Once Again - In Europe, We Are All Celtic Fans

ONE OF my mates in the Ayr Coffin Dodgers Society is what I call a “soft” bigot. He claims to be an Ayr United fan, but, if you miscall the Honest Men, he never bites back, while he goes slightly ape shit if you dare to criticise Celtic.

I got a text from him on Wednesday night; asking where my cynical text had gone, when Astana equalised. Clearly, he mixed me up with someone who gave a toss about Celtic. I was always confident in the Hoops' ability to see off the team from Kazakhstan – once I was certain Brendan Rodgers was not going to let Efe Ambrose anywhere near the field.

Celtic are still building-up to full speed, but, even at 80%, I still fancied them to win – which they did. Let's hope they get a reasonably-easy draw, if there is such a thing in Europe today, for the Play-Off round.

I certainly had more faith in Celtic winning on Tuesday night than I had in Aberdeen winning in Maribor. Better Aberdeen teams than this one have had seriously bad second leg European results, and, Scottish teams have never won in Maribor. I couldn't see the Dons winning, even before UEFA appointed a member of the Bulgarian division of the Homer clan as referee.

Some35-years ago, an experienced Scottish basketball official told me: “Success in Europe is never guaranteed, but, you can help yourself. You “buy” the referee in your home leg; I don't mean by bribing him, other than by ensuring his experience of Scotland is a great one, and he thinks you are a tremendous club, willing to treat him like royalty. Then, you work on his good opinion of you to get the big calls – but, you still have to win well-enough at home to offset the fact, your opponents are going to pull the same stunt for the away match.

“Treat your referee at home well, then, don't upset the officials in the away leg and you have a chance”.”

Aberdeen didn't help themselves – they failed to keep 11 guys on the park; they missed a penalty; they didn't score when on-top. Don't blame the referee, blame himself. And remember Jock Stein's wise words: “Take the referee out of the equation, don't give him a chance to be a factor in the game, by maybe sending off one of your guys, or having to decide if a penalty box tackle was good or concedes a penalty”.

Jock Stein died 30-years ago, his words of wisdom are even more true today than they were back then.

THE GUARDIAN ran a piece this week, timed to coincide with the opening of the Women's Football cometition at the Rio Olympics. They picked the top 20 women footballers of all time. Of course, this being an English competition, they had to get a couple of English girls into the list – while managing to overlook almost-certainly the three best British women footballers ever – Rose Reilly, Julie Fleeting and Kim Little.

But hey, these girls are from Scotland, a small country, far-away from London, of which the English know little and care even less. One or two Scots commenters got their retaliation in, quickly, and chapeau to the Jock who pointed-out, England's Kelly Smith was on the list, described as “a deadly finisher”, ahead of Little, a midfielder and Fleeting – a real finisher.

Smith has scored 46 goals in 117 internationals. Little, an attacking midfielder remember, has scored 46 goals in 115 internationals, while Fleeting has scored 116 goals in 121 internationals.

As Craig Brown was want to say about his fellow SFA executive Jim Fleeting: “Aye, he sires the best Scottish international striker, ever, and makes her a girl”. Aaaaarrrrrggggghhhhh!!!!!

SO, that's us; the league season has not even started and already we are down to Celtic being Scotland's only hopes in Europe. The Hoops will now almost have to win the Europa League – come-on, does anyone think they can win the Champions League? If Scotland's UEFA co-efficient is to get the significant boost it needs.

With each passing season we become further detached from the nations we should be competing with, and closer to the nations we once treated as “diddy teams”.

We are already beneath Cyprus, a Scottish team has lost to one from Liechtenstein in Europe. This season, Hearts lost to a team from Malta – we are almost at the foot of the barrel.

FINALLY, understatement of the week surely came from Rev. Stuart Campbell, who runs the excellent Wings Over Scotland political digest site. Stuart is an unashamed Dons fan, which colours his judgement when he, as he occasionally does, he comments on fitba.

This week, challenged as to why he apparently favoured Celtic over Rangers, Stuart replied: "Because only 60% of the Celtic support are knob-heads, against 90% of the Rangers support". I may disagree with his percentages, a tad on the low side I would say, but, it is difficult to fault his judgement.