Sonoftherock

Again, I think that's a bit unfair! He was beaten by Tsonga, again someone who was red hot, playing the Tennis of his life! Djokovic eventually stopped him in the Final, but en route he thrashed Nadal in straight set! I think we'l just have to agree to disagree on this one. I think I offered a fair assessment and argument of his performance in the majors last season. As I said, Roddick was in awesome form and was just simply better than him - he'd been playing the better Tennis in the earlier rounds too. i thought he was unlucky not to win the whole thing. As for the Gonzo and Verdasco matches... did you watch those matches? If you did, I can't believe you could say he choked. They absolutely brutalised Murray with their forehands - Murray wasn't making errors, or giving them free points... Cilic, I'll give you, he certainly under performed... but his form leading into the US Open was patchy and was poor in the earlier rounds. Cilic is a very good player on his day. I hope Andy will win a major one day, I'm unashamedly a massive fan... I watch almost every game he plays on tour. I love tennis and we'll never see a Scottish player as good as Murray ever again, so I intended to make the most of it. However, if he is to win a major he'll have to improve his game, or gain a large slice of luck along the way. I certainly don't see him as a multiple slam winner... not yet anyway. I will be disappointed if Murray is unfairly labelled a choker by our press/public, as I feel he's done the best he possibly can with his god-given ability. He's been unlucky, in a way, to be playing at a time when mens tennis is in such amazing shape. 7 or 8 years ago, guys like Hewitt, Ferrero, kafelinkov, Korda, Johanssen and Muster were winning majors. These guys wouldn't have sniff these days.

I'd disagree that he choked. He was simply beaten by the better players on the day. Andy is still a wee bit off the likes of Nadal and Federer, who can win when certain facets of their game are malfunctioning. Murray, has two, maybe three major weaknesses. (1) he always makes his opponents play a lot of balls, because he plays such a defensive game. The causes major problems when he plays one of the top guys, on form, particularly those with massive forehands. A lot of people talk about murray as one of the most intelligent match players, but he has no answer, as yet to a big forehand. When the top guys are locked in and timing the ball well, Murrays change of pace, that is so effective against the weaker player, is basically useless. Verdasco (AO), Gonzo (RG) and Roddick (W) simply bludgeoned him with their massive forehands. (2) His service is, when it's not working, a huge weakness. Murrays first serve is good, plenty of power, variety and disguise. However when he serves a low percentage, this exposes his weak second serve, which any opponent worth their salt will simply pick off. He caught Verdasco and Roddick, in particular during respective purple patches... Roddick was playing so well he nearly beat Federer in the final. Critics might argue he choked against Cilic, but I watched that match and Murray was simply off form... After wimbledon things went a bit flat for him and he started looking tired. I would argue he was just struggling with his form. I honestly don't believe Murray is choker, he is just a little bit short right now. Dinara Safina is an example of a choker - she was world number one for most of last season, dominated the womens tour but didn't have the bottle to convert her supremacy on the biggest stage. Murray has never been "due" a major in that respect, there are simply better players about. Mens Tennis is in amazing shape right now and you have to produce something a little bit special if you're going to win a major. He should be okay against Istner. He usually does well against the big servers - his return of serve is arguably the strongest on tour. Istner is a bit of a late developer at 24, but he's playing the tennis of his life and therefore will be a danger... but Murray will make him play far more shots on his serve than he's used to, and will probably force more errors. I'll take Murray in 4 sets... they've never met before, so it might take a set or two for Murray to start reading his service. Look out for Davydenko on the other side of the draw... he is my dark horse should Federer slip up.

Think it was Gary Harkins. Mate of mine is Dundee fan and reckons he's a cut above first division standard. Anyway.... this Calum Melville boy likes to talk doesn't he? Obviously I'm hugely jealous, but I'd love to see this nonsense at Dundee ending in tears.

Heard a few people speaking about this.... what is it like? Drop the dead donkey or something similar? Watched the first 3 episodes of Eastbound & Down over the weekend. Absolutely hilarious.... if you like Will Ferrell style, contrived, puerile humour that is!

The boy Fyvie must be something special. To put in a performance, in central midfield, against the Huns at Snake mountain, is a terrific effort for a 16 year old.

Yeah, but the rankings only take into account tournaments played within exactly 12months of the current date. I think the Canadian Masters has been rescheduled since last year, with cincinnati shunted forward by a week. I am just trying to make sense of these new rankings, and Andy Murray has lost the 1000 points he won last year from winning Cincinnati (things have fucked up by moving the Madrid masters from hard to clay courts this season). I am assuming this means he was effectively defending the points he won in Cincinnati the previous year at the Canadian Masters, which means a clean slate for the 2009 Cincinnati masters. Which is good news for Murray and gives him an excellent chance of holding onto the number two spot... which he should do unless Nadal wins next week and Andy has a complete shocker. Although he has a really shit draw next week.... Federer, Del Potro, Roddick, Soderling Wawrinkwa, Verdasco are all in his half! Out of form Nadal and Djokovic have it easier on the other side.

Of course it would have been different.... Nadal as wimbledon champion, defended 2000 points, which he forfeited by not playing this year. If we assume Nadal would have made the final of wimbledon, losing to to Federer, that equates to a loss of 600 points rather than 2000! Hypothetically you can then argue this means Nadals true position would be +900 points with respect to Andy Murray.

Can he play centre half?

Spot on. There are some utter clowns involved in the running of our football club.

Hope the injury isn't too serious.... Would be great to see him make the City first team. During his time at Pittodrie, I've never seen a player improve so dramatically over the space of 4 or 5 games. A pity he couldn't have continued his development at Pittodrie - technically, a cut above the usual dross we have to put up with.

I made a mistake with the size of tommy wright transfer fee.... I was out by £25,000. That hardly equates to spreading propaganda, as you so boldly suggest. Particularly when £100,000 was a figure widely bandied about in the media. http://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/733304?UserKey= http://www.skysports.com/football/player/0,19754,11789_244801,00.html http://www.darlington-fc.net/page/NewsDetail/0,,10339~1357669,00.html

That's the problem I have with this whole situation. I don't think keeping Jimmy and giving him more money, or appointing Mark McGhee will, ultimately make much of a difference. All things considered, I probably rather have kept on Jimmy, to see what he could do with a £500,000, or whatever, budget. However, nagging at the back of my mind, I'd worry he'd end up frittering the money on some Dutch no-hoper, or another Tommy Wright.

for the last two years in a row, we finished 5th and 4th, after doing so brilliantly to finish 3rd, since then we've failed to really trouble the ultimate incumbents, other than during brief flirtations. After building a strong team, who finished third and had a good Uefa cup run, Jimmy had lost certain key players, and sadly hasn't managed to replace them. Signings like Young and Duff offered little imagination and were never going to improve us, while at the other end of the budget spectrum, £100,000 a vast sum for a Non-OF side, was wasted on Tommy Wright, who's been an unmitigated disaster. Regarding product on the pitch, a recurring theme has been a team, which lacks ideas and cutting edge - we struggled to put the ball in the back of the net towards the end of last season. Jimmy had us well drilled and well organised, but against Hearts at home, United at Tannadice we failed to put teams, that we had dominated, to the sword... i watched these games and we looked short on ideas. Inspiration was zero. Also, we were close to coming a cropper, on the final day, at home to Hibs. What's your verdict? My interpretation is, as I've already suggested, that I couldn't see anything to suggest that Jimmy would buck the trend of the previous two years and lead us to 3rd place, and/or Hampden. Maybe he would have... i just couldn't find enough evidence to convince myself. I'm not criticising Jimmy, I believe he did a good job over all, I'm simply giving my considered verdict on the situation.

To be honest, I note the exact opposite on AFC Chat.... for many of the younger members, Jimmy Calderwood presided over the most successful period of their time as Dons supporters. For anyone under the age of 25, being an Aberdeen supporter was akin to subjecting yourself to weekly ritual humilation, until that is Jimmy Calderwood arrived and turned things around..... I believe he's quite popular among our younger demographic. ........while many of the over 30's like BobbyConnor, LondonScottish, RTYD, Muttonhumper, Bripod & Tommy, all of whom remember better days, and better Aberdeen teams, were among the hardcore JMG membership. In reality the Calderwood reign was neither extreme... Jimmy did a great job turning around Aberdeen and establishing us as a top 6 side, rather than perenial relegation candidates. By the end of his time here, it was pretty clear he'd run out of ideas, and had taken the club as far as he possibly could. Had he remained in charge, I've no doubt we'd have finishing top 6 into infinity and beyond..... some supporters are happy with that, others quite clearly weren't.... Calderwood was clearly sacked as the Aberdeen board decided they needed to make a change in order to continue the progress that Calderwood had made over the past 5 years. I think it's hard, for anyone looking objectively at the Calderwood era, to argue against the fact he'd plateaued at Aberdeen. However, the question remains; "is Mark McGhee a better option than Calderwood?" I, personally, see no evidence to suggest he'll be any better than Calderwood. In my opinion, the Scottish cup and regular 3rd place finishes represent "the next level" for Aberdeen. I thank Jimmy for rebuilding Aberdeen, he did a great job, but all things considered I think it probably was time to take risk, make a change and shoot for that "next level". I don't however, believe Mark McGhee is the man to do it. I'd probably rather we'd kept jimmy and handed the Motherwell compensation/three Jimmies severance money to strengthen the player pool....

Why did you dredge up an ancient post relating to Craig Levein, to post these rumours within?

That's a sensational move from Dundee, showing great ambition... but as I've already mentioned, you have to question where they'd find that sort of money. Celtic, the biggest team in Scotland, are baulking over playing £1million of compensation for a manager.... while Dundee can afford to spunk £300,000 on a single player! I can only think they're attempting to speculate to accumulate... this boy is apparently the real deal (I've only seen him play three times in total, one of which was a substitute appearance, so can't really comment first hand). They'll be hoping they can sell him on for 7-figures in about a year, while in the mean time he scores the goals to get them promoted.

I hope so. I had always figured we were totally skint, but somehow we've managed to find what'll probably amount to over £500,000 to pay off the former management team and compensate Motherwell. As such, I won't be surprised to see any further rabbits produced from hats. However, Clarkson has scored at international level, so I'd imagine Motherwell could command a lot more than £300K for him?

I don't think we'd be able to afford him. Incidentally, I was reading a motherwell messageboard last week, trying to find information regarding McGhee... I noticed a thread discussing Motherwells player of the year - Clarkson was an almost unanimous selection.

http://www.sundayherald.com/sport/shfootball/display.var.2512911.0.mcghee_to_be_named_aberdeen_manager.php Michael Grant has the exclusive, including quotes from Mark McGhee, in tomorrows Herald. Looks like the wait could be over

Indeed, many of the huge totals accumulated by other second placed teams, include 6 points registered home and away to bottom ranked teams like San Marino, Andorra, Leichtenstein, Malta, Faroe Islands etc, etc, which will be eliminated from the calculations when deciding the 8 highes scoring second placed teams. Winning at home against Macedonia and away in Oslo, would give us a final points total of 13 (assuming we are raped by the dutch), with no points lost. In reality you'll be pitching our score against the second placed, from the groups which include whipping boys like Malta(group 1), San Marino (group 3), Liechtenstein (group 4), Andorra (group 6), Faroe Islands (group 7), who will all surely lose 6 points from their total. For example, Northern Ireland finish second in group 3 with 18 points - however, Scotland will qualify for the playoffs ahead of NIR, as they will have 6 points, won against San Marino, removed from their final total. Phew!

Was wondering, for a minute there, why a few people were referring to Craig Levein as "Avril" ... until I said it out loud: "Avril Levein" - nice, I like it!

Internet rumour that has spiraled out of control IMHO. Fed up of reading all this speculation - hope we get someone in ASAP!

I would not argue this point to be fair.

Regarding Joe 90, We'll just have to wait and see.... 5 or 6 days ago, rumours abound that McGhee had already been installed. If Levein gets the job, I can't see much changing... we might do better in the cup but that is all. I'd have rather saved the money and kept fatty.

Will be interesting to hear what he ends up doing. At his age, he must still harbour hopes of one day being good enough to play for England.