DiegoDiego

Being black is shite.

The sad thing is that Celtic have pulled away from Aberdeen and Hibs over the last ten games.

I was sharing information to save folk having to look things up themselves. Just facts, no comment. Perhaps I shouldn't bother in future?

That's three games in a row now he's sat on the bench. Bologna made fourteen subs over those three games as well.

Interesting in that games back then were played "on" Firhill Park and not at it.

Indeed I am. I'd be delighted to see Bonnyrigg, Pollok, the Broch, Tranent et cetera playing at national level. I think folk do the league two teams a bit of a disservice though. Of the ten, four of them have been in the second tier since the formation of the SPL, three have only been elected/promoted to the national leagues this century, Queen's Park are full time and have paid incredible service to the game. Then there's Stenny and Albion Rovers. It's obvious a system should be put into place to enable clubs to fulfil their potential, it removes friction from the machine, it runs smoother as a result, and removes anomalies. I'm the opposite of people who advocate Leagues one and two regionalising. Plot the finances of Scottish clubs and you'd get something close to exponential. That's why small leagues at the top end are a good idea. However, there's really not much difference between club 30 and club 70. I'd propose expanding leagues one and two to eighteen clubs once the LL, HL and former juniors are close to finding their appropriate place in the pecking order. It'd give more variety of opposition, improve fluidity due to fewer bottlenecks and more promotion/relegation, remove the supposed existential threat to the likes of Cowden and Stenny, help solve the Highland League's issue with disparity and allow an extra further sixteen clubs to play at the national level which they're clearly capable of.

2007-8 they were the best part time team in the country. They also moved into a new stadium in 1997. These aren't the actions of a club who have been "blocking places for ambitious clubs for decades". Of course there have been better part-time teams this century and Stirling Albion may well find themselves in the Lowland League by the end of the decade, but that's irrelevant to the point.

It's really not.

I think there's some projection going on here: not everyone's hippocampus in a state of irreversible decay.

Haud on a minute, Coupar Angus isn't in Angus? All is forgiven Kansas City, Missouri!

I'm all for more fluidity in the pyramid but deary me. There are folk studying for highers who can remember Stirling Albion being the best part-time team in the country.

I knew Sked loved me.

I'm not really sure people should be cheering the Gamestop events. Firstly, institutional investors are very much on both sides of this, as many rich people got richer as got poorer. The richest man in the world was in on it for f**k's sake. So it's not quite the David vs Goliath* story the media are framing it as. Secondly, Gamestop is an actual company with more employees than could fit into Ibrox and they are affected by this. Because of these events they're in a horrifying situation, nobody wants to be in that CEO's shoes. There could be very real negative repercussions for those civilians caught in the crossfire. Thirdly, it's not a good thing when the markets don't reflect real value. We've been here before and shouldn't be encouraging it. Fourthly, much as society is waking up to the negative effects of gambling, I don't think making day trading sexy and easily accessible to the masses is a great idea. We've already had one very sad suicide as the result of a young man misunderstanding his potential losses. 4b, if the first bet you ever place comes in at 5000-1, you're not going to pay off your credit cards, buy a new car and then never gamble again. It's like Spud, what did Renton expect he was going to do with that money? (I'm not saying that people can't be trusted with their own money here, but I don't think sending a message of "you can f**k over the rich and make millions in one day" is a good one without first educating people in the potential downside). Fifthly, I don't think it's particularly great to take pleasure in other people's misfortune. The ratio of "I'm happy Joe Sixpack now has the means to turn his life around" to "Ha ha! That multimillionaire is slightly less rich than he was yesterday." is a pretty ugly one. Anyway, you can probably file that away in unpopular opinions or cast my mangled corpse into the big ball pit of red dots, but I don't think this is the big win most people seem to be making it out to be. * not enough children named Goliath these days.

Darvel splashing the cash again I see.

Dumbarton fans in the North section then.

You're having me on there, that's not a real person. Surely nobody calls their child Mason Mount.

Post up a screenshot next time, I'm sure someone here will be able to figure it out.

Could have done with 85,000 folk there though. I miss reaction shots of raging fans. I think most have got used to empty stadia, imagine how absurdly mental a full Hampden would be for the Euros after a season of abstinence. I think I'll probably cry the first time I'm back in a stadium, even if its Cliftonhill for the League Cup group stages.

Is it not The Championship?

Started a game on chess.com to get the feel of things before the real action starts. They've paired me (800 rating as I've never played on there) with a chap who's at 1763. A swift pumping awaits.

That's the problem with pushing the notion (by club or fans) that your club is somehow special. The fanbase end up thinking human rationality doesn't apply to them. Leicester placed more value on Rodgers than Celtic did, accordingly, that's where Rodgers went.

Quite looking forward to this. Can't wait to rage quit the whole thing after stalemateing from a commanding position.

I'm in, but don't have a chess.com account yet, I'll edit this post once I'm all set up. Edit: DiegoDiegoPB. Chess.com looks like it's improved a lot since I last visited although I'm a bit yer da about freemium business models.

I'd propose weekly matchups with each pair finding a time that week which suits them both and then something like 40+10 time control. No point rushing games but also try and get them done without dragging on.

What's the logic behind The Dominican Republic playing at home against Serbia this evening?