THE late Emlyn Hughes, before he was taken, far too soon, was one of the top draws on the lucrative after-dinner speaking circuit. He was quoted as saying this was an easy life - all he had to do was stand there and tell Bill Shankly stories for half an hour or so.
One of my favourite Shankly stories concerns his response to a suggestion from Bob Paisley and the other coaches in the legendary Anfield boot room, that he get up-to-date and use a tactics board, with magnetic "players" to illustrate the points he was trying to make in pre-match planning.
So, Wullie Shankly - he was never "Bill" to those in East Ayrshire who knew him best, duly obliged and, on the Friday before a game against Manchester United, the players found themselves gazing at a board, with 11 magnetic figures on it, laid-out in 4-3-3 formation.
Shankly pointed to the figure representing the goalkeeper, and began: "In goal, we have Alex Stepney; Tommy Docherty paid a lot of money for him, England goalkeeper, but only one cap, which says it all - rubbish". Whereupon the figure was flung in a waste bin.
He proceeded to pick up, run-down and throw away each of the other figures, until, he was left with just the front three. Turning to his players Shankly said: "And, here we have United's front three - George Best, Bobby Charlton and Denis Law. He smacked the board with a pointer and repeated: Best, Charlton and Law; well, if you cannot beat three men, you should not be playing for Liverpool".
I am reminded of that story, when I look at the media build-up to tonight's crucial Scotland v Poland European Championship qualifier, at Hampden.
Much of the pre-match talk has been about Robert Lewandowski, and how we handle the superstar Polish striker. I commend the Shankly approach to Wee Gordon Strachan.
Indeed, if our boys canny beat one man - they shouldn't be playing for Scotland.
LONG experience of disappointing Scotland qualifying campaigns has taught me not to have great expectations. But, we have already had our normal Disaster for Scotland qualifying match - away in Georgia. Given the way we have tended to do things in the past, we will rise to the occasion tonight, pole-axe our opponents, then, in Faro next week, we will struggle to beat Gibraltar, and find ourselves in the play-offs.
Here, we will be drawn against a good team which has struggled through their qualifying group and under-performed badly. I don't know which nation this will be, but, old foes Holland have been mis-firing badly.
These opponents, whichever country they may be, will then, faced with Scotland, suddenly re-discover their true form and blow us away.
We are Scotland remember, the wind is always in our face. Mind you at least, we haven't gone our of our own home-staged finals at the group stages - let's be thankful for small mercies.
LAST Saturday, Scotland's Rugby XV were comprehensively worked over by a rampant South Africa XV, at Newcastle United's St James Park.
In the course of the game, Scotland's Stuart Hogg perormed a quite outrageous "dive" after he was hit, perhaps fractionally late, by one of the South Africans.
It was a nothing incident, except, the way it was handled by referee Nigel Owens. The wee Welshman, for me the best referee in the world, is known for two things - being openly gay and for his quips to the players.
He wasn't joking, however, when he told Hogg: "Get up, if you want to do that, come back here in two weeks (when Newcastle United play their next home game), and do it then - we don't want that sort of stuff in rugby".
What a fantastic response, I wish more football referees were as quick to sort-out the divers and play-actors who besmirch the Beautiful Game..
I also wish footballers would give the referees the same degree of respect, which the whistlers in that game get from Rugby players. The hooligans, even after 150-years, are still a long way behind the gentlemen when it comes to on-field discipline.
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