Sports Editor to Sports Lay-out Sub - I Don't Care That Scotland Won 6-0, Rangers Is THE Story

AFTER all their travails in not adequately covering the Craig Whyte Months at Ibrox - let's face it, Tony Blair has more chance of a come-back than Mr Whyte - the accusations of not being on the ball, of opting not to cover the Rangers case, of being caught-out by various Celtic-minded bloggers, that lovely bunch: the A Team of the Scottish Football Writers Association probably deserve their wee break in Slovenia.

Of course, they will still have to appear to be interested in a meaningless, diddy game, between two diddy teams - when they'd far-rather be back home in Glasgow trying to pick-up the latest Rangers gossip.

The Scotland team is a mess - in the whole way it is set-up, (dis)organised and (mis)managed. Probably the only people who care are those Hampden blazers who've managed to get themselves onto the trip - it might make them feel even more important than they usually do.

And, for all this is a game, involving the national team, the squad which ought to be Number One as far as all Scots football people are concerned - if, as expected, Duff Beer announce player redundancies on Wednesday, then who Rangers are releasing will be the back page story, even if (and I know I'm entering the realms of fantasy here) some Scotland player scores a hat trick and we actually win in Slovenia.

SPARE a thought too this week for another man with problems - caretaker England boss Stuart Pearce, who has charge of the men in white for their friendly with Holland.

He has caused some ripples, which may grow into waves, by naming a fairly young squad and by leaving one or two regular England squad members out. Good for "Psycho", this is a nothing friendly, which has no real bearing on the big task for England, winning at least respectibility back in the European Championship finals at the end of the season.

He has been smart in getting some of the kids into the big team and, who knows, somebody might do a Michael Owen and play so well he cannot be left out of the summer squad. More likely, perhaps, that somebody will do what Craig Brown used to manage - after a lot of clamour to cap him, flop and be discardable.

But, supposing "Psycho" winds them up to the extent that England beat the Dutch, Daniel Levy at Tottenham continues to play hard ball with the FA and suddenly a band-wagon to give Pearce the job on a permanent basis begins to roll.

What does Pearce (and the FA) then do about the Olympic Games gig? Beckham for player-manager anyone? Or  how about a Beckham/Giggs/Scholes/Neville "think tank" with a hot line to Sir Alex back there in Manchester? It could work.

 

Forget The SPL - Look South

WITH Rangers in administration, fresh and ever more lurid revelations seeming to emerge on a daily basis and the police and the Crown Office now involved - it's a right pickle. So, forward tho ah canna see, ah guess and fear; what happens next?

I dare say, since Rangers are, seemingly, so important to the fabric of Scottish life and not merely football life: the club is (apparently) "too big to fail". Some sort of compromise deal will be cobbled together whereby, Craig Whyte having been offered up as a (thoroughly deserving) sacrificial victim - Rangers will, in time, emerge as "a going concern" and allowed to continue in the SPL.

Here's what ought to happen. A "New" Rangers should emerge, but whoever is running this club, which will still have some attachment to the institution which is now crumbling before our eyes, if they have half a brain, will say "no" to the guarantee of a continuing place in the SPL and instead, get Rangers into the English Football Pyramid at the nearest league to Scotland- probably the Northern League, Division Two - which is level 10 on the Pyramid - the English Premiership is level 1. If such famous old names as Crook Town and Bishop Auckland can ply their trade here, why not Rangers?

By retaining the real fanatics on the playing staff and the best of the younger players and by working properly at player development - something which hasn't happened at hte club for years, Rangers could I feel certain, quickly climb the ladder into the Football League, then the Championship and, if the club was properly run and managed the Premiership in ten years would not be out of the question - and that ought to be the aim.

Let's be frank here, a league such as the SPL, wherein the other ten member clubs accept that two of their number are more-important than they are when it comes to commercial opportunities, and when these two clubs are seemingly guaranteed, ad infinitum, to contest the title each year - this is a league which is going nowhere but down the tubes.

There have long been complaints from some connected with Rangers that the poor quality of the opposition in Scotland has somehow held the club back. Having to start again gives the club the chance, if the people running it have the balls to try, to get into the neighbouring, much-larger, market at a low level and work their way up to the level they think they should be at. Are there Rangers-minded men who are up for the challenge - or is staying in Scotland, bullying the rest while putting "Tim" in his place, more important.

During the current malaise with the club, "Ra Peepel" keep parroting that old Bill Struth line: "We welcome the chase".

Well, "New" Rangers are chasing redemption, the restoration of a tarnished name and reputation, is there anyone willing to take up this chase?

If 10 of the 12 clubs are incapable of sticking together to sort-out the two bullies and ensuring a level playing field, then they are not worth bothering with.

Should "New" Rangers go, what price Celtic following them very quickly, and, perhaps without the two bullies hanging over them, the remaining Scottish clubs would sort themselves out for the betterment and long-term good of Scottish football.

Scotland's best export has, we are told, long been its people. Let's export "Ra Peepel" and see how that works. Let's be very clear, if, as Rangers (and Celtic) have long opined, Scotland is too-small for them, then they HAVE to get into England. There is no way the EPL and more particularly the rest of English football will open the doors to allow them straight into the best room - but, if they, together or separately, join the pyramid at an appropriately low level and work their way up, all will be well.

Whoever takes control of "New" Rangers has a probably once-in-a-lifetime chance to make real money out of the club, but it will have to be a long-term commitment.

Look what the men behind AFC Wimbledon and United FC of Manchester have managed, without the backing which would be available to whoever was running "New" Rangers - it's doable.

SFA That's What They'll Dae - They Couldnae Run A Gird

THIS whole Rangers business just gets crazier and crazier with each passing day. At least the Scottish Football Association has finally roused from its slumber and become involved - with the setting up of an "independent" inquiry, specifically it appears, to ascertain if Craig Whyte was a fit and proper person to run a football club.

Well, pardon me, but, unless Mr Whyte is ever able to successfully sue the backsides off the BBC, Trinity Mirror, News Corp and the various lesser media organisations who have printed or broadcast various pieces about his business history and practices in the year or so since he emerged from the woodwork to "buy" Rangers, I think we know the answer to that one.

I have so far been, as far as I know, the only blogger or journalist to invoke the name of the late and still to the dwindling number of Third Lanark fans living, unlamented, Bill Hiddleston. But, I can see little difference between Third Lanark 1967 and Rangers 2012.

Similarly, I can see in the downfall of Rangers, echoes of the downfall of Scottish basketball 20 years or so ago, when Mr David Murray, as he then was, quit the basketball court for the larger arena of Ibrox.

I honestly do not see the SFA liking what any truly-independent inquiry will report to them. For my money, Mr Craig Whyte is not, by a long chalk, the only person involved in the downfall of Rangers, and how the SFA have acted over that club in recent years, who was nothing like a fit and proper person.

To be fair to Alistair Johnstone, he did warn us - the great Scottish football public, that all was not well with Mr Whyte. However he, potential "Blue Knight" Paul Murray and Dave King were all complicit in David Murray's years of mis-management of Rangers, which got the club into a pickle in the first case.

To look at a parallel case - Fred Goodwin maybe lost his knighthood, but what about the other RBS directors who took the hefty salaries and the kudos in the good years, but who said nothing to deter Fred the Shred as he embarked on his disastrous pursuit of that Dutch bank? Were they not also at fault? Did nobody have the cojones to say: "Hang on a minute Fred, are you absolutely certain this is a good move?"

For Fred Goodwin in the bank's boardroom - were the same questions never asked of David Murray, or Dick Advocaat? Paul Murray sat in the posh seats at Ibrox, he was round that boradroom table as it all unravelled. Doesn't he - this potential saviour of the club, also have to answer for his part in getting Rangers into bother in the first place?

And what about the Hampden blazers? They knew their own clubs were being asked to fight with one hand tied behind their backs. Didn't they ever think: "Haud oan a meenit, this isnae right?"

They knew the rules were skewed in favour of two clubs, who were in a power duopoly, might there have been some way, for the overall good and even betterment of Scottish football, whereby they might have brought Rangers to task sooner?

THEN there is the part which we, the "free and fair" Scottish press, who did little or nothing to even warn, play in the debacle. Having seen at first hand how Murray's recruitment of North American talent had seriously fucked-up Scottish basketball; how he had allowed the guys running MIM BC to hoover-up the local talent, without having, like every other club, an under-pinning grass roots youth system, some very good, most adequate, until, when it became unsustainable - he got out - I had told various sports desk pilots the same thing would happen at Rangers.

I take no pride in being proved correct. I warned years ago, it would all go pear-shaped and it has.

Scottish basketball continues - it's back to being the "church hall" game it was 35 years ago, before Murray got involved - in fact, it's not even as good as it was back then, but, it has survived. What precious little Scottish talent there is can still fight its way to the top, but basketball hasn't died in Scotland.

Football will survive the Rangers debacle, even if, as should happen, but won't - Rangers had to go to the foot of the class - back to the Third Division of the SFL, or even, assuming the long-required pyramid is ever put in place, back to the juniors.

We might have to serve a few more years in pots four or five for the Euros and the World Cup, but, survive we would. Indeed, properly re-organised and without the "We were the peepel" baggage, we might even prosper.

But, it seems, because television contracts have ensured that Celtic and Rangers are more-important than the other ten SPL clubs, the 30 SFL clubs, the "Non-League Senior" clubs of the Highland, East of Scotland and South of Scotland Leagues and the 170 or so Junior clubs, an accommodation will be arrived at whereby Rangers will rise again and slot straight back in as one of the top two clubs.

That's wrong.

SPL - Simply Pathetic League

I HAVE had enough of gloom and doom this week, so let's set aside the small matter of conjecture on the affairs of Rangers FC and look instead at the state of Scottish football - something I was diverted away from addressing by the events of this week.

Last Saturday, for my sins, I was asked to cover Kilmarnock v Heart of Midlothian by a national newspaper, this was, as I remarked last week, my first exposure to SPL football for a couple of seasons - it was rank rotten.

A poor crowd of just over 4000; ok, the timing wasn't great and the demands on their hard-earned being borne by the Hearts' fans at present doubtless contributed to the thin spread of Jambos in the "away" end. But, barely 4000 home fans were prepared to turn-out to watch a Killie team playing (allegedly) a high-quality passing game.

To my mind this demonstrates what I've been saying for a long time - the SPL is over-priced. It would, last weekened, have been cheaper, and infinitely-more-comfortable for me to take "'Er Indoors" to the Odeon in Kilmarnock, to watch Meryl Streep in 'The Iron Lady' than to take her to Rugby Park to watch Killie play Hearts.

Hasn't it occured to the High Heid Yins in the SPL - your core audience in Scotland are struggling in the present recession - you've got to find inventive ways of getting them to part with their hard-earned, just to keep them coming. And while you're at it, improving the quality of your product might be a good idea.

In the press conference after the match, the red-top boys, who set the agenda, only wanted to focus on the pre-match spat between "Rent-a-gob Shiels" and "Motor-mouth Sergio"; the lack of a hand-shake; what Sergio did or didn't say to Shiels Minor and vice versa.

Mind you, I don't blame them, there was very little to ask about concerning 90 minutes of misplaced passes, missed opportunities and mainly headless chicken impressions.

If that's typical SPL fare - We're awe doomed - doomed ah tell ye!

HOWEVER, my mental turmoil was eased slightly on Wednesday evening, after I was despatched to Somerset Park to cover the Ayr United v Falkirk Scottish Cup tie.

Like A Boy Named Sue - after he finally met his Dad - I came away with a different point of view. I had possibly seen the future and it might work. I was more than impressed with the performance of the Falkirk team. OK, they lost narrowly, but, the way Elvis has got a bunch of kids ready and willing to get the ball down, pass and move was refreshing. There is real talent there and I wish Elvis and his back-room all the best in their endeavours.

But, to laud the losers and say nothing of the winners would be stupid. I've said before and will probably say so again, the way big Brian Reid's name is seldom in the frame for SPL managerial vacancies amazes me, after what he has done at Ayr. He just might be the best United boss since Ally MacLeod - first time around.

His team got a chasing in the first half and were extremely lucky to turn round all-square, after scoring with their only upfield sortie of the 45 minutes. But, whatever he said in that dressing room at half time worked - they dominated the second half and might well have won by more than Mark Roberts' penalty goal. And, if ever there was an example of how to take a vital penalty, this was it.

Ayr demonstrated the old Scottish virtue of refusing to surrender to a technically-superior team and got their reward. As I told Pat Fenlon of Hibs, who was also in the press box on BBC duty - his guys are in for a good old game in the quarter-finals.

Ayr also have some young talent in their squad - as I have said, the talent is still being produced in Scotland, it's long past time the fans put pressure on the directors to make the managers and coaches work better, to give this talent a chance.

When this happens, just watch Scottish football go and grow.

FINALLY, I seem to be the only journalist who remembers the name of Bill Hiddleston, or to have raised that spectre in relation to the Rangers case. It was good, this morning, to read that the Polis are sitting-up and taking notice of events at Ibrox.

More work coming the way of M' learned friends I feel ceretain.

What Hapens Now?

IN signing-off my last posting, I aluded to the next question about Rangers: What Happens Next? Of course, at this moment in time, nobody knows. Messrs Duff & Phelps have to get to work, try to sort-out the mess which David Murray's years of profligacy and what is, from the little which has leaked into the mainstream seems an almost criminal nine months of Whyte ownership and asset-stripping, have left.

Then we await the rousing of that 10,000 lb gorilla in the corner - the EBTs tax case.

Worse case scenario is, the liquidation of Rangers Football Club - The End, finito, no more Messrs Bad Guys; but even that is fraught with difficulties. If it happens, Craig Whyte will enter Scottish football mythology as William Hiddlestone x ten - Mr Hiddlestone being the "chancer" who in the 1960s asset-stripped and took Third Lanark to the wall. Hiddlestone's legacy is Cathkin Park, the stand, the buildings were allowed, over a period of time to crumble and fall; certainly the Council have to a degree land-scaped the terraces and the pitch is still there, but, Cathkin, as those of us old enough remember it, is no more.

Cathkin was the original Hampden - there should have been a preservation order on it, but wasn't. At least, the listed building status of the main stand might save it, but, if football isn't played there - what is the site for? I'd hate to think of my grand-weans, 40-plus years hence, driving past a crumbling, dangerous, listing but still listed stand, with a graffittied, uncared-for statue of John Greig standing beside it - that could happen.

If HMRC decides to play hardball with Rangers - and I feel they will pour encourage les autres in the EPL; there can be no reconstituted Rangers, and very likely no new one, even one starting life in the Third Division of the SFL, or maybe the Juniors, hoping to maybe get onto some future pyramid.

How about this curve-ball, out of left field. Rangers FC dies, but some Rangers-minded millionaire fan - there are some out there, buys the husk that's left, including Ibrox and Murray Park.

However, instead of joining the SFL - he takes his new club, with a core staff of British players who are primarily Rangers fans, into the North West Counties League in England - which is probably the highest level which any new club can enter the English pyramid.

This club should, surely, climb rapidly through the leagues and, within a decade - "New" Rangers are knocking on the door of the EPL. Without the Ulster religious/political element which the Old Fir rivalry brings, this might well be a "clean" vibrant club - hopefully the lessons of the liquidation have been absorbed and Ibrox is again rocking every second week to full houses, seeing good football.

I know, it's maybe a bit far-fetched, it's a long-ball game: but, wasn't the long-ball game for so long a successful Rangers tactic?

Of course, more-likely scenarios are -

1, administration, the current club continues, initially with a slimmed-down infrastructure and mainly young, cheap, Scottish players. The club goes back into the mid-SPL pack for a few years, then re-emerges as title challengers; the silly stuff continues and Scottish football keeps going backwards.

2, liquidation, Rangers FC dies and is re-born as "New" Rangers, still in the SPL - well, the other ten NEED the Old Firm, they may be despotic lairds, but, they generate cash. A period of financial prudence happens, then, in the desperation to better Celtic, the bad old ways of Scottish football finance returns and it's pretty-much business as usual.

3, liquidation, Rangers FC dies and the "New" Rangers which emerges has to start in the Third Division of the SFL. They keep the Murray Park kids and the fanatics among the older players, ripping through the lower two SFL divisions. Meanwhile, with Celtic isolated in a 1/11 vote and the TV companies saying - no Old Firm games, no deal; the other clubs finally grow a pair and return to an 18-club SPL, which suddenly becomes competitive and vibrant - (that last phrase is wishful thinking) - and Scottish football is re-born.

4, liquidation, Rangers FC dies and with it Scottish football - (that's the Rangers faithful's thinking).

Who Will Be Rangers' Wee Fergus?

PHIL Mac Giolla Bhain, the Celtic-minded blogger who has been in the front rank of those foretelling of imminent disaster for Rangers over this past year used an interesting similie earlier this week - when he drew a parallel between in mid-Atlantic in 1912 and in Govan in 2012.

Right, RMS Rangers has hit its iceberg; who is in command of the rescue ships and how quickly can they get there? I have no wish to apportion blame, some of those responsible have lang syne got into the life boats and while many will seek to align Craig Whyte with that Italian cruise liner captain - and for sure the early evidence seems to point to reckless disregard for correct and prudent management - but, vessel and iceberg were locked-on to a collision course long before he took the wheel.

In the midst of their natural and understandable gloating at what has happened to the Forces of Darkness, as they see Rangers, many of the Celtic family have pointed out how, when the Families finally ran out of cash and ideas at Kerrydale Street in 1994, while Wee Fergus was the guy with the vision and the drive to oust them and right the ship from almost the point where the stern left the ocean and the final plunge began, ALL the Celtic family chipped-in.

I personally know ordinary Jungle Tims who dug really deep to see their club survive. They couldn't bear the thought of Celtic going under. Will imminent disaster mobilise the troops across the city?

Sadly, past evidence indicates that while to many of Irish or Roman Catholic descent in Scotland, Celtic is an icon which could not be allowed to die, that same desire to cherish and nurture an ailing Rangers is not, even in these dire times, evident.

I can only surmise, saying: "We arra peepel" comes as easily, but with a lot less meaning than saying, for instance: "We are all Neil Lennon". Supporting Celtic is a cause, supporting Rangers seems to be a feel-good factor.

There are guys out there who could salvage a Scottish institution, men who, perhaps not wishing to be tainted with any possible association with the wilder and more-disreputable elements in the club's following, who will, only after a wee hauf or two, in the privacy of friends they have known for years, confess to being: "Rangers Men", and who have the wherewithall and knowledge to save the club.

Whyte has to go, and soon - who is the Wee Fergus who will kick him out.

That will bring us to the next question - what happens next?

Oh Shit! The Wicked Witch is Dying

IF indeed, possibility of imminent death concentrates the mind wonderfully, there will be a deal of hard thinking going on in Scottish football's corridors of power. Because, we ought to be in no doubt, if Rangers goes under from the fall-out of years of financial mis-management, Scottish football as we know it, is dead.

This actually might be no bad thing. Sure, we would end up as something akin to the two Irish and Welsh Leagues, maybe even a Danish League - one full-time club and a lot of part-time ones. Initially, Celtic would rule the roost untroubled. However, long before  they had ran-up ten-in-a-row League titles, the Jungle Tims would be thoroughly sick of inevitable victory and longing for the old days when they had Them to hate. But in the longer run, we might have a really competitive league again.

Of course, we Scots are at our best/worst with a strong wind in our faces, we love to see the dark side of life. Rangers are only going into administration - they are not shutting down, that statue of John Greig will not be sited in the middle of a patch of grass, in the centre of an industrial estate for a long time to come, if ever.

But, even administration will change the game up here.

If that is as far as Craig Whyte has to go, the club will emerge with a leaner, fitter, outline. The bigger-name players who are coming to the end of their contracts will be allowed to depart, ditto those who are on the fringes of the action and those such as skipper Steve Davis and Alan McGregor, who have a decent re-sale value. The post- administration Rangers will have a younger, more home-grown squad. This is bad news for Ally McCoist and his management team, they will have to start coaching and managing, not trying to direct a squad of big-money, supposedly-able players who were bought.

Such a squad will still be competitive in Scotland, IF the guys in the track suits are prepared to coach.

If Rangers as currently organised is wound-up, that's the $64,000 (and more) question for the rest of the SPL. Sure, it would be great, after all these years of Rangers arrogance, to rub their noses in it, kick them while they are down and tell Craig Whyte when he comes along with Glasgow Rangers 2012 and asks to join the SPL: "No way pal, join the SFL, or, nip along the corridor and see if Tom Johnston will have you in the Central Regional Junior League - Glasgow Rangers v Larkhall Thistle, a bi-polar's delight.

But, in spite of Lawwell's claim that Celtic don't need Rangers - Aye Right, like Liz Taylor didn't need Richard Burton, Ernie Wise didn't need Eric Morecambe and Mike Winters didn't need Bernie. With no Rangers, who's going to be Schnorbitz?

As I have said before, for all their supposed friendliness with the power brokers from the other SPL clubs, when push comes to shove there is really only one club on whom Celtic can rely when they want something badly enough, and that club is Rangers.

Without Rangers, it becomes Celtic v the Rest 1v11, and that will allow a fairer, more-level playing field. For Celtic, more than anyone else, even Craig Whyte, these are dark and dangerous times. 

Today I find out - how bad is the SPL

I WRITE this post at just after 9am on a Saturday; in less than six hours I will be covering my first SPL game for two whole seasons and am looking forward to the experience, if only to see, for myself, if it is as poor a product as has been claimed.

I shall post my thoughts on the game tomorrow.

MEANWHILE, darn souf, there is just one issue in sport - will, or will not 'Arry rides to his nation's rescue and take the England job? It has been said before and by better sports writers than I, that the England manager's post is Mission Impossible - there is no way Tom Cruise and his team would take this gig.

Between an extreme paucity of talent and England expecting far too much, I fear they will never again, not even if they ever have the chance to play all their World Cup matches at Wembley, see an England captain hold aloft the World Cup.

Pedants might of course say: "So what, no England captain has ever held aloft the World Cup before". This is correct, it was the Jules Rimet Trophy which Bobby Moore and his team paraded round the old Wembley in 1966.

'Arry would be mad to take the job; however, for all his protestations of genuinely being as fick as he appears - 'Arry is a smart cookie who will most-likely screw a generous leaving deal out of Tottenham and a very lucrative salary package out of the FA - although the negotiations with Daniel Levy at White Hart Lane will doubtless be the more-difficult.

Just so long as he doesn't take Joe Jordan to Wembley with him.

IT'S Liverpool v Manchester United this weekend - in Scottish terms, Kenny v Fergie. Two successful but unloveable Scots going head to head. Both are, by birth or living time, Govan men, so they are unlikely to like each other; the fact they tolerate the other's presence in the same stadium is, I suppose, progress.

To paraphrase the great Captain Edmund Blackadder: why don't they just stay in Govan, have a square go outside Govan Cross subway station, winner gets the points. 'Twould save a lot of bother.

THINGS are getting worse for Craig Whyte. In the idyllic, sun-kissed former Ayrshire mining village where I live, the former Fuerher of the local junior team lives a half-life, ignored by most, shunned by many, because he all but bankrupted the club during his tenure as president.

He never meant to, he took over in hard times, he did his best, but, well he has never been the sharpest tool in the box and it all went pear-shaped. For all that, and in spite of our many fall-outs, I still like Jock, his heart is in the right place - the same cannot be said of his brain (if he has one).

However, this week in the pub, I heard Craig Whyte described as: "A Jock for senior football".

Ouch, that's hard. Down here, where you used to get the picture of King Billy on his white horse along with the keys to your council house - when they start joking about Rangers, that club is in bother.

Just what does IFAB stand for?

UP here, in the rarified atmosphere of the Philosophy department of Scottish Football, myself and the very few other philosophers are often accused of being out of touch with reality. I argue, it's not us who are out of touch, but Scottish, indeed, British football.

In support of this theory, I submit as evidence the agenda for next month's meeting of IFAB - the International Football Associations Board. IFAB is the supreme law-making body in world football and its membership is drawn from a wide field. Each of the four Home Nations is a member, the fifth member is FIFA. So, because of a historic anomaly, in the sport's most-important body, the one which makes the actual rules of the game - Stewart Regan, Alex Horne of the FA and their counterparts in Wales and Northern Ireland have each got the same clout as between 40 and 50 general secretaries or CEOs of every other football association on the planet.

Given that Regan can barely run a bath and the mess the FA has got itself into over John Terry and Fabio Capello - that don't say much for the other 190-something FA leaders across the globe.

[To digress slightly - it's not their international independence per se which is the big problem with the IFA's, SFA's and FAW's opposition to the Olympic football teams and the threat of forced amalgamation into a UKFA - to be known, in all probability if it happens, as The FA - it's their possible loss of their places on IFAB and access to junkets such as next month's, to be held at the swish Pennypit Park Hotel, in Surrey.]

Mind you, the four Home Nations don't actually do much with these places, the agenda - currently available for all to see on the FIFA and UEFA websites makes interesting reading. Yes, goal line technology is up for discussion, but don't hold your breath for implementation. But the stuff which will actually be acted upon is mundane.

They plan to drop the word "blatant" from the deliberate hand ball ruling for instance; they are tidying up some other wordings and the SFA has had some input into a suggestion that, if a match goes to extra time, a fourth substitution can be allowed during the additional half hour. Actually, this is quite sensible - are they sure its an SFA idea?

But, the item which caught my eye is one, from the (English) FA, which calls for tape round stockings, often used to hold shin guards in place, to be the same colour as the stockings. That should do wonders for the sale of those multi-coloured insulating packs you can buy in garages and hardware stores. Not sure about any positive effect on the game however.

You might think, between deciding what to do with John Terry - stocks and the ducking stool or castration, hanging, drawing and quartering, beheading - or all the above and sitting down with Daniel Levy and our 'Arry to sort out the Capello succession, the FA had more-serious matters than coloured tape to worry about.

By the way, it appears that the worse than useless experiment of the additional assistant referees behind the goals is to be extended into this summer's European Championship finals.

This is a great move, in theory, but, you still see the same amount of wrestling at corners, and referees and assistants still miss instances of the ball being over the line for goals not given. A potentially good change, if we can get the right men in situ, with the readiness to use their powers.

Which will survive - Rangers or Hearts?

MANY of the Sellick-minded amongst us are positively wetting themselves at the prospect of Rangers being wound-up, shut-down, liquidated, or whatever. They are revelling in the travails of the Ibrox club. So what, it's natural Scottish behaviour - the boot would be on the other foot were it Celtic which was being pursued by HMRC and sundry other creditors, as it was when only the last-minute arrival of Fergus McCann saved the hoops in the 1990s.

Whilst the on-going Ibrox saga is exercising much of their emotional steam, the thought that the so-called 'Sons of William' might be followed into the history books by their Edinburgh kinsmen the 'Cousins of William', or Heart of Midlothian as they are more-properly known could well be too-much for some of the more delicate members of the Celtic "family".

My reading of the situation is, should the worse come to the worst and both clubs are liquidated, a re-born Rangers will have more chance of immediate re-admittance to the top level of Scottish football than any re-born Hearts.

This is based on nothing more than a knowledge of human nature - Rangers, for all the mis-management of recent seasons, has always been in the tent pissing out, while under Mad Vlad and for all the diplomatic skills exhibited by reigning SFA president Campbell Ogilvie during his time as a Hearts administrator, Hearts have increasingly been seen as being out of the tent, pissing in.

[Just a thought here - Campbell Ogilvie was at Rangers when the seeds of the current problems were sown; he then went to Hearts and things also went pear-shaped; he is now Hampden Honcho - I see a pattern emerging, should we be worrying?

I ask this since Scotland's international independence is in danger from the Olympic football mess. Might we all have to vote for independence to save the fitba team in 2014?]

Right, back on-message. For all their arrogance and dominance over so-many years, Rangers have always been seen as a Scottish institution, albeit one with strong Unionist leanings. Hearts, under Romanov, have been the outsiders - even more than the "Irish" club which has consistently played the outsider card for 124 years. Some within Hampden might well bend a few rules, tweak a few strings to keep some kind of Rangers presence in the SPL - they would not, I feel, be so accommodating towards Hearts.

And, chief amongst those will be Celtic - for the simple reason: for as long as the Old Firm stick together, they can bend the rest of the SPL and Scottish football to their will. SPL rules allow two clubs, if they stick together, to hold the other ten to ransom when it comes to the big decisions.

Without Rangers, Celtic would have nobody they could trust absolutely and would be vulnerable to the other ten tweaking the rules, which currently it is alleged, gives the big two too big a share of the money.

The Old Firm, because they have, for more than a century, been a football firm which sticks together in times of danger to themselves, separately or in conjunction, will act in the best interests of the Old Firm. So, if calamity hits Rangers, the men who have to rebuild will know, they have supportive friends across the city - in the boardroom if not in the cheap seats. Hearts don't have that security blanket tucked away somewhere.

Should Craig Whyte fail, and remember, while his will be the hand on the tiller - the real skipper who had steered the ship towards the rocks, got off in his life raft a year ago, somebody will come alongside and throw a tow rope - Hearts will be allowed to sink.

In reality, both clubs should be allowed to sink - but, there's more salvage value in Rangers, so look for them to be saved.

The Sellik-minded sometimes refer to Ibrox as: "the Scrapyard" - there's money in scrap, remember.



Capello's departure confirms - managers are only employees

LET'S all laugh at England - no, maybe not. We Scots simply love schadenfreude and anything which gives us a laugh at the English football team diverts us from having to laugh at the Scottish team - it's either that, or we cry - because we really are in a bad way. At least, the English have the European Championships to look forward to.

The manner in which the Capello reign ended again shows how out-of-touch we, the football public and the football media, are when it comes to realpolitik. In football in this country, in spite of the higher profile enjoyed by the likes of Roman Abramovich at Chelsea, Vladimir Romanov at Hearts, Craig Whyte at Rangers or even back-seat owner Mr Desmond at Celtic - we still look on the manager as THE MAN in a club.

They are not - not even Sir Alex Ferguson. If push comes to shove in any club, the manager goes, the owner stays until he decided to sell. I cannot think of a single manager who was in reality THE MAN at his club since Bill Struth during his final decade at Rangers. Back then, he was the club's largest share-holder, he was vice-Chairman, he represented the club on the SFA. Not even Jock Stein had that power.

Perhaps he remained in office too long, but, Struth had the luxury of retiring at a time of his choosing, Big Jock didn't have that luxury. Capello didn't have that luxury at the FA.

The story is, he felt the FA blazers under-mined his authority by relieving John Terry of the England captaincy while he faced his trial over his alleged racist abuse of Anton Ferdinand. On the face of it, Capello has a point - however - given the media storm which is already surrounding this case and which will increase in power as his court date nears, I don't think the FA had any choice. For the good of English football, Terry had to go. Indeed, I feel he should have been left out of the England squad until the case is over and Terry is found guilty or innocent.

Capello was a foreign mercenary, the FA blazers are the guardians of the game. They have made mistakes in the past, they surely will again in the future - but, in this case - they got it right and Capello got it wrong.

MEANWHILE, back up here in la-la land, we have the on-going conjecture as to whether or not Ally McCoist should walk away from Rangers, or if he should be pushed.

There have long been rumours to the effect that Coisty never has had the confidence of Mr Whyte and that the owner of the club wants Billy Davies in as manager.

Rangers slump out of the Scottish Cup to Dundee United and suddenly, Billy Davies, is all over the media. Coincidence - or conspiracy.

Rangers need to re-discover their Presbyterian work ethic

ANOTHER of my generation of football writers, now semi-retired, hosts a blog which, naturally reflecting its author, is very much skewed towards the view from about half-way up the Copland Road Stand at Ibrox. In my old mate's eyes, Rangers' current travails are all the fault of - to some degree David Murray's failure to reign-in Dick Advocaat, but mostly to anti-Rangers bias by certain well-placed Celtic supporters.

There may well be a grain of truth in this, but, ranting and raving about the failings of the former owner and biased decisions taken by bankers will not halt FC Rangers' full steam ahead cruise towards that bloody great iceberg now standing ahead of it.

It is common knowledge that there is never a single reason for a fatal car crash, rather a lot of seemingly unrelated wee incidents come together in one big bang, which provides business for the undertaker. I presume, even as I type this, the corporate minds at KPMG and the other firms which have done well out of company failures in recent years are licking their lips at the money to be made out of the failure of Rangers.

One can only hope that, just as there was a wee, seemingly insignificant almost nerdy accountant from Croy, sitting in his office in Canada watching the old Celtic of the families lurch towards Carey Street and making ready to mount his charger and ride to the last-minute rescue - somewhere other than Scotland, a wee nerdy Larkhall boy is getting ready to do likewise for Rangers.

For right now, as things stand and as, daily, fresh revelations of the past business practices of Craig Whyte and concerns about what, if anything he can do to alter the club's course arise, I cannot help but feel - were John Laurie's Private Fraser to be a regular in certain "Rangers houses" around the club's supporters' heartlands in Scotland, his regular declarations of: "We're awe doomed, doomed ah tell ye", would be greeted as extreme optimism.

Ally McCoist's alleged demands for more money, to buy new players, are akin to the aristocrat, emerging from his bank, having been told - the money was all gone, the bailiffs would be round in the morning and he would then be out on the street, lighting-up a cigar with his last tenner.

I don't know if Coisty will ever be seen as a Struth, Symon, Wallace or Smith - but, he hasn't made the best start. Coisty can only piss with what he's been given, but, if he gets rid of the flab, puts in the hard hours on the training field and gets as fit as he can be - he can still probably piss higher than the next man.

Rangers is supposed to be the ultra-Presbyterian team. Well, perhaps a big bit of that extreme Presbyterian work ethic will get them past Celtic and on to four in a row. I doubt it, but, Coisty isn't going to get any more new players this season; his team is mis-firing badly, he has to get himself and his team of mechanics - Messrs McDowall, Durrant and Stewart on the job and working to put things right - he cannot buy his way out of this one.

As for the players, maybe, as with the old joke about the galley slaves being unchained, fed and allowed up on deck to sun-bathe, they should be told: "Enjoy the day lads - tomorrow the captain wants to go water-skiing".

I don't see Coisty water-skiing to the title, but, with the first signs of over-confidence emerging from the Lennoxtown dressing rooms, he should be ready to try.

BY the way, all this focus on Rangers' problems has tended to deflect from one obvious fact - how well Dundee United played on Sunday. Similarly, in the other games this season in which an admittedly poor Rangers team have shed points, winning sides such as Killie and St Mirren have been almost damned with faint praise.

Sure, they did beat poor Rangers teams, but they still beat them. Perhaps my Old Firm-osessed colleagues in the mainstream media in Scotland should be talking up the other SPL teams - the gap between the Big Two and the other ten isn't as broad as it once was - and that's fact.

Shoot All The Lawyers - Not That I'm Against Them

FOR my money, the trouble with the United Kingdom today is - we've got too many lawyers. At school, half a century ago, I was an A pupil - that I have since learned, meant I had a particularly good Qualifying exam, nothing more, nothing less.

Maybe I did have a few more functioning brain cells than the rest of the gang in my Primary Seven class, but, back then, a kid's chances in life were greatly enhanced, or permanently blunted, by how they did in that single exam.

Any how, in my 1A class at the local Senior Secondary (Scotland's much-superior equivalent to the English Grammar Schools), there were 35 pupils - so much for the 30 pupil maximum. We have a reunion every five to ten years and at the last one, held as we began to retire, we boasted: 1 university professor, 1 retired senior RAF officer, 1, retired senior civil servant, 1 guy who runs his own automotive consultancy, 1 IT millionaire, 1 retired and loaded merchant banker, 2 more retired bank managers, 2 journalists - both published authors, 1 retired engineering firm manager, 1 retired police Inspector, 1 senior manager for a big fashion chain, 2 mid-ranking civil servants, 2 mid-ranking charity managers, 8 teachers, 3 nurses, 1 accountant, 1 vet and 2 girls who married well and young to husbands who inherited big farms - the other 3 class members, sadly died young.

You will notice - not a lawyer amongst us. The only lawyer to come out of our year was in 1B, the next class down; he's a great guy, but the saying amongst us has always been: "If you need a good lawyer - see Bob, he knows one or two".

Nowadays we are awash with lawyers, there are so-many, they need to find ways of passing their time, so they stick their noses in where they aren't really wanted and the result has been the rise of various "industries", whose only benefit is, they create work for lawyers.

In particular, lawyers have almost invented and advanced the race relations industry. Now, I appreciate, I might be entering choppy and dangerous waters here, but having been exposed to 60-years of what passes for religious tolerance in Ayrshire, I think I can navigate my way through it.

I hold great store in the wise words of the Bard's great work 'A Man's A Man' - I have no time for those who abuse others because they are, to use the common language of the West of Scotland streets a H bar steward or a F bar steward; such people (the verbal abusers) are not worth bothering about.

But, that said, in the adrenilin-and testosterone-fuelled world of football, inhabited as it is by lots of guys who wear their IQs on their backs, I would have supposed that even a lawyer would have been able to differentiate between "banter" and racial abuse.

After all, in one of my jobs a work mate and I would, every morning, greet each other as an Orange bar steward and a F bar steward, and our line manager never felt the need to pull us up for it.

In another job, I had to go through a full stewards' enquiry after I suggested awarding someone a modern equivalent of the old Robertson's Golden Gollywog as a prize. It appears, in saying this I was a racist. Still don't see how, but, I have never been right-on PC and only used that particular childhood item as shorthand for an all but worthless prize.

So, where do I stand on the issue currently dominating English football - I refer to John Terry's loss (again) of the England captain's arm band whilst he prepares to defend his alleged racist slur on Anton Ferdinand.

I don't know too-much about Ferdinand Minor; he seems a reasonable Premiership journeyman. However, his elder brother Rio, Ferdinand Major, comes across as a bit of a twit, sharing that standing with his England co-defender, the afore-mentioned Mr Terry.

To me, Terry is a nasty piece of work; between his alleged involvement with Wayne Bridge's partner, the stories about him selling access to certain places to businessmen, his pique at being stripped of the England captaincy before and his unashamed efforts to have the post restored to him - had the FA had a shred of dignity and decency about the place, they would long ago have instructed Mr Capello to not merely strip him of the captaincy, but to kick him out of the squad.

Given his other failings, Terry may well be a racist - he may equally well not be, however, in the world of the working class, which football still is: it is not uncommon for insults to fly around when the going gets tough. The C word, the more common form of bar steward, the exrament word, quite often, in Scotland, preceded by the H or F words or Orange or Irish is far from unusual.

I would imagine therefore, in England, that the player being spoken to's skin tone might also enter the exchange. However, it's all in the tone, the context and how it is perceived.

I am assured by a distinguished former Scotland captain from some years ago that the Scotland squad which he led, one dominated by Old Firm players, and which performed an awful lot better than their 21st century successors was a very tight-knit, happy and friendly one. That didn't stop the Celtic players from addressing the Rangers ones as Orange or H bar stewards and being responded to as F or Irish bar stewards. It was all in the mutual understanding.

Of course, they didn't have lawyers telling them what to think; they knew what was banter and what was, very occasionally, abuse - and dealt with accordingly.

Get rid of the lawyers and let common sense back in. Mind you, I still think English football would be better-off without JT. 

   

Let's Play The Game In The Games

WHEN Glasgow was first named as host city for the 2014 Commonwealth Games, after the initial euphoria - because it will be great to see some of the world's top athletes in action in our largest city - I became a wee bit concerned, about how there might be a return in the massive costs of staging such a large festival of sport.

Sure, if what happens in Glasgow two years hence inspires even one young Scot to take his or her in-built talent and promise, build on it and became a sporting champion and an inspiration to the kids coming along behind, then it will all have been worth it.

That will be the long-term bonus, in the short-term, we want to see full houses at Hampden and the other venues; we want to see fans encouraging the athletes, and in all honesty, there isn't a great market for some of the Commonwealth Games sports in Scotland.

Again I turn to the fact, in Scotland, football is the only game in town and the one manner in which football and athletics worked together was in the heyday of the old Rangers Sports at Ibrox. This event was overseen by manager Bill Struth, who himself had an athletics background and some of the biggest names in athletics were only too happy to travel to Glasgow and participate in the event.

But, what made the Rangers Sports work in terms of big attendances was the inclusion, among the sprints, middle distance and field events of a five-a-side football tournament, featuring teams from the then six Scottish League teams from the city.

The hope was always that it would come down to an Old Firm final - that would really get the crowd going even more than the appearance of one or more Olympic gold medalists.

Fast forward to 2014. Imagine what the attendance would be like if football was included in the Commonwealth Games, and the final came down to Scotland v England? They'd have to lock the gates and the atmosphere would be electric. It couldn't fail and if there was a Scotland team involved and going well, it would even be Usain Who?

Of course, it will not happen, mainly because football isn't a Commonwealth Games sport - and, certainly in the context of the Glasgow games, it would have been a winner if it had been.

Now, let's take a quantum leap into another emotive topic - the 2012 Olympic Games football and the presence of Team GB. As things stand, this is a one-off event, even if Team GB were to win the gold medal, they wouldn't be around to defend it in Rio.

However, IF football was a Commonwealth Games sport, then all four home nations would be obliged to field properly-organised and funded squads, for preference playing to Olympic Games selection criteria. These teams could be an excellent bridging team between the Under-23 and full sides and would definitely help turn  club players into internationalists.

Getting football into the Commonwealth Games, would help maintain the international independence of the four Home Nations, and at the same time keep Team GB in the Olympics - giving the lucky players from the four countries who made the Olympics cut additional experience. It's a win-win situation for all four.

If Rangers Collapse - Who Will Celtic Hate?

I engaged in an exchange of cordial e-mails this week with a former colleague, who now occupies a rather nice media sinecure darn sarf, in that there Lunnun. He was once a regular Jungle Jim; now he gets his 90 minutes of Saturday suffering at the Emirates. But, he likes to keep abreast of events up the road and like many a Celtic-minded man, he doesn't know whether to laugh or cry at current events around Ibrox.

Sure, like most Scots he enjoys schadenfreude and is thus revelling on the daily doom and gloom stories concerning the Establishment club; but, like most intelligent Celtic fans, he worries what might happen, should Rangers go under.

After generations as the outsiders, the nobody likes us, we don't care alternative, could Celtic and their fans cope with being Ra Peepl, the Establishment? We live in interesting times.

Tomorrow sees the start of Rugby's Six Nations, kicking off with Scotland v England, at Murrayfield, for the Calcutta Cup. However, the rugby authorities build things up nicely towards the big one, with the rival Under-20s and A teams meeting, while for those complete rugby anoraks, the Scotland and England Women's XVs will also clash.

There is a recognised pathway in Scottish international rugby - Under-15 to Under-16 to Under-18, then to Under-20, perhaps the Scottish Students XV, then the A team and finally the big team. It works too, development is monitored and players get used to playing to a set pattern long before they win that first full cap.

On the face of it, the SFA also has a development plan - Under-15, Under-16, Under-17, Under-18, Under-20, Under-21....er!!

If you're good - say a Darren Fletcher or a Barry Bannan, you can then step almost seamlessly into the big squad; if you're not so good, or seen as a slow developer, or if you happen to play for one of the really big teams who prefer to buy over-priced foreigners to rearing home-grown players, that is either the end of your international career, or, if you're lucky and spend two to seven years in the wilderness, you might, assuming they cannot find a player in one of the lower English leagues with a Scottish granny who plays in your position, get into the main squad.

The truth is, we don't have a system that works. We did have, between 1955 and 1957, when young players could go from the Under-23 team, to the B team, perhaps gain extra experience in the Scottish League team, then graduate to the full team.

Forty-five players played for the Scotland B team between 1952 ane 1957, nine of them had previously been capped, 16 didn't make it to the main team, but the other 20 did - even if in one case, that of Ronnie Simpson, he had to wait 14 years between his B team debut and his full international one.

Between 1955 and 1976 244 players were capped for the Scotland Under-23 team, 129 of these went on to win full caps a 53% - 47% split in favour of those who trained-on to become full caps.

Since the Under-23 team gave way to the Under-21 team these percentages have reversed, and more; indeed, given that the very first Scottish Under-23 team, which lost 0-6 to a Duncan Edwards-inspred England, at Shawfield, on 8 February, 1955: Willie Duff (Hearts) Alex Parker (Falkirk), Eric Caldow (Rangers), Dave Mackay (Hearts), Doug Baillie (Airdrie), Bobby Holmes (St Mirren), Graham Leggat (Aberdeen), Jimmy Walsh (Celtic), Andy Hill (Clyde), Bobby Wishart (Aberdeen) and Davie McParland (Partick Thistle) comprised 11 players who were all first team regulars with their club, while the latest Scotland Under-21 team contained just eight players who might be seen as first team regulars at club level - and that number is an increase on what was the case two or three or even five years ago.

We have lost our way a bit in our development of international players and this is a topic I intend returning to in the near future.

Planet Fitba - It's Life Jim -But Not As We Know It

PLANET Fitba may look like planet Earth, it might rotate on its axis once every 24 hours, and take roughly 365 days to orbit the Sun, but, once you cross the space-time continuum between Earth and PF - you're in a whole new galaxy.

Why else would otherwise sane and sensible (not forgetting rich) business-men, used to making correct business decisions every day of their lives act as they do whenever they stop becoming businessmen and morph into football club directors or chairmen? Is it something they put in the water - maybe it's time we properly analysed the chemical content of  liquid Bovril - just about the only drink you ever see at football matches, but nowhere else. Repeated blows to the head from an inflated spheroid, delivered at pace from someone else's boot might be a factor - except, we don't see too-many directors doing Joe Jordan impressions.

Craig Whyte's finances may or may not be what they were assumed to be, when he first emerged as a buyer for Rangers, but, if he does indeed have billions tucked away in some Monaco or Caymen Islands bank account - the belief is growing that they somehow got there through underhand means and are kept there by the simple fact that Mr Whyte doesn't appear to pay for things until a (figurative) gun is held to his head.

But is the Rangers' owner the only seemingly bad apple on PF? Not by a long chalk. Take the English Premiership - "The richest league in the world" - its 20 clubs are owned by some apparent wide boys, who make Del Boy Trotter look like the epitome of moral rectitude, fiscal probity and good business practice - indeed, they are such a bunch of wide boys, I am amazed that Trotter's Independent Trading Company isn't the league sponsor.

Any regulatory body worth its salt, (and what are the SPL and SFA if not regulatory bodies?), would have a degree of independence, protocols in place to properly assess any would-be club owner's fitness to control that club; meaningful statutes would be in place, with bonds and deposits required so that, in the event of a single club going under - the other members would not lose out.

Did anyone monitor Whyte's background, ability to properly fund Rangers or business past? Of course not.

I had thought, when I first heard of his interest: What does a venture capitalist want with Rangers? There didn't seem too-much there which he could cream-off and make money from (the traditional modus operandi of a VC).

Since nothing obvious there, maybe we should have taken him at face value - as many did: a Rangers fan, who had got rich and now wanted that rich man's plaything, a big club to call his own.

Perhaps we wanted, too-much, to see him strip back the over-inflated playing staff, get rid of the over-paid, under-performing players, put an end to Rangers' habit of paying over the odds for average Europeans and start bringing through good young Scottish players.

It hasn't happened - Rangers have carried-on over-spending, refusing to live within their means and with the lack of a clear vision and drive which has characterised the club since Celtic ended their run of nine-in-a-row.

Now, this Scottish institution is in the hands of an apparent spiv. Even the mainstream Scottish sporting media has woken-up to the fact that Rangers might be in freefall and beyond saving.

Now, apparently, thoughts are turning to seeing what might be saved and how the club can be kept in the SPL - Rangers being too big to fail.

Well, they are not and while I would hate to see Rangers joining Airdrie and Third Lanark in the ranks of the dead clubs, would it be all that bad a thing were they to join Queen's Park and Dumbarton in the lower reaches of the SFL? Perhaps reflecting on past glories, but, still able, under the right leadership and with the right mind set, to clamber back to the top - refreshed, invigorated and able to carry on to fresh glories.

Rangers have always welcomed the chase - let's hope, if the worse happens, they welcome doing the chasing.

Just a final thought - might not a race between "new" Rangers and "new" Hearts to see which club can be first to go from the SFL Third Division to the SPL kick new life into the sometimes moribund SFL? 

Thank God That Window's Shut

WHEN I was a fresh-faced innocent, setting-out along the road to journalistic credibility (I might get there some day), the way to get ahead was to get out and meet people and make contacts. You learned more from speaking to people in their own homes and offices, or in their favourite pub; you spent time with them, got to know them and the stories came along in the course of the day.

Modern media methods are very different. Today's young journalists spend long hours in their offices, at their desks, in-thrall to the interweb - that's where they do their research, often find their stories and through  which they communicate, via e-mail, facebook, twitter or whatever.

I don't think it makes them better journalists, and while the internet is a wonderful tool for research purposes and e-mail is a heck of a lot faster than posting letters, technology can be a bad master.

There is also, among the promoted journos who run the various desks, today a need to keep in touch, to have the troops on a tight rein, to not trust them when out of sight.

But, as I see it, being desk-bound, tightly micro-managed journalists has been bad for our trade. The best journos were always the mavericks, the guys who could operate independently of their desks.

The best local news hound I know worked for an Ayrshire local paper. He would turn-up at 9am on a Monday morning, to assure his editor he was still alive, but would be out of the office (having spent the time in there compiling his expenses) by 11am. He would spend the rest of Monday trawling the pubs of his town, meeting his contacts; he would attend the local council's Monday night meeting, which would often keep him out until past midnight as he discussed events with the councillors. Then, after a lie-in on Tuesday morning, he would arrive at the office after lunch time, to type-up that week's "splash" - the front page lead story - and the pages, three, four, five, six and seven lead stories.

Wednesday, press day, would see him checking his stories for late developments in the morning, then, as the paper went to press that afternoon, he would be on the telephone to the nationals, selling-on his best stories on a lineage basis and in the process significantly increasing his earnings.

On Thursday he would do some features, on Friday, after a morning in the office, he would disappear, not to be seen again until he re-surfaced on the Monday morning. Today, he'd never survive the close scrutiny of his line managers, and in the process, he wouldn't get half the stories he did - many of which greatly embarrassed the local council staff, and just occasionally a coonsilor. He'd be just like the rest, re-hashing press releases, being mostly bored stiff and longing for a way out of what used to be, but is rarely today, a great job.

Even as micro-management of news and newsroom staffs spread like wildfire across the nation, we lucky bar stewards in the comics section, the sports desk, still had a wee bit of leeway. Club managers still like to exit the dressing room to meet a knot of reporters; they like to see the odd journalist turn up at the training ground and, provided you don't see the punch-ups between the players, you're welcome.

The players also like to see a friendly face around the place, particularly if that reporter will listen to their thoughts on the game and knod sagely as the player explains why he really should be playing for Scotland, Manchester United, Barcelona or whoever, when he can barely trap a sack of cement.

But, every January, even the sports guys become desk bound, as they go through the annual charade of the transfer window. This, particularly in Scotland, is a joke, and for me, it is no longer funny.

Each club begins the season with the playing staff which either - they can barely afford (most cases) or, more probably, they are stuck with. They will never be happy with either the quantity or quality of player they have to work with, but will give it a go, knowing, if things don't work out, if the players are crap, it is they, the manager, who is dispensible, rather than the players.

They also know that in the SPL, they are playing for third place, unless they are managing You Know Who, while in the lower divisions, while the squad they have might be good enough to win that league, they will be crushed in the one above the following season. So, if the title or one of the two cups is success beyond their wildest dreams, real success is third place and a drubbing in Europe the next season, while fourth, fifth and sixth, and those two additional Old Firm games, should be enough to  keep the directors off their backs.

Therefore, given that a maximum of seven of Scotland's 42 senior clubs can win a trophy (assuming things are spread around at a rate of one trophy per club), five-sixth of the clubs each year are doomed to failure.

They might, by New Year, accept this is inevitable, but, if they are in the mix at the top of their respective tables on 1 January, then prudent and successful dealing in the January transfer window just might make all the difference between success and failure.

These 31 days are a gambler's feast - do you stick or twist? Will than new arrival make or break you.

It's rubbish. Proper planning during the close season, hard work in pre-season, attention to detail, discipline and team-work and team spirit will do far more to bring success to a club than panic buying and selling in January.

The transfer window is a waste of time, the only people who benefit are today's idle, indolent journalists. For these 31 days they get even more shit flung at them, so they don't have to dig for it.

Does it make football or football journalism better? No way Jose - do away with it, say I.