DoofersDad

Oddquine, people often raise points here which ask for a response which never comes. I guess I phrased it hoping to spark a resonse - and boy did you give one! Good to see Don's positive post on this as well. No offence intended and certainly not to the youngsters who are clearly finding things so tough this year and whose interests we are all concerned for. Great to see your passion - may you never lose it.

I see there is now a severe weather warning for snow in the north on Saturday. I hope this does not affect travel arrangements but we'll need to see how that pans out. I intend driving down.

I don't think this is the answer for 2 reasons. Firstly, it is not where people want to be. Folk prefer a more central position and don't want to be away in a corner where you don't get quite the same overview of the game. Secondly, your "hardcore" argument is correct only up to a point. Those who like standing may be a little more "hardcore" but they aint stupid. I am all in favour of standing but give me a choice of sitting in the dry or standing in the rain and I'm afraid my bum will be on the plastic. So whilst applauding your intiative and effort in this, I personally don't think there will be enough hardy souls to make this work. I hope I can be proved wrong. To me, the frustrating thing is that there should be no need to consider these elaborate arrangements. The tragedies which led to all seater stadia occurred in huge grounds with poor crowd control. Proper crowd control and far greater number of barrier rails on the terracing would prevent disasters even in the bigger grounds. The answer is for the authorities to wake up, do a proper risk assessment and accept that the real reason for the loss of life in the past was not terracing per se - but I can't see that happening anytime soon. Is the other option not simply to have some sections of the existing seating where you are allowed to stand and others where you are required to sit. People would have a simple choice and we would all pay the same and no extra cost or work would be involved.

I take it that Rangers would be due a share of the overall gate receipts for the match? Presumably we would withhold that to partly offset their debts to us.

I do care if we go 3 years without a penalty. It means the cheating b****rds on the other side are getting away with holding and shirt pulling in the box.

I seem to have raised your hackles somewhat Oddquine but don't have a go at those who are asking perfectly reasonable questions and expressing concern at the current position of the under 19 squad. We are on the same side here and want youngsters associated with the club to have the opportunity to develop and do well. What I mean by being outclassed is that as far as I am aware they are 9 points adrift at the bottom of the SPL U-19 league with 2 points from 14 games with a goal difference of minus 37. This is not good. It can't all be attributed to poor refereeing decisions and bad luck and it must be dis-spiriting for the youngsters. It is also significantly worse than in previous seasons. I agree that it is unfortunate that the club does not give more coverage to the youth teams but there is presumably absolutely nothing to stop anyone associated with the youth set up putting the occasional post on here to keep people informed. Those giving of their time may feel they get no support but it is difficult for people to give support if they don't know what is going on. As for the reasons for the disappointing league position, Luke and yourself have given a number of explanations, some of which are more compelling than others but which on balance make it reasonable to assume that this year was never going to be a good year but that next year should be better. It is important for the club that the youngsters are given every opportunity to develop so please excuse some of us for actually taking an interest in what's going on.

Very poor crowd but I don't suppose there were many in the away support, Chic and Terry and a handful of others.

Should've asked them for our share of ticket sales 3 years in advance.

Don't really care who plays, it's how they play that bothers me. Too often Terry has picked the side that many of the fans would have gone with and they just haven't turned up. Changes are forced and suddenly everyone is up for it. If the lads can't get up for this one then they will need to keep away from Terry after the game. We should be OK whoever Terry picks - as long as Barrowman isn't playing

Very good :clapping: Of course Whitney's decline seemed to coincide with Ally McMoist becoming manager. Prior to that, Ally and Whitney used to perform together and rumour has it that Ally scored an amazing 355 times with her. Since taking over as manager all of that has stopped and Whitney took to drink and drugs as consolation.

For me the issue is not about the site and all the past politics about that, it is what we have put on the site that is the problem. I agree with Alex that its the heart and soul that makes the club but I just think we would have a bit more heart and soul as a club if we had a ground with a bit more heart and soul. Unfortunately it looks as though we are stuck with it. Don't realy see the point of the favourite pasttime of Dougal bashing here. He is stating the Highland's 2nd best team will have the Highland's best stadium. Can't see any argument with that.

You might as well say it is best addressed at the end of season. The OP has asked the question before we play the Pars so it is reasonable to express an opinion now. If you don't want to - that's fine.

I am looking towards the future. I'm wondering what Terry's going to be saying tomorrow night.

Yup. You've answered you're own question. Money talks and this is all about money. This is just a readjustment at the top and normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.

I know little about company law but I expect Whyte knows a hell of a lot. And like Baldrick, he will have a cunning plan. Once the legal processes are through we will either have a debt free Rangers or a son of Rangers - it makes no difference. Son of Rangers might, for instance be simply called Rangers Football Club by dropping the Glasgow bit which is never used in any case. And this team will either steal an undeserved place in the SPL or will be placed in the SFL from where they will quickly move back to the SPL. If they stay in the SPL nothing much will change. Their level of income will be considerably more than everyone other than Celtic and they will be the 2nd best side in the land and get stronger. If they sink into the SFL there will be some temporary interest in the jostling for 2nd spot but no other team will be able to exploit Rangers' temporary absence sufficiently nor will Celtic be harmed during Rangers brief absence to allow the balance of power to be changed in the longer term. Whilst I am sure Rangers' will be scheming ways of staying in the SPL next season, I don't see it being more than a temporary blip for them if they don't. They will be looking at the long term future. Without going into administration or collapsing the company Rangers faced an uncertain future crippled by toxic debts and nobody is going to be prepared to throw away millions into Rangers just to pay someone else's tax debt. Without a cleansing they were never going to be able compete in Europe and were increasingly going to be second best to Celtic. Increasingly they would not be able to attract decent players and were at risk of being caught by the pack. But I am sure there are a lot of people willing to invest in a debt free son of Rangers and 3 or 4 years down the line at the latest we will be seeing sums of money being invested in players at Ibrox which have been unthinkable for the last few years. There is no doubt that the old firm need each other within the Scottish system and I am sure that whilst publicly Celtic may be saying they can do without Rangers, behind the scenes they will be working to ensure the rivalry continues. Of course, the one thing which would scupper Rangers would be if Celtic buggered off and joined the English league, Unfortunately, I doubt the English would have them.

I wonder what he will have to say about Grant Munro's performance on the day and over the season. I am sure Chic will point out to him that Munro has been the rock upon which County's success has been built this season whilst ICT have struggled at the back with about 15 different combinations.

I see Zambia beat the favourites Ivory Coast after a dramatic penalty shoot out. I like unusual statistics and one here is that Ivory Coast failed to win the competition despite playing 6 games and not conceding a single goal. It's not just ICT who need their strikers to be scoring more. Mind you, unlike ICT, Ivory Coast had a penalty awarded but Drogba of all people fired high and wide. .

Is there a point to your question, Laurence? If it is something you have an opinion on (and I assume you do, otherwise why start a new thread on the topic) why not give us the benefit of your thoughts and/or knowledge to give others something to actually comment on? Otherwise, I think it safe to assume that most of us neither know nor care.

Of course we shouldn't take a dive but if fouled there need not be any particular rush to get up again unless a clear goal scoring opportunity still exists. Just because officialdom does not enforce the laws of the game as effectively as it should does not give us an excuse for joining the cheats. Unfortunately, everyone is at it and the amount of holding and shirt pulling in the box at set peices is quite farcical. It just seems to be accepted these days and then when a referee decides that a particular incident is OTT and blows, he is accused of being inconsistent. The best way to ensure consistency is to actually enforce the laws of the game as they are and not put your own version into play. It's the same with speed limits - police let you go at a few MPH over the limit most of the time and then you get done at a slightly lower speed somewhere else. If you knew that if you exceed the limit and went through a camera that you would be prosecuted then everyone would know where they stood. So in football, if the ref sees a defender holding a player in the box then it's a penalty every time. Coaches would soon stop telling players to do this if they were to give away penalties every time. Another thing that annoys me is the broad interpretation of shielding a ball when shepherding a ball out of play. Most of the time this is obstruction pure and simple. If this not obstruction then I really don't know what is. Gving the decision the way of the attacker would surely make for more interesting football as the defender would be forced to take control of the ball and actually do something with it under pressure.

I've also noticed we are not doing very well. Over the years one of the strengths of this club is how it has developed youngsters and we have had some success in bringing youngsters through into the first team. If the under 19s appear to be not just not doing too well, but to be actually completely outclassed, then that must raise some questions about the current youth set up. I always understood our youth set up to be very good. Perhaps there is just a poor peer group locally in that age group - these things do tend to vary - but I would be interested to hear some comment from someone involved with the juniors. Another point is that it will be pretty disheartening for the youngsters to be getting gubbed week after week.

Yup. Always thought there was something fishy about him. It is important to give this thread the seriousness it deserves. Davie is spot on.

A single goal defeat away from home against the best team in the country and without our two best central defenders and our two best strikers is a pretty good acheivement. It would have been nice to get a draw but next week is much more important. A win against dunfermline will put us right in the mix for top 6 whilst a loss would give the Pars some hope. If we beat them, there is no way they will catch us.

With the way Dunfermline are playing one is tempted to say 19 points will be enough. However, they may go on a run and and get a few wins before the end of the season. However, averaging a point a game will usually see you safe and as long as we manage that we should be pretty comfortable. But given we are as close to 4th as we are to 12th, we really need to be looking at the teams ahead of us and not those behind.

Not your best post, but congatulations nevertheless on your 10,000th post!