Ross Stewart

[coalman]

If he instructed his agents to use the technicality to get out of the extension then he really doesn't want to be here. All the best Ross. Sorry we only got to see half a season of you in 4 years. Hope your next club are as accommodating as we were.

[Ted Bates Statue]

2 hours ago, EssEffCee said:

Wishing a serious injury on him? Really?

Weird cunt.

Yeah, and I'm going to lend @Dman my voodoo doll.

I'm sure the Loch Ness Drogba will cope just fine with all our best wishes... too bad we never got that song going for him,

[JohnnyShearer2.0]

Disappointing really. I wonder if he will get a better contract elsewhere. 

Time for BBD to step up !

[SotonianWill]

2 hours ago, EssEffCee said:

And we certainly didn't treat his injuries out of a sense of loyalty to him, we had no choice

We did have the choice as we signed him.

[HarvSFC]

Good player when fit. However, 9 league goals over three years is more than replaceable. Larin was one behind Stewart's three year output after half a season.

Also agree with the club's stance that he maybe isn't good enough for the Premier League. We've seen him up there and he seemed a bit lost at times, bullied. Isn't your archetypal tall striker in that he'll battle with and occupy centre-backs like Larin does, nor does he have amazing pace, so a more physical striker would also be of benefit to us going forward. If the recruitment team can get this one right.

Good moments this season, but his Saints career has ultimately been very frustrating. Seeing his name on the bench in a lineup graphic, only for it to be announced 20 minutes later that he's had to pull out of the squad due to injury, or that Stewart's "two weeks away" every week for four months.

[BARCELONASAINT]

1 hour ago, ecuk268 said:

Is it possible that Tonda could do something with Downs to make him into a half-decent player?

BBD seems to have done Ok at Derby and scored goals for Blackburn, maybe he'll improve here under a different coach.

We still need to strengthen whatever happens to those two.

Tonda is not the messiah, he's a very naughty boy!

[SNSUN]

Disappointing yes, after a season where he showed he was over his injury issues but I'm not deflated by him being released. Aside from the fact he'll probably join another Championship team and could be a handful to play next season. But we signed Larin who I like to numb this news plus it now means we have to go and get another striker to join Cyle and Cam.  Getting that decision right... we need someone more Larin than Downs. 

Shame Parrott is being touted to top flight clubs as his record at AZ is great. 

[davefizzy14]

3 hours ago, VectisSaint said:

Think people may be reading too much into this. Yes he's out of contract so to all intents and purposes he's gone, but think there may be more to come on this, but nothing will happen until Scotland exit the WC (so quite soon 😉). Those slagging him off as being disloyal etc need to consider the facts (as known), the Club has not apparently covered itself in glory over Ross, albeit with mitigating circumstances. I know one thing we need someone like Stewart, mush as I like Larin he won't play 46.games in a season.

Are you saying then that we may still be in talks with Ross's representatives over a new contract? I want Ross to stay.

[saint michael]

It feels a bit disloyal after looking after him for years when not playing but I don’t think he’s as good a player as he thinks he is. We will soon find out

[benjii]

3 hours ago, Mozz said:

I'd go Hearts.

Ambitious, in CL qualifiers next season and have just lost their main striker (Shankland) to Rangers.

But presumably will pay way less than us?

[Chez]

4 minutes ago, saint michael said:

It feels a bit disloyal after looking after him for years when not playing but I don’t think he’s as good a player as he thinks he is. We will soon find out

There simply is no loyalty in football from either side these days, so it will simply be down to the fact we have not offered him what he wants and thinks he can get elsewhere, be that more money, more years or a higher standard of football.

You can't expect him to accept a fiver when someone else is offering a tenner just because he has been injured in the past. It's not his fault he is has been injured. At a stretch we can be blamed. Us overplaying him after a long time out was part of the reason he got injured. 

I think he is a better player than most Saints fans think he is. 

[VectisSaint]

3 hours ago, saintant said:

Can't see Hearts being in a position to pay him more than us.

We aren't paying him anything, so that's a moot point.

[kevdoh]

4 minutes ago, Chez said:

There simply is no loyalty in football from either side these days, so it will simply be down to the fact we have not offered him what he wants and thinks he can get elsewhere, be that more money, more years or a higher standard of football.

You can't expect him to accept a fiver when someone else is offering a tenner just because he has been injured in the past. It's not his fault he is has been injured. At a stretch we can be blamed. Us overplaying him after a long time out was part of the reason he got injured. 

I think he is a better player than most Saints fans think he is. 

I don't think he is better than most of us think. He's a decent championship striker, when he's actually not injured. Struggling to think of what he could have lined up as a better option than staying put. He surely will be signing for someone in the next few days, as the potential of getting injured at the world Cup and be left with no options is a real possibility. He would earn more here on a one year than he would in Scotland on a 2 maybe 3 year contract, so really intrigued to see who takes a punt on him that would offer a better deal. Time will tell

[saintant]

13 minutes ago, VectisSaint said:

We aren't paying him anything, so that's a moot point.

We're paying him a lot more than Hearts will as he is contracted to us until the end of June as far as I know.

[Chez]

8 minutes ago, kevdoh said:

I don't think he is better than most of us think. He's a decent championship striker, when he's actually not injured. Struggling to think of what he could have lined up as a better option than staying put. He surely will be signing for someone in the next few days, as the potential of getting injured at the world Cup and be left with no options is a real possibility. He would earn more here on a one year than he would in Scotland on a 2 maybe 3 year contract, so really intrigued to see who takes a punt on him that would offer a better deal. Time will tell

Ipswich and Hull can offer PL football and will have the parachute payments, enabling them to offer him high wages for three years. We have one year left of our parachute payments so probably can't outbid those two. 

[Chez]

If you get injured playing international football, can you make a claim for lost wages? I think the club can, but as a free agent, could the player do so? Obviously he wouldn't have a contract beyond the end of June, but could he seek an amount similar to his wages to the level he is getting now for as long as he is out?

[Baird of the land]

50 minutes ago, saint michael said:

It feels a bit disloyal after looking after him for years when not playing but I don’t think he’s as good a player as he thinks he is. We will soon find out

What comes around, goes around. Club was pretty disloyal in trying to leave it to last minute in the hopes that we could ditch him if we got promoted.

[Willo of Whiteley]

I’m sure his agents will be straight back in touch if he pulls a hamstring over the next three weeks. 😂

We need to aim for better anyway.

[ecuk268]

10 minutes ago, Baird of the land said:

What comes around, goes around. Club was pretty disloyal in trying to leave it to last minute in the hopes that we could ditch him if we got promoted.

I'd call it pragmatism.

[bugenhagen]

26 minutes ago, Baird of the land said:

What comes around, goes around. Club was pretty disloyal in trying to leave it to last minute in the hopes that we could ditch him if we got promoted.

The right call made by the club IMO. There is no loyalty from players if they can get a better deal elswhere. Why would we be loyal to a player that has cost us a lot, and provided very little, when we needed an upgrade if we went up?

And to be honest, I am pleased we are not relying on him again to stay fit for large parts of next season.

[Pamplemousse]

Financially I'd be surprised if any other team made a better offer than us, disappointing to lose him but his record speaks for itself, we need a striker who's actually going to play.

For him, I hope he gets a decent move, Hearts would be a great move, European football, Ross deserves it. Thanks for the goals and good luck.

[stknowle]

If he stays fit all next season and ends up somewhere else in the Championship then they have 20-25 goals virtually guaranteed. I think he’s a superb striker at this level. It’s the IF that’s the problem. Doubtless he wanted at least 2 years and we weren’t prepared to offer that as too risky. Both positions completely understandable and if he thinks he can get what he wants elsewhere you can’t blame him regardless of all these loyalty arguments.

[StrangelyBrown]

I guess it's all about calculated risks. Do we think we should pay what he's asking for or could we get better value from someone else now we've freed up his wages? Do we think we'll get enough from him to warrant the extra spend? Does Ross think he'll stay fit enough during the world cup to land another gig?

From my perspective I really rate him at championship level when he's fit and he could make the step up, but he's seemingly made of glass and I think based on risk we should look elsewhere.

[CB Fry]

33 minutes ago, stknowle said:

If he stays fit all next season and ends up somewhere else in the Championship then they have 20-25 goals virtually guaranteed. I think he’s a superb striker at this level. It’s the IF that’s the problem. Doubtless he wanted at least 2 years and we weren’t prepared to offer that as too risky. Both positions completely understandable and if he thinks he can get what he wants elsewhere you can’t blame him regardless of all these loyalty arguments.

Number of seasons in his entire career where Ross Stewart has scored "20-25 goals" = one. League One.

Number of seasons where he has scored more than 10 league goals in his entire career = two. One in League One as above and the other in Scottish League One in 2016-17.

I think long periods not playing are more guaranteed than 20-25 goals.

 

[stknowle]

14 minutes ago, CB Fry said:

Number of seasons in his entire career where Ross Stewart has scored "20-25 goals" = one. League One.

Number of seasons where he has scored more than 10 league goals in his entire career = two. One in League One as above and the other in Scottish League One in 2016-17.

I think long periods not playing are more guaranteed than 20-25 goals.

 

You may well be right Fry, it’s more likely he gets injured and doesn’t score 20-25 goals next season. If he stays fit - which he probably will not - I think he’s good for that return. Anyway, I don’t want to get into an argument about it - especially not with you (winky smiler emoji) - and he’s fucked off now anyway so tbh who gives a fuck how he does or does not do next season.

Edited 20 hours ago by stknowle

[AlexLaw76]

Is is evidently a good play but, even this season which was deemed as very good, he was unavailable for large parts of it coupled with being unable to play 3 games in a week.

Good luck to him - now watch him get his 20+ Championship goals next season 🤣

 

[SW11_Saint]

7 hours ago, Fabrice29 said:

Don’t really see the need for the ‘ungrateful’ narrative personally. Lads got a short career, made even shorter by his terrible luck and him and his advisors probably have had a whiff of something better for them that we’ve offered. 

He doesn’t owe us anything, he got given a contract here and it hasn’t worked out due to injuries but it’s not like it was an incredibly selfless act for us to continue to rehab him and chuck him in last season when fit. Just as we don’t owe him to offer him the best deal he’ll get just because he scored some goals for us last season. 

Good luck to him. 

💯

[macca155]

He's 29 and needs a decent contract, can't blame him for that. Saints know all about his medical issues, so I suspect weren't prepared to take the risk. Which frankly is the sensible decision.

It's a shame and good luck to him, but I can't see him playing a full season elsewhere. He'll have golden periods but injury will hit sooner or later. I'm sure they'll be interest in Scotland.

Saints need to replace him with someone a little more robust.

[Lord Duckhunter]

5 hours ago, ChrisPY said:

Think we’ve poorly managed the situation and think he’d have been good enough as a 2nd/3rd choice striker in the Premier League so shouldn’t have left it too late to renew.

Don’t talk pony man.

We don’t even know whether we could have even had renewed before the “window” anyway. Did the contract state we could trigger the extra year at any time, or was it specifically “within 5 days of the last game”. Unless you know the answer to that, you can’t say we handled it poorly, or “left it too late”. 
 

Even if we could have triggered it early, why on earth would we. I’m sure you’d be one of the first moaning  if he’d pulled up injured during the play off final, after we’d renewed it the day before. 

[ChrisPY]

6 minutes ago, Lord Duckhunter said:

Don’t talk pony man.

We don’t even know whether we could have even had renewed before the “window” anyway. Did the contract state we could trigger the extra year at any time, or was it specifically “within 5 days of the last game”. Unless you know the answer to that, you can’t say we handled it poorly, or “left it too late”. 
 

Even if we could have triggered it early, why on earth would we. I’m sure you’d be one of the first moaning  if he’d pulled up injured during the play off final, after we’d renewed it the day before. 

You’re right I’ve not seen the contract but that’d be a bizarre clause that we’re unable to trigger an extension that, aside from unprecedented and unforeseen circumstances, we’re guaranteed to be able to trigger.

Second point of me being one of the first to moan… based on absolutely nothing, odd assumption to make given I’d said he’d be 2nd/3rd choice in the Premier League. Think he’s got the ability but wouldn’t want to be overly reliant on him.

[CB Fry]

For all we know Ross decided months ago that he wanted to go back to Scotland/join and old firm club etc if we didn't get promoted. Or he decided months ago that if we didn't offer 3 years he would go somewhere that would offer him that. And maybe SFC decided months ago that we were never going to offer him three years under any circumstances.

We have no idea that the club "handled it badly" at all. Different parties wanting different things.

Thanks for half a season in three years Ross.

[ChrisPY]

3 minutes ago, CB Fry said:

For all we know Ross decided months ago that he wanted to go back to Scotland/join and old firm club etc if we didn't get promoted. Or he decided months ago that if we didn't offer 3 years he would go somewhere that would offer him that. And maybe SFC decided months ago that we were never going to offer him three years under any circumstances.

We have no idea that the club "handled it badly" at all. Different parties wanting different things.

Thanks for half a season in three years Ross.

We had the power to trigger a pre agreed one year extension. Ross had no additional input in if we chose to trigger it or not.

[trousers]

7 minutes ago, ChrisPY said:

We had the power to trigger a pre agreed one year extension. Ross had no additional input in if we chose to trigger it or not.

Yep... A power that Ross granted us when he signed the contract....

[Challenger]

Bye, make sure you don't pick up an injury any time soon.

[MB]

Good player but made of glass. No great loss. Hopefully BBD and Downes follow him out the door.

[Dr Who?]

So that new striker thread goes into full throttle. We stumbled upon a corker in Larin. So fingers crossed we land someone who can play with him up top. 

[kevdoh]

4 hours ago, Chez said:

Ipswich and Hull can offer PL football and will have the parachute payments, enabling them to offer him high wages for three years. We have one year left of our parachute payments so probably can't outbid those two. 

He's not a prem level striker though, is he?  I'm pretty sure if we knew we weren't going up the years extension would have been triggered in plenty of time. The likelihood is if we got promoted we would have let him go on a free. Probably why he has decided to leave. I'd be amazed if any prem team, newly promoted or not went in for him. He's made of glass. And he's not R9 made of glass that's worth taking a punt if you get 10 games a year out of him. He's ross stewart. Good luck to him, but he's not someone to be gutted about leaving. Personally, I think he's made an awful decision.  He's very replaceable, he isn't a Lambert or beattie, probably not even a shipperley

[Ted Bates Statue]

I was respecting the pragmatism on both sides earlier and I try to avoid counting my chickens before they've hatched ever since Lallana's pantomime act, but now I've had a few hours to stew over Stew, we spent 10M on him in 2024 and in that time we've missed out on automatic promotion twice and got humiliated in the prem. For most of that time, for all his ability he was looking like a player on the verge of retirement due to injury, a genuine passenger in our squad. Yes I know we took the risk and it's not exactly his own fault he got injured.

As an interesting comparison, David Connolly who I thought was a similar kind of permanently-injured player achieved nearly 1500 mins in his Championship promotion season, compared with Ross Stewart who barely managed 1000 this season. Tonda was very careful not to overplay him and Ross got rewarded with a call-up to Scotland as a result.

I'll always look back at that opening goal against Arsenal with fondness, but if he rocks up at one of our rivals, I will be frothing at the mouth, baying for blood and looking at hiring a hitman on the dark web.

Edited 16 hours ago by Ted Bates Statue

[woodsaint1]

Yes he did well the second half of last season, but lets not forget that he missed nearly 2 and a half seasons with bad injuries. Probably a blessing in disguise that he hasn't taken us up on the extension offer.

It frees us up to bring in a new striker and hopefully Spors can identify strike gold again (yes I know Downes was a disaster but hes done well with Scienza, Jander, Larin and Peretz).

Going into next season with a new striker, Larin and Archer, supported in attack by the likes of Scienza 🤞🏼, Azaz, Matsuki etc is a Championship promotion team on paper.

[Patrick Bateman]

At least this means I don't have to "look out for the Scotland world up results" 🤮

[Midfield_General]

8 hours ago, Ted Bates Statue said:

I was respecting the pragmatism on both sides earlier and I try to avoid counting my chickens before they've hatched ever since Lallana's pantomime act, but now I've had a few hours to stew over Stew, we spent 10M on him in 2024 and in that time we've missed out on automatic promotion twice and got humiliated in the prem. For most of that time, for all his ability he was looking like a player on the verge of retirement due to injury, a genuine passenger in our squad. Yes I know we took the risk and it's not exactly his own fault he got injured.

As an interesting comparison, David Connolly who I thought was a similar kind of permanently-injured player achieved nearly 1500 mins in his Championship promotion season, compared with Ross Stewart who barely managed 1000 this season. Tonda was very careful not to overplay him and Ross got rewarded with a call-up to Scotland as a result.

I'll always look back at that opening goal against Arsenal with fondness, but if he rocks up at one of our rivals, I will be frothing at the mouth, baying for blood and looking at hiring a hitman on the dark web.

He was also injured when we signed him. 

Saints knew the risks they were taking on when they signed an injured player. They took the calculated gamble, paying a lower fee than he would otherwise have been worth, thinking they could rehabilitate him and turn it into a bargain, but knowing the flip side was that they’d have to pay him whether they were successful or not. That’s on Saints, not Stewart. No-one forced us to sign him. 

He served out the terms of his contract. He’s not obliged to sign any new contract we put in front of him, regardless of terms. It’s his choice if he thinks he can then get a better offer somewhere else. 

Having said all that, It’s a very big risk going into the intense conditions of tournament football with his injury record and without a signed contract with someone. He’s taken a huge gamble there. 

Edited 8 hours ago by Midfield_General

[Gloucester Saint]

10 hours ago, MB said:

Good player but made of glass. No great loss. Hopefully BBD and Downes follow him out the door.

Agree although Downs rather than Downes…

[CB Fry]

5 minutes ago, Midfield_General said:

They took the calculated gamble, paying a lower fee than he would otherwise have been worth, thinking they could rehabilitate him and turn it into a bargain

This is a rewriting of history.

£10m from Sunderland offf the back of half a season in the Championship.

Sunderland did not want to sell but couldn't turn us down and RS wanted the move.

The idea that we snapped up a cheap bargain as a gamble because he was injured is bullshit.

The manager wanted us to sign Ross Stewart because he was a good striker and we paid heavily for him. 

Edited 8 hours ago by CB Fry

[Midfield_General]

8 minutes ago, CB Fry said:

This is a rewriting of history.

£10m from Sunderland offf the back of half a season in the Championship.

Sunderland did not want to sell but couldn't turn us down and RS wanted the move.

The idea that we snapped up a cheap bargain as a gamble because he was injured is bullshit.

The manager wanted us to sign Ross Stewart because he was a good striker and we paid heavily for him. 

I must be remembering it wrong then as that’s how I remember it. 

Fair enough if that’s not right - happy to be corrected. 

Edit: He had been out injured for 8 months when we signed him though. We signed him in September and he’d not played since January because of an Achilles injury:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/66681314

Edited 7 hours ago by Midfield_General

[Gloucester Saint]

9 minutes ago, CB Fry said:

This is a rewriting of history.

£10m from Sunderland offf the back of half a season in the Championship.

Sunderland did not want to sell but couldn't turn us down and RS wanted the move.

The idea that we snapped up a cheap bargain as a gamble because he was injured is bullshit.

The manager wanted us to sign Ross Stewart because he was a good striker and we paid heavily for him. 

Considering he was out of contract at the end of that season and wouldn’t be fit until autumn 2023 realistically at best (ha!) it was a serious overpay from the club. Sunderland reinvested rather effectively too. Thank goodness Che’s move to Wolves fell through for 2023/24…

Ross is a good striker as he showed in the second half of last season but half a season out of three wasn’t worth a gamble on the three year contract his agent probably wanted. Nothing against the lad and good luck other than against us, but I genuinely didn’t think we should extend on the terms likely to be asked for.

[swedish dave]

all things considered, he DAJFU when it mattered although Ironically all that good effort came to

nothing in the end and we are still In the Championship. He did well to play those 45/60 min. spells 

in switching with Larin,  which probably helped his rehab back into the football world.

Do I feel a miffed about his leaving ? .a bit,  especially after our medics nursed him to fitness for 

the best part of 2 years, but there maybe other factors, other than the money.

There is a certain kind of; London and Northern players who just can't "settle" down South and he 

is about as Scots as they come, or maybe " family issues" mean that he didn't want to stay here ?

 

If he's hoping for a good World Cup, then another club might make him an offer ..etc, but it wouldn't

surprise me to see him going back North of the border. 

[CB Fry]

18 minutes ago, Midfield_General said:

I must be remembering it wrong then as that’s how I remember it. 

Fair enough if that’s not right - happy to be corrected. 

Edit: He had been out injured for 8 months when we signed him though. We signed him in September and he’d not played since January because of an Achilles injury:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/66681314

I'm not saying he wasn’t injured when we signed him, we all know he was.

You're making out we signed him on the cheap because he was injured which is not true.

He wasn't cheap on any measure, especially as he had played half a season in the Championship in his entire career.

The gamble we took was not "let's buy this injured guy cheap and maybe it'll work".

It was "this guy won't be injured for long and when he's fit he will score the goals to get us promoted. And lets chuck ten million quid at it". He would have easily have been one of the biggest transfer outlays of that summer.

Edited 7 hours ago by CB Fry

[Sheaf Saint]

Honestly, the state of some of these comments on this and the transfer window thread. Fuck me! 🤦

Apparently grown adults wishing a serious injury on someone just for doing what every single one of us would do in the same situation and making a decision that he thinks is best for him and his family... Have a word with yourselves FFS.

He owes SFC nothing. Yes he was injured a lot of his time here, but let's not pretend that we 'stuck by him' out of a sense of charity or moral duty. We took a calculated risk in signing him when he was still injured and went into that contract eyes wide open but it backfired, that's all.

None of us know his personal circumstances. None of us know what's gone on in his head through all that time he was out injured. He might not have ever truly settled in the south and maybe wanted out at the end of his contract anyway. Maybe he's got elderly relatives back in Scotland that he wants to be nearer to. Maybe he actually does want to stay, but a new contract need to be drafted and agreed for that to happen because the old one has legally expired. Can anyone here honestly say they wouldn't at least try to negotiate for a bit more in similar circumstances? 

When he was fit, he never shirked and always put in his best efforts, and scored some cracking and important goals for us. I have no ill feeling towards him for simply deciding he wants to go elsewhere, and thank him for those moments if he has indeed played his last game for us.

But just to be clear - we couldn't legally activate the extension when we wanted to, thanks to the EFL. That's not him 'getting out of it on a technicality', it's just the absolute reality of the situation. But according to some of you, he's just a selfish, ungrateful twat/cock/snake (all actual words some of you have used). 

I fucking despair with this place sometimes.

Edited 7 hours ago by Sheaf Saint

[Zorba]

He’ll be the talisman in that Scotland squad..

They’ll all be “back in 2 weeks”.

[trousers]

3 minutes ago, Sheaf Saint said:

grown adults

As my old grandma Molly used to say... "Never assume"...