Skyline Drifter

It might be quicker in your case to parade the crowd before all your ex-Chairmen.

Did he? Shows what I know then! I was sure Roddick would win that.

MURRAY WINS!!!!! World Number 2 on Monday!

Some match this! Second set tiebreak has swung back and forth. Murray's had and narrowly failed with one match point but Tsonga has a second set point here.................... and fails too. 8-8

Yes, I did say in the first post that in the scheme of things the difference in East Stirling's crowd is probably minimal. I do think in the schem of what we're discussing though the Cowdenebath support is irrelevant. I accept it would have been a bonus to East Stirling and probably everyone else in the 3rd division financially for your away support to replace Cowdenbeath's. However, fact is you were, regardless of the rights and wrongs, told to play at East Stirling that day. Having not done so the relevant figures are the difference in gates between the take when it is eventually paid and what it would have been (pure conjecture of course, no way to actually measure that). What Cowdenbeath would have taken had the fixtures went as originally expected isn't directly relevant to what you cost East Stirling by not playing when you should have. I'm not calling for big financial penalties here incidentally, please don't think I am. I think you probably should get a small points deduction for it (though I wouldn't be surprised if they were happy just to get on with things now) and have to meet any verfiable additional costs East Stirling actually had (ie pies that were wasted). I wasn't suggesting you should pay for a crowd reduction which would after all be completely unquantifiable anyway.

I think Roddick will beat Del Potro. Murray v Tsonga probably depends which Tsonga turns up. In form he can be devastating and huonded Murray on hard court in Australia last year.

Rearranging it on a weekend, whenever (and I doubt Saturday early would be popular with those in both supports who have tickets to actually attend Hampden), still doesn't make it the first weekend of the season when there's a greater surge of interest. You probably will take more than Cowdenbeath but that's irrelevant. It's whether the crowd against you in the rearranged game is more than the crowd against you if the game had gone ahead when planned that's relevant. The fact it may ultimately be a bigger crowd than they'd have expected a month earlier can't possibly be a defence.

Well yes, the game will be replayed. But it will presumably be played midweek with a much lower crowd than a home season opener would have had (yes, ok, in the scheme of East Stirling crowds it can't get all that much lower). They probably had some costs for staging the first game that will be repeated next time. Don't know if they do their own match catering but presumably a lot of pies etc were bought and went to waste, if not by East Stirling then by whoever owns the catering franchise. They may have to reprint a programme (although they may just do the same one with an insert or indeed nothing at all). They might have had to pay stewards because it was too late to cancel. Of course all these could equally happen with any postponed game for weather so it's not the end of the world but if Livingston are found to have breached rules in not turning up and get a points deduction I'd imagine they will also have to make some financial reparations to East Stirlingshire. Hamilton had to pay Stenhousemuir's expenses for their infamous strike hit game as I recall.

It's a week late. I'm torn between being incensed that they have hypocritically turned their stance on this 180 degress or pleased that they have seen the light. I bet East Stirling are flaming though.

They have a safety certificate now. It was announced on their website this morning.

Source for the second information? Why would there be two votes? If they were only sitting to decide if the first punishment was to be upheld why would they have a vote on the punishment at all? Is this a whoosh?

McGruther remains in charge of the club until the courts say differently

Our website is also now reporting that after a lengthy meeting it remains Airdrie away for us on Saturday.

Why would I wind you up? It is an 11am meeting.

Meeting started at 11am

Ah, I see. Sorry, when people have referred to the "Livingston 5" I thought they were taking about five people but that's the name of the company formed to take over the club is it?

Yes he is, until the court relieve him of his duties they are still in interim administration. The appointment of new directors doesn't change that. As an aside, I've missed this along the way somewhere, who are the Livi 5? Clearly Gordon McDougall, Ged Nixon and Neil Rankine are three of them. Who are the other two?

Sorry Duncan but that's still just absolutely factually incorrect. I've already tried to correct you on that point once today and you ignored it. Appeals over red cards DO cause the original decision to be held over until the appeal is heard, though, as I said previously, in all but exceptional cases they move smartly to hear the appeal before the next game. On a semi related matter, Kevin Fotheringham just last season was banned for a lengthy spell after being found guilty of racially abusing Gregory Tade during an East Fife v Stranraer match. He appealled his ban and had it set aside until the appeal was heard (he lost and eventually served the ban in full).

He's referring to the post by Stadio delle Almondvale above but I think he's misinterpreted it. I think in context all SDA was saying was he expected a separate hearing to determine later the punishment for failing to play East Stirling so it wouldn't all be finished tomorrow. I think on that front he's technically correct though as I suggested earlier, all parties may just agree to deal with that tomorrow too. SDA can feel free to correct but I don't think he was suggesting it would head further up the appeals process.

What's not to understand? McGruther has applied to the Court to remove the old directors and appoint new ones since apparently the old directors were being obstructive. However, as ever with these things, at the last minute the previous directors filed the correct paperwork and the process wasn't necessary. The Judge asked why the directors had met in Italy (she obviously doesn't read this website or any of the sport pages recently) and was told that's where athey now are located. Meanwhile Euan Duthie, who represented McGruther yesterday in court, has been instructed to provide legal advice and represent the club at the SFL meeting on Thursday (and potentially beyond if Livi choose to take the matter further).

That's actually entirely wrong and doesn't help your case one bit. Sir Callum Melville's convicted criminal example was more what you are looking for. Red card suspensions are indeed set aside until such times as an appeal is heard, although normally they will do all that's possible to hear such an appeal before a next game is played.

Utter tripe MCL. The SFL has not made up rules or punishments as they went along though Longmuir's comment about demotion from the first division not being considered at the original meeting because the business plan was based on first division football continues to haunt. The SFL did NOT postpone the game, certainly not willingly anyway as their statement clearly showed. Livingston refused to compete in it and therefore they had no option but to advise it wouldn't go ahead. I'll grant you Livingston did indicate on the Friday that they wouldn't play but if it was so obvious that would be the case in conjunction with an appeal perhaps you'd care to shed some light on why: 1 - They didn't bother to tell anyone until nearly 6pm on the Friday, and 2 - They made an announcement confirming an appeal almost a whole hour before they confirmed they wouldn't be turning up to play East Stirlingshire (and also why Ged Nixon went out to the car park and told fans gathered there that would be the case at the same time as the first statement was formally released but it still wasn't mentioned on that statement). The Hamilton game was technically not abandoned as it never started. It was postponed just as it would have been had it been frozen off or waterlogged. Granted that one was even less notice than Livi gave but it wasn't done by the club in a fit of pique either, it was a unilateral action by players (not without good cause).

For the umpteenth time Hamilton were given a 15 point penalty because that's what was needed to stick them clear at the bottom of the league with three games to go, not particularly because the offence was deemed worthy of 15 points. It sets no great precedent here except in terms of a points deduction being applicable. The size of that deduction is still up for debate. Technically Thursday's meeting has nothing to do with the failure to fulfil that fixture which should require a separate LMC decision (assuming they lose the appeal - obviously if they win the game would have been null and void anyway). As such it shouldn't be discussed and it should come up for decision later. However, I'd imagine all parties could agree to deal with it in the same forum if they really wanted to. I guess that would have to include the agreement of Livingston.

I'm now one of them I see. I can't be arsed counting back but I'd think getting on for half of them will be since the fixture scratch against East Stirling. I wasn't that bothered about the whole thing before then. I still think their actions last week were a disgrace. They were wrong not to play the fixture but what really got me was the way they did it. For that reason I'd hammer them on it. If they'd said from the word go or at least far earlier on the Friday I might have contented myself with a 3 point deduction or something but the way they did it deserves more.

1 - There's nothing anyone on here can say for sure on that. It's between Massone and Flynn. Inevitably either Flynn committed fraud or Massone didn't do his due diligence properly. 2 - What changed is he didn't stick to the plan he agreed and missed scheduled payments. 3 - Was this money to be gifted? I rather suspect not. If it was then yes, I'm sure he would have, though there may have been issues with how it was spent potentially I suppose. If it was just to be added to Massone's loan account then he'd be duty bound not to allow more debt to be incurred. 4 - Well they didn't try to push one through last week. They did say they'd look at the rules in place to relocate the SFL membership from a company if Massone didn't agree to go. The fact a long established organisation was considering amending a long held principle just to get Massone out should tell you all you need to know really! 5 - The club is still in interim administration so yes, the interim administrator is running things. Rankine is a half share in the consortium bidding to take over. The extent of his actual involvement at the moment only he and McGruther know of course.