No signings, so no news is no news!!
By Gordon Thomson
January 29 2003
At time of writing this it's been a fairly quiet transfer window as far as Airdrie United are concerned. Out has gone Kenny Brannigan to Queens Park as their new manager and there have been no new signings yet with only two days to go. In saying that we have extended deals for Gow and Vareille.
Of course we all wanted to see Taylor sign again. Roberts could have a goalscoring hero all over again. Some said McPhee, some said Forrest, some even went as far as to suggest wee Alex Neil. But so far new signings, and indeed even decent rumours, have been thin on the ground. Should we be worried? I distinctly remember Jim Ballantyne tell us that this year was strictly a year for consolidation and not to get carried away. Maybe it's a bit too easy to get carried away considering some good cup performances in particular making a mockery of our 'new club' status. Why have we become so ambitious so soon? It must be something to do with the way that Sandy Stewart has organised a fairly useful looking side on a relative shoestring budget. Sure we have some players who are of a quality we've not been used to down the years but there are a good few gems in there too. Indeed many fans now think we're only one or two players away from promotion material. Indeed if Simon Vella had been fit to play against St. Johnstone our starting X1 would have been a match for anything outside the SPL and maybe one or two clubs up there too. So after an slow start we've settled on the 343 formation that served Sandy so well as a player in Alex MacDonald's 90's team, we have now developed the same trait of being hard to break down but maybe lacking a clinical finisher that would guarantee a few more points. I'm sure that many Airdrie fans will have been surprised at the quality of McGeown, McGowan, Vella, McVey and Gow and we can see that there is still a lot to come from some other 'kent faces' like Docherty, Wilson, Armstrong, McGuire, McKeown and even Vareille. It's maybe a bit frustrating looking at where we are in the league and seeing the second promotion spot isn't exactly disappearing over the horizon but progress has most definitely been made on the park this year and victory at Perth next week, surely possible, would mean that a promotion charge could be funded next season thanks to a share of the subsequent gate receipts at Parkhead later in the month. If we win at Perth, of course! But for me it looks like Sandy Stewart is the man for the job. I was screaming for him to get it when Gary MacKay was chosen nearly four years ago and I'm even more sure now that he's the man for the job. We're not too far away, honestly. We're not going down and the next couple of weeks will obviously have a massive bearing on our future. We can play a part next week by roaring the team on. Together I'm sure we'll do it. I still think that there will be someone signed before the deadline, possibly a central defender to replace Brannigan, but even if there isn't I'll not be too worried. We have got to think of the bigger picture I suppose. If next season is to be the one, then next season will look after itself. In the meantime midtable security and the dream of a cuptie at Parkhead will still drive us on whether there is a transfer window or not.