Latest news with #AdamWebb
BBC News
3 hours ago
- Sport
- BBC News
Webb believes recruitment mistakes behind Saints
St Johnstone owner Adam Webb believes the summer planning at McDiarmid Park has been "night and day" in comparison to when he walked in the door 12 months ago, when recruitment mistakes were made. (The Courier), externalJosh Rae, the 24-year-old goalkeeper who has joined Raith Rovers permanently from St Johnstone, has revealed he rejected a move to Atletico Madrid at the age of 13. (The Courier), externalRead Sunday's Scottish Gossip in full here.
Glasgow Times
14-06-2025
- Politics
- Glasgow Times
Scottish clubs set to push for football alcohol ban lift
The moves comes after St Johnstone chairman Adam Webb branded the current legislation 'discriminatory' and 'offensive.' St Johnstone are one of a number of clubs pursuing applications to establish pre-match fan zones next season. And the Scottish football authorities hope the widespread implementation of controlled zones selling alcohol to fans in supervised conditions will persuade Holyrood to relax a ban introduced as a response to disorder between Rangers and Celtic fans at the 1980 Scottish Cup final. Read more: First Minister John Swinney recently warned that the government were 'not sympathetic' to the idea of reviewing the legislation. Privately, however, senior figures inside Hampden believe that stance could change after next year's Scottish parliamentary elections. Successful fan zones up and down the country, they believe, can hope to accelerate the process. St Johnstone chairman Webb told Herald Sport: 'We intend to have a fan zone operating before our games and if you do that for a season and there are no reports to the police of any problems then it should be able to be expanded. 'We need to take gradual steps and adopt a logical, rational approach instead of the current one size fits all. 'The situation is unique to Scottish football and the 'one size fits all' attitude is so unfair. It makes no sense. 'We understand that there has been violence at certain games and certain clubs and that the police probably ought to have a role in whether or how alcohol can be sold at certain games. I get that. 'But when Saints are playing clubs where there is no real history of animosity in the Championship and we still can't have an open situation where people who want to drink can have a beer then that makes no sense. 'Where there is a game where violence might be anticipated, then conditions will be placed upon alcohol sales. We understand that, but I think it's time to take it forward and review this. 'You look at other sports in Scotland enjoy carte blanche to sell alcohol, like rugby. 'That would anger me as a Scottish football fan and I would be lobbying my political parties and if they heard that from enough fans, loudly enough, then maybe the law would change and we wouldn't have to be sneaking around the edges on this. 'The ban is discriminatory, it's offensive and it makes all football fans out to be hooligans. And that's just not true. 'There are clubs and games where there would be no problem at all and this law has to go. 'I'm okay with gradual change, but we can't just take no for an answer forever.' Mindful of the divisive nature of the debate, Webb believes fan zones are a logical starting point. 'Let's make sure everyone feels comfortable about it. In the Premiership there is obviously more sensitivity and concern, but you could still have some test policies, some test program, that could be tried out over a season. New things could be tried.' While the SPFL and SFA have continued to quietly lobby the Scottish Government on the issue, their cause was undermined by various instances of crowd disorder towards the end of the season. Scenes in Glasgow city centre were followed by a bottle being thrown on the pitch during the Rangers-Celtic game at Ibrox, while Aberdeen defender Jack McKenzie was struck on the face by the back of a seat thrown from the stand during a game against Dundee United. In a statement yesterday the SPFL revealed that notices of complaints have now been raised against Aberdeen, Celtic and Partick Thistle over incidents which occurred at the end of the season.'
The National
14-06-2025
- Politics
- The National
Scottish clubs set to push for football alcohol ban lift
The moves comes after St Johnstone chairman Adam Webb branded the current legislation 'discriminatory' and 'offensive.' St Johnstone are one of a number of clubs pursuing applications to establish pre-match fan zones next season. And the Scottish football authorities hope the widespread implementation of controlled zones selling alcohol to fans in supervised conditions will persuade Holyrood to relax a ban introduced as a response to disorder between Rangers and Celtic fans at the 1980 Scottish Cup final. Read more: First Minister John Swinney recently warned that the government were 'not sympathetic' to the idea of reviewing the legislation. Privately, however, senior figures inside Hampden believe that stance could change after next year's Scottish parliamentary elections. Successful fan zones up and down the country, they believe, can hope to accelerate the process. St Johnstone chairman Webb told Herald Sport: 'We intend to have a fan zone operating before our games and if you do that for a season and there are no reports to the police of any problems then it should be able to be expanded,. 'We need to take gradual steps and adopt a logical, rational approach instead of the current one size fits all. 'The situation is unique to Scottish football and the 'one size fits all' attitude is so unfair. It makes no sense. 'We understand that there has been violence at certain games and certain clubs and that the police probably ought to have a role in whether or how alcohol can be sold at certain games. I get that. 'But when Saints are playing clubs where there is no real history of animosity in the Championship and we still can't have an open situation where people who want to drink can have a beer then that makes no sense. 'Where there is a game where violence might be anticipated, then conditions will be placed upon alcohol sales. We understand that, but I think it's time to take it forward and review this. 'You look at other sports in Scotland enjoy carte blanche to sell alcohol, like rugby. 'That would anger me as a Scottish football fan and I would be lobbying my political parties and if they heard that from enough fans, loudly enough, then maybe the law would change and we wouldn't have to be sneaking around the edges on this. 'The ban is discriminatory, it's offensive and it makes all football fans out to be hooligans And that's just not true. 'There are clubs and games where there would be no problem at all and this law has to go. 'I'm okay with gradual change, but we can't just take no for an answer forever.' Mindful of the divisive nature of the debate, Webb believes fan zones are a logical starting point. 'Let's make sure everyone feels comfortable about it. In the Premiership there is obviously more sensitivity and concern, but you could still have some test policies, some test program, that could be tried out over a season. New things could be tried.' While the SPFL and SFA have continued to quietly lobby the Scottish Government on the issue, their cause was undermined by various instances of crowd disorder towards the end of the season. Scenes in Glasgow city centre were followed by a bottle being thrown on the pitch during the Rangers-Celtic game at Ibrox, while Aberdeen defender Jack McKenzie was struck on the face by the back of a seat thrown from the stand during a game against Dundee United. In a statement yesterday the SPFL revealed that notices of complaints have now been raised against Aberdeen, Celtic and Partick Thistle over incidents which occurred at the end of the season.'
BBC News
20-05-2025
- Business
- BBC News
'No regrets' - Saints owners focused on 'making club great again'
St Johnstone chief executive Francis Smith says the club's American owner Adam Webb has "no regrets at all" about getting involved, despite his first season at the helm ending in businessman Adam Webb took control at McDiarmid Park last summer. However, despite replacing manager Craig Levein with Simo Valakari last October, the club finished bottom and will play in the second tier next season for the first time in 16 years."No regrets at all, Adam and the investors are focused on making this club great again," Smith told BBC Scotland."So they are going to work hard, the ones that are on the board will work with us other directors to make sure the club continues to be a sustainable model."We want to get through the [next] season without making too much of a loss because we want to make sure that when we come back to the Premiership we are focused and ready to fight for top six."Smith added: "Nobody has made a boob, they bought the club, they said at the start they are in here for the long haul."They are here to rebuild St Johnstone, build the infrastructure, give us the tools to be a successful club."It won't be this rebuild every year after year. Now we are at the bottom, we will rebuild and make it sustainable for the future."Smith stressed the importance of getting promoted from the Championship at the first attempt and says Valakari will be given the tools to enable him to do winning a remarkable domestic cup double four years ago, it has been a steady decline for St Johnstone, culminating in this season's relegation."We can only assess what we have been involved in, so we can only assess from August to now," said Smith."We have given extra money where we can, we have appointed a manager who has an enthusiastic approach to football, but again maybe it comes down to past recruitment and things like that that. Maybe we have not had the best players or the best value players to sell on."St Johnstone is a club that needs to bring in youth players that become either good assets on the park or sellable assets to allow us to work as a good sustainable club, that is what St Johnstone do."We will probably post a profit again this year from the Premiership and then going into the Championship we will look probably to make that loss."But we are focused on rebuilding the club, we have been making all these little changes around the stadium and the infrastructure and things like that and we have obviously backed Simo in January, we brought players in – was that too late? Potentially it was."
BBC News
16-05-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
'It meant everything' - Valakari eager to repay Saints faith
Simo Valakari says the backing of St Johnstone owner Adam Webb "meant everything" as he looks to lead the club back to the top 16-year Premiership stay was ended in midweek when the 2-1 defeat by Hearts consigned the Perth side side to the who took charge in October, remains as head coach after Webb insisted the Finn was "just getting started on the project to return St Johnstone to its glory days"."It meant everything to me," Valakari said. "The first day he signed me, he put faith in me and I feel it most that I could not do it [keep St Johnstone up]."We're all disappointed about the results, all disappointed about the outcomes. Of course, we need to understand that nothing is guaranteed in football."That's why, yes, it was good from our club, from Adam, to make it clear again that this is what we are, that's where we go and now we start working on it."When I first came here, we already started to work on two sides. We had this short term that we wanted to stay in the Premiership. I need to be very, very clear, we wanted really badly to stay in the Premiership and do the rebuilding in the Premiership."We could not do it, so now we are in the Championship and the rebuilding continues. On the football side, all the aspects of the club have been together, but now because we know where we are, we can open it. We only have one plan and we start working towards it."
