Kingsmills

The doubters are silenced. Well done Charlie.

It seems that it was Paterson's decision to appoint Cooper as his assistant. I wonder why he chose him ahead of Duncan Shearer ?

Certainly in preference to monday night.

Five points. Three from Aberdeen and one each from the Edinburgh clubs.

I read that Peterhead intend to turn full time. That's ambitious for a club with average crowds of well under a thousand.

The club have experimented with discount ticket prices in the pat for certain matches but without much of an effect on the attendance. Don't hold your breath.

No great surprises there.

To the extent that we are bottom of the league in terms of turnover, average crowds and playerers wage bill yet far from botom of the league we can be fairly described as punching above our weight.

I also have an affection for the Doonhamers but not their arrogant current manager.

The squad would be weaker without him.

When those involved run onto the field of play at any professional spoting event. Make as much noise as you possibly can from the stands but stay behind the barrier.

Steve Paterson laid the foundations over the best part of a decde nd other maagers have reaped the benifits of a squad with no superstars and an attitude ummatched in the Scottish game.

It may not have been tactical genius but our coaches recognised that what we were doing wasn't working and changed the system to something that cwertainly did albeit with some help from the Falkirk goalkeeper. So credit to them for pulling the game out of the fire.

There's a bit of a difference in having an Arsenal youth team player to a Norwich City one but any bright new talent has to be welcomed even in the short term.

When condidering individuals who have made a signnifigant contribion to the club we shouldn't forget that the person who made the largest personal investment in the club was In Fraser who ultimately suffered the biggest personal loss. Mr Fraser was seen, perhaps with justification, as being unreasonably obstructive at the time of the restructuring but his initial capital input did much to help get the cluboff the ground.

I'm surprised that he hasn't taken the chance to get some first team football under his belt.

Good performance, great result. Always happy to support any Scottish side in Europe.

I also think that Robbo might be a good outside bet.

The then PLC under the chairmanship of Doug McGillvray, although doubtless well intentioned, had undoubtedly dug itself into a very deep financial hole. Total liabilities were hurtling towards three million pounds and were increasing at the rate of over £300,000 a year and that at a time when total turnover was less than a million. That is a critical state of affairs for any company. Frankly, although doing their best, that regime was unsustainable and the existing board members had no clear idea of how to progress whilst servicing the debt far less making any inroads into it. Our high profile triumph at Parkhead was perhaps more signifigant than many supporters realise. In my opinion if it had not been for the windfall of being drawn away at Parkhead and the subsequent income from to two SKY matches against Aberdeen I doubt very much if the company would have survived that financial year. So perhaps we have the hapless John Barnes to thank for our current status almost as much as David Sutherland. E ven with those huge bonuses the company contrived to lose money that year and by the time David Sutherland came along our creditors, particularly the bank, were becoming distinctly twitchy. I agree with other posters that if it hadn't been for the bank's confidence in his business acumen and, I suspect, personal guarantees of the debt, they would have pulled the plug before much longer. Tht might not have meant the complete demise of the club but would have spelt the end of full tme football and any SPL ambitions perhaps permenantly. Many people, both on anf off the pitch, have contributed to our current success but probably none more so than Mr Sutherland.

Even if his last boking was harsh most of the prevous ones were justified and many completely unnecessary. Time that this otherwise talented young man began to mature.

McSwegan seems to be on a bit of a scoring run with the reserves but I suppose that Wyness is ahead of him in the pecking order for a place on the bench.

As Scotty has said, what I said was that they were reasonable claims for penalties of the sort that are sometimes awarded and sometimes not. Just because there is reasonable claim doesn't necessarily mean that the penalty itself is legtimate. What is clear is that a number of Scottish referees would award penalties to the Old Fir in these circumstances particularly at home while they would be much less likely to award a penaty to the opposition unless it was an absolute stonewaller. So I reiterate, credit to Mr Brines for having the courage to ignore his surroundings and making a fair balanced judgement.

Is it not just the St Mirren game that he misses ?

Having watched the somewhat abbreviated highlights of the match on Scotsport, I must, for a change, pay some respects to referee Ian Brines. It seemed to me that Rangers had two legitimate shouts for penalties and whereas either would have fallen into the very soft catagory I've little doubt that manyi n theScottish refereeing fraternity would have awarded one or even both of them especially in the circumstance of Rangers being one down at Ibrox with time running out. It's clear that many referees do favour the old firm especially at home whether deliberately or not. So, great credit for Mr. Brines for being fair and impartial on this occasion.

The Scotland result because it was much more of a surprise. Frankly, Iwas astonished that Scotland overcame France but only mildly surprised that we beat a mediocre Rangers outfit at Ibrox.