JohnMc

Condolences Graham, I hope you and your family are managing at this difficult time.

I For all they've lost Stewart and he was an important player for them I was still impressed with their January signings. Alex Bruce should be more than capable at SPFL level, the young lad from Liverpool seems to be rated very highly and Mulumbu was one of their best players last season, getting him back is a good bit of business. I wouldn't discount them just yet, they'll beat most sides particularly at home.

Clarke's talking about refs and Rangers because that means he doesn't need to explain how his side lost to Hearts on Friday.

I did the Football Aid Rangers charity match towards the end of that season. We got a 'training session' at Auchenhowie as an extra surprise, Bobby Russell and a couple of the youth coaches putting a diverse mixture of supporters through a really enjoyable couple of hours on the pitches followed by a tour of the facility. In the 1st team dressing room there was a noticeboard. On it there was a memo from McLeish to all the players warning them that it was compulsory to eat lunch together after training. It had come to his attention that some players were sloping off straight after training and that they were a team and there was a league to win and he expected everyone to be focussed on that. We all read it and all had the same opinion; nae chance. Couldn't see Celtic slipping up. A further reminder that I know very little about football.

Well he's got Tav clear on the right for a flighted pass, Halliday is pulling away from his man onto the left, Jack can come short for a quick pass to feet and back to Worrell again to create space in behind him, McAuley can come to him either taking the pass or drawing the attacker creating even more space for Tav and of course McGregor is clear behind him. He had options, he just wanted too much time and took none of them.

Yes, money and reputation will always hold a huge appeal I agree, but maybe some will think twice as it's not like smaller EPL sides, far less German ones, are paying YTS salaries. I've certainly not judged Gilmour as a player, just his choice of club to join. There will always be outliers however Chelsea in particular are terrible at promoting young players into their first team. Indeed Chelsea's entire youth set up seems to be geared to create players to sell to smaller clubs and generate income, rather than create players to play for Chelsea. Fair enough if that is their strategy, but it's a cold, heartless one and goes against my views on what football is about. That said so much of modern football appals me that my transformation into Victor Meldrew is almost complete.

Our system nullified our full backs last night. Tav in particular really missed Candeias and so we missed our right flank. I was surprised Dafoe started, I assumed he'd be a player we used from the bench, either to replace Morelos after he'd ran himself ragged or to change formation for the last 15 mins if we're chasing a goal. Kilmarnock played well though, their number 8 was the best player on the pitch I thought, he controlled the midfield and the tempo of the match. Jones had an outstanding spell in the second half, I was really impressed by him having previously been a bit meh about him. I do think though that it was just one of those nights. We gifted them the first and the second, although from 25 yards I don't think he should be able to score, but they didn't create much apart from that whereas their keeper had a couple of good saves and we'd one off the post and a penalty claim that on another day would have been given. It's frustrating and we really didn't work hard enough or smart enough, but let's not overreact, there's still a long way to go and other teams will drop points at Rugby Park too.

With the recent trend of young English players leaving Man City for first team football elsewhere, I wonder if the English super-rich clubs might start to find it harder to attract the Billy Gilmours of this world. If someone like Ruben Loftus Cheek, an established England international, can't get into the Chelsea first team, what message does that send to the youth coming through below him? I thought Gilmour was badly advised at the time and nothing I've seen since has changed my mind. He'd have been much better off either staying with us or moving to Southampton or Everton or a side with a track record of promoting and nurturing youth, he'd still have been handsomely rewarded.

Great preview 26th, bravo. Tonight will be first away match of the season and my first trip to Rugby Park in a very long time. Hope the match is as good as the preview.

Bump.

It's strange signing as by all accounts Stewart didn't do all that well their last season. Maybe Aberdeen just want to weaken Kilmarnock in case they pip them to third...

The thought of one of our players helping Dundee Utd get promoted just sticks in my craw, as someone else said I'd rather we gave him to Ayr, Ross County or ICT, and if Hardie is going out on loan again give them him too. Dundee Utd's self inflicted spell in purgatory has often been the only moment of light relief in the last few seasons. I was reading and interview with their new American owner this week, I do so hope he turns out to be a charlatan intent on asset stripping and selling their ground to Tesco.

Only give him to Dundee Utd if he's guaranteed to remain injured for the rest of the season, otherwise give them nothing.

Surely Northern Ireland international and Corby raised Billy McKay is too?

Stewart was excellent when he was at Dundee. It's not worked at Birmingham clearly and he didn't do much at Aberdeen either, I thought he was a great loan signing at the time, shows you what I know. No doubting that Clark is getting the best out of him at Kilmarnock though. Birmingham haven't recalled him for no reason, clearly a club(s) have made an effort to sign him. I'm surprised a Hearts or a Hibs haven't made a move for him.

I'd love to see Hardie get a run of games with us. He can clearly score goals at SPFL level, whether our shirt proves too heavy for him we'll only know if he gets a chance. I'm pleased we've recalled him. The coaches will see him up close in the next couple of weeks. I'd start him against Cowdenbeath in the cup, giving Morelos an extended break. Lafferty seems to be struggling with something currently, what kind of ailment it is I'm not sure, but he's not right. Having Morelos, Defoe and Hardie in the squad for the second half of the season doesn't feel like overkill to me. We all know Morelos will be booked and probably sent off anytime he even looks the wrong way at someone, opposition players will make the most of any contact with him and no ref fancies death threats so Morelos won't get any 50/50 decisions going his way. We'll need all our strikers in the next few months.

Signing Davis and Defoe and recalling Docherty and Hardie from their loans would certainly enhance our striking options and our creativity from midfield with almost no outlay in transfer fees. We're fairly strong everywhere else, that's where we need options.

Socks Gaffer, socks, that's what you get for Christmas at my age, socks and heartburn. I'm disappointed, if not entirely surprised, that this level of in-depth, high quality, valuable analysis hasn't found an audience on here yet. I'm going to send it to Swiss Ramble on Twitter and see if we can become mates. For me I think it proves, as Livingston top the table, that crime clearly does pay. That's an important lesson for all of us particularly at this time of year.

I'm not an accountant, but I was mildly distracted this afternoon and decided to see what each point has cost each side this season. Currently Celtic are top of the league with 42 points, however with a wage bill of £59.3 million to date each point has cost them a staggering £1,411,905 each. We're second with 39 points. Our wage bill is £24.1 million, so every point has cost us £617,949 so far. That's a staggering difference and, I think, should be kept in mind when comparing us currently. That being said Aberdeen, on 36 points with a wage bill of £7.8 million, have a £ to points ratio of £216,667 Hibs, on 29 points, have a wage bill of £5.3 million, so are paying £182,759 per point, Hearts with a wage bill of £6 million are on 33 points, so £181,818 per point. Where it gets really eye-opening though is St Johnstone and Kilmarnock. I can't find published wage bill for St Johnstone so I'm going to assume it's the same as Kilmarnock's at £2.2 million. With 31 points they've 'paid' £70,968 per point and Kilmarnock, with 38 points, have paid £57,895 per point. I've not worked out the rest of the league because I can't find wage info for them, but I'm assuming St Mirren, Hamilton and Livingston are paying less than Kilmarnock and St Johnstone, while Dundee and Motherwell are probably paying around the same. That being the case if Livingston have a wage bill of £1.5 million and on 30 points they've paid around £50,000 per point. At the other end Dundee, on 10 points with a wage bill of say £2 million are paying £200,000 per point. Anyway, what does all this mean, well, frankly, absolutely nothing, other than perhaps highlighting that some managers are doing pretty well with the resources they have and some are doing poorly with what they have. I've yet to hear a word of criticism about Neil Lennon for example, yet St Johnstone, Killie, Livingston and even Hearts are out performing them this season, sort of. *Celtic and St Johnstone have played one match less.

I understand the sentiment of the thread, if not some of the comments. We don't currently have a title winning squad, and if we don't find some creativity in the transfer window, we won't win the league. But if we do, and we can keep Morelos fit (and playing for us), and someone else can contribute goals we'll still be in the hunt come March and April. We're not that far from having a good side. I disagree with those that say they can't see what the side is trying to do, for me it's pretty clear what we're trying to do, we're just not doing it very well. A midfield 3 of Coulibali, Jack and McCrorie isn't going to create many chances or contribute many goals. With Arfield, Kent, Grezda, Dorrans and Murphy unavailable we're struggling for creativity and goals from midfield. Currently everything gets shuffled wide to Candieas and Middleton and it's eventually crossed into the box. That's because we've no midfielders capable of putting their foot on the ball and picking a pass. We're also reliant on full backs overlapping, but with Barasic out we lose the left hand side. Flanagan and Halliday simply aren't left backs. You do wonder just how pissed off everyone must still be with Wallace that he can't get a start currently. In all honesty if we can get away with a draw on Saturday I'll be fairly content. Let's see what we look like at the end of January.

Much better than last week's. I've not actually listened to it yet, but I just know.

Levein has become a master at misdirection. His side are in terrible form and he should be coming under some pressure, but he keeps spinning the conversation in other directions. It's impressive in some ways.

Great idea, but don't put it outside Pacific Quay, put it outside Broadcasting House in London or Sport's HQ in Manchester.

See if you don't buy or read a newspaper, how do you know what the quality of writing is like? The 'big' papers, the London based broadsheets, a number of the international publications, still contain superb writers and a breadth of topics that can't be matched. The hyper local 'papers' contain news that simply can't be found anywhere else. The quality of writing around Scottish football is generally low and if that's all that interests someone then whether in print, or online, 'newspapers' will generally disappoint. But if you want to know about subjects beyond that then 'newspapers' are still the best source of information, opinion and depth of coverage, I my opinion of course.

I bought a newspaper yesterday (The Times), it's the first one I've read since I was on a long flight about a fortnight ago. It's actually fantastic. The 'magazine' alone has a fascinating article about triplets in America separated and put up for adoption, an interview with Lenny Kravitz daughter, a bodyguard, a woman who underwent pioneering stem cell treatment on her MS and an interview with Little Mix, that I'm hoping will make me look pretty smart to my 10 year old daughter. I'd recommend it to anyone, it's less than a couple of pounds too. I think we conflate a number of issues when we speak about the demise of newspapers. Firstly the problems with Johnston Group, the company who own the Scotsman, are unfortunately typical for a number of 'media groups'. I do genuinely think this is a bad thing, not so much for titles like The Scotsman or the Yorkshire Post, there are alternatives to them, but for the many, many smaller local titles like the Stornoway Gazette or the Southern Reporter in the Borders also owned by Johnston Group. There's not only still a desire for 'local' news but also need for it. Who will watch the councillors or the police or the land owners without them? Secondly the issues with Johnston Group, for me, are around ownership and expectation. The aforementioned Stornoway Gazette and Southern Reporter simply shouldn't be owned by hedge funds. They should be independently owned, ideally by person or people local to that area. A living can be made from a local 'paper', but it can't deliver the kind of profits demanded by stock market listed PLCs. The ownership model is wrong, not the concept itself. News in the press has been 'out-of-date' since the advent of the radio. Television has been a mainstay of our culture since the 60s, the press reporting yesterday's news has been the case for decades now. The internet has sped up the ability to follow breaking stories and general news, but newspapers were always much more than 'news'. Part of the problem for 'papers' is the change in advertising, which not only create income for papers but also drove sales. Jobs, cars, property, personal ads, local buy and sell, were reasons to buy papers. It's the loss of this that's been the main problem. Added to changing social habits such as fewer people using public transport and fewer people smoking so visiting a newsagent and buying tobacco, a packet of mints and the evening paper. Obviously us all carrying smart phones also takes away the need to buy a 'paper'. The great thing about newspapers for me is their coverage of other topics that I'd simply never read otherwise (Little Mix above for example). The internet in particular creates echo chambers, where too many people are drawn to people with the same views as them. I've basically left two other Rangers messageboards because anyone with a different view was simply shouted down. I watched the evisceration of Forlan's Sister and Gunslinger on a different messageboard with dismay. Their view went against the orthodoxy of the mods and loud voices there, yet even though it was clearly thought out and considered it was dismissed in an aggressive and intolerant way. The fact they were later proved correct is of little consolation. It is to the great credit of Frankie and the other admins on here that they both foster and encourage different views, but let's not pretend that's the norm for the internet. Newspapers have always had political bias. That's been part of their attraction for many readers. Some do occupy the middle ground and have columnists and articles from across the spectrum. Others very clearly nail their colours to a mast. That's fine too, no one makes you buy them. I guess the internet is the same, but on steroids. The coverage of Scottish football, for so long a mainstay of the Scottish press, draws criticism from many of us. But we should be careful about writing off the entire industry because of that. Does anyone think democracy is safer or better today than it was 10 or 20 years ago? Do you think people are better informed, more balanced and able to see different views? Or have we become more entrenched, more tribal, more hung up on identity than on rational experience? I know what I think. Someone needs to pay journalists to carry out the interviews, to follow the leads and to be able to compose prose that enlightens, or moves or angers us. If we lose that the only way is downwards in my opinion.