RANGERS' DUMMY-SPITTING, toys-out-of-the-pram-chucking reaction to Auston Trusty's yellow card on Sunday was not a good look. So much for “We welcome the chase” and Dignity. Scottish Football's institutionalised bastion of Unionism is methinks taking their desire to be “British” a bit far, embracing English Exceptionalism and Entitlement.
Of course, when your club has enjoyed the decades of “honest mistakes” up to downright cheating from supporters, wearing black and carrying whistles and flags onto the park, it's bound to hurt when you begin to suspect the same support is being given to another club.
My own view on Sunday was, Nick Walsh didn't have his best day at the office, but, there were players on both sides who probably made more mistakes than the referee and his assistants. Now, the Laws of the Game state quite clearly: “The Referee is the sole judge of fact”; it's not as if Walsh ignored Trusty's kick to Jack Butland's head – he did yellow card the Celtic defender. In Rugby Union, a far-harder game than Football, a kick to the head, even if the Referee deems it only worthy of a yellow card, does carry a mandatory ten minute seat on the naughty step. I have been saying for years, Football's yellow cards should also require the recipient to go to the naughty step for a time.
Rangers' distress at the events of Sunday and the game's authorities to them and to their complaints may play well with their fan base – who will be fed a distinctly pro-Rangers slant on things by the gentlemen of The Lap-Top Loyal. But shouting “We wuz robbed” has never worked in the real world.
The bibliography of Football is choc-a-bloc with brazen examples of hagiography, those books about the two main Glasgow football teams and their Club Legends particularly so. For instance, James Handley's 1960 tome – The Celtic Story is often referenced as a story so-far removed from factual, it would have been rejected as absurd in Hollywood.
As Handley tells it, Celtic were being, as some of their fans insist to today: Always cheated, never defeated” - Scottish Football was institutionaly anti-Celtic, yet, for much of the post-war period Handley was dealing with – the most-influential club administrator in Scotland was Celtic Chairman (Sir) Robert Kelly, who held high office in both the SFA and The Scottish League.
History has not been particularly kind to Sir Bob, but, for all the rival claims of such giants as Willie Maley, Jock Stein, Billy McNeill, Fergus McCann and anyone you care to name from the club's more-recent past, it could be argued, Sir Bob has been THE most-influential single individual in the club's 137 year history.
I dare say, as he went about his business in Scottish Football's corridors of power, there would be times when Sir Bob felt the rest of the clubs were out to hurt Celtic, but, he fought his battles where it mattered, around the committee table and I sense, he won more than he lost.
Sir Bob was not the only Celtic figure to hold high office in the national governing bodies, Jack McGinn – John's Grandfather – also made a huge contribution to the club and to the game at national level.
It might be fair to say, Celtic have taken more-interest in Football governance – beyond the affairs of their own club – than their rivals across the city, so, it could well be: a bit more noblesse oblige and a bit less Droit de Seigneur (leave that behaviour to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor) might serve the Ibrox club better.
When I first got interested in Football, in the mid-1950s, this was a decade of great change in Scotland. Rangers Legend George Brown – a former Scotland Captain and at the time Rector of Bellahouston Academy, was then Chairman of the SFA Selection Committee, trying to introduce some new ideas at the highest level – but, at that time, probably the most-influential Rangers man around the SFA was George Young, who, as National Team Captain was, in effect, Player-Manager at a time when we didn't have a Team Manager. As far as I can remember, Brown was the last Ibrox High Heid Yin to have a meaningful role in the corridors of power.
Certainly, David Murray for instance, had no interest in being involved in overall football governance and, to be brutally frank – you wouldn't want the Muppets who have been in-charge at Ibrox since his departure anywhere near decision-making.
Might may be right for the likes of Donald J Trump and Vladimir Putin, but, in Football Governance, there is a lot to be said for soft diplomacy. Perhaps, instead of looking down on the 40 “Diddy Teams” if the Big Two showed a wee bit more grace and favour, they might well have even more power than they have to shape things.
Their recent method of shaping things has seen them, albeit in different economic times, kick-out their age-old position as the peak of a Scottish player's ambition. He might start at the local Junior club, or a lowly Senior club, but, if he could get a berth in the dressing room at Ibrox or Celtic Park – he was made.
Look at these legendary teams:
Rangers 1949 “The Iron Curtain Team”: Brown; Young and Shaw; McColl, Woodburn, Cox; Waddell, Paton, Thornton, Duncanson, Rutherford.
These players were respectively recruited from: Queen's Park; Kirkintilloch Rob Roy, Airdrieonians; Queen's Park, Musselburgh Athletic, Dundee; Strathclyde, Kirkintilloch Rob Roy, Schools Football, Dunoon Athletic, Mossvale YMCA.
Celtic 1967 “The Lisbon Lions”: Simpson; Craig, Gemmell; Murdoch, McNeill, Clark; Johnstone, Wallace, Chalmers, Auld, Lennox.
These Legends arrived at Celtic Park from: Hibernian; Glasgow University, Coltness United; Our Lady's HS/Cambuslang Rangers, Our Lady's HS/Blantyre Victoria, Larkhall Thistle; Blantyre Celtic, Heart of Midlothian, Ashfield, Birmingham City (originally signed from Maryhill Harp), Ardeer Rec.
OK, I get the different times argument, but, as The Celtic Song says: “if you know their history” - well, I believe the numpties at the top of both clubs today, and in particular the numpties down Edmiston Drive, have forgotten their club's history – both clubs are Scottish institutions – maybe, if they were a bit more Scottish and a bit less British, Irish, European – and went back to the management systems which worked and which brought European trophies to both clubs, they would get on better.
On Sunday's evidence, both clubs, more-so Rangers, are an awful long way away from where they see themselves, far less where they aspire to be. And an awful long way away from being able to influence the Beautiful Game.
No comments:
Post a Comment