Wanted - A Fan On The Park

I HAVE long held that Celtic and Rangers, because of the weight of expectation which falls on their players on a weekly basis, require at all times to have a player who is, for want of a better expression - the Keeper of the Faith. Such a player need not be the club captain, or even the best or most-influential; but, what he has to be is: "the fan on the park" - the guy who is playing for the thousands who can do no more than cheer-on the team from the sidelines.

 

Such a player, perhaps lacking the technical quality so necessary in Champions League play, more than pays for himself in the most-important battles - the purritch and auld cales of domestic league games. As I warned in my last post, it is no good beating Barcelona if full points are not taken against St Johnstone. That's what happened and for all the very good non-Scottish imports he has brought to the club, I feel Sunday's result against the Perth side showed that what Neil Lennon really needs to get hold of is a player who is Celtic to the core - a Neil Lennon or Roy Aitken-type figure who can, by sheer force of personality turn damaging draws such as Sunday's into victories.

 

I will still be very surprised, should Celtic not run away with the SPL, but, if  they don't, then indetifying and nurturing the "fan on the park" has to be a priority.

 

 

 

THE latest inductees into the Scottish Football Hall of Fame were named at the weekend. Let me say, straight away, I have to argument with the five men inducted, all are worthy of inclusion - however, that said, I am amazed to see one iconic Scottish football figure has still not been inducted.

 

I refer to the great Jimmy McMullan - captain of the immortal 'Wembley Wizards'. In an ideal world, when the HoF was conceived, the 11 Wizards and the 11 LIsbon LIons ought to have been a combined shoo-in. They perhaps weren't all worthy, but, as the two greatest teams in the history of the nation's favourite team game, they should have gone in en bloc.

 

But, I digress; even allowing for the special status of that win on 31 March, 1928, McMullan's record as a great player and an even-greater captain did, and continues to, make him worthy of a place in the HoF. I refuse to believe there are 82 worthier men in the history of Scottish football.

 

I also hae ma doots about one of the new inductees, Andrew Watson of Queen's Park, who won three caps in the early 1880s. Apparently Watson's unique selling point for induction was that he was the world's first black internationalist. Good for him, however, I feel to induct him ahead of some of the other legends of that time - when Scotland truly was the best side in the world, is nothing more than a sop to political correctness and the Racial Equality Industry.

That's the thing with the HoF induction process; the choices are made by a panel of so-called experts. Well, when it comes to the history of Scottish football, I consider myself a lot better-informed than some of the "experts" who make the who gets in decisions and, over the years, there have been several clear instances of club loyalties getting guys in far earlier than they might perhaps be correctly inducted.