wynthank15

Dylan Kerr formerly Kilmarnock mentioned on the radio that his team Gor Mahia are playing Everton on 6th November at Goodison. He reckoned 5/6 were SPL standard and a few could play in the English championship. maybe Robbo should take a look. These guys are all looking to play their football in Europe according to Kerr.

I would much prefer that our youngsters played the real game at whatever level rather than watch TV or computer games or even watching the real thing. It gives them fitness for future years, discipline, work ethic, teaches them to take knocks fair or unfair and builds a competitive spirit all of which are transferable to other aspects of life. It would also give our country a larger pool from which to develop professional players. Regrettably, today's society seem to be encouraging the exact opposite producing an unfit, overweight, soft generation with an expectation of entitlement and no competition. I recall playing against Harmony Row under 15's there were 40 boys all clamouring for a game and their manager picked a team from that group before the game, he could probably have picked any 11 because they could all play. In the 70's The Scottish Amateur league had 7 divisions each of 16/18 sides, West of Scotland 6 divisions, Scottish reserve 3 divisions, Stirlingshire 3 divisions, Paisley and district 4 divisions. Our club had 73 registered players at training for three sides on a Saturday so the number of sides probably don't reflect the number of registered players. We need to somehow get back to those days and I firmly believe it starts at the schools.

The fact Qatar have the wc in 2022 tells you all you need to know about this organisation.

We agree Kingsmills, two shots on target in 90mins one a pen, we can discuss all night about formations but the lack of a decent touch, wrong choices and complete lack of pressing is just so dispiriting, as long as the basics are missing you can play any system you choose it will not make any difference. The paucity of our game was exposed by a team ranked 90 something in world football, fortunate to get away with 2-1. No point in blaming the manager he can only work with what is available but those whose livelihood depends on our sub par level of football will continue to talk up our game and find any excuse for our lack of basic skills.

Why wont they open the west as a standing only pay on the day area with barriers to lean against for those with bad joints who can't sit without stretching their legs for 90mins. also a better view from the west when the sun gets low in winter.

Sounds like the wonderful sounding Direct Democracy, we will have a meeting, you can have your say, then we will ignore you and do what we want. Example: My neighbours and I went to a meeting prior to the National Park being formed, we were told we were getting a National Park though no one locally had asked for one but we were to have input regarding the name which was proposed as Cairngorms National Park. We pointed out that this was grammatically incorrect as there is only one Cairngorm mountain so it should be singular or Grampians if they wished to use the plural. You know the rest, I laugh every time I see the carved granite sign, an edifice to ignorance or Westminster indifference don't know which. PS non political I don't vote

PS I too apologise for being off topic couldn't help myself after reading RIG's comment.

Thank you for speaking on my behalf Kingsmills, RIG started this with his Hughes is a moron nonsense which is actually insulting and derogatory and I am not about to let it pass. If you want to split adjectives, Hughes was our most successful manager to date, that is a FACT no matter how much you may dislike it or try to argue against it. How do you define greatest exactly??? You can have a talented squad with a useless manager and achieve nothing. I hugely liked Patterson as a manager, he could spot a player, built two great mid-fields, played attractive football and never won the 1st division, he was a great manager but not our most successful..

What have you got against our greatest ever manager RIG? you just can't let go.

I hear what you say Mantis but Vogts record still stands and he had nothing to inherit, I believe the useless Vogts rubbish was put about by the hierarchy you mention to cover for the paucity of our game at that time, the guy was an outstanding international player so he understood the game and since his time no one has managed to do better and no one has started from a lower base. I was at the game you mention in the north enclosure, I think if you watch it again Scotland got away with some brutal tackles from the back which would not be tolerated in today's game, we haven't moved with the times where the game is organised to protect the ball players, quite rightly, where the player goes down on minimal contact and gets a free kick. Our players have to be better at protecting the ball in tight positions and winning our share of these free kicks amongst many other basic things. I will give you one example, watch Italy's opening goal against us at Hampden 4 players including our captain turned their back on a throw in something an amateur player is told never to do, it's why you practice running backwards, and we lose a goal inside 5 mins from a throw in!!!!!!!! Professionals???????? Its these schoolboy howlers that we need to get out of our game which we saw on Friday night against Belgium but you only get that by experience. Marcello Lippi was asked what he sought in a player and he answered intelligence.

Since when did the SFA/SPL take any notice of what supporters want? You are after all only the lifeblood/milk cows of the game, what TV and the corporations want is where the money is. What they ignore is that without the fans there is no game as JS said, use that power. Two weeks of boycotts by all the fans in the country would achieve far more than the 250th survey they have held in the past twenty years. Don't be fooled by useless surveys, it's akin to so called participatory democracy, you can have your view but we aint gonna change anything and your views whilst taken on board, considered, mulled over, cogitated and absorbed we have decided to tell you politely to F*** Off.

Absolutely agree Mantis but I think the game down south will change when Sky/BT start to cherry pick the games they will show. When grounds are half empty due to games being televised the TV cos will start to pick and choose, only the rich will survive and I can see the day when the Champions league will be an actual league set in stone. Of course the game is nothing without full stadia as an event and a TV spectacle and I can see the public becoming bored with a European league without relegation. Even at the moment many of the group matches are not sell outs. Football at the top level is becoming so expensive that it will face the "Rollerball vision" (a film ahead of its time) where the top clubs are owned by corporations and entire countries (which we already have in the case of Man City) where the whole game becomes politicised as a means of control/mass distraction.

SFA and logic should not appear in the same article.

Okay Mantis I will say it: I am cynical and say that, as Euro 2020 will be staged at a multitude of venues including Hampden, they are only trying to make it easier for home nations to qualify. It may still not be enough, I actually believe our ranking is way above where we actually are, the fact we rarely play African and S. American nations rather falsifies our standing. I actually agree with McLeish forget records wins and losses give as many players as possible International experience against good opposition. you only learn by being in the same situation often enough, then you make the correct decision automatically. Sometimes you need to go backwards to move forward which leads me to my next point: Caley Canary this myth about Vogts being clueless is extremely unfair, the guy's command of English was not the best but if you recall he inherited an ancient Craig Brown team hence the reason for giving so many different players caps, he had to rebuild from scratch and he wasn't afraid to expose them to better sides. I will let Vogts record speak for itself, he remains the last Manager to get us to a play off, quite incredible given what he had to work with.

Apparently, we have the second highest ranking in the section. Not getting out of the group would represent a new low.

Correction Glover apologies.

This was true of players in the 70's I played with one player who was offered 3 professional contracts and turned them all down because he had a well paid job with car and house assistance purchase scheme, pension etc etc he was a wonderful left footed player who would have given Beckham a run for his money at free kicks. Those were the days when we had some superb players in the Scottish amateur leagues, many of the OF S form signings played in those leagues during that time.

Good work Yngwie, I fear they are just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, but let's see. So many false dawns previously I've lost count of them.

Do you mean improve Scottish Football or improve the competitiveness of the SPL? The OF are not leaving Scotland and I don't see how the standard is improved if they are not in the league. I would be in favour of the 3 foreigner rule that was used briefly in Europe before it became a free for all, which would ensure that Scottish players played in the SPL. My bugbear with the OF is that they have the financial clout to buy any Scottish player they want as the rest of the teams are so impoverished they let their best players go for a pittance. The result is that no club gets an opportunity to build a really good side to challenge the OF. What's even worse is they can buy good young players and leave them in the reserves or loan them out (Scott Allan, Ryan Christie) thereby depriving the opposition of an important team member whilst denying them top flight football which does nothing to help the national game. I disagree that we won the SC due to the absence of Rangers we defeated the team that won the league in the semi final and we finished as the third best team in the country. Sadly, I only see a downward spiral for Scottish football in national and league standards there is just not the pool of players that was once available in the 60's and 70's. Our humiliation by a Belgian side who hardly got out of 2nd gear and our lack of possession (at home) reflects the true state of our national game it's abysmal. I can recall games at home against the likes of West Germany and Brazil where we were the dominant side in both matches I think you can find the whole game against W Germany on line.

My cousin and his son who were regular ST holders wrote to the Chairman and told him they would not be paying PL prices for Championship games. I suspect many others may have said the same which prompted the statement that prices would be held if we got up last season. Barn door and horses spring to mind. Perhaps someone is aware of the difference in ST sales?

A manager who has achieved 3rd place in the league as opposed to a rooky at ANY level is much more likely to keep us up despite the loss of some of our best players and a horrendous injury list. Given the benefit of hindsight would you really mention JH and RF as equals in managerial terms? Anyhow, there is a great saying amongst financial commentators that people deserve what they wantand they get it good and hard, that also applies to football fans especially those who wanted JH out and RF in. Enjoy the championship for a few seasons more.

Raith were doomed before JH joined them I think he only had about 10 games to turn things around, everyone bangs about Raith but it hardly compares to a squad that you have worked with and built. The grave mistake as you put it was appointing Foran who had never managed at ANY level. JH even said after he left that RF was "no coach" and he was proved right in that in spades. If you can't see the difference between the football played under Hughes with the football played under Butcher then I can't help you.

JH would not have got us relegated and all that entailed, There were many emergency signings made due to our ridiculous injury list in that last season. That's what led to the stand off with JH saying the budget had been cut (excluded those emergency signings) and the board maintaining that he budget was unchanged.

Unbelievable, did you live under a rock the year we won the SC and had our highest ever league finish? JH will go down as our greatest ever manager and rightly so, were you by any chance one of the agitators for Foran to take over?

Remind me again how much we got for Christie?