RicoS321

Exactly. I didn't even include Rapey McRapesonface or Arneson and a couple of others (Ash) that could have been on it. Good work!

Aye, you're right. Just the top ten worst signings then Seabass. I'll start: Zola Tate Mclachlan Parker Tansey Forrester Storey Morris Wylde Nwakali Edit: of course some of those weren't permanent. Replace McLachlan with Maynard (I'd erased him from my memory), Tate with Gleeson and Nwakali with Halford. Was Parker a loanee? If so, replace with £400K Stevie May.

Exactly. Seabass, edit the list to remove the loanees (unless then signed permanently like Logan). If you could also write a longer list of McInnes Worst Signings, that'd be great. Just when you have a spare minute.

Logan will have telt Lowe that the Tims are a bunch of scummy racist fucks and he'll take a huge paycut to join his beloved dandies.

Lewis. I think Shinnie was an excellent signing (as was McLean) due to the fact that I didn't think we'd get either of them, but they were also very easy signings that we knew could go directly into our first team and perform in the SPL. Ferguson has to be very high up the list because absolutely nobody expected him to be where he is now after signing him. He's a tremendous talent who'll only get better and I'm still very surprised at McInnes noticing his talent before anyone else. In terms of return on investment, I suspect he could be the one that sees the greatest return (in absolute terms, rather than in percentage as I expect Cosgrove will earn us 20 times what we paid for him).

Exactly. It might be quite good for the dons PR to have the first player to come out whilst playing in the SPL too.

But that is VAR's problem. If Willie Collum is Scotland's best ref then there are 5 other cunts that are significantly worse than him sitting in the VAR room when that fucker is on the pitch. It's systemically bad. It just doesn't work. The notion that you can only use VAR for clear and obvious errors is completely flawed too. As soon as VAR is called for when the Tims don't get a pen and then not called for when the Huns don't get a pen then the whole thing becomes a conspiracy because "who defines that a decision is a clear and obvious error? It then resolves none of the problems that it is supposedly designed to get around by replacing one controversy with another. You change it to a "X no of challenges" model then that number just keeps on increasing, the types of incident that can be reviewed get added to (a throw-in given the wrong way that leads to a goal) and an increase in the number of "false calls" used to waste time or just simply put pressure on a ref to overturn a decision that doesn't really need overturned. It'll be gamed as much as anything else. It's sky sports wankery.

We definitely need another midfielder. I'd be happy for us to have Considine at left back for the first two rounds of qualifying if there's a chance of getting Lowe back. I think it's a very important position for us and we should take the time to get it right. Considine is fine there as cover for now, but the last thing we need is a player no better than Considine filling that role because we get the first available player. Lowe would be fantastic if we could get him for another year or even as a permanent signing (which I doubt). We saw in the games against the Tims at christmas time and other games when Lowe was missing what a very good left back can bring over and above an average one. There's no point in getting in an average one basically.

That was the most horrendous ending to a game of fitba ever. Scotland obviously fucked it like, but 6 minutes to VAR an obvious fucking penalty, then to bring it back when the keeper makes a save because they were half a yard over the line and finally play 4 minutes of stoppage time, ignoring the entire time taken for VAR. It was stupidly bad. I'd have chinned the ref had I been on that pitch. I'd be asking for a replay it was that bad. A terrible advert for the bird's game, caused by fucking about with the rules. Shove VAR up yer hoop, it's fucking awful (offsides excepted of course, as they can be calculated by a computer). I've never seen a keeper save a penalty when on their line, nor attempt to. If someone can find a clip of a keeper anywhere in the world, ever, saving a pen without going beyond their line I'll give them a virtual pint. It's fucking ludicrous. Thank fuck they're dicking about with this in the birds game.

Used to be good. Assume he still is. Good work dons. Let's get Gleeson out the door now.

I actually think that the Luxembourg outfit will be margarinally better.

Ethan Ross looks like a player. I'm not convinced by McLennan or Frank Ross. I don't think either will make it anywhere near the level of GMS on his day. McLennan is a good squad player, but until he learns the art of not falling over the ball he'll get nowhere. I disagree about McGinn, he had a couple of games where he showed flashes of his previous self (that goal against Motherwell) and I think he still has the ability to do something that no other player in our squad can. He's young enough that fitness shouldn't be an issue and he's never really been lightening quick so his dropping of a shoulder will be enough to get him past a lot of defenders still.

It's an interesting article. The difficulty I have with it is that the author comes to his conclusions without real historical context or linkage. For example, suggesting FDR foresaw USD becoming the world reserve currency isn't really backed up by anything he's written. He's basically applying a backward prescience to FDR in reaction to what actually happened rather than what FDR understood or targetted, for which there doesn't appear to be any evidence. It basically removes any incremental positions and opportunity that arose as events occurred (i.e. FDR reacted to events), which seems unlikely. The holocaust industry is an excellent book, but it doesn't seek to argue that there was no holocaust which is essentially the argument put forward by the article. Focusing on the loose usage of the term holocaust seems a little flippant given the volume of slaughtered jews as recognised within the article. The notion that it matters whether the jews were slaughtered post-labour or pre-labour in the camps is neither here nor there. It's interesting that he takes the "bottom-line/working back" approach when discussing FDR (USD became world currency, therefore that was FDR's aim) but works the opposite way when discussing the far bigger crime of the holocaust (consistency would suggest that he'd work back from the fact that X million jews were killed, ergo the holocaust was planned). His argument, it seems, is that the jews were a victim of circumstance after being taken to the work camps. It's a basically like saying that the rhetoric surrounding Dave Cameron's "hard-working" British people had no influence on the British public assuming that there were huge volumes of people scamming the unemployment benefits system and that it was a massive problem. Cameron never actually stated that anymore than 1.5% of benefits claims were fraudulent, he just implied it by dropping the term hard-working in to every single speech he did (by implication, those that were unemployed were lazy scum scrounging from the rest). In other words, Hitler didn't need to construct a plan of action for the holocaust, it was implicit in every single thing he said about jews, and implicit in everything he didn't do to prevent them being slaughtered (whether before or after providing their labour). He's taken a very nuanced view of the books he talks of that I don't think represent the views of the authors. He acknowledges this at the start of the article but then fails entirely to provide the relevant citation of each conclusion he draws so that the reader can index it back to the source (something David Irving or Norman Finkelstein would never do). In this regard, it's slightly disingenuous. The "you can check the details for yourself if you want" to article writing isn't good journalism for a guy who professes to want good journalism. I only started David Irving's book a few years back before getting bored so I might re-read it (probably not, getting lazy these days), so I've definitely taken something from the article!

It's already happened. Barclays gave England women's fitba £10M for example. EPL teams are giving money to their female counterparts and so on. They are all looking for "first-mover" advantage as nearly always happens in sponsorship deals. Someone takes a punt and that punt is - often - turned into real following as the investment is used to improve marketing, quality etc etc.

Agree with all this. McKenna's passing was okay. He had to aim long pretty much constantly because of lack of support, with a few of those long ones going too long as expected. He did what was required of a Scotland centre half against Belgium by keeping things simple and at the same time not giving it away in a dangerous position. There was one in the second half where he toe-poked it accross the other side of the pitch in a panic, but otherwise he did well. His partner, Mulgrew, is obviously a much better footballer (with the ball) but he has the downside of switching off at least 3 times in important situations throughout a game so it's swings and roundabouts. The "international class" thing is probably a little out-dated. I suppose what is pertinent these days is if he could play EPL, and I think last night showed that he isn't quite there yet but wouldn't look out of place in the high end championship. He's still young enough that he'll gain a bit more confidence on the ball in future years as his passing isn't shite, it's his reverting to the punt when not called upon that is the issue. Plays with his head down a little, he should learn from McLean.

That's not strictly true. I enjoyed playing pretend managers when I was 14, and I wasn't a loser. Each to their own though Tyrant, you're right of course. It's just another hobby.

But is it as a result of his policies, or the man himself? Can you separate the two and continue with one and not the other? Or would that result in the same coverage, replacing Corbyn with another person. Let's say Jess Phillips took on the Corbyn manifesto. A decent communicator, easily as good as yer best (of 10) Torys in most departments. Would she face the same thing? MacDonald would, obviously, but somebody outwith that - without the history/baggage. Again, it's bizarre that the is even a discussion to be honest. The BBC and it's fucking leader debates have a lot to answer for. At every opportunity it is their responsibility to shout down any comments about the personality and focus on the policy. I don't believe there is huge bias in their coverage, just wholescale incompetence and laziness. They allow themselves to be dictated by the stories in the press rather than take an objective look at the importance of each subject. Never allowing a discussion on a single topic to get deep enough to be understood by the average viewer. More harm than good in my opinion.

This. In fairness to him, the media - including yer left of centre media (Guardian etc) - have offered him little air time to combat anything. It was notable that his population increased at last election time when he was actually given time to discuss policy. Labour will need far more than that though if they are to win a general election. It's a strange one. I expect a lot of people would support many of Corbyn's policies (many wouldn't, of course). If you replaced Corbyn with Starmer or Thornberry (for example) then you'd lose the policies too I expect; moving central, blurring the lines between Labour and Lib Dems. It gets to the heart of what the purpose of the Labour party is. I don't think it's that nuanced any more. To me, yer Thornberrys and Watsons serve very little purpose - the political candidate equivalent of avoiding the question: "We are not the Torys" being their strongest selling point. I'm not a Labour or Corbyn supporter mind, I just find it intriguing that we/they have such a personal focus on an individual at the expense of what could be a decent set of policies that encapsulate what the Labour party was traditionally set up to represent. If I were a Labour MP and I believed in Corbyn's policies, then I'd be dragging him kicking and screaming over the line if I thought he were incompetent in the understanding that the policies and party were far more important than the leader. That doesn't seem to be happening, which suggests that either the Labour MPs are incapable of doing that or that they don't believe in the policy/manifesto. In reality, no MP should need to be led by anyone if they're even remotely competent as an individual. They should all be leaders. Rather, it seems that they may all be careerists like they're Tory counterparts. Oh well, FPTP anyway; total horseshite.

Good stuff. I think fantasy fitba is for losers, but at least it'll be losers promoting the Scottish game. Well done.

That's not political correctness. The BBC is supposed to be impartial, so giving more coverage to women these days is a nod to that impartiality. Sky will do whatever makes them money as a private company. If they can sell shit to birds at a greater rate than that lost through blokes not wanting their channels contaminated then they'll absolutely do it. Furthermore, the investment in the women's game has gone through the roof in England, and sponsors will demand - and get - their air time.

Couldn't find a thread for it. Even one for discussing how shite it is. Anyway, pleasantly surprised by the action so far in the wifie's world cup. Some decent fitba. Good technique generally speaking. Keepers improving. Slow-paced at times and I reckon they could shorten the pitch to make it better (especially these world cup pitches which are hampden sized). Otherwise, quite enjoyed it. VAR aside, which is clearly as pish in women's fitba as it is in men's.

Agree with most of that, but I thought McLean had a decent game. He seems to prefer playing that holding role. The problem I thought was that we had 3 midfielders of similar style and ability playing it very safe for 90 minutes. Never breaking from midfield into their box and the late runs were too late or not at all. Overall, it was a very cautious performance and Clarke is going to have to do much better than that if he's going to qualify for a tournament. You only get one chance, and that chance is made by winning games against the pish teams. Clarke just needs to look back at the last ten or so years of Scotland qualification to see that there is always a single game (Georgia, Lithuania, Czech Rep, Ukraine etc) where we just needed to take a risk and go for it to get 3 points that allow us the glorious failures against the big teams and still progress. It's simple stuff. If Brophy is shite for 45 minutes then fucking hook him (or give him 5-10 minutes to turn it round). If the midfield is too static and not threatining then change it. But do it in 50 minutes and give yourself a good length of time to fix it. Accept it when your starting 11 aren't doing what you wanted and deal with it. In the end, Clarke was let off the hook last night as 1-0 isn't enough to sit on in an international match (unless it's backs to the wall against a bigger team). I hope he's very quick to learn. Belgium is a free pass on Tuesday. I think Clarke is capable of setting us up not to get totally humped.

But for the same reasons though. Complete control of the club and zero transparency. I'm not a shareholder, but if I was I wouldn't vote for this. The only reason most AFC fans hold shares, I assume, is to allow them to exercise some sort of opinion and have some sort of ownership of part of the club. This dilutes that massively, making your valueless shares now worthless too. It's basically just another step towards allowing them to do what they like with our - the fans' - club. Anyway, Westhill, ken.

Nope. Doolan isn't good enough. A good finisher but slow as hell. A significantly poorer version of Rooney but in the same mould. Main is far more of a battering ram as well as capable of finishing if opportunity arises.

The Virtues. Best thing I've seen on the telly in a long time.