The Queen's Park 2018-19 Thread

[The Spider]

47 minutes ago, an86 said:

Will be genuinely surprised if we don't end up with a St Mirren youngster on loan. 

Hunch or inside info?

[The man with no name]

On 1/14/2019 at 19:12, The Spider said:

Ok, I've now gone through it and believe the key clauses to be as follows;

6.2 To promote the practice and play of football...................................and for that purpose to establish and maintain amateur teams of football, and other players.

That seems straightforward enough to me, however the Committee might argue that the following clause gives them the power to override that if they feel it's neccessary for the objects of the Club; one of which is obviously its survival.

41. The transaction of the business of the Club and its entire management shall be vested in the Committee, who shall have full power of management and control over the conduct and affairs of the Club............................and they shall, subject as aforesaid, have power to do all acts and things which they may consider proper and advantageous for carrying out the objects of the Club, and in particular (but so as not to restrict the preceding generality) they shall have power to do the following things:-

............................................

To enter into contracts for the Club and rescind, alter, and vary the same, and to do all such acts and things as they may consider expedient or necessary for the purposes and objects of the Club.

So I think there's a fair degree of subjectivity in this, and in the absence of a definitive statement we'll just have to wait and see how it plays out. Interesting times ahead!

I can name 2 professional players that played in the Championship winning squad of 1999/2000. I can name loads more since then. Are you not 19 years too late?

[Bring Your Own Socks]

2 hours ago, DundeeSpider1867 said:

I feel like Magee and McLaren both need an old head with composure...

 

...so maybe see if theres an Andy Millen-esque guy looking to get regular games again out there?

First one is spot on.  And teach them how to get a hold of a waist or jersey  McLaren geared up in the second halfon Saturday and Tony Quinn was in the dugout. Draw your own conclusion.

Second one I'm afraid is asking a bit much. 

[Bring Your Own Socks]

57 minutes ago, The man with no name said:

I can name 2 professional players that played in the Championship winning squad of 1999/2000. I can name loads more since then. Are you not 19 years too late?

You're not Davie Provan, are you?

[The Spider]

1 hour ago, The man with no name said:

I can name 2 professional players that played in the Championship winning squad of 1999/2000. I can name loads more since then. Are you not 19 years too late?

They were re-instated amateurs. The only professionals to ever play for the club were loanees, but the get-out clause there is that they weren't paid by us, thereby avoiding breaching our amateur code. Feel free to contact the Club if further clarification is required as public discussion of this topic is being actively discouraged.

[The man with no name]

42 minutes ago, The Spider said:

They were re-instated amateurs. The only professionals to ever play for the club were loanees, but the get-out clause there is that they weren't paid by us, thereby avoiding breaching our amateur code. Feel free to contact the Club if further clarification is required as public discussion of this topic is being actively discouraged.

I wasn't aware this was being actively discouraged.

I remember being asked by Ross Caven at a Club function a few years ago my views on professionals playing for Queen's Park, I think he was shocked when I replied "I was under the impression they had been for years!"

[an86]

3 hours ago, The Spider said:

Hunch or inside info?

I don't have access to inside information. Everything I say is general havering. 

[Bring Your Own Socks]

1 hour ago, an86 said:

I don't have access to inside information. Everything I say is general havering. 

[The Spider]

3 hours ago, The man with no name said:

I wasn't aware this was being actively discouraged.

According to Hampden Diehard and Bring Your Own Socks it is, and who are we to doubt them?

[The man with no name]

17 hours ago, The Spider said:

The only professionals to ever play for the club were loanees.

So no player has signed professional forms and played for the Club?

[Bring Your Own Socks]

[The Spider]

3 hours ago, The man with no name said:

So no player has signed professional forms and played for the Club?

Didn't say that that. What I said is that the club don't pay any professionals who play for us, thereby fulfilling our amateur ethos that we don't pay players anything other than expenses. For the purpose of this exchange I am of course exluding the £1 contracts previously foisted upon us by the league. To the best of my knowledge, bearing in mind that I do not work for the club nor am on any committees, no player has ever been paid anything other than travelling expenses for which they must (or used to have to unless that's also changed) submit receipts.

To fulfill legal and registration contracts there may some players on professional contracts, but they are only paid expenses. If you or anyone else knows differently then do tell.

[The man with no name]

On 1/14/2019 at 19:12, The Spider said:

Ok, I've now gone through it and believe the key clauses to be as follows;

6.2 To promote the practice and play of football...................................and for that purpose to establish and maintain amateur teams of football, and other players.

That seems straightforward enough to me, however the Committee might argue that the following clause gives them the power to override that if they feel it's neccessary for the objects of the Club; one of which is obviously its survival.

 

"straightforward enough to me"

We have loan players - professionals paid by other Clubs to play for us. We have players on professional contracts who have played for us (whether paid or not, they are registered professionals).  I look at "maintain amateur teams of football" and think this isn't straightforward at all.

I go back to an earlier point I made that I feel you are 19 years too late. 

I found a letter the other day that I wrote to the Secretary of the Club in March 2000 questioning the loan players we had brought in. I called it the slippery slope to professionalism. Did you write one then?

[The Spider]

Your points are all entirely valid, and at the time we re-signed Ross McFarlane for a couple of games all those years ago (I wasn't around at the time we re-instated R S McColl from Newcastle and I suspect neither were you ) I did communicate my views that I thought it was a step too far. We then continued to strip away the conventional veneer of amateurism (loan players being the most blatant) until we reached where we are now. We cannot turn the clock back, and if you think that's what I'm getting at then you've either misunderstood or I've not explained myself properly.

This particular section of debate began with whether the Committee have the power to change us from an amateur club to a professional one. You may believe that we are professional already in everything but name, and whilst I'd be tempted to agree with you that's a separate issue. I maintain we are currently an amateur club solely by the fact that we don't pay our players anything other than expenses. Do you accept that definition so that we can put this particular aspect to bed and wait to see what the coming months bring?

[williebraveheart]

2 minutes ago, The Spider said:

Your points are all entirely valid, and at the time we re-signed Ross McFarlane for a couple of games all those years ago (I wasn't around at the time we re-instated R S McColl from Newcastle and I suspect neither were you ) I did communicate my views that I thought it was a step too far. We then continued to strip away the conventional veneer of amateurism (loan players being the most blatant) until we reached where we are now. We cannot turn the clock back, and if you think that's what I'm getting at then you've either misunderstood or I've not explained myself properly.

This particular section of debate began with whether the Committee have the power to change us from an amateur club to a professional one. You may believe that we are professional already in everything but name, and whilst I'd be tempted to agree with you that's a separate issue. I maintain we are currently an amateur club solely by the fact that we don't pay our players anything other than expenses. Do you accept that definition so that we can put this particular aspect to bed and wait to see what the coming months bring?

Signing Ross McFarlane at any time was a step too far. Slowest thing I ever saw on two feet! Gave the impression he was playing in diving boots.

[The man with no name]

1 hour ago, The Spider said:

Your points are all entirely valid, and at the time we re-signed Ross McFarlane for a couple of games all those years ago (I wasn't around at the time we re-instated R S McColl from Newcastle and I suspect neither were you ) I did communicate my views that I thought it was a step too far. We then continued to strip away the conventional veneer of amateurism (loan players being the most blatant) until we reached where we are now. We cannot turn the clock back, and if you think that's what I'm getting at then you've either misunderstood or I've not explained myself properly.

This particular section of debate began with whether the Committee have the power to change us from an amateur club to a professional one. You may believe that we are professional already in everything but name, and whilst I'd be tempted to agree with you that's a separate issue. I maintain we are currently an amateur club solely by the fact that we don't pay our players anything other than expenses. Do you accept that definition so that we can put this particular aspect to bed and wait to see what the coming months bring?

I'm sorry but I can't agree to that. If the terminology used is maintaining amateur teams of football then I have to say we fail that test and have done so for years. Anything else is trying to dress over the fact that we fail our own definition. We have or have had professional players playing for us and therefore we are not maintaining an amateur team of football.

I think I have convinced myself it is straighforward after all!

[an86]

This is why I can't get particularly bothered about amateur status. We have had multiple pros in on loan. We don't pay our own players, but it's a fact that we have had professional footballers play for us.

We are largely amateur, but we've been quite flexible about that. It's why I think any move into semi-pro may be a natural evolution, given the direction of travel, rather than the radical change it's been painted as from a football perspective. The main issue for me would be financial and how we could make the club function and compete at league level. 

That's not to say I don't respect that it's not a hugely important issue to others. QP are my local team and amateur status wasn't a key issue in terms of my support. It just happened to be the circumstance. 

Edited January 22, 2019 by an86

[Mick1867]

3 hours ago, The man with no name said:

I found a letter the other day that I wrote to the Secretary of the Club in March 2000 questioning the loan players we had brought in. I called it the slippery slope to professionalism. 

Ah, the wee magician Paul Walker being one of those players, probably the most effective loan player we have ever had. He was brilliant, he played the last 8 games of that season and I doubt we would have ended up 3rd division champions without him. Stranraer took Scott Edgar on loan in exchange,  a tremendous piece of business by Cowboy.

Some might call it a slippery slope, others might call it an expected progression. The trapdoor to the Lowland League combined with our departure for Lesser makes it a subject that has to be considered imo .  I started supporting Queen's because they are my local team, nothing more. I love and respect our history but we'll always have that no matter. If we end up semi pro in League 2 or amateur in the lowland league, I'll continue to fully support the club but I'd rather stay competitive in the SPFL, as long as we have the finances to manage that. It would be a brave ( and probably foolish) committee who chose to decide this without a members' vote however.  

Edited January 22, 2019 by Mick1867

[Spidersmad]

The way I see it is that Queen's are an amateur club which occasionally fields professional players on loan. The fact that these loan players are paid by their parent clubs allows the club to maintain that Queen's are still an amateur club, but for me that's little more than a technicality. They are professional players playing for Queen's Park. When I started supporting Queen's back in the 1960s the definition of amateurism was similar to that used in Rugby Union at the time. You were either an amateur, in which case you could play, or you were a paid professional, in which case you could play somewhere else. If you turned professional there was no way back through reinstatement. That kind of purist amateurism is long gone at Hampden. Like some of the posters above I would have nothing against Queen's paying players. It would be a simple progression from the current situation. For me the main questions around this would be financial and what the effect would be on the youth development system.

[The man with no name]

1 hour ago, Mick1867 said:

Ah, the wee magician Paul Walker being one of those players, probably the most effective loan player we have ever had. He was brilliant, he played the last 8 games of that season and I doubt we would have ended up 3rd division champions without him. Stranraer took Scott Edgar on loan in exchange,  a tremendous piece of business by Cowboy.

Some might call it a slippery slope, others might call it an expected progression. The trapdoor to the Lowland League combined with our departure for Lesser makes it a subject that has to be considered imo .  I started supporting Queen's because they are my local team, nothing more. I love and respect our history but we'll always have that no matter. If we end up semi pro in League 2 or amateur in the lowland league, I'll continue to fully support the club but I'd rather stay competitive in the SPFL, as long as we have the finances to manage that. It would be a brave ( and probably foolish) committee who chose to decide this without a members' vote however.  

Mick1867 that was my view in 2000. Times change and football has changed. In 2000 there was no threat to our league status and therefore the Club could continue to stay amateur and offer young players an avenue into senior football. With the pyramid system and talk of colt teams joining the league then nothing is certain anymore. Times change, opinions change and I would put affordability above any sentimental reasons in deciding to go professional or even less amateur than we are.