I take most comments by football chairmen with an extra large pinch of salt.
The necessity was hammered home to me after taking one at his word that two of his top players were going nowhere, broadcasting that on radio, and then spending the rest of the evening wiping the egg off my face when the pair were unveiled two hours later in the east end of Glasgow as last-minute transfer window signings.
It was an object lesson in the relationship between journalists and folk who run clubs.
Our job is to get information, theirs is to keep it from us.
Sometimes we get sold a pile of guff and the job the next time we’re informed of something is to subject it to more detailed scrutiny than before.
Football clubs are private businesses
That said, there are many reasons why football folk find it acceptable to keep things from not only the media but from fans too.
Contractual and privacy justifications – and negotiating strengths and weaknesses – when dealing with players are all factored into the equation.
Except for fan owned clubs, there is a simple truth which is an uncomfortable one for many supporters to accept.
That is, the club which you like to call ‘yours’ isn’t yours at all.
It’s a private business run by one or more wealthy individuals and, since they take the risks, they also feel with some justification that they – and not the fans – should be free to take the big decisions which impact on that risk.
So when St Johnstone chairman Steve Brown decided for various reasons to sell Ali McCann to Preston North End, his main reason being that he’d have a very unhappy asset on his hands if he refused him the move, he was, in his view, justified in making that decision.
He will however also have to accept that fans will hold him to account by their own different standards for his judgement call.
Stephen Thompson never recovered from his decision to flog Stuart Armstrong and Gary Mackay-Steven to Celtic when Dundee United were flying high.
He had his reasons. They just didn’t satisfy the United supporters who parted with hard-earned cash to support their team week-in, week-out.
The former United chairman’s relationship with the fans crumbled with his decision and immediately degenerated beyond saving, ultimately leading to his selling up at Tannadice.
Similarly, many Saints supporters who pay their cash feel that they’ve been short-changed in the McCann affair.
A double cup-winning team was always likely to be plundered, the only questions were how many players would be looted and whether that would constitute highway robbery.
Saints fans accept that the sale of Jason Kerr for £600k was a fair deal for an uncapped player in his final year.
McCann though has been eulogised by many as a future star and many among the Perth public feel that he’s been sold on the cheap.
Steve Brown is doing what he feels is best for the club, but many fans feel rightly or wrongly that he’s let them and the club down.
As chairman he’s led them to unprecedented success, but football fans, like jilted lovers, can be very unforgiving.
This could be the end of a beautiful friendship.
Leigh Griffiths could be a sensational signing for Dundee if he can recapture anything close to the form he’s capable of.
The Celtic striker, on his game, is the best in his position in Scotland bar none.
He’s been off his game with the various issues which have side tracked his career, but at 31 he should be anything but over the hill.
He offers an electric burst of speed over a short distance which is destructive to markers and, as a striker of the ball in terms of accuracy and pace, he is unmatched in our top flight.
Or at least he was when he was at his very best.
Dundee are taking a calculated gamble that he retains enough of his best to make the move a success.
With 123 goals in 261 games for Celtic, his lethal ability in front of goal is proven. The key question is how much of his ability he still has and, if it has been diminished, how much of it can he recapture.
If he can find a substantial amount of it, then Dundee, on paper, have a potentially devastating forward line with Griffiths, Cummings, Sheridan and McMullan all offering a combination of pace, trickery and finishing skills.
With Charlie Adam and Paul McGowan crafting passes for that quartet, James McPake may have pulled off a master stroke in signing a master striker.
Dundee United need two things to ensure a profitable season.
They need to find their second half form v Hearts, when they were tidy and hardworking and thwarted only by Craig Gordon in imperious form in goal.
And they need to find an out-and-out striker either from within their ranks or from the list of free agents now that the transfer window is shut.
Nicky Clark and Marc McNulty are mobile and neat in their play but with Lawrence Shankland’s departure, unless one or both can be reinvented as a traditional target man, United look like they’ll struggle to turn their spruce play into goals.
Only time will tell how their transfer window signings will perform, but much is expected from Finnish signing Ilmari Niskanen who can provide ammunition from both wings.
If the wingman’s ability is to be fully capitalised upon, United need to ensure they have someone who can cash in on the supply which he will hopefully add to their repertoire.
There are the bones of a decent side emerging at Tannadice and two good wins against Rangers and St Johnstone were no flukes, but the goal threat looks to be on the light side.
If manager Tam Courts can successfully find the solution to that problem his first season in top level management could be a very good one.
