Aim Here

Wow indeed. Could it be that the Rodgers era with the unbeaten 1.5 year run, and the (not quite certain, yet) Double Treble were all caused when the Rangers team decided to be a gang of rude dicks to the actual Celtic Team at the 2015-16 Scottish Cup Semi, and only succeeded in making the guy with all the money *really fucking annoyed*? With that sort of outcome from a fairly trivial slight, perhaps Rangers could indulge in some self-reflection and some behaviour modification in future...

What makes you think that the magic cup is for the benefit of Rangers? They drink a toast to the health of the Queen, and that certainly seems to be working, given that the idle old bat looks like she'll live to about 250 years old.

Hey, guys, you know Rangers fans are having a really bad week? And that Hibs are threatening to cut their away allocation at the end of the season, which has caused some measure of grumbling over at their fan forums? And that you've got a game coming up at Easter Road, where you'd ordinarily have about half the South Stand, and nearly filled that last time. Here's a thought: if you sell your allocation out as quickly as possible when the tickets go on sale, there's every chance that Hibernian FC might feel inclined to increasing your share of the South Stand to something larger than what they're planning on cutting Rangers down to. It does mean that Hibs fans might have to be a bit slower to buy tickets for the game, but we've got home games vs both Celtic and Rangers too, so you're probably a distant third on the prospective games-to-go-to list for some of the more casual fans, no offence. Anyways, just imagine the righteous, indignant, outrage as Rangers fans find out that some wee diddy team that can't even fill up 1/3 of their own stadium is getting a bigger share of Easter Road than the orcish hordes who bring that blue pound they all go on about? It would be glorious. So how about it? If you're going to go to Easter Road, make sure and buy your tickets as early as possible, and pass the message on. Do it for the seethe.

You left out Dabrowski, who has eked out a semi-regular role as dugout seat-warmer in first-team games, but does have the usual problem of the 'dead man's boots' form of career progression that second-choice reserve keepers tend to have.

The Vanguard Bears are still doing essential research into which school everyone went to before deciding whether to side with the players, the manager, the board or the fans.

Waitwaitwait - the Union Bears are protesting by buying the ticket, going to the match, but they won't be singing their most hateful party tunes? This day just keeps getting better and better. Also kudos to the Union Bears for issuing a statement that isn't a begging letter.

Maybe a coded signal that the mole is Declan John.

Mo only played for one of the Rangerses.

Said bamming provided all of Scottish football, particularly Hibs, with the biggest laugh it's had so far this year, so your analysis might be a wee-bit off...

Just take a step backwards and think about it. This is Craig Levein, we're talking about - a self-made master of mindgames. A few weeks back, you guys were forever bigging up his Svengali-like masterstrokes, like the initially-successful 'Natural Order' bait, and the phantom injuries-that-never-were before the last derby. Hitting the Czechs with a surprise 4-6-0 strategy that they'd never in a million years expect. Instigating injury time dugout confrontations with opposing players to waste time. You all know what Levein's about by now. Craig Levein isn't signing Maclean for his football. He's signing Maclean to send a signal. It's his thing. And what signal would Hearts send by signing up a geriatric striker in his twilight years, probably for bobbins? Simple: don't expect too much from Hearts next season. Craig's talking right at you guys with this one. Hearts are doing next season on the cheap, and he's managing expectations appropriately. I'm guessing that if he goes all out for a 'we're going to get a Europe spot or a cup win next season', sign up some flashy superstar from Bundesliga.2 or the English League One and barely scrape top 6 again, you guys will whinge about stagnation, and next year's season ticket sales will plummet. Look where the inflated expectations of the Sevco fans are getting them? Every OF match, they're demanding the heads of Graeme Murty and Dave King for not beating the team that's only lost two league games in two years. The board are being pulled into risky financial behaviour and pawning their facilities to payday lenders to gamble on actually playing some European football just to keep their heads afloat. And that's so that those overentitled fans can feel like winners again like the old glory days to keep them buying those sweet, sweet, season tickets. Rangers are being squeezed on the pitch, in the stands, in the courts, and in the shareholders meetings. Nobody in Scottish football wants to be The Rangers right now. Not even poor oul' Brechin would swap places. Dave King's hedge fund is a riskier investment than the Glebe Park hedge, which at least provides a guaranteed income from the occasional curious football tourist. Budge is obviously smart enough not to go down the Sevco route, and Hearts are sticking within their means, even if that means the football will be decidedly mediocre in the near future. Perhaps they know there's trouble brewing, like those anonymous multimillion donations are starting to dry up - or perhaps Craig is lining up a proper signing later on in the year so you at least get a small frisson of excitement at some point. Either way, Craig knows his limits and he's priming you to avoid massive disappointment. Steady income, straightforward, mid-table football, low-profile signings, or better still, 15-year olds on work experience, season ticket sales down by only 10% or so over two years, etc, etc. Keep the business ticking over until next year, when maybe something will turn up. Last thing Hearts needs is a full stadium of hyper-excited fans in August drifting away before the winter break and swearing off ST renewals altogether. Besides, Maclean has form for going apeshit after scoring goals versus Hibs. Having him do that again, or, in the alternative, crippling Kamberi or Ambrose with a horror-tackle, will have you guys amused and gleefully posting gifs all over Kickback like nobody's business. Craig Levein knows how much the fans lap that stuff up. No need for spectacular results if he can keep you distracted and happy for a wee while. This is the entertainment business, after all. Meanwhile, your team is in safe, solid hands, with no chance of administration or relegation. Relax, guys. You should respect the mindgames of the most devious man in Scottish Premiership football. Craig knows what he's doing with this signing.

The tinpottery here is that her tactical input couldn't have been worse than what actually transpired.

That's clearly a very glorious thing indeed, and doesn't belong in this thread.

Hah, fair enough. The trouble with sarcasm on the internet is that the people who use it are indistinguishable from the many folks around that are genuinely that stupid!

You're showing your age, since if you were around in the 1990s, you wouldn't talk such utter pish. This was 1998, not 1978. Political correctness, as a mass media buzzword, was around since the *early* 1990s (it's use by the left as an self-deprecating joke was around for a bit longer). People were *far* from universally homophobic then (though the world has improved markedly on this issue since 1998, I'll concede). Overt racism was much less common then than it is now that those alt-righters have been congregating in the more disgusting shitholes on the internet and occasionally seeping out into proper society.

All the funnier when you remember that they have multiple 30-page threads on rangersmedia demanding that the club reduces Celtic's away allocation. Apparently us upstarts have some nerve to start acting the way they do...

I don't think it matters which type of match ticket you've bought previously; you have to have bought tickets prior to the current season.

More like it's only the Jambos who are pretentious enough to pass off 'knowing what the words they use actually mean' as postmodern French philosophy!

I've cycled from Inverness to the County game a few times. I always take the train home though. That does make sense; cycling is faster than the Inverness-Dingwall train.

I think we might have to ease them in gently to this one. They're already being multi-scunnered by the fixture list - midweek Derby, losing out on home matches in preference to a lottery for seats at Ibrox, and a Friday night out in Aberdeen. Telling them the brutal truth that their team doesn't even like them on the same day might send a few over the edge...

Did you guys spot the deliberate mistake in the Hearts statement on the post-split fixture list? From the statement: "The club cannot understate how much the first-team continues to appreciate the support they receive from the fans, as they bid to go undefeated since returning home in November." From the Oxford English Dictionary: understate, verb: Describe or represent (something) as being smaller or less good or important than it really is. The club are saying it's impossible for the team to be less appreciative of your efforts. The team thinks you suck. Don't take my word for it, that's Ann Budge telling you!

The Jambo bus is real. It is a thing. It is an official thing, available at the Hearts store. You can buy yourself some sort of bus made from pseudolego for the knockdown price of £80. The fact that this item is available to the general public has been bringing great joy to football fans all across Scotland. The Hampden exuberance lego is just a disgraceful and snide satirical sneer aimed at the makers of said bus, by jealous and cynical troglodytes of the Hibernian persuasion. I urge you to ignore those fellows, who clearly don't appreciate the finer things in life.

The only team owing something they can't pay off is Rangers. There's two different shaftings here - disparity of games vs Rangers and disparity of home/away games overall. Two teams need to suck up a hit for the first type, and only one team needs the latter shafting, and it can be done without any imbalance in the non-Rangers games on the schedule. That team can be one of the previous two. For instance, if Hibs get the second shaft, it's just a case of Killie and Hibs playing Rangers away, while every other game balances out the season's Home/Away fixture count for that pairing. Hibs play 18 home games to everyone else's 19, and that missing game is the one they play at Ibrox. That way, Aberdeen doesn't get their schedule unnecessarily mussed up by playing at Easter Road again. Other teams can be likewise singled out for the shaft, depending on the whims of the SPFL. The only matchups needing an imbalanced Home/Away count involve Rangers. As an aside, Killie most definitely won't be swapping away games for home ones, since they're the only team, besides Rangers, who have more home games played than away ones already - they'll be one of the two teams going to Ibrox. It gives us a one in four chance (one in three, since there's no danger that it's Celtic) of being the other team playing Rangers away. I suspect Hearts might even be more worthy of taking the hit than us.

Wouldn't it be Celtic, Killie and maybe Rangers at home? Those are the teams that owe us a home game.