St Mirren FC will continue to fly the flag for Paisley’s UK City of Culture 2021 bid with an extension to a deal to keep its stadium name in place until the end of May 2018.

If the town takes title there will be an option to extend the sponsorship to retain the name of the Paisley 2021 Stadium until May 2022.

The news is announced as the club erected new signage outside the stadium and is an extension of the original two year two-year sponsorship and stadium naming rights deal struck with Renfrewshire Council in November 2015. The venue was renamed from St Mirren Park to mark Paisley’s UK City of Culture 2021 bid.

Paisley is shortlisted for the title alongside Coventry, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Swansea. The winner will be announced this Thursday evening by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, which organised the competition.

Paisley 2021 Bid Director Jean Cameron said: "St Mirren are at the heart of the community and we are delighted to have their continued support.

"Paisley’s bid journey has been a positive one and will continue no matter what the outcome this week is. The Paisley 2021 stadium forms part of this legacy and keeps the name going."

St Mirren Director Tony Fitzpatrick said: "The fortunes of the town and the club are interlinked and we are delighted to continue with our support of Paisley 2021.

"A winning year of culture would be great for both the town and the club. With the UK City of Culture decision imminent, we wish Paisley the very best of luck in its bid for the title."

St Mirren Chief Executive Tony Fitzpatrick recently paid a visit to Valencia CF after being invited over by inspiresport's Head of Sales for Scotland, Jed McCabe. 

Inspiresport, who have a close relationship with St Mirren, are also partners with the La Liga side and Tony was invited to see how the structure at Valencia worked from the academy right through to first team.

Tony had the chance to watch several academy games including Valencia vs Villarreal U14s and U18s games. He was introduced to Valencia first team left back, Toni Lato who came through the academy and was recently voted 15th in FourFourTwo's 100 Best Teenagers in the World 2017. Tony talked with the full back about his pathway from the academy to the first team.

Valencia legend Miguel Ángel Angulo also took time to chat with Tony about Valencia's philosophy and how they go about scouting the best players in Spain. Tony was also invited in behind the scenes of the first team training area and the Mestalla Stadium before finishing his tour off by attending the Valencia vs Barcelona match.

Due to the link between St Mirren and inspiresport, the hope is for St Mirren Youth Academy teams to go over to Valencia and test themselves against their peers at the same age group and for both clubs to build strong relations going forward.

As we approach the busy festive season I thought it worthwhile to give you all an update on happenings in and around the club.

Womens Football

One of the points that was raised at nearly all of the Supporters meeting prior to our takeover was the desire to see the creation of a St Mirren Women's football team. I am delighted that we have taken the first steps towards achieving that goal and I believe we have the people with the qualifications and drive in place to ensure it is a success.

Tony Fitzpatrick has been in communication with the girls for a long time with the view to forming a Women's team and SMiSA’s recent involvement allowed us to gain the momentum required to get it off the ground.

Trials for players interested in joining the new team are being held at Renfrew High School 4G pitch on Thursday 30th November. Players should aim to be there for 19.15, 19.30 start.

Buddievision

One of the reasons for creating a full time head of media post last year was to provide regular website updates on things that were happening in and around the club. James has helped achieve that with an enthusiasm and commitment that sees him working many unsociable hours to get content up and online for fans all over the world to enjoy.

The website has continued to evolve and it’s been great to see the e-store taking off with tremendous sales of replica kit, books and corporate hospitality being recorded since its launch.

We are now ready to make further improvements and James has been tasked with launching the next stage of that digital revolution with the imminent launch of our new "Buddievision" platform which is currently free to air prior to an official launch on 8th December.

With the help of of Invest in Renfrewshire’s Graduate Internship Initiative we are in the process of recruiting an individual to assist James in making this a success and giving Saints fans new insights into everyday events at the club and “behind the scenes” access.

We have tried to keep subscriptions at an affordable level (£4.99 per month and £49.99 per year) and you can trust that the subs will be used directly for funding additional resources and technologies to provide the best possible service to our supporters.

Supporters Liaison Officers

We are still at a very early stage in the development of the Supporters Liaison Officers at St.Mirren but I am certain we have two very committed and forward thinking supporters in place who will help to nurture a positive relationship between the club and our fans.

It is difficult at times to balance the wishes of the supporters with the needs of the football club and, as I have said on previous occasions, sometimes difficult decisions have to be made for the good of the club even if they are not popular. There are usually plenty of factors to consider which are not always obvious for those not involved in the day to day operations of the football club.

Banner versus Morton

The situation with the banner at the Morton game was a good example of trying to get the balance right.

The banner was reported in the independent SPFL delegates match report under the heading “Discriminatory behaviour-sectarian, racial, abusive behaviour”.

It is unlikely that we will receive any punishment from the SPFL for this given we have no history of similar indiscretions in previous reports, but we have to take action to mitigate the chances of a recurrence and the likelihood of us incurring fines which would have an obvious adverse affect on club.

We have also worked hard with Police Scotland to allow us to have all our home games police free with the exception of the derby match. This healthy relationship with the Police comes as a result of historic good behaviour in the stands and represents a substantial cost saving to us over the course of a season.

The banner in question led to some awkward questions in our discussions about maintaining this police free environment going forward.

We discussed how best to handle this at our monthly SLO meeting and agreed it was best for the SLOs to engage directly with the singing section involved and to keep the issue as low key as possible.

There was a bit of confusion and outrage on social media as this dialogue took place which was a little unfortunate but I hope the 2 month withdrawal of the banners was a reasonable outcome in the end and all parties now appreciate why action was taken.

As a result of our positive actions in tackling the issue we have been allowed to retain our Police free status at the 2021 stadium.

Everyone at the club can see the benefit and added atmosphere created by the singing section both home and away and we all appreciate the time, money and energy that has gone into evolving this. We want to see this continue to grow as it genuinely makes a big difference to the team.

Street Stuff

I recently attended the ROCCO awards where our Street Stuff program won yet another award as “Community champions”. To date Street Stuff has won just short of 20 awards both locally and nationally!

The tangible results achieved in the community by this program continues to astound me and we should all be proud of our football club being part of it in partnership with Renfrewshire Council. It is of no surprise to me that it forms one of the cornerstones of the towns bid to be 2021 City of Culture.

SMiSA

We continue to develop our relationship with SMiSA in working towards creating a sustainable and successful supporter owned club. Every bump along the way makes us stronger as it helps both sides have a better understanding of how decisions affect the other organisation.

In the last £2 SMiSA quarterly spend one of the items proposed was the purchase of new balls for the first team training. This created some negative feedback.

At first glance I can understand the view that this is something the club should fund but again there is slightly more to it than meets the eye and in future we will explain things better before the vote is put to the supporters.

The first team have plenty of balls to train with and this is of course part of our budget, however, the match ball manufacturer changed this year and we are given only a limited number of the new balls from the supplier. 

Jack, being the perfectionist he is, wanted to ensure that training was all conducted with the new balls to ensure total consistency with those used on match day.

These balls retail at nearly £100 each so it was actually a significant amount of money required to fulfil the managers request and something we had not budgeted for.

 Your support in favour of the proposal was greatly appreciated and whilst it’s hard to quantify the benefits you can be sure that it is Jack’s belief that these small things all matter as he works to bring the on field success we all crave.

Thank You

The festive period is always a busy (and expensive) time for everyone.

The support at Inverness on Saturday was truly sensational and I know the management and players really appreciate it.

As Chairman of your football club I’d like to personally thank each and every one of you for your continued support of the team, both financially and emotionally!

#COYS #KTF

Gordon

The St Mirren Football Club Ltd. (Company Number: SC5773)

Notice is hereby given to Shareholders that the Annual General Meeting of the Members of the St Mirren Football Club Ltd will be held at the Paisley 2021 Stadium, Greenhill Road, Paisley PA3 1RU on Thursday 14 December 2017 at 7:15pm.

By Order of the Board
C Stewart (Secretary)

A Member entitled to attend the vote is entitled to appoint a proxy to attend and vote in his/her place. A proxy need not be a Member of the Company. Shareholders will be contacted directly.

We note the newspaper article yesterday that revealed the eight clubs chosen to spearhead the Scottish Football Association’s elite level of Project Brave.

Some supporters have been in touch, disappointed with the decision not to include St Mirren as one of the club’s involved at the elite level of the programme. However, we can confirm that we did not apply for elite level status at this time.

Going forward we will be a part of the ‘Performance Progressive’ category. Having done our research on this we believe that with our current, sustainable business model this category will give us a best possible platform to work towards attaining elite level over the next three years.

To achieve elite level we will have to employ five additional members of staff on a full time basis (U18s Coach, Sports Scientist, Head Of Recruitment, Performance Analyst, Head of Children’s Programme). Over the next three years we will actively strive to recruit these positions as fits in with our business model and the timeframe given to achieve elite level status.

We are proud of the hard work we have done at the academy in recent years which can be seen with the likes of academy graduates Kenny McLean, John McGinn, Lewis Morgan, Kyle Magennis and Stephen Mallan all in the full and U21 Scotland squads in the last week, while Ethan Erhahon and Ben Cameron have been regulars in the U17 and U16 squads over the last year.

That hard work will continue as we look to keep producing players for the first team who can go on to play at the highest level.

Statement from Gordon Scott on SMiSA £2 quarterly spend. 

"I have been placed in a very awkward position by the inclusion in the latest SMiSA £2 spend of the following:

Glenvale FC £1820.

This local Ferguslie Park based group is in its 50th Anniversary year, and have youth teams at every age group through to adult amateur level. Unfortunately they have a shortfall in their funding for this season due to receiving less than expected from other sources. They have asked SMiSA if we could help them with this which would enable them to offer free coaching to local four and five year olds. This would be consistent with SMiSA desires to get more local children involved with footballing activity, and to bring the Club and the community closer together. Sessions are held both at the St Mirren Dome (which brings some income into the Club) and at Ferguslie Sports Centre.

I explained to SMiSA that the club already provide these programmes through our Street Stuff and community programmes so they would effectively be funding a project that would impact on our existing classes. I also explained that if they put this option in then I would be forced to post this article and that in itself could jeopardise our relationship with Glenvale. Despite this they have decided to include it in the £2 spend anyway.

I have spoken with someone from Glenvale this morning and they fully understand the club's position. We have managed to build up a very good relationship with them over the last year which resulted in them playing their 50th anniversary game at our stadium and we want to continue to evolve that relationship.

I need to support the staff at this football club who I am constantly pushing to increase numbers at our community classes. I could easily sit back and rely on the SMiSA voting system to carry on as normal as I don’t think many St Mirren fans want their money spent on items that are not beneficial to our football club. However, I feel that I would not be giving our staff the support they deserve if I was to not make the clubs position clear on this.

As always it will be down to you as individuals to make your decision on how the money is spent but I felt I had to give you the clubs perspective on this occasion."

It is with great regret that we have learned that former club admin worker Kathleen Steel passed away earlier this week.

Kathleen was a well-know face at both the stadiums on Love Street and Greenhill Road through her time working at the club through the 1990s and 2000s up to her retirement five years ago.

Kathleen's funeral will take place on Wednesday (25th October) at 2pm at the Woodside Crematorium in Paisley.

Our thoughts and condolences are with Kathleen's family at this time.

Please note that the Stadium, Ticket Office and Club Shop will close this Friday (13th October) at 2pm. 

We are aware that some people are having issues accessing the online ticket system.

If you use an iPad, iPhone or MacBook you will be unable to use the system. This is out-with our hands as it is due to a dispute between Apple and Adobe. We are currently trying  to resolve the issue, but it involves writing a programme for each of the 8,000 seats within the stadium.

If you are using a PC or laptop we would suggest that you use Mozilla Firefox as your  browser and download the latest version of Adobe Flash Player, this will allow the seating template to load.

We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

As a Club we are of the opinion that every fan deserves the right to enjoy their football without listening to constant torrents of abuse being hurled at the players, officials and other supporters.

We appreciate that we all have our moments and our intention is not to punish every misdemeanour. However, there are people who spend the entire match shouting abuse and spoiling the enjoyment of those around them. 

The atmosphere created by our fans around the stadium on match days just now is exceptional and we want to continue and encourage that trend. 

We have made a decision to clamp down on people who behave in this unacceptable manner and over the next few matches we will be warning and, if necessary, removing the culprits. 

Your assistance in making this a redundant task would be much appreciated. 

The SPFL guidelines are as follows:

Under SPFL rules in respect of Ground Safety, Behaviour at Matches and Damage to Stadia, each club must ensure that its players, officials, supporters and any other persons connected with the club do not engage in unacceptable conduct at a stadium on the occasion of an official match.

Unacceptable conduct covers conduct that is violent and/or disorderly. This includes, but is not limited to: actual, attempted or threatened physical violence against a person or persons, intentional damage to property, using threatening, abusive or insulting words or conduct, displaying writing or any other things which is deemed threatening, abusive or insulting. 

The Club have a duty fulfil these rules or face sanctions from the SPFL such as a fine or points deduction. 

St Mirren F.C. accepts its responsibility under these rules and will not tolerate any form of unacceptable conduct as detailed above. Any supporter who engages in such activity will be liable for sanctions imposed by the Club which may include withdrawal of season tickets, exclusion from future matches involving the Club or, in the event of persistent offending, an application being made towards a football banning order.