flyingscot

More than that- we're racking up wins- indeed if someone had said we'd go to Croke Park and tour Argentina without defeat you'd have got very long odds! Andy Robinson has done a superb job at tidying up the team, changing our direction and play. The media seem to think the backroom stuff is being worked on from what I've read and he seems to have a real understanding of Scottish rugby. Sure we've had bad games and results but in general he's sorting things out and it looks positive. Up to 7th in world rankings above Wales and Argentina, and gives us confidence into the Autumn with some big players coming back. My only concern is that England come sniffing- but then given the way England treated him and his results there last time he might not want the job- esp. given Aston, Andrews and Johnson have done no better. Parks, for all the people who criticise him, has really done well, some mature performances and no matter your opinion on him, he has done very well for Scotland in the last few games. Chris Patters... who? My only negative on Parks is that he is sadly, going to play for Cardiff and not Glasgow next season- real loss and I don't see Glasgow fighting for the Magners Playoffs next year.

Aye- bet you do... Cut the grass today- bit of a farce too and it badly needed done. Only problem was whilst it was sunny I got 3 stripes done before it started to pour down, I'd stop the electric mower and wait 5 mins only for it to be sunny again. Repeat about 5 times till I had the whole place done. Pain in the arse, but glad it was done- some of the grass was a bit yellow underneath and I only got about 4 stripes to a bucket full on clippings! Still Strawberries are coming on...

True, not getting the bonus point was a big blow- a problem for Glasgow all year- only 2 winning and losing bonus points! Leinster did have a good rush defence although I question the officials not catching them for offside a couple of times. I don't think any of the yellows were harsh (assuming the first was for hitting Cussiter(?) without getting the arms around) indeed the last yellow benefited them as it left us with uncontested scrums, when Glasgow were killing Leinster in the scrum. I was surprised Jones just didn't move to penalty try them a couple of times but he is the ref.

Anybody catch Glasgow Warriors last home of the season tonight? Just back in from it- an easy 30-6 victory over an admittedly second string Leinster side. Leinster were fairly poor after a strong start and the indiscipline was absolutely shocking- 4 sent off to the sinbin and it could have been more. Michael Cheika is whinging a bit about it and about it and granted it was James Jones refereeing who is not the best but they were out of their depth- inexperience isn't an excuse. It was like watching Ireland committing all the cynical stuff at the breakdown and tackle without managing to do it subtlety.

Any benefit in creating a new team and not just upgrading the established Paisley Pirates into the Elite league since they play there anyway and have a grass roots support? Guess it is sponsorship and not being associated with anywhere might attract more people?

Hasn't stopped snowing in EK since early on this morning. No sign of stopping either!

Nice and heavy again! Traffic was fine though until I hit a queue - BMW had stuffed it into the Central Reserve and the slow traffic and congestion was making things difficult in the snow so sat there for 35mins!

Been pushing things in and out of the car park all day today, slush with a layer of ice = zero grip.

Really- Paterson was worse and got hooked with 10/15 to go? His decision making wasn't the best on a couple of occasions when the passed out to the wrong side and a couple of poor kicks in play but he was brilliant with the boot at penalties (couple of tricky ones some thought he was best not going for) and scored all bar 5 of Glasgow's points. Became highest league points scorer too. If that is on a mince day, I'd like to see him on some good days. Might be a 6 month farewell but a good start to one! Glasgow deserved the win (Richie Vernon was excellent) and record attendance of just under 9000.

I noticed that all the 75 buses were turning at the roundabout at Croftfoot Road, but the 31 was persevering and heading up the hill to E.K! It was alright, but quite funny to see some of the folk spinning up the hill whilst folk in the outside lane blasted by, no problem. High gear kids. East Kilbride was fun- someone nearly span out infront of me then I stopped in a queue on a hill. As I sat there I felt as if the car was moving and sure enough it was sliding down after I had stopped. Moved forward and it was O.K.

London drivers are bad at the best of time- hard accelerate- foot to the floor, hard braking and keep 3 inches from bumper at all times including snow and ice. Hence the chaos. They seriously do not know how to drive at all including in the dry!

Jeeze, car shouldn't be that bad on the brakes- it wasn't the worst I've seen. I just used the gears a lot today to stop. Gritters are actually not that brilliant in the snow- they aren't some miracle solution. Not uncommon for a road to be gritted but a heavy snowfall to just sit blanketed on top of grit. Gritters also don't usually get sent out in the rush hour as they just sit in traffic and it is useless.

Apparently the roads round EK are getting quiet bad, would say we've had about 1/2inch since 12.45pm.

Hillington and Paisley area are like death zones for snow- it just never snows around here, and when it does you know it will be bad- it is pissing it down at the moment with rain. Indeed I work in East Kilbride and I drove back down with 1/2inch on the roof of my car Thursday and sitting outside the Shell on Paisley Road West folk were looking at me like "where the f**k did you come from?!" EK will be bad in the morning no doubt, I'll get to Newton Mearns or Busby depending how you go and it will be like a different climate. I doubt NLC don't send out gritters simply to save on overtime from Winter Maintenance budgets. That would very much surprise me- might try and find out. Grit can be absolutely crap in snow however applied at the wrong time. Too early and your fecked, don't increase the amount enough from ice and your fecked too.

East Kilbride has got about 1/2 inch on top of the cars and on paths. Unless it is 6 foot deep here, nobody else in the Glasgow area really has any snow to worry about! Still snowing but it is slackened off.

Glasgow and Edinburgh 1st and 2nd (at least till Sunday) in the Magners after a superb performance from Parks with the boot (perhaps Robinson might give him another try).

I have a bit more confidence that we will do fine in the 6 nations rather than the struggle to do anything. Our general play is alright, it just lacks a certain something which hopefully Robinson can address. We'll not win it by a long way, but with some improvements I think we have a good chance of 4th place this time. We do have decent enough players, but they need to all turn up we can't have passengers. I'm not sure about Paterson, where do you slot him in etc. We need to go the blood capsule route and bring him on to kick! Godman does have a hard act to follow and needs to improve his kicking. Kicking has never looked natural to Dan Parks, even though he takes them at Glasgow. If it is miles out, however he has the distance over a lot of kickers. Hines yellow card was predictable. Someone behind us was talking about the player getting called over and said it must be Hines, he always gets carded. Right on. Decision making is the key and needs to improve. Argentina were loving slowing the ball and we couldn't put it through hands as well as a result. Still work to do, after that. Mind you work to do could be an SRU slogan. Still no ticket sales on matchday for half empty games FFS.

Well today was a kick in the balls. Utter rubbish from Scotland proving our attack isn't good enough against a decent but not spectacular Pumas side. One of the worst games I've seen in many, many years, dull and scrappy and you could see which way it was heading after an hour- dire stuff. Godman was poor today in the kicking stakes and was getting some abuse from the stands for his poor play in the last 20 mins, that is his problem too inconsistent. The lineout and scrum weren't great at all either. We should have put them to bed in the first half however as the pumas were mince and never really out of their half, their penalty chances were all about 40m out! Crawled all over them and Rory Lamont got white line fever and got greedy- had he passed it through hands by one more man out wide we'd have been over for the score, instead he tried to go for it himself 5m out and got tackled move broke down. You could say great defence but in reality it was silly play like that just frustrated the fans. You can't pass up chances. Similarly Godman went for a really tricky penalty kick on his wrong side just outside the 22 near the farside touch line when he really should have gone for the corner and taken the lineout and tried to push them over for the try. We kept giving away silly penalties, decision making was questionable and ultimately we paid the price today. Bit depressing and much work to do.

I have one two. Couldn't get one for the England game though- they sold them yonks ago. I wish they had done what was done in previous years and balloted it so those who went to Autumn Tests got a ticket to go, that way those who really support the team get to go over those who turn up for the 'big' games never to be seen again.

How the Aussies didn't win that I don't know, but it is a fantastic result. Finish off the Argies next week for 3/3.

I don't understand that either. It seem a case of De ja vous and lessons not learned to run at a loss.

I suspect some of the 10 chairmen know how close they are to it to be them getting punished. Dundee and East Stirlingshire were both backing Livi in the press- so that would be 2 if they followed up.

Yep- the SFL how can we make a decision worse? I think it was the correct call, albeit too late- it hurts Airdrie and Cowdenbeath badly. If they go back down they have wasted a year. The SFL needs to put in place clear guidlines so everyone knows where they are. I think this is the end for Livingston- can't say I'm overly sad for the club, but I guess the Livi fans will be gutted. Looks like last week was the fause dawn?

Spot on. It would have been easy for us to continue paying big money for players and chase success. Instead we spent years in D1 paying our way and accrued debt paying for new stands to even qualify for the SPL. We did what most people would do- sold something, in this case out ground to pay the debt. Livi simply spent, spent, spent and then said we can't pay it back. If someone did something so stupid on a credit card they'd be blacklisted- and going bankrupt means you can't get a current account for at least 6 years!

I think the point deduction is best too. IMHO we are at a stage where other clubs cannot prepare for football in D1 or D2 when they expected to be at a lower tier (Airdrie etc.). There has to be a penalty for clubs that do this- although nothing helps creditors.