VincentGuerin

Aye, but teams that get reported on on Five Live or BBC Breakfast aren't playing in regional competitions. They're playing in English national competitions, so it makes English news. BBC Scotland reports on the Scottish stuff. It's of absolutely no interest to the vast majority of Five Live's audience. Scottish people living in England have access to BBC Scotland. It cannot be expressed enough that Scottish football is not of interest to a general UK audience.

That Coventry decision is a genuine travesty. Nobody who loves football can want that.

Soldier, Spy.

Important to remember that it's a small minority and that loads of Rangers fans are decent folk who would never join in with that stuff and hope to see it stamped out. They really do. . Definitely.

Don't feel too bad about that one, to be honest. In the League Cup semi we lacked any kind of plan and were just pushed aside. That was different today. Rangers didn't really bother us a lot more than we bothered them, and Ifelt there was a clear plan for how Hearts were going to explot them in the wide areas. But when we got into good positions there was a lot of poor decision-making in terms of final pass, and basic errors like poor first touch. To win games like that you need to execute your opportunities, and Hearts failed to do that. But I think we were in the game until the second goal and it was a decent enough punt at it. You're always second favouritesagainst the OF, and you need things to go right. Ultimately, we lost two unbelievably cheap goals in a game where we were rarely troubled apart from that. But you need to do more when you get into good positions, and that's what cost us. Could have been worse. It's been a good season and we just need to go and see out third now.

Not getting dragged into ref chat, and I'm just going out. But, even in games with no VAR, it's not unusual to see a ref let a foul go to see how play develops then stop the game when it becomes obvious the fouled-against team are at a disadvantage. Anyone who watches football has seen this. Anyway. f**k the ****, I'm off.

Not sure why you think anyone would or should be interested. We've got BBC Scotland for our stuff. Nobody down south gives a f**k about the Scottish Cup, and very few people could even tell you who is playing in the semis. No point pretending it's news.

No. We've never beaten them at Hampden. We beat them in the Scottish Cup final in 1998, but that was at Parkhead. A very poor record. Got to change sometime.

Celtic: The USSR of football. Can't think of anyone winning a cup beating them both at Hampden. Somebody on here will know if it's happened.

Yeah, off out in an hour or so. No idea whether I should be feeling confident or now. It'll be a good day out regardless.

Had that on DVD when I was younger. nightmare when my parents found it.

I've used buses and trains to get around the UK. On a coach I can take a bigger bag than Ryanair, and it's generally included in the price. On a train I can take any size of bag I fancy for absolutely f**k all. I'll generally be treated with respect by the staff in both of those scenarios too. Ryanair are miles worse than either of those options in the UK. If it's a choice between Ryanair or the train between the south of England and Scotland, it's an absolute no-brainer. Train every time. Bus takes too long, obviously.

Massive hurdle in the way to get there, but their defence yesterday is one I'd fancy playing in a cup final. Looked so vulnerable to the cross ball, and were awfully square quite often when Aberdeen were in possession in the middle of the park. Hoilett's cameo looked like it might go down in Scottish fitba folklore. Was only half-joking when I posted on here that I expected Aberdeen to win and Hearts to get scudded. It had the feel of a Big Cup Story about it.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/apr/20/landlord-of-child-free-pub-defends-exclusion-policy

3-3, two last-minute equalisers, a penalty shoot-out, a keeper missing the penalty to win it before saving one to win it. And we've got 100 pages on a penalty decision that didn't impact the outcome of the game. f**k me. Anyway, time to crack the first can of the day. Hope Hearts make as much of a game of it today.

Bottom Six and Out the Cup Thread for this pish.

Aberdeen have been a good big game team all season, so not shocked they made a good fist of it today. I actually wouldn't have bet against them in the final against anyone left.

It's a bit student journalismy. I've not heard anyone I'd normally listen to react with anything other than positivity to the appointment. So, who are the folk this article is railing against? And some of the points are quite weak. Cifuentes, for example, "turning around" QPR's form would be challenged by a lot of QPR fans. They remain a very streaky team, as they were before he went there, and they remain at very real risk of relegation. Stendel, although I don't hold him responsible for it, relegated Hearts. And that's before we encounter the issue of whether Jim Goodwin is Scottish. Not great writing, imo. And I'm not sure what made this a necessary article.

Aberdeen are going into this lower than a snake's belly. Not so much out of form as just plain shite, fans can't be arsed, nobody thinks they've got a prayer. Rangers are struggling, Hearts are having a good season, we're taking a big support, people are enthusiastic. So, the only possible outcome is Aberdeen beating Celtic 1-0 while we lose by 4 or 5 to the sticky buns.

I don't believe either of those sides have their own end at Hampden, or that their teams essentially have their home changing area there. Of course that's relevant. It's technically neutral, but the way the OF are treated at Hampden stretches that definition to its very limits. There's absolutely no justification for it. I heard some Police rep on the radio once talking about how it was necessary so that the fans could enter the stadium safely. You see, asking Rangers and Celtic fans to negotiate different ends of the same stadium on different visits is utterly impossible, but asking Hearts fans to do the same if we win our semi and play Celtic in the final (or probably even Aberdeen) is absolutely fine. It's ridiculous.

I can't say I think Hearts are in any way favourites here, but that seems a very generous price. Number 9 seems to be fit and well as far as I know.

FTFY

Club Twitter saying more than 19,000 in the press conference tweet. Hearts are basically the biggest football club in the world.

There isn't really an alternative to Hampden that makes any sense. It's not perfect, but it's hard to justify a move anywhere else.

Aye. But the biger clubs know that they don't really need to make meaningful concessions. What the f**k are Port Vale going to do about it? Baw is burst.