Saturday, December 30, 2006

Agent's role under scrutiny as the SPL transfer windae opens

Newspapers have always speculated about possible player moves... it helps shifts copies, and arguably meets the needs of fans, who all enjoy a bit of idle gossip and speculation from time to time about who might be turning up at which club. Such stories are often based on little in the way of hard facts, using "sources close to the club" and "insiders" to flesh things out... but in this context, it's usually a bit of harmless fun.

What has been happening in Scotland over the past couple of months has, however, arguably crossed the line into manipulation of the market. Willie McKay, an agent with an already dubious reputation amongst fans, and one of the few agents who refused to comply with the recent investigation into corruption in the English Premiership, began representing Kevin Thomson and Scott Brown of Hibernian earlier in 2006, and almost immediately began pushing for moves for them both. When his initial efforts were rebuffed by the club, he has waged an increasingly bitter campaign against Hibs, using a complicit Daily Record newspaper as his main weapon. Most recently, it ran a story with extensive "quotes" from Scott Brown, claiming that the fee Hibs are seeking for him is too high.

Now, the Daily Record, you can imagine, is quite happy with the arrangement. They get the inside information on a story involving two of the most highly-rated players in Scotland, and as long as the story runs, they can generate more and more copy. As the Hibs board have a long-standing policy of "not commenting on speculation", the paper has only one source for these stories, yet that has not dulled their enthusiasm. It is time to ask, however, if this blatant disregard of all the basic tenets of responsible journalism is acceptable.

For one thing, no one who knows Scott Brown personally believes for a moment that the quotes attributed to him actually came from his own mouth. That is not to say he didn't agree to them appearing alongside his name... almost certainly he did. But if even supposed direct remarks from an individual can now be ghost-written, it makes the reader question if anything in the paper can be taken at face value. Secondly, although Hibs are not speaking to the paper, surely they have a duty to investigate the situation anyhow, rather than just print one side of the story? Their most recent effort was to print a claim from Willie McKay that both players had "been more than threatened" by the Hibs manager, and told they would be dropped from the team - claims that were palpably untrue.

All of this has rather overshadowed the forthcoming month of wheeler-dealering, but here's brief summary of what might happen over the next 31 days:

Celtic: Started the ball rolling by signing Steven Pressley on an 18 month contract on Friday, unlikely to do a huge amount of business beyond this. They need a long-term replacement for Neil Lennon, but Strachan has stated a preference for waiting until the summer.

Aberdeen: There's been speculation over Russell Anderson, their inspirational captain and centre-back, who surely should have had more Scotland caps by now. Rangers dearly need him, but Anderson has said warm words about staying at Pittodrie. Jamie Smith may go in January if still refusing to sign a new contract. Have already brought in Craig Brewster as cover upfront.

Rangers: Their defence, in particular, is an absolute mess, and with Lee Martin and Phil Bardsley going back to Man Utd after their loan deals, they need reinforcements. Whether there is any money to bring in the kind of quality they need, though, is debatable. Scott Brown looks to be beyond their budget; Paul Hartley maybe isn't.

Hearts: There are anything up to 30 Lithuanians training in Edinburgh right now, so expect plenty new faces from Romanov's footballing empire to turn up at Tynecastle. Pressley's already gone, and there will be few surprises if Hartley and Craig Gordon get sold.

Hibs: need a new keeper, need a new keeper, need a new keeper. John Collins threw Scott Brown's transfer request in the bin, but if he and/or Kevin Thomson are sold, expect replacements. Collins will want to stamp his own mark on the squad he's inherited, but may wait until the summer.

Kilmarnock: Ongoing rumblings about their winger Steven Naismith, and Killie are after another striker, but money is, as always, tight down in Ayrshire.

Falkirk: Having just scored a hat-trick at Inverness, Anthony Stokes is attracting more and more attention by the day. Falkirk are desperate to extend the Arsenal player's loan until the end of the year, but may be outbid by another club down south. Alan Gow has interested Hibs, but they will probably only move for him if Scott Brown leaves.

Dundee Utd: Lee Wilkie has gone out on loan to Ross County (given he only signed a pay-as-you-play deal with Utd in October, who knows if he has any future under Craig Levein). The Arabs are absolutely flying under their new boss, but the chairman will probably want to wait before spending some more money, given the amount of cash that's been wasted on under-performing squads over the past few years.

Motherwell: Plenty speculation around striker Scott MacDonald, but happily Stephen Craigan has signed a new deal.

ICT: Charlie Christie will have been relieved when Craig Brewster got sacked at Utd, because it would stop him trying to sign all his players in the transfer window. They are a tidy outfit, though, and a number could still be coveted elsewhere. Here's some pure speculation - Hibs will make an offer for keeper Mark Brown.

St Mirren: deserved point against Rangers to sign off 2006, but St Mirren's recent results have been poor. Gus McPherson wants a few more players, and luckily he's familiar with the lower divisions, because that's where his budget will send him.

Dunfermline: Put simply, they need to sign the Messiah, because little short of a miracle is going to pull them out of this one.

Friday, December 29, 2006

Celtic on course for the title, but Rangers still lacking direction

As 2006 comes to a close, Celtic can reflect on an exciting and successful year. While the team have been playing pants for weeks now, their current lack of form is a temporary blip, hugely outweighed by the positives. For their Glasgow rivals, however, the exact opposite is true - for Rangers, 2006 has been a low, low year, interspersed with the occasional high point.

17 points clear at the top of the SPL, Celtic know that the championship is as good as theirs, and it's very difficult to argue with back-to-back titles as convincing evidence for a team's dominance. They are still in the Champions League too, of course, and that is equally important, not least for the additional income it brings to the club.

What is really impressive is that all this has been done while the team has been rebuilt from end to end. A comparison between a typical team sheet from 3 years ago and one from this season illustrates the point. A long-term replacement for Neil Lennon is needed to anchor the midfield, but all else is much changed, with the average age (and average salary) of the squad considerably younger than it was. As has been pointed out here before, Strachan has enjoyed his fair slice of luck along the way, but he deserves credit for a good job so far. Today's signing of Steven Pressley on an 18-month contract will shore up the defence, too, which has conspicuously poor in recent weeks.

Paul Le Guen, on the other hand, still has much to prove, and there is a growing feeling that he's already blown it, just 6 months into the job. Many Rangers fans, and sections of the media, seem to have made their mind up already, and once that happens there is no way back. Take, as an example, the reported spat between Le Guen and his captain, Barry Ferguson, earlier in December. The story was an innocuos one - Le Guen believed the role of captain was considered less important in France than in Scotland - but it was spun as a major "row" between the pair, with the tabloid staples of "bust-ups" and "show-down talks" getting a tired airing.

Rangers have achieved some impressive results recently - wins over Hibs and Aberdeen, for example - but have capitulated far too often elsewhere. It suggests that Le Guen is having trouble motivating his team, and if that's the case he really is in trouble. Their backline remains a shambles, and the recent draw against Celtic was really anything to write home about. All in all, it's not been a happy conclusion to the year. Further progress in the UEFA Cup might buy some time for Le Guen, but he does look precarious. Chairman David Murray won't sack him yet, but if things get worse Le Guen could be jettisoned at the end of the season to deflect the wrath of the fans.

If any manager deserves to give himself a pat on the back, however, it is Jimmy Calderwood. Aberdeen have been solidly top 6 for the past couple of seasons, without really setting the heather on fire. This term, though, it seems to have clicked into place, and they are in 2nd on the table on merit.

There's a certain irony that this upturn in results has coincided with some serious belt-tightening, as the club has committed to finally get to grips with its debt. For much of the 90s, Aberdeen were spending beyond their means, and flirting with relegation. Now, taking the lead from others such as Hibernian in matching outgoings to income, they seem to have a new purpose about them. Long may it last, for Scottish football gained hugely from Alex Ferguson's belligerent Aberdeen of the 1980s, and needs some of that competitive spirit from the North East back again. There are, though, a couple of flies in the ointment. One is that Aberdeen have decided to move house to help clear those debts, selling Pittodrie for development. This is perhaps a problem for another day, as it's not scheduled to happen until 2008, but it's an interesting question as to what the capacity of the new stadium will be. The game against Rangers was a 22,000 sell-out, but they often struggle to get half that number through the gates. And that is a real problem, as Calderwood has admitted - without more ticket income, he's gonna struggle to hold his squad together.

The Entertainers from Edinburgh continued to live up to their reputation with another engrossing derby on Boxing Day, which Hearts eventually won 3-2 after Hibs had fought back from 2-0 down. These 2 clubs have lit up the SPL in 2006, Hearts grabbing headlines with their regular crises off the field as well as their football. Who knows if 2007 will bring stability to Tynecastle, or yet more trauma?

Hibs, meanwhile, have been scintillating at times this season, humiliating some of the SPL lower order, but they remain soft-centred and liable to concede cheap goals. They have also had to endure ongoing transfer speculation surrounding Kevin Thomson and Scott Brown, who may or may not be away in January. Their future, though, looks stable - debt is down, they are about to start building work at their new training ground, and John Collins has made an impressive start as manager.

Jim Jefferies has been at Kilmarnock a while now, but he continues to over-achieve with the resources at his disposal. Killie's great strength is that they always seem to compete, and - unlike Rangers, for example - don't switch off against the "smaller teams". This is the way to pick up points regularly, of course, but Killie's main hope of success this season is probably the League Cup.

Down in the bottom six, four teams have all arrived on 24 points. Falkirk and ICT can be reasonably satisfied with their seasons so far, while Motherwell and Dundee Utd have both recovered impressively from scary starts. Neither look in any danger from relegation this season, which wasn't the case a few months ago. Just two points adrift of this pack are St Mirren, who have gone in the opposite direction to the Well and the Arabs, fading after a strong start. But they'll probably be ok, too, because right at the bottom - and 8 points adrift - are poor old Dunfermline. They are going to need results to go their way quickly if they are going to avoid the drop.

So, there you go - half way through the season, we can pretty sure who's going to win the SPL and who is going down. But everything else is up to play for.

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Elvis has left - will the building survive?

There were plenty of goals in the SPL last weekend, with Hearts back to winning ways after a run of 10 league matches without a win, but it’s the latest own goal they scored off the park that dominated the headlines. Valdas Ivanauskas, back as coach and apparently refreshed after his month-long sick leave, had hinted at a possible resolution between the club and their suspended captain, Stephen Pressley, but it turned out that it was only the terms of his departure that were being discussed. Having agreed to the termination of his contract – and signed a confidentiality agreement – Pressley’s 8-year relationship with Hearts is over.

You hope, for his sake, that in return for keeping his gob shut, he has asked for any money owed to him to be paid upfront, in cash, as Hearts’ record of paying their bills is not great. Just ask George Burley, Jim Duffy, Phil Anderton or Racing Genk, who are all still waiting to be paid money owed to them by HOMFC. Yet Pressley won’t be short of job offers if he needs help paying off his Christmas spending. Celtic, Rangers and Dundee Utd have all been linked to him, while George Burley has expressed an interest in bringing him to Southampton. At 33, his playing career looks far from over.

The real question is not why Pressley has left Hearts – it is clear by now that Vladimir Romanov does not tolerate dissent of any kind – but why it is that the Hearts fans are still keeping faith in their eccentric owner, despite the latest victim of his ruthlessness being their talismanic and popular captain. Oh sure, there are some unhappy voices, but the majority view is expressed by Shaun Lawson, whose latest article urges his fellow Jambos to continue to back the regime at Tynecastle.

But, in these fractious times for the club, backing one party means siding against the other, and that means supporters turning their back on Pressley. One accusation levelled at him by these supporters is that he’s too old and too slow, and no longer good enough to justify his place in the team – an opinion that doesn’t seem to be shared by those clubs now competing for his signature. The other is that, by hijacking the press conference in October to voice his concerns about the management of the club, Pressley betrayed his employers, and deserves his punishment.

This is a gross distortion of the situation. In an era when players are widely seen as spoilt, egotistical idiots, Stephen Pressley is not your average footballer. He doesn’t even look like your average footballer. He doesn’t wear bling or big-label hoodies, but instead has adopted the idiosyncratic, scruffy style of the mid-90s Glasgow indie scene. He would look more at home on a stage in a dingy venue, rather than a football pitch. He is also an intelligent, thoughtful man, who has used his understanding of the game to overcome his limited natural ability. He lives quietly and out of the limelight off the park – on it, he’s a natural organiser and leader, and the sort of committed player fans rightly love. As the old cliché goes, he would run through a brick wall for the team.

Speaking out about his concerns with the running of the club public was surely not self-interest, or an attempt to engineer himself a move away from the club, as some have ludicrously suggested. It was, instead, a genuine attempt to improve the situation at an organisation he cared about. As he said himself, he had been expressing those concerns for sometime internally, but Romanov clearly wasn’t listening.

And was this really a sackable offence? In many ways, what Pressley did was unprecedented, but only in the sense that he put himself in front of the cameras. Players blab about issues that their club would rather remain private all the time – it’s just that usually they do it through their agent or trusted journalist. Using the press to try and encourage a bid for your services from a rival club is surely much more disloyal, but it happens all the time and players don’t get sacked for it.

Yet Hearts supporters put themselves through these convoluted thought processes because the alternative is terrifying. Hearts, as a club, is technically close to bankruptcy. Its debts at least match its assets, and already exceed them. Unlike Abramovich, who bought Chelsea for cash and cleared the debt at a stroke, Vladimir Romanov has just transferred the debt to his own bank. If Romanov was to walk away, and his bank called in that debt, the club will be in real peril. So the fans will try all they can to keep their sugar daddy happy, hoping he will stay long enough to redevelop the ground and help Hearts earn the money they need to pay off the debts.

At the moment, though, the opposite is happening, and so far Romanov’s ownership has seen a large increase in the club’s debts, not a reduction. Those same fans who are still championing the chairman believe he has a coherent plan to turn things around – but on the crucial stadium redevelopment there is still no progress. Meanwhile, the club captain - who proved his commitment to the cause time and time again - is now yesterday's man.

Surely, any properly thought out plan for the club would have found a role for Stephen Pressley, who has been such a linchpin for the past 8 years. Ivanauskas described him as the “cement” holding the club together just a couple of weeks ago, which now looks less like an attempt to heal the divisions, and more a way of patronising him into accepting his pay-off.

Now the cement has gone, it’s time to see if the bricks start falling down.

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Back to square one

Over the past couple of weeks, the clubs at Ibrox and Tynecastle have been making postive noises about turning their miserable seasons around. Rangers have turned a corner! Hearts are sorting out their differences!

Aye, right.

Rangers' latest defeat, against Falkirk, is all the more demoralising because it ended a mini-revival in the club's fortunes (3 wins in a row) that suggested Paul Le Guen was getting the hang of this tricky thing called Scottish football. But his team still has problems all over the park: their defence is shaky, their midfield is often out-classed, and things are going from bad to worse up front. Kris Boyd picked up an injury at the weekend and is apparently out until the New Year, Filip Sebo (Le Guen's biggest signing to date) has done little to suggest he has what it takes, and no one expects Dado Prso to recover the agility he had a couple of years ago.

Well played Falkirk, though, with another inspirational performance from Russell Latapy. Used to play for Rangers, you know.

Last week, Vladimir Romanov had supposedly made peace with the Hearts supporters, after praising Steven Pressley. Now, the captain has seemingly been suspended from the club. They managed a 2-2 draw with St Mirren but that was just a brief interlude as the club resumed trying to tear itself apart. There are still appeasers in the ranks of Hearts fans, though, determined not to upset their volatile chairman at any cost. It could cost them dearly.

Celtic can probably be classed as Champions-Elect now. They are not playing as well as they were in September, but they are still picking up points and that means the title is all but theirs. A draw would have been a fair result against Aberdeen, but they won and are now 16 points clear.

Hibs didn't play as well as they can on Saturday either, but ground out a win against Craig Levein's resurgent, combative Dundee Utd. But the result was overshadowed by Scott Brown's transfer request. John Collins was emphatic in his response - "I read it, ripped it up and threw it in the bin" - but it will take all the rookie manager's nous not to let this row destabilise their recent good form.

Dunfermline's new manager, Stephen Kenny, returned to Northern Ireland to lead his old club Derry to victory in the FAI Cup. Let's hope it helped him forget about the 5-1 mauling from Kilmarnock, eh?

And ICT lost 1-0 to Motherwell at home. ICT have forgotten how to score goals and are drifting down the league. Dunfermline remain 5 points adrift at the bottom, but there are a number of clubs who could get sucked into trouble down there.

Sunday, December 03, 2006

Think you're attractive? Depends how rich you are.

Celtic's chief executive, Peter Lawwell, was at the Soccerex conference in Dubai last week. Socccerex dubs itself as “the only global convention dedicated to the professional b2b football environment”. In layman’s terms, “how to make money out of the world’s favourite sport”.

Peter Lawwell gave a speech in which he characterised Celtic as one of only 5 or 6 clubs with global appeal, hampered by a domestic league that is “fairly unattractive”. Lawwell has finally accepted that the chances of Celtic joining the English Premiership are non-existent, although expect to hear a lot of bleating from Glasgow if Cardiff ever make it to the promised land. Instead, he is agitating for a yet further expanded elite European competition, a long stated dream of that unlikeable group G14. The aim, of course, is to make more money.

But one wonders if he had the chance to watch last weekend’s Hibs v Celtic match last Sunday before he flew out, because here was football that certainly was attractive for all the right reasons – fast, technical, and exciting. It was a football match that kept the crowd on the edge of the seats for the full 90 minutes, as Celtic fought back from 2-0 down and Hibs held on, before conjuring a chance that would have won them all 3 points right at the death. For all that Scottish football is dismissed as agricultural, just look at the squad of the runaway leaders. Players like Shaun Maloney (last season’s player of the year, by the way), Aiden McGeady and Kenny Miller are quick, skilful and like the ball played to feet, not hoofed at them from 40 yards.

Yes, there were full-blooded tackles, and confrontations between players, that would probably not be allowed anywhere else, but these are part of the character of Scottish football, part of its unique identity, and to be treasured all the more as football increasingly becomes a contact-free sport elsewhere. Not better, not worse – just different.

Compelling spectacle though it was, this match is nowhere near as valuable as a commodity as even the most mundane fixture in the English Premiership. Scottish football is a poor relation compared to its obscenely wealthy neighbour. Easter Road has a capacity of around 17,000, which is an obvious limit on the number of tickets that can be sold for the game. The domestic TV market in Scotland, with a population of only 5 million, is also limited, so the obvious route to growth is through “overseas” sales. In the poly-channel digital TV market, live sports events are increasingly unique, as viewers cannot skip through the ad breaks. This makes them attractive to advertisers and broadcasters alike – just today, BT announced a deal with Setanta to sell Premiership and SPL matches to their broadband customers.

It is not entirely fanciful to suggest that the SPL could grab an increased share of the “overseas” market for televised football. After all, leagues fall in and out of fashion: a decade ago, Serie A was much admired and watched across Europe, before viewers started turning away after too many boring games, and there are signs that the all-conquering Premiership is losing some of its excitement. To do so, however, depends on making the league competitive on a consistent basis. Unfortunately, Hibernian’s own experience of the past week show just how hard that is.

Scott Brown had a great game against Celtic. A tenacious and dynamic midfielder, he is a genuine flair player and has a very promising career in front of him. Everyone – including Hibs – accept that his future probably lies at a bigger club. Unfortunately, that is not enough for the Old Firm. Along with Kevin Thomson, the Hibs captain, Brown changed agents in the summer, and has been promised immediate riches by Willie McKay. Despite only signing an extension to his contract in the summer, McKay has now declared the terms of this contract unacceptable, and has been agitating to renegotiate terms, aided by the Daily Record, who have printed a succession of leaks from the agent while Hibs remain silent. When this failed, the player handed in transfer request after Saturday’s game against Dundee Utd. The clear aim is to force Hibs to sell in January, probably to Rangers, and hopefully for a knockdown fee.

None of this is healthy for the Scottish game. Either Scott Brown stays, and helps Hibs to compete against the Old Firm. Or he leaves, to the highest bidder, earning Hibernian the money to try and replace him and strengthen their squad. Having one of their key players deliberately destabilised is not in Hibs interest, obviously, but here’s the interesting thing – long term, it’s not in the Old Firm’s interests either.

It might be unrealistic to expect Lawwell and his fellow delegates (Willie McKay was at Soccerex too) to put short-term, narrow self-interest aside for a while, and think of the bigger picture. Dubai, after all, is the prime exponent of such thinking - a desert state that found billions of dollars worth of oil under the ground, and had an unprecedented opportunity to create a sustainable legacy for generations to come. Instead, they are splurging the lot on 7 star hotels, environmentally ruinous golf courses and holiday apartments on artificial palm-shaped islands, all built through exploiting cheap migrant labour from the sub-continent.

Celtic – and Rangers – need a healthy SPL. It’s about time they recognised this fact, and did something constructive, rather than endlessly moaning about it.

Monday, November 27, 2006

Celtic held as Rangers and Hearts get serious

The 5000th goal in the SPL's nine-year history was scored this weekend, but this arbitrary milestone was forgotten by even the SPL itself. (Check out www.5000thgoal.com for yourself to see if they've updated it yet). Instead, atention was focused on the title race, and whether Celtic might just face some competition after all.

After their miserable starts to the season, there are signs that both Rangers and Hearts are trying to learn from their mistakes, and focus on the only thing that really matters - winning football matches. Rangers are now finding some form, having won 3 times on the bounce in the SPL, and qualified for the next stage of the UEFA Cup. After fighting a battle of wills with his team selection, Le Guen has now given in to pragmatism, and is selecting the best performers for the job - even if it means most of his summer signings being left out. So, McGregor was back in goal at the weekend, and Kris Boyd started upfront, and Rangers won 3-0. They were aided considerably, though, by some inept defending from Kilmarnock, which infuriated their manager, Jim Jefferies.

Hearts couldn't manage a goal, and so had to settle for a draw with ICT. This was their 8th game in a row without a win, illustrating the serious damage recent rows have done to the squad's form. Once again, they were reliant on the brilliance of Craig Gordon in goal to get them out of trouble. Off the pitch, though, the hierachy seem keen to mend bridges. Pressley has been reconfirmed as club captain, and Vladimir Romanov returned the Scotland ahead of the weekend. He met fans' groups last Friday before travelling to Inverness for the game. Those fans seemed in conciliatory mood, too, so everyone is friends again. For now.

Mr Romanov had Valdas Ivanauskas in tow, who has resumed his duties as Hearts' head coach after his sickness absence, and claims to be fit and ready to get the team back to winning ways. Pressley may have characterised his return as "incidental" to the problems at Tynecastle, but he seems popular with the squad - even the Scottish contingent - and he is certainly better at the job than Eduoard Malofeev. According to Alex Kolovski, the Hearts Sporting Director/translator/press spokesman, Malofeev will be available by phone while he takes his UEFA Pro Licence course, but frankly Ivanauskas would get sounder football advice by calling the speaking clock.

So both these clubs are making efforts to improve their fortunes, but they will still struggle to make a significant dent in Celtic's lead. They recovered from 2-0 down to share the points against Hibs in a scintillating match at Easter Road. Armchair viewers who chose this game as a warm-up to the Man Utd-Chelsea will have been thrilled with their choice, as Hibs ran rampant against a Celtic side who had achieved that heroic win on Tuesday night. The match was, as the cliche goes, an advert for the Scottish game, with some great play in amongst the crunching tackles. There was some play-acting from Neil Lennon, too, as he incited his opponents and then
claimed to have been assaulted by them, but the referee refused to take the bait.

Ultimately, despite how well Hibs played, Celtic earned the draw, and demonstrated two strong reasons why they are still odds-on favourites to win the title come the end of the season. Their fightback from 2-0 was sparked by a refusal to accept they were beaten, the hallmark of champions. When Kenny Miller received the ball in the 70th minute and scampered off down the left, looking for an opening, his team mates rushed forward in support, and Evander Sno steered the eventual cutback into the net. Their second great strength is the depth of the squad. McGeady is a fine impact player to have on the bench, and proved it with their 2nd goal.

Also on the bench was Derek Riordan, an unused substitute. 8th in the overall SPL scoring chart, he also scored the 4000th SPL goal, back in 2003. Nowadays, despite scoring a hat-trick for the Celtic reserves in midweek, he can't get a game. Will he be playing for Celtic when the chance to score the 6000th comes along?


Motherwell 4-2 Falkirk
Dunfermline 0-3 Aberdeen
Dundee Utd 1-0 St Mirren
Hibs 2-2 Celtic
ICT 0-0 Hearts
Rangers 3-0 Killie

Friday, November 24, 2006

Rangers through to the knock out stages of the UEFA Cup

More than a few Rangers fans will have allowed themselves a wry smirk on Tuesday night, as Celtic celebrated getting through the group stage of the Champions League for the first time. Much like we did last season, they will have said to themselves - the first time ANY Scottish club achieved this feat.

Of course, Celtic won the European Cup in 1967, but it's widely accepted that the Champions League now favours the big clubs from the wealthier leagues, leaving countries like Scotland on the outside looking in.

So in the interests of impartiality, we love fitba would like to congratulate Rangers on their progress in the UEFA Cup. A 2-2 draw with Auxerre was enough to guarantee their involvement in the next round, regardless of the outcome of the final group game.

This might just provide the catalyst to turn Rangers' season. They equalised twice last night, the team demonstrating a pleasing degree of resilience which has been notably lacking up to now. And Paul Le Guen was pragmatic in his team selection, starting with two players - MacGregor and Boyd - whom he has previously shunned.

Scottish teams are starting to learn how to play European football. This can only be good news for the game as a whole.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Celtic defy Utd to make history

So, Celtic are through to the knock-out stages of the Champions League, after a stunning victory over Man Utd at home. It's the first time in seven attempts that they have successfully negotiated the group stages of this competition, since the competition was created out of the old European Cup. Gordon Strachan may well go on to become of the greatest managers in Celtic's history. But after another night of high drama and frayed nerves, he has once again shown himself to be one of the luckiest.

When these two clubs met in the corresponding fixture at Old Trafford back in September, many in England rashly predicted a thrashing. Blinded by the riches of the Premiership, and Utd's recent history in Europe, they assumed the Scottish club would be unable to live with their hosts. Celtic did lose the game 3-2, but they left the field with some credit, having taken the game to their hosts. Now, in Glasgow, they needed a win - anything less, and their chances of qualification would be hanging by a thread.

The accepted approach for the underdog in this situation - and Celtic were the underdog - is to try and lull the opponent into a sense of complacency, by stressing how much stronger they are, and then attempt to surprise them on the park. Strachan did the opposite in his pre-match press conference, wrapping his club in the old Scottish perceptions of injustice and arrogance by claiming that the English "pat yourselves on the back too much", and that the gap between the Premiership and the SPL wasn't as big as people assume.

This was brave. By the end of the first half tonight, it also looked a little foolhardy. For the first 45 minutes, Celtic were all over the place, as Utd dominated possession and launched attack after attack. But once again, Strachan proved just how lucky he is. Despite getting his tactics and personnel desperately wrong, his side somehow got to the break without conceding a goal.

Strachan had made some fundamental errors in setting up his team. His first mistake was to select Evander Sno in such a high pressure game. Strachan might have been charmed by his strong performances in recent weeks in the SPL, but tonight the 19 year old looked hopelessly lost. He seemed to shy away from the ball, and when it did have it he either conceded possession or passed backwards. His other big mistake was a baffling formation that left his midfield outnumbered and overrun. Somehow, United couldn't quite make their superiority stick, although they might have had a penalty when Balde tugged at Rooney.

Two substitutions at half time turned the game. Jarosik came on for Sno, and Maloney replaced Zurawski as Celtic belatedly went 4-5-1 to match their opponents. He couldn't do much about the hapless Bobo Balde in defence, with Caldwell out and Kennedy still recovering from his long injury, but he seemed less shaky with Lennon and Gravesen in front of him. With the right footed Maloney on the left, and left-footed Nakamura on the right, Celtic now had lots of bodies competing in the middle of the park, and Utd found far less space to operate.

Then they got a fortuitous decision, Nakamura scored a wondruous free kick, Boruc saved Saha's penalty, and the game was won. Celtic deserve to celebrate this great win, but they also need to learn their lessons. Surely, their luck can't hold forever.

Friday, November 17, 2006

Clash of the also rans

Round 15 of the SPL, and there was no question which fixture grabbed the attention: the Hearts v Rangers clash at Tynecastle. But it was not for the reasons they would have liked.

At the beginning of the season, many people thought this match would have been a battle between two potential champions. Hearts had lost 2 big players over the summer and not really replaced them, but after finishing as runners up and winning the Scottish Cup last year, their supporters believed things would just keep on improving. Meanwhile, Paul Le Guen was appointed as the messiah who would revive Rangers and bring trophies back to Ibrox.

How wrong things have gone since then. Not only are Celtic miles ahead of the sorry pair of them, they can't even put distance between themselves and the chasing pack... at kick off, Aberdeen were 2nd in the table, courtesy of their victory over St Mirren the previous day. Yes, broke, success-is-but-a-distant-memory Aberdeen. There's not so much a big 3 at the moment, as a... One.

So, this fixture was compelling not because these clubs are doing so well, but because they are doing so badly. The ongoing crises at Tynecastle and Ibrox have provided the stories of the season so far in the SPL, and are both inexplicable, in their way. On the one hand, you have Vladimir Romanov, a riddle wrapped in an enigma inside a puzzle, or whatever it was Churchill said about the Russians; a man who has claimed a grand vision for his club, but has a very strange way of trying to achieve it. Then, you have Paul Le Guen, recognised as one of the most talented coaches in Europe, who not only has failed to improve Rangers, but made them worse.

As it was, Rangers won the match, with a late goal from Nacho Novo. The wee Spanish forward is one of the few success stories for Rangers this season - all but ignored by Alex McLeish, he is playing more regularly now under the new gaffer, and scoring goals again. Barry Ferguson had one of his better games in recent times, too.

So Rangers have jumped above the Dons into second place, but time will tell whether their nightmare is over. They only beat Hearts, after all, in a poor game between two teams in poor form. The club have been heavily engaged in the darks arts of PR over the past week or so, firstly issuing a statement of confidence in the manager, and then throwing their beleaguered supporters some titbits, by leaking news of an imminent bid for a Hibernian midfielder or two. But, just because the Glasgow papers might lap it up, doesn't make it so. It is not the chairman's opinion of Le Guen that really matters, but the fans', and only a continued sequence of wins will appease them. And unless David Murray digs into his own pocket, there won't be any money for new players in January - certainly not Kevin Thomson or Scott Brown.

The best PR savvy in the world couldn't spin the Hearts story in a positive light at the moment, because the outlook is bleak. They have now gone 7 games without a win, and - like Rangers - desperately need to conjure a run of results from somewhere. But they seem utterly incapable of doing so.

It was hardly surprising they lost. The build up to the game had been dominated by speculation over whether Craig Gordon would play - or would he too be dropped, like the other members of the "Riccarton Three". In the end, he did, as did Paul Hartley, but it was hardly ideal preparation. Handing the captain's armband to Hartley on Sunday might have been seen as an attempt to heal a rift, except that Pressley is still excluded.

It was Edouard Malofeev's last game in charge, as he has now left to get his UEFA coaching badge - at the age of 64! If he waited a year, he could retire to Sochi instead. Eugenijus Riabovas was supposed to be taking over, but the BBC is now claiming he isn't after all. Meanwhile, the assistant John McGlynn, the only constant in the coaching staff over the past 2 years, and caretaker manager twice, is seemingly leaving to become the boss at 2nd Division Raith Rovers. So Hearts are currently directionless.

Bizarrely, given his hands-on management style, Vladimir Romanov wasn't in the country at the weekend, but is expected in Scotland this week. He's got plenty to keep him busy - Hartley has asked for a chat, and he will need to deal with the fall-out from the match, after director Alex Koslovski accused the fans of booing some players just because they were Lithuanian, and a group of 200 or so supporters held a protest after the game.

So, Rangers and Aberdeen are now on 25 points, with Hearts on 22 with Kilmarnock and Hibs. It is hardly where these two big spenders thought they would be at this stage of the season.

Motherwell 1-6 Hibernian
Aberdeen 2-0 St Mirren
Celtic 3-0 St Mirren
Dunfermline 2-1 Dundee Utd
Kimarnock 2-1 Falkirk
Hearts 0-1 Rangers

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

Laidback Latapy still has the legs for the SPL

Now that Setanta have their feet well and truly under the SPL table, they have become bold enough to start dictating their terms to the league. Mostly, this has passed without controversy in Scotland, for one good reason - when the last broadcast deal ended, and the "SPL TV" channel failed to get off the ground, Setanta were left as the only game in town, with the 12 clubs in the top division happy to agree to just about anything so long as there was some money in it for them. In other words, they were not negotiating from a position of strength.

Televised Sunday football was the inevitable first step, and now live games on Monday nights are the new thing. There are grumbles about the impact on attendances (getting back from Aberdeen to Edinburgh at 10pm on a Monday night, for instance, is not the easiest journey in the world) but Monday nights are probably here to stay. If the SPL is to develop any kind of meaningful international audience, televised games are key.

Now, Falkirk is little more than an hour from Edinburgh, but the Hearts fans still had an unhappy trip back home last night. It seems the club are about to appoint their 7th coach in less than 2 years (there is no point in claiming the most senior role in the dugout at Hearts qualifies for the title of "manager") and it looks as though Romanov is now exacting his revenge on those players who defied him in public a couple of weeks ago. Gordon retained his place, and arguably Hartley was just rested, but Pressley had been jettisoned from the 1st team squad altogether, and has possibly lost the captaincy for good.

For all this turmoil, they would still have won the game, but for one man: Russell Latapy. At 38, and long after most people assumed he was spent as a player, the wee playmaker is by far the most influential player at Falkirk, having done more than anyone else to get them to the SPL and keep them there. His equaliser, in the 84th minute, was just reward for a battling home performance, and further vindicates the Falkirk manager's continued faith in his oldest player. At this rate, he could - like Teddy Sheringham - celebrate his 40th birthday still earning his living from the professional game. There's more than just the similarity in age, too. Like Sheringham, Latapy has something of a reputation as a playboy.

Latapy arrived in Scotland in 1998, signed by Alex McLeish for Hibernian on a free transfer from Porto. Hibs had been relegated the previous season, McLeish having arrived too late to avoid the inevitable. They had been flirting with disaster for a couple of years, but ironically had been one of the main movers in favour of breaking away from the Scottish Football League and setting up the SPL. The new division had come into existence without them. McLeish's job was to rebuild the squad and get them promoted again, quickly.

Hibs ended up storming the 1st Division Championship and bouncing straight back up. Once back in the top flight, they wasted no time in proving their worth, playing some pretty football as they did so. There were a number of influential players in the team - Kenny Miller and Franck Sauzee among them - but Latapy was key. Playing in a free role behind the strikers, he was vital to McLeish's stated ethos: "play it on the fucking carpet". Hibs banished route 1 football and passed almost everything through Latapy, once the team had realised that he very, very rarely gave the ball away, and he could deliver the killer ball. He liked to score a bit, too, averaging 10 goals a season.

Season 2000/1 was even better for the Hibees. Money problems meant they had to sell Miller to Rangers for £2m, but they continued their progress. Alongside the undoubted class of Latapy and Sauzee, other, more workmanlike players - like John O'Neill - were in the form of their lives, buoyed by confidence. Hibs ran Rangers close for 2nd place all season, only just slipping to 3rd in the final weeks. More importantly, they got to the final of the Scottish Cup - a competition they had not won for nearly a century. Surely this was their year. After months of contract negotiations, it was clear that Latapy would be leaving at the end of the season, and the Cup seemed such a fitting trophy to sign off with.

On the Wednesday night before the game, however, everything went wrong. Russell Latapy was arrested for drink driving. In his BMW with him were two girls he'd been out partying with - and Dwight Yorke, whose season at Old Trafford had finished a week earlier. So he decided to come up to Edinburgh to see his mate and go out on the town.

The story got out across Edinburgh, and Alex McLeish, faced with such blatant indiscipline just days before the biggest game of his managerial career, took the only option he felt open to him - he sacked Latapy, and banished him from the club. 3 days later, Hibs barely showed up against Celtic, and they got beat 3-0. They haven't got as close to the prize since.

Financially, Latapy was barely inconvenienced by the sacking, as he moved to Rangers on a Bosman just days later. But his fresh start in Glasgow didn't last long... in October McLeish was poached from Hibs to replace Dick Advocaat at Ibrox. Not surprisingly, given the previous, McLeish had limited trust in Latapy, and he played fewer games than he might have expected to. After limited success, he went out to Dundee Utd, before accepting a drop to the 1st Division with Falkirk.

The Falkirk manager, John Hughes, was a previous Hibs player himself, and recoginsed Latapy's qualities. Cutely, though, he hired him not just as player, but player-coach. It was not for his lifestyle advice - Latapy has smoked throughout his career, and is unashamed about it - but for his technical expertise. The enhanced responsibility revitalised Latapy, and he is now enjoying a rich period in his career. He tends to play a little deeper these days, but once again he is absolutely key to the way his team plays.

He even has the experience of going to a World Cup, with Trinidad & Tobago, even though he played very little in the finals themselves. This was his own fault, in a way - after persuading his friend to come out of retirement, T&T ended up playing with Yorke, and not Latapy, in the midfield playmaker role. But he probably wasn't too disappointed - Latapy had played a large role in getting the team there, and the fans back home recognised his contribution.

He has not led a blameless life, and he is arguably a poor role model in a country that has severe problems with underage smoking and drinking. But Latapy's enthusiasm for the game, and his sublime skills, have contributed much to Scottish football. He is one of those select players - like Gianfranco Zola - that even opposition fans can admit to liking.

When Falkirk were at Easter Road in September, the home fans applauded him, despite his acrimonious departure. Despite the fact that they were losing. Latapy raised his hands above his head and clapped them in return.

It is just a game, after all. And it's there to be enjoyed.

Falkirk 1-1 Hearts
Hibs 2-0 ICT
Aberdeen 2-1 Motherwell
St Mirren 1-3 Celtic
Rangers 2-0 Dunfermline
Dundee Utd 1-0 Kilmarnock

Thursday, November 09, 2006

CIS Cup update

Well, the SPL title might look done and dusted already, but fortunately the CIS Cup is keeping things interesting. Celtic were already out, beaten on penalties by Falkirk on Tuesday, but that shock result has already been eclipsed by the extraordinary stories from the remaining two quarter finals last night.

One of the most pleasing developments in recent years has been the resurgence of the Edinburgh derby. The Old Firm clashes remain the biggest fixtures in Scottish domestic football, but it's healthy for the game overall that other matches now qualify for the "big game" billing. With Hibs having a terrible record against Hearts in the League Cup, and Hearts struggling at their rival's ground in recent years, last night's game promised much.

As it was, Hibs won with embarassing ease, and will wonder this morning how the final score was only 1-0. They were good, taking control of the game after a typically frenetic opening 15 minutes, but they were helped by an abject Hearts performance. Once again, their tactics and line-up was baffling, with no Brellier in the squad and no threat up front. The baggy-shorted Hartley roamed all over the pitch to try and get his team going, but eventually he faded after being asked to do too much on his own. Meanwhile, Hibs realised early on that they could simply feed the ball to Ivan Sproule any time they wanted to, and let their winger run at a hopelessly exposed Jose Goncalves at left back. Goncalves was - along with Hartley and Craig Gordon, again - Hearts' best player, but he had no support from Mikoliunas ahead of him or anyone else. By the time Mikoliunas was replaced, on 65 minutes, Hearts were ragged and looking beaten.

At Ibrox, meanwhile, Rangers were dumped out of the cup 2-0 by 1st Division St Johnstone. If the crowd of just over 30,000 was a worry to those in charge, it was nothing compared to the way the stadium emptied before the final whistle, as the fans left in disgust. A few hundred stayed on to stage a protest outside the ground, but many others probably decided there was no point. The manager is admitting he has serious problems, the chairman David Murray wants out, and the fans aren't turning up in the usual numbers. Le revolution is going badly wrong.

All this means that Hibernian are now being proclaimed as favourites for the League Cup, but this is being disrespectful to Kilmarnock, who are the other club through to the Semis. They have been more consistent than Hibs this season, and will fancy their chances in this competition. Either way, a club outside the top 3 is going to win a trophy this season.

Monday, November 06, 2006

Is it all over then?

We love fitba was created to do two things - give existing followers of Scottish football an alternative perspective on the game, and encourage supporters of other leagues to keep an eye on developments up here. After all, the SPL 05/06 was an absolute rollercoaster of a season, so much more intriguing than, say, Chelsea's march to another Premiership title.

But here we are, in early November, and while Chelsea face a genuine threat to their 3-in-a-row ambitions, Celtic look home and dry already. 13 points clear of Hearts, 15 between them and Rangers, can anyone catch them?

As posted on here recently, Celtic have been far from perfect over the first quarter of the season, but they have been lucky. Gary Caldwell's horror show against Benfica mid-week will not have surprised any Hibs supporters, who became used to their old captain's inexplicable losses of concentration at key moments, but the fact that this beating has not fatally undermined them in the Champions League group is something of a blessing. Similarly, Celtic have been pushed to the wire several times in the SPL this season, but time and again key moments have gone their way and they've walked away with the 3 points. Arguably, they should never have been allowed the late winner against Hearts at the weekend - but the goal stood, and with it came the victory.

Gordon Strachan deserves some of the credit, though. Other than find a use for Derek Riordan, he has managed integrate his many new players into the first team squad, which should see them well-placed over the winter, when injuries and suspensions can threaten to derail a title bid. The midfield, in particular, has looked tasty for a while (which is why Riordan can't get a game), with Sno and Jarosik making contributions when Nakamura, Maloney, McGeady or Gravesen need a rest. He could even push Caldwell forward to deputise for Neil Lennon if need be, which might be his better position anyhow, with cover at the back. Either way, it would be a surprise if they get to January without still having a healthy lead over the chasing pack.

Paddy Power has already paid out on Celtic taking the title. It's a neat ploy to win the Oirish custom of course, but maybe they also want to encourage their punters to place another bet - out of Hearts and Rangers, who's gonna implode first?

Hearts were full of indignation at Celtic's controversial, and very late, winning goal, enabling them to dust down one of their favourite subjects: refereeing bias towards the Old Firm. But they had a legitimate case, and the 2-1 scoreline was not a fair reflection on the match. There was still no space for Brellier in the starting line-up (although he was on the bench) alongside 4 Lithuanians - suggesting Romanov is still choosing the team, despite Malofeev's protestations -but they played a lot better, and Velicka is justifying his place on his performances rather than his passport. Steven Pressley was missing, but apparently genuinely ill, and not dropped. It would seem from the outside, then, that everyone at the club has agreed to calm down and settle their differences after the mayhem of a week ago, but things will go off any day soon. They can't help themselves.

Rangers are just an abject shambles. Manager Paul Le Guen found it "unbelievable" that they lost at the weekend, and seeing as they were playing Dundee Utd, he had a point. But this is new, improved Dundee Utd, under yet another manager, and Craig Levein made sure they didn't roll over as usual. Charmlessly, Barry Ferguson was back to his old self after the match, putting in an instensive shift with the journalists to make sure they all knew how disappointed and hurt he is by Rangers' plight. He's not conceding the title yet, either. It's possible that one day he will, as captain, accept some responsibility for the team's failings and his own lacklustre displays, but don't hold your breath.

The chairman David Murray is both loyal and stubborn, so Le Guen won't get sacked. But the squad is no stronger than it was under McLeish, and quite possibly weaker, and complete disgust from the stands is only being averted by decent results in Europe. If they slip any further behind, though, things might turn nasty. Rangers are used to not winning anymore, but they won't tolerate being humiliated for much longer.

Celtic 2-1 Hearts
Dundee Utd 1-2 Rangers
Hibs 2-2 Kilmarnock
Inverness 1-1 Aberdeen
Dunfermline 0-3 Falkirk
Motherwell 0-0 St Mirren

Scotstoon

We love fitba is striving to bring you the best Scottish football-related content on the interweb. And here's some more - scotstoon, a satirical weekly comic strip. Enjoy.

Tuesday, October 31, 2006

D is for desperate

The Edinburgh clubs have been hogging the headlines recently, but they are not the only ones in crisis. (Not that there's a crisis at all, of course. Hibs have pulled themselves a sexy, if untested, new manager in John Collins, probably the most urbane Scottish footballer of the past 2 generations, while Hearts are absolutely on track and there's nothing to worry about. Honest.)

No, the 2 clubs at the foot of the SPL are in it up to their necks, and have decided a change of manager is exactly what's needed to get the journalists to make the trip across the Forth Road Bridge.

Jim Leishman was first to go, sacking himself as manager of Dunfermline after the 4-0 battering by Hibs last week. He's likely to stay on at the club in some capacity but he was still very emotional when breaking the news to the players. An honourable and decent man, Leishman loves the Pars to bits, and used to support them as a boy. More pertinently, he performed miracles for them in the 1980s, as Dunfermline crawled their way up into the top division, their fans shrugging off the patronising remarks from supporters of "bigger" teams as they did so. He will be revered by those same fans for a long time to come, but they probably need a change to turn their season around. Leishman admitted a few weeks ago that the squad was good enough to survive this season - an implicit admission that the management wasn't.

It looked as if Craig Levein, the man who walked out of Hearts as soon as he got wind of a potential takeover by a certain V. Romanov, would be his replacement. But, instead, he's gone to Dundee Utd to replace Craig Brewster.

Dundee Utd somewhat ludicrously suggested on Monday that Brewster's departure was a "mutual and amicable" agreement, despite the fact that just a week ago the manager was insisting he would "never" walk away from the job. Mind you, this is the same club that denied its chairman had ever said anything disparaging about Brewster, after the entire press room had overheard him slagging him off in a phone call.

Be in no doubt, Dundee Utd are cursed. The only question is whether that is because of the chairman, or something more fundamental (although given the chairman is currently battling prostate cancer as well, it's easy to draw simplistic - and tasteless - conclusions).

Eddie Thompson has now appointed his 5th manager in 5 years (he claimed today it was a decision made by the board, but this is a one-man show). The first 4 were all sacked because they weren't delivering on the chairman's expectations - but with each sacking, those expectations have had to be lowered still further. Craig Brewster was tasked with steadying the ship and regaining a little bit of respect for the Tannadice club. Levein has been brought in to avoid relegation, at whatever cost. He's probably the right man for the job but don't expect it to be pretty. Levein's Hearts played some of the ugliest football in the SPL, and nothing he's done since has suggested any change in his "ping-it-tae-the-big-man" philosophy.

But just what is it with the Tangarines anyway? They're another club who were great in the 1980s, and maybe that's enough to condemn them to the karmic pain they are now experiencing. Thompson has put some money in, buying a big squad on some big salaries, but the results have been abysmal. Craig Brewster was in charge for just 28 games, but won just 2 of them. That's beyond poor.

One player, who had a horrible weekend when he was caught in a nasty challenge by Gary Caldwell, sums up their problems. David Fernandez played so well for Livingston that Celtic bought him for £1m. They then discovered he wasn't quite as good as their existing strikers, the player's confidence dipped because he wasn't in the team, and Celtic eventually off-loaded him. Dundee Utd signed him, but he did nothing for them, suggesting that he was washed up as a player. So they released him as well. But then he signed for Kilmarnock and - guess what? - he's looked pretty tidy again. In fact, until he got injured, he was the most dangerous player on the pitch, causing Celtic's defence all sorts of problems. Unfortunately, he is now out for the rest of the season with a knee injury, and Killie are gonna miss him.

Perhaps chastened by the fact it took Dundee Utd only a day to appoint a new manager, Hibs have finally replaced Tony Mowbray. John Collins started his successful playing career at Hibs, and is now hoping history repeats itself as a manager. He's untested, then, but a bold, high-profile appointment for the club. It's a good first job for him as well, but although the squad has plenty of talent, they lack discipline - in both senses. At times they are tactically naive, failing to hold the lead in games they should be winning, and they can be petulant when things don't go their way, picking up too many bookings, as shown on Monday night, when they had Chris Killen sent off and ended up losing 2-1 against Aberdeen. Collins will need to translate the professionalism he displayed as a player into the way his team plays.

Hmm, an entire posting almost done, and barely a mention of Hearts? Shurely Shome Mishtake?

Falkirk 5-1 Dundee Utd
Dunfermline 1-1 Hearts of Mid-Lithuania FC
St Mirren 1-1 Inverness
Rangers 1-1 Motherwell
Kilmarnock 1-2 Celtic
Aberdeen 2-1 Hibernian

Friday, October 27, 2006

Newsflash

Don't you just hate it when that happens? Post a story, then immediately our world of 24/7 connectivity brings a story that has a significant bearing on the story you've just posted. Grr!

Steven Pressley, the Hearts captain, this morning gathered the press to read out an incomprehensible statement, but there is apparently "significant unrest" in the dressing room. Hard to make out what exactly he is so troubled about, but read it for yourself here.

Maybe Elvis is angling for a fortnight's holiday as well?

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Heart of Mid-Lithuania Football Club

Readers may have noticed a new link appearing on we love fitba's sidebar this week - The Big Feller blog.

As you hopefully have noticed by now, we love fitba is strictly - and deliberately - non-partisan. Patriotic, fair enough, and a passion for passing football, but that's it. We are sick of the established media's bias, and are making a stand. If Celtic, Rangers, or anyone else deserves a good write up, they will get it here. If anyone deserves a kicking, we love fitba will be wearing its boots.

The Big Feller, by contrast, is an unashamed Jambo, but he's done a huge amount of research in an attempt to answer the question everyone wants to know: what on earth is Vladimir Romanov up to? You can read it here.

It takes a very positive view of the man, outlining a long-term plan to steward Hearts into being a self-financing, successful club. After which, he going to buy himself a castle and design a Romanov tartan.*

There may well be a plan in place that will achieve the Hearts of every jambo's dreams. But there are clouds swirling above Tynecastle. The pitch no longer meets requirements for a club aiming for regular European football and the stadium is badly in need of redevelopment. Romanov has talked about building hotels and flats alongside the stadium but it's a business model that's yet to work in the UK, and anyway there isn't much room as the site is cramped and hemmed in by flats already.

The land is worth around £20m as a housing plot, but then Hearts would need to find a new home. The experiment with Murrayfield hasn't worked and there is no obvious site nearby. Their city rivals Hibs have ruled out a groundshare, so this would be a huge financial burden for a club which is already somewhere north of £20m in debt, which is effectively in the form of an overdraft with UKIO. Aside from its ground, Hearts only other significant assets are the training academy at Riccarton (a joint venture with Heriot Watt University) and a shit-hot goalkeeper, say £4m. None of the rest of the squad are currently valued anywhere near as much, and the compensation for Andy Webster won't be more than a few hundred grand. If they are relying on transfer fees to fund their progress, it's a very risky strategy indeed.

Romanov did put a few million into the club as working capital when he bought his first stake, but the club has spent that and is going to make another big loss this season. So they have short term as well as long term debt issues. Belgian club Genk is currently asking FIFA to bar Hearts from making transfers until they receive the balance of their fee for Mersad Besilja, who joined Hearts in January.

Then there's the man himself. Romanov is not the first club owner to fancy himself as a manager, but it never really works, does it? Interfering in transfer policy is always unwise (even if you're as rich as Roman Abramovich). Getting involved in matchday tactics is even worse. He seems unable to separate his role as owner of a football club from the role of running a football team, and it's likely to end in tears.

Fair enough, George Burley might have been a spendthrift who liked a drink, but for fecks sake man... the team was flying.

*possibly.

Monday, October 23, 2006

SPL quarter season round up

With 11 matches played, it's a good time to take stock of the season so far. All the teams in the 12-club SPL have played each other once, so they've all had the chance to size each other up. welovefitba's 1/4 season round up has been delayed by a day, for 2 reasons: Dunfermline and Hibs did not play until Monday night, and we were waiting for Hearts to sack Ivanauskas and appoint another new coach.

So, let's start at the bottom, where Dundee Utd and Dunfermline are locked together on 8 points. Dunfermline have the excuse of a long injury list at the beginning of the season, and no money. They have been hanging onto SPL status by their fingernails for a couple of years now, and it wouldn't be surprising if they drop through the floor at the end of this season. 5 years ago they were a tidy, effective team, and boss Jim Leishman loves the Pars more than life itself, so their fans might still hold out some hope that he can get the club to punch above its weight again. Their keeper Dorus De Vries, performed heroics against Hibs, but they still got thumped 0-4. It will be a long, long season for them.

It's hard to know where Dundee Utd fans can look for inspiration, though. They are a much bigger club, with much stronger resources, but they are in freefall. Craig Brewster is just the latest manager to try and turn things around, but he admitted at the weekend that relegation is now a real possibility, infuriating his chairman, Eddie Thompson. Again. (Thompson was overheard describing his manager in less than complimentary terms after the first game of the season). Brewster is a United fan, but he's drowning not waving, and as he said himself, 2 wins from 27 games tells its own story. That sound you hear is Thompson sharpening his blade.

Motherwell might be only 2 points above the gruesome twosome, but their form has improved markedly from an abject start to the season, and they should continue their recovery. Terry Butcher has proved a tough act to follow, but Maurice Malpas seems to be getting the hang of it now, and Motherwell have some decent players in an admittedly small squad.

Falkirk, on 11 points, have carried on much as they did last season. They are a tidy and compact side, and keep possession well. However, their home form has been very poor, with just one win all season, and they don't score enough goals. They will need to improve on both counts if they are to avoid getting sucked into a relegation dogfight.

St Mirren, 3 points above them, can have no complaints. Gus MacPherson has kept the Division 1 Champions in confident mood, and they should build on a solid start. The truth is that the bottom half of the SPL contains a few teams - yes you, Dundee Utd and Dunfermline - that are no better than those in the division below. Which is how clubs like St Mirren can get promoted, and then compete, with much the same squad. If they go back down this season, welovefitba will eat its (pixellated) hat.

Locked together on 15 points in 6th and 7th places, neatly straddling the top and bottom halves of the table, are Hibernian and Aberdeen, the two clubs who see their natural position as members of the elite, but often find themselves slumming it in less rarefied territory.

Aberdeen manager Jimmy Calderwood was extolling his team's exciting, attacking football at the weekend, with the club hoping more entertainment will get the punters through the turnstiles. Less than 11,000 turned up, however, many fans no doubt struggling to put the usual dour displays out of their mind. It would be a welcome change to see a more attack-minded Aberdeen having a go, but there's no guarantees it will last. A phrase about a leopard and his spots comes to mind.

Hibernian thumped Dunfermline in their Monday night encounter, teeing up the predictable question: imagine how good they'd be if they had a manager? No announcement has been made on Tony Mowbray's replacement yet, but it's no surprise the club are taking their time, because the new man has a tough brief. There's a lot to work with at Hibs, but the team developed a set way of playing under Mowbray - a sort of fluid 4-3-3/4-5-1 - and the fans won't want it to change. So, the new manager will need to improve consistency, while keeping the flair. It's anyone's guess what kind of season they might have.

Inverness Caledonian Thistle are in 5th, Charlie Christie doing an excellent job of maintaining the progress made by the previous manager, er, Craig Brewster. Who walked out on ICT to take up the Tannadice hot seat. Oops. More than any other manager, Christie will dread January, because his job is about keeping his squad together rather than adding to it, and a few of his players are coveted by others.

Jim Jefferies has been doing a fine job at Kilmarnock for so long now that it's easy to get complacent about them. In fact, the bigger clubs still have a complacent attitude towards their trips to Ayrshire, and then get humbled on the park (Hearts being merely the latest). Ultimately, the lack of resources have told in recent seasons, leaving Kilmarnock just short where it mattered. A top 6 club certainly, and there on merit, the next level would be a domestic cup or qualifying for European competition. They have a 3 point advantage over Hibs and Aberdeen as it stands, but these 3 will swap places all season long.

And so to the top 3. Paul le Guen has had a harrowing introduction to Scottish football, his nadir coming in the 1-0 loss to ICT a week ago, when his keeper's every touch was booed by their own fans (they were unhappy that MacGregor, who'd performed heroics in the UEFA cup, had been dropped to the bench). le Guen's favoured No.1 then made an absolute clanger and gifted ICT the 3 points, doing his boss no favours at all. Crucially, of course, Rangers are 10 points off Celtic already, but progress in the UEFA Cup has bought le Guen a bit of time. The SPL title might be beyond them already, but if he can show the team is progressing then the fans might put this season down to "rebuilding" and hope things improve next time around.

Le Guen's other big problem is Hearts. If they finish ahead of Rangers again, it will look less like a blip, and more like a trend, and that kind of decline simply won't be tolerated in the blue half of Glasgow. Hearts are certainly a better team than Rangers right now, and deserve to be ahead of them in the standings. Whether this continues is probably all down to Hearts, and how Romanov plots the remainder of this campaign.

He hasn't sacked Ivanauskas, but he might have broken him - he's been signed off sick for 2 weeks to try and recover his health. You have to feel sympathy for the intense Lithuanian: he's under huge pressure to deliver results, and under constant scrutiny from the media (he does not appear to enjoy the limelight) and yet he does not have the authority to pick the team to get those results. While he's away, Edouard Malofeev (job title: who knows?) takes care of team affairs.

Hearts have a lot in their favour, including a strong squad and some good players. Unfortunately, that same squad is far too big and unbalanced (8 strikers!) and the team selection beggars belief. The Scottish axis of Gordon-Pressley-Hartley is pretty constant, but the others positions are chopped and changed at wil. Romanov has a clear preference for blooding the young Lithuanians, but his selection policy has cost Hearts several points already, and arguably hampered their chances in their brief European campaign. If his plan is to grow Heart of Midlothian football club, results are surely paramount.

The leaders Celtic are still capable of turning in distinctly average performances, but Strachan has been lucky this term that it hasn't cost him. He has been rebuilding the squad since he joined in summer 2005, but it is now starting to gel, and should get more consistent as the team develops. The two centre backs, McManus and Caldwell, are starting to answer their many critics, Caldwell having also noticeably grown up through experience with the Scotland team. Up front, meanwhile, Jan Vennegor of Hesselink is finding Scottish football to his taste, and Kenny Miller, again helped by his heroics in a Scotland shirt, has put his early season goal drought behind him.

8 points clear at the top already, Celtic are looking good to retain their title.

Monday, October 16, 2006

Goodbye Tony Mowbray

While English fans looked forward to the resumption of the Premiership to blot out memories of Steve McLaren's inadequacies, Scottish supporters could be forgiven for wondering how the SPL could possibly match up to the excitement and heroics of the national team. Defeat against Ukraine might have dampened some expectations, but the victory over France will be remembered for a long time.

But the SPL delivered. 2 days of goals, thrills and keeper spills gave fans entertainment on the pitch, while managerial crises gave the media plenty to talk about. As a spectacle, the SPL is good value at the moment.

Match of the weekend was the Edinburgh derby, which was interesting in itself. Hibs and Hearts have the intense rivalry that all good divided cities have, and the derby has always been a massive game for their supporters. But it's no longer just a local tussle, ignored by everyone else. These days, everyone sits up and pays attention. It was the only game on Sunday, the Setanta channel thumbing through their "Sky guide to televising football" again to big up the big game.

Hearts have done a lot to create this hype, the Romanov Revolution building a bubble of expectation around the Tynecastle club. But this time around everyone was talking about their rivals. Hibernian lost their manager 3 days before the derby, and bets were on the leaderless club imploding under the pressure.

In the end, a thrilling match ended 2-2, and in many ways it summed up Hibs under Tony Mowbray. The home side were 2 goals up after 15 minutes, passing their way around the Hearts midfield at will, and threatening a rout. But they couldn't hold on, 2 blunders from their keeper allowing Hearts to take a point from a game they should have lost. Yet again, Hibs had delighted their supporters, but, ultimately, left them disappointed.

Tony Mowbray was a coach at Ipswich who persuaded the Hibernian board to give him his first job in management. He was already knew something of the Scottish game, having been a player at Celtic for 3 seasons in the early 90s, but Hibernian were taking a big gamble.

If his inexperience raised eyebrows, what happened next was simply astonishing. Rather than adopt a reticent, cautious approach with the media, playing it safe and buying himself some time to settle in, Mowbray spoke freely to anyone who would listen, eloquently explaining his footballing philosophy. He liked neat, passing football, players who wanted to get the ball down and beat people with their skill, not their muscle. It played well to the gallery - Hibs has long been a club seduced by pretty passing - but most reacted with bemusement. He wanted to pass the ball? In the SPL? He was making a rod for his own back, surely, and many predicted he'd be sacked by Christmas.

Early results were indifferent, but Hibs stayed focused on the manager's strategy, with the players trying to put their manager's words into action, rather than resort to percentage football. A club that had got used to route 1 tactics and bottom 6 finishes suddenly saw something more. Their manager was trying to build a team to talk about.

The crowds started to flood back. Hibs' average gate had been on the slide for some years, but Mowbray reversed that in a season. They had been lucky to get 10,000 through the gates for the less attractive fixtures (and often got a lot less than that). At the recent Falkirk game, the ground was a 17,000 sell-out. Away, as well, Hibs suddenly became a big fixture, as their fans followed in their thousands to support the team, often out-numbering the home support. Whatever else he had achieved, Mowbray had helped the club find its self belief again.

It wasn't just their own fans falling under the spell. It was generally recognised that Hibs were the most exciting, attractive team in the country. What's more, it was a team made up largely of home-grown talent - the Hibs Kids. With no training academy and laughable facilities, Hibernian had somehow tapped into a rich seam of talent, at just the time it was cutting back on pricey foreign players because of financial problems. 6 of the starting 11 were Scottish and under 24, and they seemed to have no fear. While every other team would go to Celtic to defend in numbers and try and nick something, for example, the Hibs Kids would swagger on to the park and try and outplay the champions.

It didn't always work out, and Hibs were often frustrated by teams they "should" have beaten - like Inverness or Falkirk - who worked out that if they packed the midfield and crashed into tackles, the team from Edinburgh could get petulant and lose their way. The very tactics, in fact, that teams used to reserve for those daunting trips to Celtic. Hibs leaked far too many goals throughout his tenure, and the players often betrayed their lack of experience by failing to protect a lead. But under Mowbray Hibs finished 3rd in his first season and 4th in his second, and reached the semi-final of the Cup both seasons. Petulant they may have been, but he got his team to play for him.

Ultimately, though, Hibernian's lack of resources told. They failed to make any sort of impression in their UEFA Cup and Intertoto adventures, and that second Scottish Cup semi-final was a humiliation, as a desperately under-strength team were spanked 4-0 by Hearts. It was this lack of cash that probably persuaded Mowbray it was time to move on. He may have persuaded his employers to finally invest in their own training facilities, but he had very little money to strengthen the squad, and watched helplessly as Ian Murray, Derek Riordan and Gary Caldwell all walked out the door at the end of their contracts. He lost Garry O'Connor, too, but while Hibernian did receive a transfer fee for him, it was doubtful how much of it Mowbray saw. When Celtic signed Thomas Gravesen in the summer, Mowbray brooded on the fact that his wages alone (reputed to be £40,000 a week) represented his entire squad budget.

At times he seemed exasperated by Scottish football in general, stating that he could never become a career manager north of the border and that he probably had a maximum shelf life of 4 years. A teetotal and footballing obsessive, Mowbray claimed to know nothing about the cultural life of Edinburgh, and didn't form much of an emotional bond with the city.

Yet his departure, after just 28 months, came as a surprise. He had, after all, declined a job offer from Ipswich at the beginning of the summer because he had unfinished business at Hibs. Just a few months later, it seemed, he considered his work to be done. It may have been exasperation at his transfer budget that pushed him away (and an ultra cautious Chairman, Rod Petrie, who put profits before players). Or it may have been the fact that he was overlooked for the Middlesbrough job. His hometown club chose to ignore him and appoint the utterly untested Gareth Southgate instead, and Mowbray might well have wondered if his achievements were really being taken all that seriously in England.

If that is the case, it's an enormous shame, because he DID have work still to do in Edinburgh. He had rebuilt the squad during 2006 as players had departed, strengthening the defence and adding Moroccan flair with Benji and Zemmama. With a decent keeper and a couple of other signings, Hibs could have continued the upward spiral Mowbray often referred to. He often spoke and acted like a man with a 10-year plan for the club, and he had so much goodwill from the fans that they would probably have seen it through with him. Instead, someone else will now try and pick up where he left off.

He is an outstanding coach, who helped develop the resources at his disposal, for the good of both Hibs and, potentially, Scotland. The number of scouts from the English Premiership and across Europe who turned up to watch his team showed that he WAS being taken seriously outside of Scotland. He was adored by the supporters, and always provided good copy for the media. And his team helped bring unpredictability, flair and thrilling play back onto the pitch, pleasing everybody (especially Setanta).

Scottish football will miss him.

Kilmarnock 1-0 Aberdeen
Dundee Utd 1-4
Rangers 0-1 ICT
Falkirk 1-1 St Mirren
Motherwell 2-1 Dunfermline
Hibs 2-2 Hearts

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Scotland get a dose of reality

So, Scotland's last qualifying match of 2006 ended in disappointment, but 9 points from 4 games is a healthy return and leaves only goal difference between them and France at the top of the table. Making it to Euro 2008 will take still take "a miracle", as the manager Walter Smith said, desperately damping down expectations, but they have put themselves in the mix.

In the end, they were undone by the guile of Andriy Shevchenko. The first of Ukraine's goals came from his clever free kick, the ball ricocheting around the box before being stabbed home by Olexander Kucher. The 2nd he claimed himself, after tumbling from the merest brush from Robbie Nielson. The referee got that one wrong, and also wrongly sent off Steven Pressley, but it was Shevchenko who did the damage.

How Scotland could do with a striker like him. Kenny Miller, with the game still at 1-0, completely missed a free header from 6 yards out. Smith had already sent on Kris Boyd to play alongside Miller, but he achieved very little. Whether he might have chosen Garry O'Connor instead of Boyd to try and force an equaliser is open to debate, but he didn't have the option. O'Connor wasn't on the bench. He wasn't even in Kiev, having failed to arrive back at the team hotel on Sunday evening before the squad flew out on Monday morning.

He hadn't bothered to phone the manager himself to explain his absence - he left that to his manager. By Monday morning, with the story dominating the morning sports reports, he had realised his mistake and issued a grovelling apology (but no explanation), but it was already too late. The squad had left without him.

O'Connor had failed to make the flight for the last away fixture against Lithuania, having complained of a stomach bug and pulled out of the squad. Walter Smith was privately furious at his behaviour and now seriously doubts his commitment, and O'Connor's international career looks over. Scotland's recent recovery has, after all, owed everything to commitment.

Later in the week O'Connor claimed it was personal problems that caused him to withdraw from the squad. He had already claimed that he was homesick, and considering a move away from Locomotiv Moscow in January. His wife has apparently failed to settle in Moscow, and spends most of her time in Scotland. He regretted pulling out of the Scotland squad, he said, but in his world "family came first".

The sadness in this is that he only moved from Hibernian to Moscow in March, in a deal worth £1.6m. He signed a 4-year contract that increased his income 10-fold. Now, he wants to come home. The boy from Port Seton seems unable to cope with the responsibilities of his wealth and career. At the time, he admitted the money was a massive factor in his decision, but also spoke a little about continuing his development in a fast developing league. Garry O'Connor is no world-beater. But still only 23, he has time, but he has potential to improve. Sadly, it seems low down his priority list.

In the past 20 years, Scottish football has become increasingly parochial. Oh, there are a lot of other nationalities in the SPL, but Scottish footballers have travelled less and less well. There are a few high-level exceptions - Gary Naysmith, David Weir and James McFadden at Everton, for example - but not many. There are more young Scottish players with potential coming through the ranks than a few years ago, but unless more of them learn the knack of adapting to the toughest leagues, Scotland won't reach their potential either.

Monday, October 09, 2006

Better and better

welovefitba failed to predict the scoreline on Saturday, so apologies if any of you were looking here for betting advice (very inadvisable). We were halfway there... Scotland obliged with a goal from a Paul Hartley corner, but France blew it by failing to find the net themselves. In the circumstances, we're very happy to be proved wrong.

(Happy, also, to laugh at the Daily Mirror tipster, and any punters he persuaded to part with their money. He recommended backing Scotland to lose against both France and the Ukraine at 7-4 - because it was "a certainty").

If you were being French, you could argue that Scotland rode their luck. But the home side had put themselves in the position to benefit from any good fortune through astute tactics and hard work. The first half was mostly one-way traffic, as France attacked time and time again, but Scotland never lost their shape or composure. Instead, they remained organised and focused, each player performing their role. They knew that if they could frustrate their visitors long enough, an opportunity might present itself to snatch a goal of their own. And that's exactly what happened.

The 5-4-1 formation was not a surprise, but Walter Smith had unexpectedly given James McFadden the opportunity to lead the line. McFadden lacks the physical presence or predatory instinct desirable in a lone striker, and fluffed the one clear chance he got, but he harried and hassled every minute he was on the pitch, helping to stop France grab control of the game. In midfield, Hartley, Ferguson and Fletcher all did well, while the back line never stopped working. And when all that failed, Scotland had Craig Gordon in goal, who looks better and better with each game. Apparently, Arsene Wenger is a fan.

The set-up will be the same in Kiev on Wednesday, although Dailly is suspended and will need to be replaced at right-back. Kenny Miller will return, fresh after his own suspension, and surely McFadden will stay in the team, although pushed to the left of midfield. The only sour note of the weekend was revealed this morning, when Garry O'Connor failed to show up at the team hotel and was dropped from the squad. The Locomotiv Moscow player is unhappy in Russia and wants to return to the UK, with his family apparently unsettled. Scuppering his place in the squad seems an odd way to engineer a move, however, and his conduct is inexcusable. Scotland are on the up, but their revival has been based on discipline. This applies off the pitch as well as on it.

Friday, October 06, 2006

Preview: Scotland v France

The qualifying campaign for Euro 2008 resumes business again on Saturday, with another fixture next week. By next Wednesday night, some nations' hopes of a place in Austria and Switzerland will already be hanging by a thread. But not Scotland's.

Improbably, Saturday's game at Hampden Park is a clash between the 2 leaders of Group B. The expectation is that Scotland won't be at the sharp end of the table in a week's time. But, thanks to the 6 points picked up against the Faroes and Lithuania, they won't be out of the running either. However, any return from the games against France and the Ukraine would be very welcome indeed.

France are priced no better than 4-6 to win on Saturday, an indication of the tough task ahead of Scotland. What chance do they have of causing an upset?

Job no.1 will be defence. Walter Smith is a naturally cautious, pragmatic manager, and he will set Scotland up in a safety first formation, probably 5-3-2. With his assistant Tommy Burns saying a point would be a good return, and Steven Pressley saying they will need to play very deep to negate Thierry Henry's pace, the home team will be looking to camp out in their own half and invite France to try and break them down. There is no pace in Scotland's back line at all, so they cannot afford to let Henry have any space at all. If he breaks through them, he'll be gone. Scotland's defence will be very, very busy.

If this sounds scary, at least the Scottish tradition of quality goal keepers is being kept up by Craig Gordon. By far Hearts' best performer in their dismal European campaign, he is an excellent shot-stopper who has developed the welcome habit of pulling off stunning reflex saves. Much of Scotland's hopes rest on his shoulders.

At the other end of the park (y'know, the centre circle), Walter Smith has been moaning about Kenny Miller's suspension for a while now, and giving few clues about who's going to play instead. Kris Boyd seems the obvious choice, but if Smith doubts his workrate, expect a front 2 of Garry O'Connor and McFadden. Against centre-halfs of the quality of Thuram and Gallas, this pairing looks like struggling, but with Gallas an injury doubt there's a chance Boumsong could replace him. Fingers crossed.

Selection issues in the middle of the park were settled when Nigel Quashie got injured, allowing Barry Ferguson to stroll back into the team. Hopefully, he'll up his pace considerably once the whistle blows, because it's the midfield who'll determine whether Scotland can get a draw or a win. They'll need to cut off the supply line to Henry and whoever plays alongside him, and try and support the attack where possible. Darren Fletcher and Paul Hartley are the shoe-ins for the remaining places, and have shown some potential - Fletcher can graft, and Hartley can pass. Smith will also have options on the bench (notably Hib's Scott Brown) who will look to take opponents on.

For all the emphasis on defence, France will need to be put under pressure at times, if only to relieve the pressure and allow the backline to regain its shape.

It will be a tough ask. But not impossible. welovefitba prediction: 1-1 (Scotland's goal from a Hartley set-piece).

Monday, October 02, 2006

The split

Normally the SPL waits until April before "the split", the quirky arrangement where the league divides into 2 parts and the top six and bottom six play out the season against each other. Last weekend, though, there was a different kind of split on offer, with 3 games each on Saturday and Sunday as Setanta imported more of Sky's marketing blueprint into Scottish football. Celtic, Rangers and Hearts were made to wait until Sunday, in order to maximise the TV audience.

Saturday, then, would have been a good day for Kilmarnock and Hibernian to put some points on the board and try and jump up the table, if only for 24 hours. Both fluffed it, and it was hard to say who had the worse day. On the face of it, a 5-0 drubbing by Motherwell (currently 12 out of 12 in the table) is as bad as it gets, but Kilmarnock boss Jim Jefferies will probably see this as a one-off. Provided, of course, it remains a one-off.

Hibs, on the other hand, managed to make September a month to forget - and when they had already beaten Rangers and put 6 past Gretna in the CIS Cup, this would seem like snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Two successive 1-0 defeats against teams they *should* be beating - Falkirk and St Mirren - has brought despondency to the Leith club's fans. The season just refuses to get going for them.

Oh, and Dunfermline had a bad day too, but when don't they?

On to the Lord's day, and Celtic laboured and laboured and then got the 3 points at Falkirk after an 85th minute goal from Aiden McGeady. If only the 21 year old winger had chosen to represent Scotland rather than Ireland, the entire nation could rejoice, because McGeady is the best player in the league at the moment, and looks to be improving by the game. Regardless of his nationality, if his form continues like this Strachan will be having a word with the Celtic hierachy about getting him signed on a longer contract.

Rangers huffed and puffed too, and eventually beat an unlucky Aberdeen by the same margin, and by another late goal. Through the group stages of the UEFA Cup and no further adrift from the top of the league, Paul le Guen has steadied the ship, and goes into the international break a considerably happier man than a week ago.

Hearts, though, are out of the UEFA Cup, but paradoxically seem to be playing much better than they were. Staying away from Murrayfield seems to help, playing their most expensive player, the Bosnian winger Mirsad Beslija also does them favours, and of course playing Dundee Utd never does any harm.

St Mirren 1-0 Hibernian
ICT 1-0 Dunfermline Athletic
Motherwell 5-0 Kilmarnock
Falkirk 0-1 Celtic
Rangers 1-0 Aberdeen
Hearts 4-0 Dundee Utd

Monday, September 25, 2006

Good week, bad week

One of the oldest cliches in football is that form goes out of the window in derby matches. The theory is that the passion stoked up by local rivalry can help the weaker team overcome its superior neighbours, and its something for the underdog and its supporters to hang on to.

Old Firm encounters, though, tend to go with form, and the current statistics bear this out. Rangers have not won at Parkhead in 16 fixtures, and if any of the blue faithful thought the first Old Firm clash of the season was the day to end this depressing run, they were sorely mistaken. Not only did Rangers lose 2-0, they didn't really make a game of it, and the result is as bad for them as it is good for their old rivals. Some have commented that the latest contest between the 2 Glasgow giants was less aggressive than in recent years, but the truth is that Celtic didn't really need to fight for the win.

Let's start with the happier side of Glasgow. Gordon Strachan could not have wished for a better result. Thomas Gravesen scored his first goal for his new club, which will help him settle in the middle of the Celtic team, and Kenny Miller finally broke his duck after 17 games for Celtic. He was unrestrained in his celebration, too, which won't have made him any more popular with his old employers (he was with Rangers before moving to Wolves). At the back, the defence emerged unscathed and the Caldwell/McManus partnership looks finally to be gelling. With an 8 point gap to Rangers, Celtic can afford to turn their attention back to European matters, with a Champions League fixture this week against FC Copenhagen.

Paul le Guen was hailed as the master technician when he arrived at Ibrox, the man to restore Ranger's dominance in Scottish football. But it is not working out like that, and they now host Molde in the UEFA Cup on Thursday knowing that defeat will cause mention of crisis in the stands. They weren't in the contest on Saturday, and on current form could easily drop many more points before they next meet Celtic in the league. If the gap between them gets much wider, Rangers will be throwing in the towel half way through the season.

Barry Ferguson was somewhat more energetic in the press than on the pitch in the aftermath of the game, conducting a round of interviews to complement the serialisation of his book in The Sun, who hilariously billed it as his autobiography, by Iain King. The theme of the extract was similar to his interviews - he loves Rangers so much, and he knows how much the fans are hurting because he used to stand on the terraces alongside them. He then explained that he was getting back to full match fitness and the forthcoming Scotland matches would be no problem for him.

Frankly, he shouldn't get ahead of himself. While the likelihood is he'll walk straight back into the Scotland team, armband on, that has more to do with Walter Smith's stubborness than his form, because on Saturday Ferguson was once again poor. His opinion was that his team played well but didn't do anything in the final third, neatly passing the blame to the strikers (what a noble captain he is). This was simply untrue. Rangers desperately needed to take the game to Celtic and refuse them time on the ball... instead they were repeatedly cut open in midfield, allowing their opponents to get the ball out to their wingers time and time again. When Jeremy Clement (one of the few le Guen signings to have made a positive impact so far) is fit again, the Rangers manager is going to have an interesting decision to make.

Celtic 2-0 Rangers
Hibs 0-1 Falkirk
Dundee Utd 1-1 Motherwell
Dunfermline 2-1 St Mirren
Kilmarnock 1-1 Inverness CT
Aberdeen 1-3 Hearts

Tuesday, September 19, 2006

The curse of history

15 years ago, Hibernian Football Club nearly went out of business. Bankrupt and desperate, and playing in front of dwindling crowds at a decrepit ground, the only solid offer of new investment on the table was a takeover bid from Wallace Mercer, a prominent Edinburgh businessman. And owner of Hibs' Edinburgh rivals, Heart of Midlothian.

Mercer's negotiating position was strong, and he knew it. He talked openly about pooling the resources of Hibs and Hearts, of allowing the "wee" team to act as a feeder for the other team, perhaps dropping down a division or 2 if it helped them to find their level and blood young talent. Not for the first time, and probably not for the last, the plan was to try and finally create a footballing force in Edinburgh that could compete with the mighty Glaswegian twins.

In the end, the "Hands off Hibs" campaign re-energised the Leith club's support and brought them together, if only in unity of hatred against Hearts. Tom Farmer, another Edinburgh businessman, but one with strong links to the Catholic community (Hibernian Football Club was formed by Irish immigrants), was cojoled into saving the club from extinction. Wallace Mercer reflected before he died that he regretted ever attempting to force an Act of Union on Edinburgh's football clubs, because of the vitriol that came his way from Hibs fans. But at least it had demonstrated that at least some people were passionate about Hibernian… it demonstrated what Hibs were for.

But what are Hibs for now? Apart from a League Cup, improbably won in the midst of that near-death experience, the only silverware has been the Division One trophy Hibernian bagged on the way back into the SPL – but of course any trophy that requires relegation in order to make your club eligible is not something to brag about. Famously, the club has not won the Scottish Cup for 104 years, and has little else to show for its endeavours. This is a club with a proud history – enormously successful in the 1950s, when it was the first club in Britain to compete in the European Cup – but in an era of Old Firm domination at home and the increasing wealth gap between the big 4 leagues and the others in Europe it seems unlikely they can ever reach those heights again. There's a strong tradition, and rich history, but seemingly limited prospects.

This seemed to be the realisation Tony Mowbray, the current Hibernian manager, made last year. In his first season, his team had finished 3rd , and he was recognised as manager of the year. He could have done the same in 2005/6, except that suddenly Hearts had Romanov money to burn, catapulting them out of Hibs reach and into direct competition with the Old Firm. Hibs finished 4 th (again, as much as anyone could reasonably expect, given the huge gap in financial resources between them and the clubs who finished above them) but Mowbray seemed depressed by this, talking about how he had "a natural shelf life" in Scotland and that sooner or later he'd be off to try his luck in England. He is, after all, widely respected for what he has achieved in his 2 years at Easter Road so far, blending a young (and cheap) squad into a team that can really play, and will not be short of offers from covetous chairmen.

And yet… last week, Hibernian Football Club announced their latest financial results, and also that the manager and his assistant had agreed new 12 month rolling contracts. The accounts were simply astonishing – increased revenue, increased operating profit, well-managed debt. Wages at 42% of turnover. More season ticket holders, in a ground that has been steadily redeveloped into one which now hosts International Friendlies and Elton John concerts (not on the same day, obviously). Plans for the new training centre on the way. They even found time to sign a long term deal with the latest talented striker off the Hibs Kids production line, Steven Fletcher.

The turnaround from 15 years ago is simply astonishing. No question that the benign ownership of (now Sir) Tom Farmer has given the club some space to get its affairs in order, but he hasn't thrown money at the club either. As the man ultimately responsible for paying the mortgage, he made it clear to the board that, if the club wanted to stay at Easter Road, it needed to trade at least at break-even point. They are not being bankrolled any longer.

And then Hibs ended their week by beating Rangers at the weekend, and beating them comfortably. It was a performance that put a smile on Mowbray's face, and he spoke afterwards of his belief that this team is getting better and better.

Rangers now hold little fear for the "wee" team from Leith. Last season, they matched Hearts in the league, although were beaten comfortably in the Cup Semi-Final (a match where Hibs relative lack of resources were laid bare). They haven't got as many points off Celtic in the past few seasons, but every match is now a fiercly contested battle.

Mowbray himself isn't getting carried away, and rightly so. There is no way Hibs will win the SPL this season. Or next season, in all probability. They have failed to grasp any of the recent chances of making an impact in the UEFA Cup. But they are growing as a club, and if they keep on growing, anything could become possible.

In an era of mysterious wealthy benefactors throwing money at their clubs, and mass financial irresponsibility, Hibernian deserve applause and recognition for trying to get success the old-fashioned way.