Harry Chibber

You both somehow got there before I got the chance to edit my post.. No chance we got £110k for Rankin If the original offer for Christie was £500k and we rejected the offer twice before accepting then I would certainly hope that we have got more than "just over half-a-million"

Have we ever publicised transfer fees? Not that I can recall anyway. Have we ever sold a player of note (apart from Niculae-gate) £65k for Rankin & £150k for Mckay??

He doesn't even have a wiki page In all seriousness where has this guy been plucked from? Is it likely that a club our size has paid for a scout to watch this guy before signing him? It seems as though we are recruiting through an agency that probably has invested interests in seeing their clients getting game time. Hopefully it works out but it just seems like random dross being signed to fill a team sheet ... if we are doing that I'd prefer it was Scottish talent that was getting the chance. We need quality over quantity

Still no official word on the final fee?? Also good to read that we rejected 2 bids before accepting a final offer ... would love for the club to prove me wrong and announce our first million pound player

What is that on the shorts?

Good point well made. Glad to finally have some decent money in the bank for a player but just think we could have done better. Just hope this money is reinvested.

Used to love away games at Livi.. hated them but the games were always good.

Agreed. It would be good to sign a player that has some sort of goal scoring record no matter what level he is at, he must be buzzing at the moment and we could do with someone on form and ready to start sticking it in the back of the net. We could probably pick him up for £10- £20k, which is a gamble worth taking

Is the final fee £600k? Has this been confirmed anywhere? Just over 5% of what Celtic have reportedly sold big Virgil for...

I think that is fair. They are not going to pay a million when they can sign him on a pre-contract in 4 months. If we couldn't agree a new deal for Christie, I would fancy our chances leaving it to a court to decide what is a fair settlement for training compensation. Ryan Gauld - sold for £3 mil James McCarthy - sold for £1.2 mil Stuart Armstrong - sold for £2 mil Both McCarthy and Armstrong have been awarded PFA and SFWA young player of the year awards, respectively. With Christie being SFWA young player of the year 2014/15, I think a good lawyer could easily make a very fair argument that > £1 mil is fair compensation.

Vigurs signing seemed strange at the time but if Christie is to leave (looks very likely) then we have a player that can play a similar role. Roberts if he ever plays for us is also supposed to prefer the number 10 role. Christie is a special talent but if there was a position that we could afford to sell a player from then that is it... we are losing half our goals this season though. The point is, we don't need to sell so we should be playing hard ball until they make us an offer we can't refuse. Stokes will not be moving to us so I think everyone that has that in their sights is well off the mark. I've heard £600k is agreed, if true that's a ******* joke

Haha not a chance.... I couldn't take the criticism! Might be a few quid short as well.

I can't see us getting Stokes. I'd rather see us sign a striker than taking him on loan if we have to pay any sort of contribution to his salary - he'll be on at least £5k a week, probably a lot more. Apparently Watkins was only getting £400 a week with us so we are well off the mark Anything less than £1 mil for Christie is poor business. If he signed a pre-contract next year he would still only be 21 and we would receive training compensation - he is Scottish young player of the year and there are several examples of Scottish youth players not to win this title that have been signed for much more than that at his age. Agree with RIG we have shown our hand too early but I don't blame the board for selling if we get a decent offer

KB, I'm talking about when the original deals were negotiated, not when the damage is already done and other clubs had become interested. No club would sniff about or offer pre-contract when they were both 21 because ICT would be paid a youth development fee. At that point we should be making the decision on what potential the players have and offering suitable contracts to take them to 24. Seeing both these players leave at age 23, as soon as we are no longer due compensation, isn't a mistake I would expect to be made by any of the other teams in the SPFL.

Did you actually read my original post before jumping to the defence of the club? There is no "grand plan" but it is clear for all the good the board has done in the past to keep us out the red, they have missed an opportunity this year. We will probably never have as successful a season as we did last year and we failed to build on it. If we were ever going to attract new fans to the club this was the year but instead they have been caught sleeping. I would only expect reinvestment of the earnings from last year but the numbers don't add up. We are down on numbers and quality from last year when the club should be in our strongest position ever after the year we just had. As for letting Ross and Shinnie leave for absolutely nothing the year we were no longer entitled to reimbursement, that is just embarrassing. If we continue to make basic errors like that then we will always be a small club.

That's not speculation...that's calculated risk/decision making and I agree with the theory of what you say. What is being advocated by HC is that the club spend money they don't have and/or increase annual budgets on the basis of one off windfalls.....something that we, as fans, have been critical of in the past when it looked like the club may be following such a course of action (e.g. Niculae). Not what I said at all.

Not the worst result given the circumstances but I can't see where a win is going to come from.

We ARE only a small club. A nationally renowned club but with a regular fan base of around 2500 and a small budget we are undoubtedly a small club. That is quite simply a matter of fact. *losing As for the shirts, it's not a matter of when the shirts are available but that the fans buy them when they are. If you had the money to buy one in June why not keep it aside? Though I do feel a pre order system at least would help. We are now an established SPFL club and Scottish Cup Winners.. as for attendances we are only ever going to increase the gates by showing ambition and by being a progressive club. Apart from the big boys our attendances are competitive with others in the division. I would like to see our net spend for this year (in terms of new contracts) compared to last and with others in the division because I am sure we are well behind the rest of them. No, its not a matter of simply keeping money aside for strips. When are you more likely to buy a new strip? a) when you have just won the Scottish Cup and are competing in Europe with the hope and expectancy of the new season or b) when we are no longer in Europe, memories of the Scottish Cup win are fading* and we are 6 games in without a win and scored only 4 goals and worse yet - County are flying. That's for existing fans. What about new fans that we could have attracted after the Scottish Cup Win, are they still likely to keep money aside for a new top? It's supply and demand. We had the demand and still have no supply. Also Cabrini? The fans are paying the same price for football tops that are being made by an inferior brand ... Imagine a new fan or a fan that is being swayed towards ICT, went to the final celebrated with the rest of us. Loved it! ICT release 2 new nice as **** adidas tops (just for 1 season) ... guaranteed sales. Fans delighted walking about wearing these tops, others see them and also want one.. sales spike and ICT has not only made a profit on purchases but also have recruited a new set of fans. An adidas ICT top is more of a pipe dream but even stay with Errea for one more season and just make sure that we have tops available for any potential new fans! If making a new deal with Cabrini ... insist that we have our new strips before now... better yet get ahead of the game and strike a deal before last season had ended!! Show a bit of organisation .... do your job. * to be fair will take a long time before I forget that day

Nothing. It's an away game and doesn't matter where the goals come from. Would still bite your arm off for a goalscorer though

Yaaassssss! You fecking dancer!

It's a very famous business cliché and is as relevant to our situation as any. It isn't even speculating in the cases for Shinnie and Ross, both have left the club for absolutely nothing due to lack of foresight. We should never have let their contracts end at age 23 when they could walk away the club without us receiving any compensation for their youth development. When contracts were being negotiated this should have been the first thing to take into consideration. Of course players/agents have a say in this but we should have absolutely insisted on this point for our 2 of our own. Why am I not surprised that you would come to defence of the club. Feel free to comment on any of the other points made in the list or all of them if you can provide a reasonable explanation for the position we are in. I'm sure with your position at the club you will have as good an explanation 'excuse' for all the failures in that list. ... here's another relevant business cliché for you: "If you're not moving forward, you're moving backwards" I take your point KB but it's more in terns of Shinnie and Ross I was referring to - why have a youth system if by the time we actually produce 2 excellent SPFL players they are able to walk away from the club for free?! We have shot ourselves in the foot for the chance at a transfer fee but more concerning is that the money we've spent coaching & youth contract to get them to where they are is all down the pan. As explained above we should have insisted on this as an absolute must, if the player leaves for free the following season then good luck to them but I hope the club has now learned their lesson and will look at Polworth, Ferguson, Sutherland & Christie The Foran contract is crazy as well? Why give any 30+ player such a long contract. Impossible to predict injuries he's had but surely a player at his age was more susceptible and that money could have been passed around the team.

Ok then. Two of our most valued assets have walked away from the club for absolutely nothing. Not only have we missed out on a transfer fee for both, our board and their belief in short contracts have made sure that we did not get reimbursed for the time and resource spent on their development. Both players have moved to direct rivals within the same division. We have replaced 4 players from a cup winning squad with players that have never played at this level and unsurprisingly they are struggling We have no striker, needed one since Billy left... Christ we needed one before Billy left Billy is now returning to play for one of our rivals We have 2 points after 5 games and only scored 3 goals all season We are suffering from an injury crisis with half the squad in A&E We now have Cabrini as a shirt sponsor and we still don't have our strips (only team in SPFL) - when they go on sale we can only get them through JD sports and there is a very good chance we have lost a fortune on this deal by being so short-sighted. We are now set to lose Ryan Christie to Celtic and if our history of transfer dealings is anything to go by then he will probably go for much less than he is actually worth. We are yet to see the club spend any of the money they received from the sale of Billy Mckay and last years earnings. For the first time in our history I actually feel that County are a bigger club than us.... luckily we have the Scottish Cup win to hold them off but we need to do something quick or we will take a hiding off them this season. I am sick to death of hearing people say "we are only a small club" and making excuses for the board not doing their job properly. We are literally loosing money because they are acting like a small club and failing to reward our players with contracts that would have resulted in some sort of transfer fee. In all business you need to speculate to accumulate - the board were lucky last year that we managed to have such an amazing season because it was not for their doing.

This is a monumental **** up by the club Not surprising... complete ******* amateur wee club negotiations. No long term planning and the standard disregard for the fans

Come off it mate.. he is from ICT and Butcher said he was surplus to requirements... not his fault. Saying that his club choice was poor Great signing .... and significantly our first Scottish signing in feck knows how long... also he is one of our own although he does need a good wash! Hated him because I was gutted he left and went to County because he was at that time the most talented players we have produced. He's had his time away and will be hungry to impress. With him and Tansey we have 2 of the best set piece takers in the league. Also with Vigurs competing for a midfield position it frees Williams up as a left back so does.. in a way give us defensive cover NOW WE NEED A STRIKER!

this has to be a ******* joke... we are Scottish Cup Holders and we are having to live off the dregs of Scottish Football shambles.