buster.

Another test. How to approach a home second leg already a goal to the good. Getting the balance between defending and attacking will be difficult.

It might have been 50 years ago,

It's an encouraging sign. There will be those whose rationale for supporting Independence will be political and they opine it would be better for them/their familyor reasn X and Y, as a result...... Those who simply wave flags and have a polarised opinion in any given subject that is based on the flag, are free to have their opinions but are more 'fundamentalist'.

SDI lawyers who wrote up at least part of the 2017 contract will I'd imagine, have blocked pretty much any sideways route out.

They've finished second for the last several seasons and can't be discounted that easily. Until we achieve a consistency of result throughout the season, we won't break away from the provincial pack. We have to put the results together, until then words are just that.

Better to ignore Sutton than write articles about him, attention is what he craves and is why he has been 'successful'.

It's about SG building a squad that he is comfortable and confident enough with to be able to do a job over a season. We aren't at that stage as yet and IMO it wouldn't be reasonable to expect us to be. He'll have to be a more shrewd and careful manager than Souness was for various reasons. So far, I like his general approach and when the first set-back comes, he needs to maintain that approch and not be dragged off course by pressure. At the moment it's more to do with a solid starting XI and in the absence of large budgets and creative genuis, I'd agree his priorities re. defence make a lot of current sense.

You wonder if there were any attempts in those negotiations (2017) to get it done up front and not take the 'outside bet' of the High Court further down the line.....and if so, how much SDI wanted for it ? There isn't any mystery to the Ashley M.O., he will use any leverage he can secure to the hilt.

After consultation with lawyers, I'd be looking for removal or substantial change in connected terms of the 'carry over' and would be prepared to up sweetner by 500K.

My grammar is colin Nish, it was about the 2017.

I thought you asked me about a choice from 2017, not the present situation. Here's your choice circa 2017,...........What do?

Presuming the option taken was the best available. Continue negotiating until removal or material change in clause(s) we've now been seriously hampered by.

Not being aware of detail or it's potential implications appears to have played a part in this latest setback. As they say in Spain, with SDI you need siete ojos.

Bottomline,....we are all on the same side and want the same thing. It's a complicated matter with limited facts available but some things are apparent and can't be ignored. What concerns me is the executive management as a whole. I should write an article on it tbh, put my thoughts together and bore you all.

You should apply for any Amateur Propaganda Construct vacancies for those who can spend hours patrolling messageboards !!! ....

Don't sign up to it in the first place, Spring2017.

If the "we" includes you, you'd do well to learn from the past and instead of going into a 'siege mentality' mode, look objectively at what has happened. Some waved red flags regards Whyte and Green but were largely ignored. I'm not saying we've got a similar situation but I do think things are far from ideal and it should be about objective vigilance of events and in this case FS is simply stating the facts.

If there has been a significant f**k-up, that doesn't necessarily make everything that went before it wrong. Where do we go from here is the real question and that ain't easy.

I've been critical of the board for certain things for a while now (see only Gersnet article I have wrote, December 2017). Lately, I've seen more things that suggest to me that we are not well run as a business. So, you are right regards negativity.............. If it's what I see, then that's what I'll say. Siege mentality won't solve problems, it'll more than likely delay meaningful attempts to solve them. ------------------- As for the footbal operation and SG&Co, in particular I've been very clear that we need patience and reasonable expectations. He needs 18 months and 3 transfer windows before we can really expect to see the 'flowering of buds'. On the way towards that, steady improvement should suffice.

SG to Mark Allen:....I need a CF AND CH.... NOW. MA to board (not sure who/SR on hols): ....Hearts won't budge from X00,000, canwe get the deal done at that price ? Reply ? If we have more irons in the fire we can move to a different target but what CF do we get that can 'reliably do a job in the SPL/Europe' for less than 500K ?

Hearts know we want the player now and won't IMO be for letting him go for less than 500K.

It was only speculation on my part. It's difficult to say with any certainty that the board should currently do this or not do that without knowing where things actually stand.

I wouldn't be surprised if part of the settlement includes SDI approval required for such communication wrt issues concerning or connected with a prospective new deal. Sounds OTT but thats Ashely's M.O.

Fair enough but I think that at least in part, we saw this yesterday.

I wouldn't worry about the arithmetic, it will have been the Betfred Cup and it's rules that confused you. What I do worry about though, is when messageboards or podcasts start speculating about the number of points a set number of league games will bring. I have never seen it go well. Our good runs have tended to come when I haven't seen such.