Swello

He obviously lurks on here Just in case he does: Don't play Cedric in Midfield, Don't play Cedric in Midfield, Don't.....

I can't help looking at the smiling faces celebrating a goal by a lavishly paid player and thinking that not one of them has yet heard the phrase "The Banter Years".

To be trite about it - this is the definition of whataboutery, even if there is truth to it. I'm sure Hearts supporters won't be want to be judged by the standards that we all judge OF supporters and it's to Hearts' credit that as a club they haven't tried to question the guys claims or deflect (it would have been easy for them to brief against the player while making the sort of weasel-worded pish statement that Celtic come out with every time their supporters disgrace themselves). Outside the OF, the knuckle-draggers and throwbacks that exist at every club are a containable problem with the right action as they are literally a small group of individuals - and so clubs and the normal supporters need to do their bit so that all the isms never become accepted.

My main problem with the "expectations for the season" type threads is that the very same people who (reasonably given our budget) say "avoid relegation", "10th place" or "a mid-table finish" have a vast fucking meltdown and want the manager, the players, the CEO and the Kitman hunted because we don't win for a month. What do people think a mid-table season looks like, never mind a 10th place finish? You're going to lose a lot of games and have spells in the season where you are shite - if you avoid those things, you're looking at some season and being back where McCall had us..... There should be a "the unrealistic expectations you have and are scared to mention" thread.

Dundee fans would need to endure the phrase "the scorer of that goal against Barcelona" in every match report produced by a glasgow-based paper. Nothing is worth that.

Have we had this tin-pottery yet?: Difficult to imagine that in another league....

As a (clueless) supporter - I've watched a lot of keepers over the years for us. When I see Carson - weak at "shot stopping" isn't really what springs to mind.

Maybe true although I don't remember that - but he was desperate to allow Celtic fans to have the Cooper Stand at Fir Park and sent out a consultation to Cooper Season Ticket holders asking them to "vote" on it as he felt it would be worth 6 figures to the club. When - as anyone that understands a west of scotland diddy club support would expect - a resounding "no" came back - he did it anyway. Tinpot.

I tried to imagine that happening at Fir Park under any circumstances and the seethe got too much....

oooft.

There's three things at play I think. Dons_1988 is spot on that shite TV kickoff times have ruined traditional cup weekends for the bigger clubs that feature regularly. Our cup game on Sat was a 3pm, we had 1500 supporters there and it was a great day out - that wouldn't have happened if it was on the box. Secondly, cup games disappeared from Season Tickets and now that season tickets are everything, a lot of folk who would be there if the game was on the 'ticket simply won't. Lastly - I think we have imported another piece of received wisdom from English footy that doesn't actually fit here - namely that the League is paramount to the exclusion of everything else and the cup is an inconvenience to be tolerated. With the money washing around the top two leagues down south (and the value of a promotion between the two), I can almost see that point of view, even though I think the FA cup down south is a fucking great competition and it shouldn't be devalued. But in Scotland? There is no huge TV deal outside of the CL and in so many cases, a good cup run could be the difference between profit and loss - or it could enable a better player to be added that could make the difference in a really tight league. We should be prioritising the cups as no one league game will have such an impact on your balance sheet (excepting the Premiership play-off)..... 'mon the cups.

I always thought concentrate on the league was a joke that people came out with after getting papped out the cup - or after you're drawn away to Celtic or Rangers - it's not something for serious consideration surely? In any case, Utd's finances can't be in a rosy state of health after rattling around in the Championship, so I'm sure the income would have been welcome - and their supporters can't have had a season so packed with fun that they wouldn't fancy a good cup run. If the league survived fine with Hearts, Hibs and "Rangers" being absent at the same time, it's a bizarre argument to suggest that missing one mid-table club for a season or two constitutes any kind of problem at all. TL;DR - Everything Billy Dodds says is shite.

I've noticed similar. I've actually been impressed with Cifcti so far, even though I'm giving him some allowances for being unfit and having had a couple of years of drifting through loans and so being short on confidence. I'm confident that he's not drifting now and has settled in well (something that we as a club have always put an emphasis on I think) and is putting in some decent workrate and is definitely linking up really well. I know the club had targets in mind and both Cifcti and Main were on our list - but the fact is that they are an almost ideal blend based on what I've seen so far - and some credit needs to go to the club for achieving that in the January window. The only downside as fas as i can see is that we are effectively rehabilitating a player for Celtic (or more accurately, whoever Celtic move him on to in the summer) - as I don't think he'll be fully at the required level of fitness until the start of next season. I know that we are getting a very good deal on wages for him and so can't really complain - but I'd love to see him after a Robinson pre-season as I think he would be excellent. On the Main Stats Splat or whatever that is called - it looks like trying to shoehorn US style stats into a very simple game where it doesn't really fit.

Getting wound up by a couple of Brora fans just makes him look like er, a horses arse. And a w****r

Was just going to say the same thing - what was that all about?? Classy.

Ever since we won the cup, we've always taken really decent away supports for these type of games. Also - really not convinced Kipre was offside for Alred's goal that was chalked off...

"Singh when you're winning" would be my bet.

Berbartov in a semmit giving him a cuddle is at the upper end of camp. Also - smaller than Dan Twardzik

Great signing - although I'm intrigued why no-one down south would touch someone with his pedigree (regardless of his mental health issues). Any background on that?

I don't have time just now to respond fully - but my initial concern is that Colt teams would effectively be cross-subsidised by their parent club and to me having teams that could not be sustainably run on their own merits would make a mockery of the senior league that they were in - or would lead to a Gretna-like situation where they are flying through the leagues using money, coaching setups and facilities that they couldn't conceivably fund. Even sensible sounding ideas like colt teams having to be one level below their parent could lead to some really messy outcomes. I personally think that the Championship (still fucking hate typing that) is a brilliant league - but imagine the mess it would have been if Hearts, Hibs, Rangers and Utd Colts all had to be summarily demoted due to their parents being relegated in the space of a couple of years as has happened recently? It would render the competition meaningless. What if Aberdeen, Celtic, Hearts, Hibs, Motherwell, Killie, Dundee, Dundee Utd, St Johnstone colts all rose to the Championship over time - you could be in the farcical situation where only a couple of teams could be promoted. If you put an artificial ceiling on the number of colt teams in any league, then you are back to putting arbitrary barriers in place and messing up the integrity of every league below the prem. Lastly - (and this isn't aimed at you) - I've never been comfortable with treating lower division clubs as some sort of expendable social-club-with-a-football-pitch-attached - my view is that they've got as much right to exist at their natural level as we do - and putting unreasonable strictures on them is as unfair and counterproductive as it would be if the biggest clubs in the Prem did it to 'Well.

"Daily Record jeopardises China Trade Deal after diplomatic incident"

There are copious threads on this, so I don't really want to derail the MFC one - but over and above the idea of effectively ruining league 2 - the fundamental thing that I don't understand is that surely if all 8 Elite Academies, as would presumably be their right, took up a Colts place in league 2, then they would be playing against other colt teams most weeks unless the league was massively expanded? There can't be a fair situation where some clubs are locked out of the system and so you could conceivably have a situation where half the league can't be promoted or relegated. In the extreme example where you presumably have an expanded 18 team league to accept (at least) the elite academies Colts - the 9th place club would be promoted in the event that the colt teams all did well and clubs with double figure league placings would be in the promotion playoffs. Or the opposite where a club finishing 10th out of 18 could be relegated to non-league football. I can't see a way to balance the improved development opportunities with not utterly fucking up the league.

I need the details of this for possible sarcastic use in future match threads.

Based on what Crags said after the challenge cup games - they want to see the U20's play against men to get them ready for the first team - I would assume that is why we want Colts to be accepted. Everyone knows that the OF colts is supposed to be a forerunner to other elite academies being in there too - so it's not suprising that we are up for it. I'm not sure why being in a team of men whilst on loan isn't even better but there you go. I remain of the opinion that the Colts stuff is one of the most ill-conceived ideas ever to be shat out of the SPFL - and that really is saying something. Get it in the bin.