Steven W

When you say better than some, I'm guessing you mean England, USA, Brazil. But very few others. It's interesting how the right wing governments have failed so badly with this. You're right in saying SG's hands are tied to some degree by WM (maybe we'd have done better were it not for a certain vote 6 years ago going the wrong way), but the upshot is, no excuses - this has been handled appallingly. That a second lockdown is on the horizon just goes to emphasise it.

Our leaders have failed us. This first lockdown was a cock up of epic proportions. And now we find ourselves in the same position again six months later. A vaccine (in this country) seems as far away as ever. The economy is trashed. No end in sight

Should have been doing this kind of thing months ago

Its entirely possible. You just won't get paid for a few weeks.

Out of interest, what is it with this forum and that word?

Lockdown 2 seems inevitable. (And dare I say Lockdown 3 thereafter) If it comes to pass Johnson and Sturgeon should hang their heads in shame. Scotland's reward for our slower exit from Lockdown 1? Would seem to be Lockdown 2......

In fairness he spoke well. And him coming on every week to Off The Ball is to his credit.

East Stirlingshire are playing Falkirk tonight at the Falkirk stadium. Game behind closed doors with no one allowed to attend. Meanwhile, at the same time, a fun fair is going full pelt in the car park.....

That was announced before the events (put back to 5 October as part of last week's new measures). Not as a result of the weekend events. Jason Leitch on Off The Ball at the weekend mooted the prospect of each team doing a pilot event as every stadium is different. He seemed to suggest that these could take place over the next few weeks

I can only assume infections must have soared in the back of it, as SG have confirmed no pilot events this weekend.

I've not, so i've not seen any details of it. Surprised at that (maybe you've read it though). Especially when Devi is still pushing zeo covid

Interesting that Ireland have today adopted a 'Living with Covid Plan'.

Sooner or later, this is going to result in a harsh shielding program, and the pursual of herd immunity for everyone else unless the vaccine comes soon. I heard John Sutton (of all people) ask Jason Leitch a question today. He was comparing flu to Covid and how we live with flu and get on with our lives, and therefore will we have crowds of 50,000+ at football matches in the near future. JL replied that "I was with you until you said near future". He then basically said that Covid will become comparable with flu in time as, among other things 'we build up immunity'. It was a hint at herd immunity from him. Something I think we're actually already seeing in places (fuckin' hope so!)

Next couple of games are important. I know it's early in the season, but they're still important. If we're not going to be adding to the squad (seems increasingly unlikely), then we've certainly got our work cut out. Most of the team are looking like the step up is a big ask. I guess it's up to the manager then to get the best out of them. I'm still confident he'll do that, but time will tell.

Either way it needs looking at.

Ah! That'll be it. If our infection rates were comparable them, then obviously we'd be having crowds like theirs. Would we f**k......

Decent (socially distant) crowd at the speedway in Poland tonight on BT. Meanwhile in Scotland were telling parents they can't watch their children play football...

Quite agree. "Long Covid" - FFS.

Caught a little of Lens v PSG last night. A fair sized crowd at that. A lot more than 300 anyway.....

Sweden added to the Safe Air Bridge Corridor. Interesting.....

Whilst obviously I have no inner knowledge of each teams' financial coming and goings, I deliberately said "League 1 and below, and most championship sides" as I'd say Hearts could last a while without fans (I think they shifted 11,500 season tickets). The others would clearly struggle. A strange angle to come at me from, when Im pretty sure you're in agreement with me.

I think those should go ahead too (with the crowd adhering to social distancing guidelines). The difference is, that the Premiership teams could probably survive all season if they had to with no fans. League 1 clubs and below (and some championship teams) can't survive with no fans, and thus no income. At present I suppose there's a chance that fans could be back in time for the season starting, but it doesn't look very likely does it?

Its up to the Joint Repsonse Group to make the case to the SG. We all know that there's no good reason why say, Lossiemouth v Strathspey, or Annan v Elgin etc couldn't go ahead with the crowd adhering to social distancing measures.

True. The SG has been applying a one size fits all approach throughout. In fairness, they've got a lot on their plate just now and probably cant be getting bogged down with the finer details of HL, WoSFL etc. That's where this Joint Response Group comes in, who should I detailing plans to demonstrate how fans could attend at this level very easily. So far the JRG have been like nodding dogs, but if they don't begin to stand up for the sport, we're going to lose a lot of clubs.

I think Scotland is opting out of one. You'd be forgiven for thinking that anyway. Nothing on the horizon..........