andy steel
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Everything posted by andy steel
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Or ask them to shrug it off, as you or I would assuredly do with any knocking piece written by Them!
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I disagree a bit' date=' I think Alexscott's point about expecting support for the forces as a whole being forthcoming - and being visibly forthcoming, or else - is a valid and unsettling one & I don't like it one bit. My issue is with the expression of such a dissenting view [i']during[/i] Remembrance Sunday itself - I just think that is being rude to those people who don't swallow the media line but for whatever private reasons of their own find solace in the two minute's silence. There is a legitimate debate to be had, but surely not on this day of all days.
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Oh how I wish....I would absolutely love a day in court over such a trifle as that piece. The whole process would be ripe for satirising.
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Good Lord! I wonder why? The use of the word 'fucking', or 'shit'perhaps? I find it hard to believe that it was such a hard hitting and perceptive article that the alarm bells started ringing at Parkhead and SFA headquarters! I can't say as I give a monkey's, but that is odd.
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I usually avoid commenting on these kinds of threads on the day itself because I know I am very much in a minority, and have no wish to hurt the feelings of anyone else at a sensitive time. But this politicising of the poppy seems like a red herring to me, as much as I respect AlexScott's opinion above. You don't have to buy into the standard media ideal to observe a minute' silence. If you don't agree with bits of it, disagree after the day and don't disrupt those who have no issue with it. I had a lovely two minutes in my garden this morning, thinking about the family members who fell during WW2 and the effects that had on my beloved Grannies. Beautiful crisp sunshine and another 12 hardwood rose cuttings planted in all their memories. That does for me. I didn't go to any official ceremony, but there was no need to poke them in the eye either. Observing good manners is not an endorsement of military crimes, it really isn't.
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That's true enough, and makes Neil's moaning even less convincing. I'll follow your example and get my tulips in.
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I watched Sydney FC v Melbourne Victory on Saturday morning and you're right, the standard is pretty poor. Granted the first half saw 5 goals, a red card, a penalty, the home side go 2-0 and then 3-2 up after a comeback, but the standard was poor. But what I took from it was that if you have an audience and you market the product properly the lack of quality can be overcome (or hidden, to be more honest). The Aussies have modern stadia and I assume (soccer being a minority sport) they have competitive pricing in place, because there was a decent crowd there, including about 1,000 away fans: my Oz geography is not that great but I do know it's a big place, so that's quite something. The only natural advantage they have over us is that their time difference means they can play at the unappealling-to-British-clubs 9am Saturday morning slot; everything else they have, they have created by means of marketing. Compare that to us! I grant you dealing with the mentalists in the game is not easy, but our current policy of cravenly letting them run the game is not good for the future.
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You may say I'm leaping to conclusions here...but I don't think he likes us very much.
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FWIW I thought Eric Ferguson was going to be the dog's bollocks.
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Weird! I certainly have little desire to play that mob, but it would be hoping for too much that they would, in a fit of self-righteousness noteworthy even by their standards, refuse to play us and gift us 12 points a season when we get back up.
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Your Sunday morning thoughts on the man who needs a grievance like normal people need air. The SPFL are coming under fire from the permanently disaffected manager of celtc, Neil Lennon this weekend. The monotonous drone of the Ulsterman complaining is as much part of the landscape in Scots football as long balls, a lying media and lunatic supporters, but this time some may feel he has a point: sending his team north to Dingwall immediately after a Champions League match, in which he and his footballing troubadours carry the hopes and good wishes of all Scottish fitba fans, seems scant reward. Leaving Holland immediately after their game - unsurprisingly, given the state his club's supporters left it in - Lennon's team will have gone to bed late on Thursday morning, possibly coming in for light physio or a rubdown that afternoon, leaving only Friday for the tactical plans for the Ross County game to be discussed and players assessed. One session is not enough for any coach to form a coherent plan, but is Neilly right to have a good at the SPFL? I don't think so, since it's the TV companies who are calling the shots. And since the SPFL, which is in effect run by his boss at celtc, Mr Lawwell, signed up to the deal it's a bit rich complaining about it now. The bad luck for celtc is that this weekend is a Super Sunday in England, with first Spurs v Newcastle at lunchtime; then Sunderland v Man City; topped off with the mouth watering Man U v Arsenal clash in the evening. They don't even have space to fit in the always pleasing Swansea game, so what chance of them fitting in what is, frankly, a game which won't interest anyone outside of Celtic or Ross County fans? With FA Cup kicking off this weekend as well, there was no space on the Monday night schedule for the celtc game; and it obviously couldn't be played on Friday night. The bottom line is that the game panicked and sold a rubbish deal to Sky & BT; the only teams they are interested in are Rangers and celtc; therefore they will do as they are told and lump it. The sight of SPFL bigwigs in China this weekend crowing about another deal - £20m this time, which unless it is broken up in a hugely unfair manner means an average of £50,000 per club; one might even raise the spectre of sporting integrity here - drives home the mistake they made when signing up to Sky. The need to get the game on TV and bring in some money is seen as paramount, not just for financial reasons but also because they were terrified lest the absence of Rangers drive away coverage, revealing the rest of the game outwith four Old Firm clashes to be what it is - of no interest to TV companies. All right, if they feel that way, sod them! I might not care about Dundee United games but no doubt Dundee Utd fans do, shouldn't the SPFL be looking after them first? I might not ever look at a St Mirren game but I imagine Saints fans do; why aren't the SPFL watching out for their interests? It's all been said before, but poor old Lenny's latest whinge brings us back to where we started: small leagues and 4 games a season is killing the game, and instead of finding some medicine we are doing the equivalent of buying smack from Sky and ignoring the real issues. Lennon is right that the SPFL is out to lunch: but given who runs it and given which club it appears to be run for the exclusive benefit of, whose fault is that? The chance was there to revamp the game and instead the head burying, the claims of a bright new dawn, the willful refusal to notice the ever emptying stands and the ever diminishing quality goes on. I watched AFC Wimbledon v Coventry last night and the London club had better players than I saw watching Ross County v Inverness the week before. This is not something that fills me with joy but there's no point lying about it. Anyway, no need to run crying to the press, Neil. Just walk along the corridor to Mr Lawwell's office and get him to explain why his Professional Game Board signed up to a shit TV deal. I warn you in advance though, you won't like the answer: because when it comes to football on Sky or BT, celtc (or Scotland) doesn't count for a fart. The shoehorning in of this celtc game at Ross County is proof if ever it were needed that we are nothing more than an afterthought once the real games, the proper football, has been scheduled in. Perhaps in the future we will reject a deal which doesn't allow a certain percentage of each club's games to be played at 3 on a Saturday. Since in effect this only applies to two clubs it ought not be that difficult to manage. Perhaps the resultant coverage of other teams will spread TV money a bit more fairly, creating a more level playing field. Perhaps more fans may turn out to watch if teams play with less fear, although it may be too late already. But perhaps the people who dropped the game in the shit will have the decency to stop moaning about it when they get some on their shoes.
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Tbf Pete, every club in Britain outstrips the Tims at this fairly simple act of remembrance.
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You see the town of Amsterdam ankle deep in garbage and call it 'impeccable behaviour'. Not by my book.
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The idea that a support the size of celtc's doesn't contain a proportion of drunken neds is comical. It is fun watching them trying to more or less beatify their support, though, when the evidence points so emphatically the other way.
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Craig Whyte links with nominated advisor Daniel Stewart & co?
andy steel replied to the gunslinger's topic in Rangers Chat
I think the biggest mistake the requisitioners have made is to back off from an EGM to avoid 'costing the club money'. Giving these people time is a bad, bad idea. -
Fair point.
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If all fans left was wrappers, paper hats and confetti you might have a point. If cities welcomed football fans the way they do New Years' revellers you might have a point. But they don't. In Manchester, there's no doubt that the number of people compressed into a small area and the total lack of facilities on offer by a council and police service who seemed hell bent on pretending it wasn't happening contributed to the temporary 'Mare Urina' which swept, like a warm yellow tsunami, through the Lancashire town that fateful day. Nevertheless, the sight of so many Bears roaming the streets with a slab under each arm - a slab, for fuck sake, that's 48 cans - just about knocked me down, which is much the effect it seems to have had on the Bears in question. MCC & GMP's being utterly useless and, indeed, complicit, for a lot of what happened and how it was reported doesn't go so far as forcing the lager down those throats. There's no comparison between the welcome or the culture of organised festive celebrations, even Edinburgh's boozy Hogmanay, and the behaviour Scottish fans display abroad. It's a false argument to defend what seems to me to be anti-social loutishness which, while I may expect it from them (actually I know loads of them who are perfectly nice people and wouldn't dream of behaving in such a way) I hate to see it from anyone in a Blue shirt. No doubt the same people rolling about blootered imagine they are carrying on the traditions of Struth et al. I can't see it.
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Rangers 3 - 1 Dunfermline (Jig 70 pen, Daly 77, Mohnsi 90)
andy steel replied to Frankie's topic in Rangers Chat
Sorry to be negative, but I think the reason he doesn't do very well is that he isn't especially good. Any player with ability ought to have spent the last 18 months having an absolute ball, doing tricks, bagging hat-tricks and accepting the inevitable boots on the ankle as tribute. Aird & MacKay must be looking at that spot in the team/on the bench and thinking 'that's up for grabs. No way is he better than me'. -
or, Got those Puritan Blues again! Plenty of other titles by the MenInBlack come to mind this morning after another night of dispiriting Scottish drunkeness/loutishness/hooliganism/complete innocence punished by heavy handed policing (delete according to level of delusion). Get a Grip on Yourself, Straighten Out, Hanging Around and maybe some advice our hoopy cousins should have listened to, Walk on By. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohRbJJohv6Y But before we get any further on, I want to be clear that this is not a celtc-bashing piece. The target is Scottish people in general, although it may prove impossible not to let some shadenfreude through the editorial filter. When we went to Manchester, I was amazed, on my return, to discover I had been amongst not Bluenoses, as I had imagined, but thousands of undercover celtc fans, all secretly taking notes and making detailed reports on the goins-on. How else to explain the hordes who bombarded the phone lines and newspapers with denunciations of our bestiality, our anti-social behaviour, our boorishness? Having spent 8 hours in that dreary city as we lost the UEFA Final, I saw precisely no trouble. Zero. I did see loads and loads of steaming Bears, though, and I did have to pick my way through the ad hoc canals of pish which added a new, if not especially fragrant, item to the Mancunian tourist itinerary. It was just plain embarrassing. Like when you go on holiday and the wee dicks who are the most pished and the least able to handle it are always Jocks. When the Tartan Army visited Paris for the game in which James McFadden scored that wonder goal, Youtube was ablaze with many clips of boozed up fans celebrating before and after. It also showed the City of Lights ankle deep in empty cans and bottles...it was a clash between the free market, desperate to exploit visiting fans for their last Euro, and the freedom from responsibility, a trip abroad and the throwing off of any need to act like an adult. And now, when celtc descend upon Amsterdam, it looks (and probably smells) much the same. And no doubt tonight the phone ins will be hot with callers either berating the police for beating the fans or berating the panellists for not berating the celtc fans. I won't be listening, for there's nothing to be gained on that ground. Either putting the boot in (metaphorically) or absolving the celtc support of any blame is equally useless: what's needed is a collective, society wide frown upon people aged between 15-75 staggering around blind drunk just because they have travelled a few miles to a football game. I'm not calling for some Calvinistic temperance pledge here: I'm not teetotal. But I'm 42 and I know how much to have and when to stop. Anyone who likes football and doesn't know that, in 2013, if you are part of a big crowd which is pished up the cops are going to go in at some point is deluded. It always happens. The level of reporting may vary, but it always happens. Police forces, especially larger municipal forces, are conditioned to treat such crowds as the enemy and given the state various Scottish clubs and the national team's fans have left behind them, who can blame them? The bottom line is that if we carry on treating European away days as a gigantic piss up we have only ourselves to blame when the coppers wade in. Any media excuses over the next few days will do nothing other than guarantee it will happen again, and again, and again. But the day the likes of the desperately proletarian Keith Jackson come out and decry excessive drinking in a footballing context there will be two blue moons in the sky: despite not actually being a manual worker, he and his like for some reason feel a desperate need to come across as connected to the horny handed sons of the soil who attend the game in Scotland. Never mind that Scotland has been, for decades, a service economy. Let's play up to the hard working, hard drinking stereotype because that will make us more manly. Like some Bluenoses who automatically class anyone who doesn't buy the LUMP mentality as a handwringer, a wuss. It's pitiful and immature, no better than playground name calling, but when you have the power of the media behind you it is also dangerous. Sad to say, the only media person who might actually oppose such behaviour would be Graham Spiers, but he would be unlikely to risk his special pet status amongst the hooped fanbase to actually have the courage of his convictions and speak out. We shall see, I suppose. In the end, it's pretty black and white. You can go to Europe's famous footballing cities, get hammered on booze and then get hammered by the cops. Or, you can go, have a few drinks, and come home without a cracked skull. It's a simple, easy message and one which any media with an ounce of social responsibility would have been hammering home years ago. No it doesn't rule out being attacked by cops on the edge of a nervous breakdown but it does provide you with a hell of a better defence is you are actually able to stand up while being attacked. Outside of ourselves, who are as we know an irredeemable collection of neanderthal knuckle draggers who ought to be put out of our misery asap, Scotland likes to think of its' football fans as a jolly lot, welcome everywhere and ambassadors for the nation. Short of putting forward The Krankies, Kevin Bridges and Craig Whyte I can't think a less funny line up, and the sooner we start reinforcing this message the sooner scenes like last night will be a thing of the past. Something better change, indeed.
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I likewise take your point, Barca, but let's face it, they are Scottish. I'm not going to join them in their lunatic cultural schizophrenia - they have grown up Scotsmen in a Scottish culture. If they want to indulge in the 21st century equivalent of 'blacking up' by going all Oirish for the football, that's their business.
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Only read the first wee bit and then decided against polluting my brain with the rest. Drivel.
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Dirty Bhoy! The state of that square with empties is just plain embarrassing, I don't care who you support. Fucking cavemen.
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Leaving aside any sort of 'who's worse' tombola, watching the various Youtube clips just drives home how grossly uncultured Scots fans are when abroad at a game. The ground in the city centre is littered with empties, just littered with them. Various fans stumble past, clutching vast cargoes of swally. The clink of broken glass - never a good sound when coppers are around - is audible at every step. No doubt the reek of piss rises from the historic cobblestones this morning. It's the same when we go abroad, it's the same when the much vaunted Tartan Army go abroad, plainly it's the same with Timothy. What a bunch of tits Scots are sometimes.
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Soon be clear anyway, when those charged are revealed to be called Zlatan, or Jean-Marc, or Pim, or some other non-Sots/Irish names.
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Yes! That's what's been missing, a fans' group headed up by a Messianic New Testament Leadership Cultist. Like Bill, I can see light at the end of the tunnel as well. If it turns out to be a train and he'd driving, I shall lay me down upon the tracks.