I HAVE 'a dustbin brain.' Odd facts, stories and ephemera get in there, and lie there, to be dragged out some way down the road.
For instance, there is this largely forgotten 1961 minor hit record: “Warpaint” - performed by the even-more forgotten Brooks Brothers. It includes the lines: “There's still time and there's still hope – let me introduce you to a bar of soap.”
The first of those lines came back into my head yesterday, when I read that Rangers had banned the Supporters Club and its members, who had sung then uploaded that offensive little ditty about new Celtic signing Kyogo Furuhashi.
It's a long-awaited breakthrough in eliminating the lunatic fringe from Scottish football. I have maintained for some time, to paraphrase that line from “The Six Million Dollar Man,” “We have the technology – we can exterminate them.”
The technology has been in use for some time which would have enabled our football clubs, particularly the Big Two and always assuming they had the will – to get shot of their more-embarrassing and upsetting followers.
But, what's a few sweery words, some unacceptable chants between friends. These are the most-faithful of the Faithful, Ra Peepul who will Follow, Follow to the ends of the earth; buy all the replica strips, the scarves and the videos. OK, they frequently have gone and will continue to go too far, but, the bottom line is, if they continue to spend, it's good business for the clubs involved.
OK, bad behaviour by fans is not an Old Firm monopoly, but, they do have more nutters per square metre than all the other clubs put together. Mucking the Ibrox byre properly will be a lengthy process, but, this is a welcome start.
CONTINUING this blog's theme of pop songs and lines there from – I refer now to the Neil Diamond classic: 'Forever In Blue Jeans' and that opening: “Money talks, but it don't sing and dance and it don't walk” - well, for almost as long as football has been played, money has talked, in England they have been suited and booted, up here, in comparison, we've been forever in blue jeans.
Until comparatively recently, Rangers were immune from the big money south of the Solway. I reckon Jim Baxter, who in any case had grown tired of living in a goldfish bowl in Glasgow, was the first Rangers first-team regular to move south. Previous Rangers' players to have gone to the English League, such as Billy Stevenson or Alex Scott, had departed after losing their place. Celtic on the other hand has always been, like the other Scottish teams, a selling club when English clubs came calling.
I reckon the Rangers' board were actually glad to be shot of Baxter, they could clearly, had they wished to, kept him at home, but, his transfer to Sunderland was mutually beneficial. Any way, fast forward 56 years and apparently, there is a tug of war going across Liverpool's Stanley Park, with both Everton and Liverpool keen to sign young Nathan Patterson.
Now, I can understand the blue half of Liverpool being interested, young Nathan clearly has a bright future – but Liverpool. Pardon the cynicism, but, whichever journalist came up with that one needs to get out more. The Reds have a 30-strong first-team squad, which includes no less than ten defenders. The right-back spot is currently filled by Trent Alexander-Arnold, who is but three years older than Patterson, and 11 caps more-experienced in international terms.
To put it bluntly, Liverpool don't need Patterson, I reckon that one is the work of an over-inflamed imagination. If the Everton interest in genuine, Patterson will go, Rangers can no longer hold-off the big English clubs.
Selling him might actually be good business for the club, except, they are most-likely to spend any transfer money in bringing in a lower-cost, inferior foreign replacement, rather than grooming the next Nathan Patterson.
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