BonnybridgeICT

Worst night of my football life tonight.... and paid 15 quid for the privilege of that embarrassment of watching our reserves play. I hope some pride is restored in the league straight away.

I like the new redesign too - I only wish the club's own website was as good and up to date!

Is it not standard practice across the Scottish leagues to present the trophy to the champions at their next home game following the title being clinched, therefore against Dundee for us? This would always be the case unless the title is clinched with no home games remaining.

I'm hoping Falkirk stay up for that reason too!

Lets deal in facts - 7 goals for Scotland in 15 games. ONE of which was a penalty against Faroes. Let me run through the rest of the goals for you to clarify- GOAL 1 - v Bulgaria - "Premier League top-scorer Boyd took just 13 minutes to claim his maiden goal with a fine first-time finish as he latched on to Darren Fletcher's perfectly placed pass to lash in an angled drive. " GOAL 2 - v Bulgaria - "Boyd, however, put his side back in front two minutes before the break when he was first to react after Stoyan Kolev spilled Russell Anderson's shot following a well-placed cross by Teale." GOAL 3 - v Faroe - "Fortune continued to smile on the Scots when a penalty was given for a trip on Boyd after 23 minutes. The award looked a soft one and the Rangers striker's spot-kick was not well executed but slid under Mikkelsen." GOAL 4 - v Faroe - "Boyd doubled his tally on 38 minutes, running on to a fine Fletcher pass and slotting into an empty net after Mikkelsen had blocked his initial shot." GOAL 5 - v Georgia - "Kris Boyd opened the scoring, heading home from a precise Gary Teale cross in the 11th minute." GOAL 6 - v S Africa - "Scotland improved after the break and Boyd scored with a half-volley after 71 minutes following a superb ball from captain Darren Fletcher." GOAL 7 - v Lithuania - "A glancing header from Kris Boyd gave the Scots a half-time lead." Quotes from BBC website via links from Wikipedia. Consider also that he has only made 6 starts in full international matches, in which he scored 6 goals. 8 of his caps were as a substitute (3 of which were in the last 10 mins of the game, including one where he came on in the 90th min, while a further 2 were in 70mins+). Info for this came from the SFA website. Yes, the 'ugly' Boyd apparently only scores penalties for Scotland. :D Personally speaking, I think Boyd needs to play in a set-up where he is supported by a 'work horse' striking partner. Sometimes this isn't an option/luxury that Scotland can work with in a game where we are playing against a top side and are playing for a draw or stolen goal. However, in the opportunities that he has been given for Scotland, the FACTS show that he has actually returned a decent scoring record.

What a terrible start to the year for you. Hope he sees sense soon. You could maybe try that aversion therapy to try to cure him of this affliction - maybe a Celtic shirt wired up to some form of electro-shock device?

I watched the old firm game as my wife's family are all Celtic fans. I thought it was pretty entertaining, if a bit one-sided. Certainly plenty of chances and only a cracking save and some awful finishing kept Celtic from winning. I can't wait to read the morning papers and read all the (no doubt) 'outrage' from one side of the OF about the disallowed goal. In the spirit of it being a competitive game where you want to see meaty challenges etc then it was a very soft foul... however, fact is, it was a foul and therefore technically correct to be disallowed. The replays clearly showed fortune's arm nudging McGregor's arm before Fortune then headed the ball, thus impeding McGregor after he had both hands on the ball in the air. The controversy that will rage on about the disallowed goal will of course ignore the fact that, for all their dominance, Celtic were pretty poor up front, with the exception of McDonald, and should have killed the game off easily. The other incident where Lafferty was shown a yellow card for his studs up challenge.... thought he was very very lucky to still be on the pitch. I can only think that the ref maybe didn't quite see just how high his boot was. I expected a red card to be shown. The thing that annoys me about the OF games is that any semi-contraversial incident is blown up into a major talking point that is debated and analysed for weeks. A Rangers fan I know actually has a season-by-season spreadsheet on his computer of major decisions that have went for and against his team in comparison to decisions for and against Celtic.... sums it up really! Meanwhile us poor folk seem to manage to accept that sometimes you get the breaks and sometimes you don't... it all just evens itself out over the course of a season!

To be honest, even if Boyd had made himself available for every Scotland game, would he have actually played many more games under Burley than he had done up to that point? Similar to many of the posters here, Burley didn't rate the guy. 31 year old, injury-prone Norwegian defender Iwelumo ahead of Kris Boyd?!?!? :( "aw naw!"

I'm not on holiday :) Our council doesn't give us any time off other than the actual public holiday days. I've been in this week grafting away as usual for the tax payers. My previous colleagues at a nearby authority are in the same boat. It must just be the northern lot that get loads of holidays over the festive period! If I remember right from my time at one of the northern authorities, you didn't get many of the public holidays and instead used them in between Christmas and New Year so that the office could shut down.

Scotland are hardly blessed with an array of quality strikers and when we create chances we need to have guys on the field who know where the net is and have the instinct to be in the right place at the right time. I'm still haunted by THAT moment against Norway - was watching it in a bar full of Norwegians....slightly ruined my holiday. Boyd's goal scoring record speaks for itself and Levein would be shooting the team in the foot to ignore a player like that who is willing to play for his country, regardless of what has happened in the past. Boyd's record at full international is 7 goals in 15 games - that includes a couple against Bulgaria in the Kirin Cup, one against Georgia in the Euro 08 qualifying, and one against Lithuania in the same qualifiers. Hardly what you would call diddy teams! In any case, they way Scotland have been playing, no team is a diddy team.

Trunk roads are contracted to bear by Scottish Parliament. Councils are responsible for the rest but they prioritise bus routes and town centres.

Remember as well that if you have any defined trunk roads in your area then it's not the Council that have responsibility. The Scottish Government have responsibility for assigning the contract for that - think it's still BEAR. The council prioritises the roads they have and will only get round to minor roads once priority routes have been done. Sometimes they are fighting a losing battle and, as has been mentioned previously, with budget pressures they have limited resources to work with. Most councils will supply a grit bin to streets free of charge and keep it filled if asked so that local residents can reduce the effects of bad weather on their bit of the pavement/road. Speak to your Roads Department regarding that. I was out myself last night gritting my pavement and driveway from the council grit bin that's in our street (we have 2 bins in our small street - one either end). The other thing to bear in mind is that northern councils have a disproportionate financial burden for winter maintenance in comparison to more southern Scottish councils i.e. snow up north more frequent than down here in tropical central Scotland. Highland, Moray, etc will have to find the budget out of the same relative level of funding that other councils have.

Levein gets my vote for manager. Exact same reasons as outlined by Scotty. If Levein is going to use the role as a stepping stone then, when the time comes, i'll be more than happy to cheer him on his way as he's parading the European Championship trophy/World Cup around Hampden. :(

Really like that - modern but traditional enough to keep most folk happy.

I know it takes a while to get stock organised, photographed, and uploaded on to t'interweb, but hopefully the new gear will be fully available to buy online in time for next christmas.