Here We Go Again

"DIAMOND geezer" Ray Winstone has a nice little earner going on Champions League nights on ITV, with his commercial for in-play betting with some online bookmaking firm. Winstone might look like a prototype Millwall fan (I think he has an affection for West Ham), but I don't think "footie" is the number one conversation subject down at the Groucho and the other watering holes wherein lurk the London Luvvies.

I don't bet, but, with little Lennie's touchline ban over, I might be tempted to see what the odds are against the Celtic manager being banished to the stand again between now and the end of the season - and make a small investment.

Lennie apparently intends going-on as he has in the past, charging around the technical area and down the track like a souped-up Duracell rabbit - he seems to think this the best way to gees-up the Celtic players. He should maybe have a word with a Lisbon Lion or two; one of that sainted group of players once told me nothing got him focussed or motivated quite like looking across at the Celtic dug-out to see Jock Stein, face like fury, just staring at him.

Brown pants time, time too to up the work rate and attempt to please the boss. Stein was often like a simmering volcano, but I don't recall him charging about, throwing wobblers to the same extent as Lennie.

Another thing which caught my eye today was, in a piece by a young whipper-snapper of a journalist, for whom I forecast great things, the suggestion that Lennie was about to exchange his place in the stand for: "the best view of the pitch" - from the dug-out.

Pure pish, the best view of the pitch is the bird's-eye one; the higher the perch the better you are able to survey your domain. Just look at the example of raptor birds, who soar to great heights, before diving down to take their prey.

Head coaches in American Football patrol the touch lines, simply because they have to make the big calls as to what players they have to put into the game for each play over a match. They can field any 11 from 47, so they need to be hands-on and at the head of their batallion.

But, they have half a dozen guys, as high up the stadium as they can be, surveying the field, watching the positioning and feeding them information.

In international rugby, the coaches are also sat high up in the stands, surveying, watching, deciding, but in constant touch with minions on the touchline, who get the message on to the players.

Have you ever noticed how, in rugby internationals, whenever there is a place kick at goal, the water boys and the tee-carrier, usually the kicking coach, are immediately onto the park. They're not there just to bring water, on-field coaching is going on.

But, football is a simpler game, it flows more naturally and has fewer natural breaks. Therefore, it is harder to change things on the hoof. So why doesn't the head coach ape his rugby counterpart and remain up high, but in touch with the accolytes on the bench? He gets a better view, he can still intervene if necessary and, crucially, in the case of Neil Lennon, he'd be well away from potential flashpoints with match or even fourth officials, or opposing coaching staffs.

Keeping Lennie out of the front line might not do much for Paul McBride QC's fees income, but just might work better for Celtic. I think it is worth trying.

I NOTE that Falkirk is the latest club to be facing financial problems. Why am I not surprised - until the SFA stops farting about and sorts out the game, financial failure will continue to be a feature of Scottish football.

Scotland is skint - our heavy industry is all but gone, we're the only nation on earth ever to strike oil and end up poorer. We've been shafted for ages by a political class of gold-ploated numpties, "advised" by a civil service who are not only uncivil, but serve nobody but their own best interests.

We cannot afford the number of full-time football teams we have. The Scottish football cake has been shrinking for years, but, what happens? Every time a team looks like going under, some kind of saviour comes along and hey presto, most of the debt somehow vanishes and they carry on.

On the few occasions when a club does go under, instead of consolidating with a smaller league, another club is brought in - Third Lanark begat Clydebank, enter Meadowbank, Inverness CT, Ross County, Elgin City, Peterhead, Gretna came and went, to be replaced by Annan. Airdrie went, and voila, Clydebank became Airdrie United.

We need fewer clubs in Scotland, not more, or even the same number. Scottish football was at its post-war peak of popularity with 30 clubs, today, with much-reduced crowds we've got 42, it's economic madness.

The decade between "normal" football resuming in 1946 and the start of European football in 1955 was boom time for Scottish football. OK, Celtic have never before or since under-achieved as badly as they did then, but, they were still contenders and managed to win one League Chamionship, two Scottish Cups and the Coronation Cup. Rangers won four League Championships, four Scottish Cups and two League Cups.

Aberdeen won a League Championship, a Scottish Cup and a League Cup; Clyde won the Scottish Cup, Dundee won two League Cups, East Fife won three; Hearts won a League Cup; Hibs won three League Championships; and Motherwell won a Scottish Cup and a League Cup.

Quite a few of these trophies were won by predominantly part-time squads, not so many years later St Mirren won the 1959 Scottish Cup with a squad which included two petrol tanker drivers, one brewer's drayman, a teacher and a driving instructor.

So, in the first nine post-war Scottish seasons, seven clubs other than the Big Two managed to get their hands on one of the three major items of silverware. In the last nine seasons, of full-time, so-called more-professional football, only four clubs, Hearts, Hibs, Dundee United and Livingston have caused the Old Firm to cut down on silver polish.

And the present-day Rangers squad doesn't have a defence like Brown; Young and Shaw, McColl, Woodburn and Cox, or attackers such as Willie Waddell or Willie Thornton. And they don't have a penalty taker like Johnny Hubbard.

I'd rather have Bobby Evans, Bertie Peacock, Charlie Tully, Bobby Collins and Willie Fernie than some of today's Celtic stars.

Where are the successors to Conn, Bauld and Wardhaugh, or Mackay and Cumming at Hearts? What price the not-so-famous Hibs Six: Scottish internationalists Tommy Younger, Hugh Howie, Jock Govan, Bobby Combe, and League internationalists John Paterson and Archie Buchanan - far less the Smith, Johnstone, Reilly, Turnbull and Ormond "Famous Five" up front at Easter Road in those days?

Aberdeen fans might bemoan the lack of quality in today's squad, when compared with "Fergie's Furies" - what about the 1955 title-winning squad, the likes of Fred Martin, Archie Glen, Alec Young, Jackie Hather, Harry Yorston, Paddy Buckley, Bobby Wishart and the young Graham Leggat - that was some squad too.

Clyde had international stars in post man Harry Haddock and scientist Archie Robertson, while at Bayview, East Fife's George Aitken came up the pit one Thursday, travelled down to London on Friday, helped Scotland beat England 3-1 on Saturday, travelled back up on Sunday and was back at the coal face on Monday morning. Couldn't happen today.

You can be a part-time footballer, but still be professional. Ah there's the rub - being professional. A lot of our so-called professionals are highly unprofessional in their life styles and demeanour.

Sort it out and we can again see great football in Scotland.