DoofersDad

Hope he does.

did we not offer hayes the best deal ever to an ict player ?. could not see us paying a player the higest wage ever and not even having him on the bench. if he was still here he would be first name on teamsheet every week for me Whether you play someone should depend on how well they are playing and not on how much they are being paid. He was dross today. If he was out of contract there is no way Butcher would offer him as much to return here as he offered him to stay.

Having turned down a contract offer here he is obviously out to impress. But he needs to remember that those he is trying to impress will look at his overall contribution to the team and not just any spectacular goals he scores. He needs to avoid the temptation to be selfish and go for the glory himself when there are better options. On one occasion in the first half he started a penetrating run and then lost posession going it alone when Billy was clear in the middle and screaming for the ball - he really should have passed it. Not so for his goal though. He did well to get clear on the by-line and Langfield, clearly expecting him to square it was way out of position in anticipation of intercepting. Shinnie saw the gap and exploited it ruthlessly. Mind you, if he was thinking of going to Aberdeen he'll maybe want to think again. Players often look good because of the way their team mates play. Shinnie gets great service from his team mates and when he scored today MacKay was in the perfect position for the cutback which was why Langfield was out of position. I really don't think he would look as good in a red shirt as he does in a blue one (with a little bit of red in it). If he plays to the team's collective strengths for the rest of the season he is going to get offers from much better clubs than Aberdeen

A really important result for us in keeping the momentum going after the break and all the off the field issues. After a fairly indifferent first half for both himself and the team, a touch of real quality from Andy Shinnie turned the game and after that we were different class. If Shinnie's goal was good, MacKay's first was even better - and his 2nd wasn't bad either. For me, MacKay was MOTM by a country mile because apart from 2 great goals he never stopped working for the team. Meekings was superb as well. Just a mention for Nick Ross and Philip Roberts who came on as very late subs. No sooner were they on than they were involved in a great move which nearly produced a goal which would have rivalled if not bettered MacKay's first. There is real quality on the bench and you have to think that if Hayes was still with us, not only would he not get into the starting eleven, he might not even get on the bench. Very impressed and happy with that performance.

Applause at 6 minutes! Why? Applause at 90 minutes works for me.

Great opportunity to remind everyone of England's 1938 shame! untitled.png Shame? England won 6 -3! This is actually quite interesting and my comment above is not entirely tongue in cheek. It is, of course easy to regard the Nazi salute as shameful in hindsight but however uncomfortable it may be, one really needs to see it in the context of the time. The match was pre-war but clearly there were huge tensions. The German government saw the game much as they had seen the '36 Olympic games as an opportunity to demonstrate to the world the superiority of the German race. Whilst Hitler was not at the game, most of the other leading Nazis were. There was a crowd of 110,000 expecting another German victory to extend their 14 game unbeaten run. The English officials (in consultation with the British Government) did much agonising about whether to give the salute or not. The view was that to refuse would be seen as a petulant gesture which would just ensure the hostility of the crowd and, more importantly, the wider German people and Government. Give them respect in the formal pleasantries and give them a beating on the park where it matters was the view. They did just that rounding off with a superb Stanley Matthews goal to seal a great victory. At the time this was seen as real setback to Germany in their propaganda campaign. Had England not given the salute and then been on the receiving end of a 6 - 3 scoreline the boost to the propaganda of the Nazi regime would have been huge. In retrospect I think it is fair to say giving the salute was a mistake. Snubbing the Nazi's by refusing to salute and then giving them a hiding on the park in front of such a huge crowd would have doubly deflating for them. But of course, because of the terrible events that followed, it is the picture of the salute that is the enduring image and the impact of the match on the German people at the time is forgotten. But we stray off topic. Had he been there as an honorary Englishman, what would wee Gordon Strachan have done? Would he have followed instructions and given the salute? No. I think he would have done this

In my hurry to post I must have missed the fact that the tongue in cheek emoticon hadn't loaded up!

But I'm sure his bank manager does.

Speaking as an Englishman, I would say that English players would far rather face a Scotland team led out onto the park by Levein than one led onto the park by Strachan. Scotland is too small a country to have a team of top quality players but it can have a top quality team. One of the key ingredients of that is passion. Not only does Strachan have that, he can transmit that to his players. I think he's the man for the job.

German league football went through a poor period but it has got its act together again. German club sides may well become the dominant force in Eurpoean football in the next 4 or 5 years and this success will be reflected in the national side - much as it pains me to say it. I think Pep has made a good choice and if he can instil some of the Barcelona style into the German game, they might even be good to watch as well.

No it doesn't matter. Some of us just like being pedantic, that's all.

Should fit in well then.

But whilst the team is usually known as England, it is in fact, the team representing the England and Wales Cricket Board and therefore as a Welshman, it is your national side. And whilst you hear of Ireland and Scotland competing in ODIs, you never hear of a Welsh side. Cricket is still fairly healthy in the central belt and is boosted by the number of players of Indian and Pakistani origin. Someone told me a few years ago that there are actually more Cricket Clubs in Scotland than Rugby clubs. Not sure that is still the case.

I've not seen Laurence play so can't make an objective comparison. However, I'm very happy to have such a talented youngster as Roberts in the squad.

No Luke!! He's on trial at Birmingham. A Brummy is a person from that city. Had you used the colloquial term Brum, which incidently is short for Brummagem, a name used for Birmingham in the middle ages, then you would have gotten away with it. Whatever happened to that other high scorer who left Scotland for Birmingham........ah yes he's with Swindon Town. No Alex!!, Luke would not have got away with using the term Brum. Brum is used to refer to the city of Birmingham and not to that city's 2nd football club. A player could be on trial there and be desribed as being on trial in Brum or at Birmingham - but not at Brum. Saying "at Brummy" is equivalent to saying someone playing for Liverpool is "at Scouser". In any case, "Brummy" is a mis-spelling and the correct spelling goes against the normal spelling rules and is "Brummie". Now I've got that off my chest, I think i'll have a kipper tie - with milk and 2 sugars. Don't you just love that accent!

Move teams in closer proximity between leagues? Yes. They've been doing it for years in England at levels 2,3 and 4 of the pyramid system and without any particular problems. And please don't use the argument that distances are not as great as they are in Scotland because for some they are greater and with poorer transport links. Some teams in the English Midlands could find themselves in a league which takes them to East Anglia one year and Cornwall the next. There can be considerable change in a regional division from one year to the next but it is accepted because of the overall advantages of the pyramid system. Would it not be the same team that is always flipping from one league to another though? Yes it is. It is the teams roughly in the middle of whatever region the leage covers. They may find they play teams predominantly to the north or east of them one year and then teams to the south and west next year. Perhaps a bit unsettling but the positives are they and the fans get to go to different places and the overall travelling distances are far less than if the league was not split on a regional basis. Folk seem happy enough with it. It's more variety.

Move teams in closer proximity between leagues? Yes. They've been doing it for years in England at levels 2,3 and 4 of the pyramid system and without any particular problems. And please don't use the argument that distances are not as great as they are in Scotland because for some they are greater and with poorer transport links. Some teams in the English Midlands could find themselves in a league which takes them to East Anglia one year and Cornwall the next. There can be considerable change in a regional division from one year to the next but it is accepted because of the overall advantages of the pyramid system.

No team has any guarantees of any derbies at all. You will get a derby if your local rivals just happen to be in the same division as you. You are more likely to get derbies the more teams there are in the league but if you have fewer teams in the league and play other sides more than twice, when you do get derbies you get more of them. Assuming that two different league set ups result in the same total number of matches then things will average out that you have the same number of derbies. I appreciate that this mathematical fact gets distorted in that some derbies will occur more often than others according to which structure you have. In the current set up, for instance, you can expect Hibs and Hearts ubsually to both be in the top flight and therefore get a lot of derbies, but on the other hand East Stirling never get a derby against their Falkirk rivals. What the proposed new set up would do is to increase the movement between the divisions to allow derbies between sides that rarely get them at the moment. The other side of that is that there may be some years when there is not a derby that almost always occurs with the current set up. So if Hearts end the first half of the season in the bottom 4 and end up getting relegated then it would mean no derby the next season. All that does is make the next derby when it does occur that much more tasty. The greater variety of derby fixtures can only be good for the game IMHO. If you want more derbies, the only way you can guarantee that is to have a regionalised structure and that is a no brainer for the top flight. But, as CaleyD says, it makes real sense as an alternative to the proposed 18 club 3rd tier. (Rangers playing in the 3rd Division West next season has a nice ring to it!) I also don't buy the argument about season tickets. I appreciate that folk would be buying into a bit of an unknown package but aren't they now? At the moment you don't know how many home games you are paying for, you have no idea which clubs you may see twice or only once and you have no idea whether you will see end of season matches which will see the club fighting for a European place or relegation or whether they are relatively meaningless middle of the table matches. I'm not hearing anything peruasive to suggest this proposal is not worth exploring further.

That's what I like to see. An opinion backed up by objective argument. I think the answer to the OP is "Yes". County shouldn't need to strengthen in order to secure survivial but despite their current position they are not that far off top six and will be aiming for that. Not only would that offer provide some money spinnig games at the end of the season, it would provide some real credibility for the club. Offering contracts to mix of experienced players and players from abroad who are looking for an opportunity to get on the radar of bigger clubs in the UK sounds like a sensible strategy to me.

Very sensible suggestion to split the bottom tier into regions. I'd go with that.

Now sold for 50p.

I think I'll take a minority viewpoint here and say that I'm actually quite taken with the proposals. Previously I've been in favour of a league of more than 12 but I think there are sufficient positives here to overcome that. In no particular order, advantages include:- Meaningful games for nearly all teams for most of the season. The opportunity for half the teams in the top two leagues of 12 to play against a total of 15 different sides in the year. Potential for up to 4 sides to get promoted each year. This is likely to provide far more movement of clubs through the structure so it won't be a constant round of playing the same clubs year after year. A real incentive for clubs to maintain standards or else they will find themselves dropping down the structure. The introduction of a pyramid structure which will bring fresh blood in and get rid of the dross at the bottom. The re-introduction of standing at matches in the top flight. Amalgamation of the SPL and SFL management structures into a single body. Rangers will remain in the bottom flight again next season. It's not perfect but few things are. The problem we have in Scotland is that we are a small country and simply don't have the population to support sufficient big clubs necessary to make a really competitive top tier league. In my view there are some real advantages here, most important of which is the way it will freshen things up and provide real opportunity for smaller clubs to move quickly through the leagues. This will force other clubs to make sure they maintain their standards. There have been a lot of comments about teams resting players late in the first half of the season when it is obvious which group of 8 they will be in. That will probably happen but then it happens now! For instance,within the current set up as soon as it is clear that County are not going to be top 6 then they will have nothing to play for. With Dundee being cast adrift they are likely to have the last third of the season planning for next season and experimenting in matches which could have a major significance for other teams. In any case, why would clubs rest many players around the mid point of the season? Players need to be match fit and to play together as a team to be best prepared for the crucial end of season games. One of the reasons we are doing so well this season is that we have a generally settled team. Keeping the team playing together might be the smart move. To be honest, I don't know how similar this structure is to those which have failed elsewhere and I would be interested to learn why similar systems have been scrapped elsewhere. But for the moment, these proposals look to me to be the best that have been proposed for years and there is an opportunity to revitalise football in Scotland. In the absence of any alternatives offering significant change, I think these should be seriously considered but we really do need to see a bit more detail and get a better understanding of the implications before we can come to any firm views.

That's what I call making amends for an error. And whilst we have no football to watch this week, it is good to know that youngsters in Greece are trying to emulate our passing game. http://news.uk.msn.com/blog/trending-blogpost.aspx?post=bcf9d7d7-1018-40af-9351-ddbcd334ba9e

Except all four call-offs are due to waterlogged pitches. Oops! I was just going by what Fraz said in an earlier post. Maybe the waterlogged pitches have frozen.

Isn't it ironic! The SPL takes a short mid winter break, but before it does the heavens open and games are called off because of a waterlogged pitch in Dingwall. Then the break comes so folk decide to take in some Highland league foooty. The weather is drier but colder with the result that games are called off due to frozen pitches. Meanwhile SPL pitches are perfectly playable because of the heating but no-one is playing on them because of the break. Cue snow for next weeked and a postponement for safety reasons.