I'll start off the lookback on the last fourteen days in Scottish football
with a question. What is the more newsworthy story? The sanctity, which
is a referee's home being breached yet again by one particular set of
football supporters here in Scotland, or a footballer spitting on an opponent?
Let me rephrase that. Which of these incidents would be he more newsworthy in a normal, civilised footballing country?
Yes folks, there's a negative story to be had involving a Rangers
player, and bhoy oh bhoy our yahoos with typewriters have went at it full tilt.
Top of the pile of course being those splendidly neutral chaps at Radio
Snide. Yes folks, the people who deliberately kept the lid on the attack on
referee Mike McCurry's home the previous weekend were the first to give the
Amoruso/Grady 'incident' star billing last Monday morning.
If nothing else we should at least be grateful to Radio Cattolica for
once again proving the point that Septic-Minded journalists here in Scotland
don't work to a hidden agenda. The fact is, there is nothing about the
way they operate or go about their business that can be looked upon as
hidden. They are very much up front and in your face about what they aim to
achieve, thank you very much.
Just compare the clamour by Scottish journalists to have a Rangers
player hung, drawn and quartered because of TV evidence, which is pretty
inconclusive at Ayr last weekend. And contrast the absolute silence on
their part four months ago when BBC TV cameras presented us with pretty much an open and shut case when the Celtic goalkeeper banjoed a Rangers player up the tunnel at the munky-hoose last October?
Some of the logic displayed by Timothy on the subject had to be seen to
be believed. Let's see now, we had one mhuppet allowed to say on STV's
sports letters page (545) that Amoruso should be banned immediately so that it
would even up the scores what with Larsson being injured. We had
another telling us that Amoruso should be fined 5k and be made serve an
automatic 4-match ban. We had another implying on the FF message boards that it was Klos who caused the aforementioned 'aggro' at CP last October. As we've said before on many occasions here at FF. Timmy is mentally warped from the cradle to the grave.
How Lorenzo Amoruso can now be afforded a fair trial, when the BBC and
Amoruso's accuser have already conducted their own sneaky
one-way-trial-by-TV and the press rat pack have also found him guilty,
is anyone's guess? But as we've said before The SFA have had no qualms
breaking their own house rules, such is their haste to put the boot into Rangers
FC.
Let there be in no doubt either, that Rangers FC is reaping once again
what has been sown in the last dozen years or so from the present
custodian's pathetic negligence. And Alex McLeish will no doubt realise (if he
hasn't already) that it will seem as if it is only him and him alone who is
shouting out on the club's behalf. A lone voice as it were.
It seems to me, Rangers can start fighting back by refusing to allow
players to be interviewed by the BBC or Radio Snide. And by that I mean, no
interviews, no co-operation with these networks ever again. It
obviously needs to be repeated once more, Chairman Meoww would never, ever allow
people who were deliberately negative about his Metal Empire or were
hell bent in putting the boot into it, the time of day. So why should it be
any different with Rangers FC I just do not know?
Derek Johnstone? Quite simply, the sooner he is booted out the club the
better. It has to be the biggest insult imaginable that Johnstone is
allowed to take a weekly wage from the club. Just in case you have all
forgotten, Johnstone, came out on the Friday after Douglas was caught banjoing Moore, and said it was for the best keeping these sort of incidents all
hush-hush.
How many instances do we need to catalogue here at FF before the
support wake up to the fact that Johnstone is a parasite, a leech that will run
a mile rather than stand fighting Rangers' corner in times of
controversy.
Sadly of course, corrupt SFA endorsed bodies are the only option
because if you allowed the clubs themselves the power and/or option to fine or
punish their own players for misbehaving, then anarchy lies just around the
corner. I mean, imagine the scenario whereby a yahoo gets involved in a
malicious incident on the park. Would you honestly take the word of the people
who told us Kevin Dunne was going to be barred from CP for life, at face
value? Trust a yahoo? Well, as PT Barnum once said of fools, 'There's one born
every minute.'
I have to say that because of the Amoruso witch-hunt, chronological order
has gone for a Burton in this week's scribble. The big man however was
also something of a last gasp hero the week before, with a brave stop in
injury time from a Hearts free kick. Well, not being at the game, Radio Snide
told me Amoruso was the man to thank for gathering all three points but the
Sunday papers said Malcolm.
The only positive aspect to take from both the Hearts and Ayr games
(from my vantagepoint in front of the 'tranny') was the number of chances made. It's
just not good enough though that we should be going into the last 5 minutes
of such games with our hearts in our mouths, when there has been enough
chances made beforehand to be strolling to victory.
It was superb to be hurtled back once again to images of my childhood
as the skills of the one and only Willie Henderson were showcased on Wednesday night. Wee 'Ten a Penny' really was something else in his day although for me as a Rangers fan some quite bittersweet moments were contained in this look back at the ghost of Rangers past.
If truth be told 'Bosman' has been a disaster for football. It has
benefited only one section of football and that section is of course the players
at the top end of the food chain. What we now have is greed unparalleled
in the history of the game. Or am I being too harsh on the players here?
I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when 'Wee Henny' told us that Man
Utd offered him a 5k signing on fee as a schoolboy 42 years ago. But in the
end up his old man accepted #3,500 LESS from Rangers, such was his old
man's desire to see his son play for the teddies. Three and a half K, now
that wasn't small potatoes back then. Yet how many of us would have acted
exactly the same as Willie Henderson's old man in the same circumstances?
The fact is, Rangers (and I'll include the yahoo here also) back then
and for decades earlier as well, preyed on the emotional pull of what it
meant for Scottish youngsters to play for either side of the OF divide. They
knew that they could get away with paying less than the English clubs,
although that wasn't a big problem as such until the #100 a week barrier was
breached down in England. As Baxter used to say, 'I'm on a third of what Johnny Haynes was on down at Fulham. I don't consider myself to be a third of
the talent he is.'
Yet a few years down the line, Rangers, despite the loyalty shown them
by the Henderson family from the beginning, despite the massive crowds
they could attract, baulked at paying Willie Henderson a ten grand signing
on fee and a ton a week. It's pretty ironic when you think back, that if you
could accuse Rangers of being small minded back then. You could accuse them
of the reverse and paying well, well over the odds for average talent in the
last decade. It is to be hoped that one day we will get it right.
Getting back to the subject of 'Bosman' if I may. If it was wrong that
the tables were loaded in favour of the clubs back in the Henderson era,
then it is equally wrong that it is the players who call all the shots
nowadays. Again, it is to be hoped that some middle ground can be reached in the future. Not that it will effect the punter too much I suppose, because
it will still be the ordinary supporter who shells out his hard earned
anyway.
But I digress, I see that one East Coast mhuppet has decided to try and
outdo his west coast cousin in the 'Let's hold the ref personally to
account for my being in a huff after a derby match' stakes. A 38 year-old Hivee fan sent a nasty email to referee Willie Young after he had awarded the
jambos a penalty in an Edinburgh derby match.
Now there's two things intrigue me with this story. 1 - How come the
mhuppet knew Young's email address in the first place? Although I suppose
mailing a nasty wee letter to fatfuddung@flabbyref.com is not going to find it's
way to John Rowbotham's PC, mind. And 2 - Why didn't the Hivee do what the
rest of his moronic pals do in the same circumstances. That is, blame the
result on the fact that the dud manager used to play for the 'Teddies'.
PS, there's no truth in the scurrilous rumours doing the rounds that a
spokesman for the yahoos tut-tutted at the behaviour of the Hivee and
said, 'If that was a Celtic fan that acted like that, he be banned from CP
for life!' I mean, who'd ever believe a yahoo coming out with stuff like
that?
The vexed question of whether a coward like George Bowie should be
allowed to earn a wage at Ibrox raised its ugly head again this (Friday)
morning. George the kiddy on bluenose likes to distance himself from Rangers by telling the world that he is a Morton fan. The other morning just after
the 8:30 sports slot he is talking about his son and how he is a St Mirren
fan.
So here we have the rather unlikely scenario where a Morton fan is
making sure his son is brought up as a fan of his Renfrewshire rivals? I don't
know who is in charge of such things, but please, please, please just get
Bowie to feck away from Ibrox and make sure he is never allowed to darken the doorstep ever again. I tell you, his old man Ross, must be turning in
his grave that he fathered such a cowardly, unprincipled piece of garbage.
The Govanhill Gub.