Especially for clubs at home on Sunday. They've got two and a bit working days to sort that out. Midweek next week isn't much better. Thankfully we're away for both but I'd think home teams for Boxing Day may just say it's not practical to sort in time.

I think we'd all respect if the club's said closed door for the initial 3 weeks and we will ensure we use whatever capacity we have for any ongoing restrictions after that time. 

Ideally they just wouldn't play though. 

[Skyline Drifter]

2 minutes ago, itzdrk said:

I think we'd all respect if the club's said closed door for the initial 3 weeks and we will ensure we use whatever capacity we have for any ongoing restrictions after that time. 

Ideally they just wouldn't play though. 

The problem with just "not playing" though is I think we all know this is unlikely in reality to be three weeks and "on ye go, as you were". Like last year, it'll drag on a couple of months and there will likely be some significant restrictions through to February or March now. We can probably just about make up 4 fixtures in remaining midweeks without ending up with 2 games a week as long as nobody suffers major weather backlogs of postponements or goes deep into the Scottish Cup (although that would mean a midweek trip to Inverness somewhere down the line for us unfortunately). If it drifts on a month or two longer you need to either get back to playing closed door anyway or accept its going to be a shortened season in some manner.

[Kitty_Boy]

1 hour ago, Finlay21 said:

I don’t get the point a number of fans are saying we need someone who has been a manager , our best performances in recent years was down to how players were coached during training sessions , they were taking by 2 good coaches in Scally  and Stewart , McCall very rarely took anything to do at training , he got the players to fit his way of playing and left it up to the others to do the coaching , Mathie will likely be taking over some of the roles McCall made off the pitch and give the new coaching team the player’s they want to suit the style of football and let then do similar to  Scally  and Stewart 

Where is the man management - arguably McCall's biggest strength - coming from? 

That's the biggest risk/unknown for me. 

[itzdrk]

1 minute ago, Skyline Drifter said:

The problem with just "not playing" though is I think we all know this is unlikely in reality to be three weeks and "on ye go, as you were". Like last year, it'll drag on a couple of months and there will likely be some significant restrictions through to February or March now. We can probably just about make up 4 fixtures in remaining midweeks without ending up with 2 games a week as long as nobody suffers major weather backlogs of postponements or goes deep into the Scottish Cup (although that would mean a midweek trip to Inverness somewhere down the line for us unfortunately). If it drifts on a month or two longer you need to either get back to playing closed door anyway or accept its going to be a shortened season in some manner.

Oh it'll definitely drag on, I guess the hope is that after 3 weeks when announcing an extension to restrictions that they are more sensible.  

I'm also of the view that we probably need to take into account going forward that this same week two years in a row now there's been a big covid wobble backwards, things have to change to move on from this and it may well be that for football at the end of the year we need to have a break from playing across all of the leagues.  I guess we will get a taster next year with the world cup (obviously our whole team will be there representing various nations). 

[D'Jaffo]

15 minutes ago, WATTOO said:

I'm thinking a Celtic coach would be higher profile than a mid table League 1 Manager but can't say I know for sure.

Stephen McManus might be a more well known name in Scottish football than Ian Murray but at the end of the day the club will likely have an idea of what kind of wage they can offer the manager and that figure will probably be the same for whoever gets the role. In terms of management though, Ian Murray has a much better profile than Stephen McManus does and if the wage was experience dependent he would command the higher salary. 

[D'Jaffo]

4 minutes ago, Kitty_Boy said:

Where is the man management - arguably McCall's biggest strength - coming from? 

That's the biggest risk/unknown for me. 

Aye and man management is less of a skill that can be acquired and more of what kind of personality the manager has. Itzdrk touched on it but we could really do with a guy who can at least create a positive atmosphere in and around the club and make the players want to come and train hard and play well on a Saturday. For guys like Murdoch, Moffat and Muirhead the place will have been a depressing place to be for the last year or so as I can't imagine them particularly enjoying working under Hopkin and Duffy. 

I have never met Marvin Bartley but he comes across in the media as being reasonably sound and seems to be well liked amongst his peers and ex teammates. Whether he can use that to build strong relationships with his players remains to be seen. 

[Finlay21]

13 minutes ago, Kitty_Boy said:

Where is the man management - arguably McCall's biggest strength - coming from? 

That's the biggest risk/unknown for me. 

The new coach , I would think man management skills would be a part of the criteria required to be the new coach , 

[No_Problemo]

For Bartley, and any manager really - it is all about complimenting your strengths with those on the coaching staff. With the director of football model, this is just about as important as the guy given the main role IMO. 
 

ETA, Mathie will obviously have an idea about Bartley, in terms of him being a senior member of the squad at Hibs. 

Edited December 21, 2021 by No_Problemo