MUCH as I hate to disagree with a good Paisley Buddie, I feel Derek McInnes was talking mince when he said he was proud of his Aberdeen team's European bid, which ended at Pittodrie last night.
I fear SAF would not have been "Pwoud, very pwoud" had his Aberdeen side tumbled out of Europe so-early in the season, to a definite "diddy" team from a "diddy" country.
OK, I have often said, we Scots perhaps have too-guid a conceit o' oorsels when it comes to fitba, but, Aberdeen had a higher Europan co-efficient than the team from Kazakhstan who eliminated them; Scotland has a higher club co-efficient than does the former Soviet republic from so far away, while Scotland has a higher international co-efficient than Kazakhstan. So, by these simple statistics - to lose to a team from Kazakhstan was NOT a performance to be proud of.
Once again, Celtic is left to carry the saltire in Europe. At least, they got a wee bit of a break with the draw for the Champions League play-off round, when they were paired with Malmo.
No Swedish team is ever easy to beat, but, it's not as if Celtic will have to make another lengthy trek to the other end of the continent. This one will be close, it will be hard, but, Celtic are capable of beating the Swedes.
And, it's a nice wee earner, potentially, for former Malmo player Robert Pritz, who will surely be dragged out to speak at length on the tie - given that getting an Old Firm old boy to speak on such occasions is the default position of the Scottish fitba media.
Of course, this being Celtic, "The Magnificent Seven" will surely have his peace and sanity tested between now and the tie, by sycophants anxious to hear his views on Scottish-Swedish football relations.
PARDON me if I cannot get excited about BDO's latest look at football finances. The current model of Scottish football management, at SFA and SPFL level doesn't work - but, I don't see a willingness to change things being evident any time soon.
We will just, as we have always done, stumble along, from crisis to crisis, with our football product reflecting lack of investment, lack of imagination and an unwillingness to rock the boat of self-interest.
Doomed we are, doomed ah tell ye.
IN the course of researching what I hope will be a new book, I have been trawling through football match reports from 60-years ago. What a pleasure this is. We get all the necessary information, without the hysteria of today, and, mercifully, the writers back then were allowed to have their own opinions, rather than simply parroting the opinions of the managers and players.
Quotes from over-rated coaches and players were also, mercifully, nowhere to be seen. Aye simpler times, and, I think, the fitba was better.
Mind you, some things never change. One issue of the local paper, which I was looking through last week, had a report of a West of Scotland Junior FA disciplinary meeting, at which a local junior team's linesman was banned for a month, after it was found that, in site of his denials, he had indeed: "Advanced menacingly towards the referee, taking off his coat in the process and threatening the official".
The linesman, one of my father's drivers, denied the charge. I was at the game, about 20-yards from the incident - you bet he acted as charged, I saw it all.
Mind you, the best bit of bare-faced lying I ever heard at a junior disciplinary meeting was by the Cumnock Juniors official who denied a charge of hitting an Auchinleck Talbot player over the head with a corner flag.
Said official - who never got to be Cumnock president, because (amazingly) he could never win the Cumnock Village Idiot of the Year competition: first prize (allegedly), to be Cumnock Juniors president for a year - had claimed he had been holding the corner flag horizontally, and trying to edge the Talbot player and one or two others away from the club-house entrance at the end of a typically tousy Cumnock v Talbot game.
This outrageous claim was, however, undone by the match referee, who told the disciplinary hearing: "I felt the wind from the flag stick, whizzing past my nose, as the Cumnock official brought it down in an overhead motion to connect with the Talbot player's head".
Cumnock were duly fined £100 for the official's misconduct. Mind you, the consensus within the meeting was - he hadn't hit that particular Talbot player hard enough!!! I have to agree. Nae names, but, in the litany of wee, narky, annoying nyaffs in fitba, this Talbot guy was right at the top of the list.
TO return to long-ago incidents. In the course of my research I read an old report in which the go-ahead goal in a Scottish Junior Cup quarter-final was described as having been "prodded home".
Aye right. I was right behind the goal when the scorer shot, from about three-yards. It was the most amazing "erse-hole winder", the ball nearly burst the net and I was convinced it would come through the rigging and hit me in the face.
If that was a "prod", I'd hate to see a fierce shot.
I await your book!
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