The Real PapaBear

Zaps, if enough of us write to our MPs and MSPs, often enough they won't be allowed to sweep it under the carpet. in fact, I say we should phone every American radio station we can think of, as well

mibbe - but they're not in the 24 as far as memory serves. kanchelskis and arteta are two more i've remembered. Naismith, Jelavic, Weir, Andy Gray, Duncan Ferguson, Trevor Steven Gary Stevens rideout mojo stuart mccall gough durrant gascoigne kanchelskis arteta

quality mate! Accept my thanks on behalf of Uncle Mac

rideout mojo stuart mccall gough durrant gascoigne off the top of my head

Sasha Papac and you want a gold star? Puleeesssee. You're going to have to up your game here, matey - this is the big leagues. Uncle Mac goes back to 52. Uncle Mac wouldn't dignify any question to which the answer was Sasha Papac. Uncle Mac demands questions that can only be answered by conversations/arguments in a pub. Sasha Papac is not the answer to any of those questions.

God forgive me, I shouldnae laugh at the mentally, oh christ what is the term these days, the mentally challenged? the logically disenfranchised? the general fuckwittery? Tommy, I'm half thinking you're one of us! The greatest Bluenose minds on the planet couldnae come up with a more ridiculous parody of a sellik fan. The yankees against the jets???? Americans should contact UEFA to complain??? the Da Vinci code???

stb - great question; would love the answer if you could find it in your heart? cheers mate laudrup11? Quality question, my man; quality. Now my problem is how to ask a quiz question that involves a) celtic and b) celtic scoring without getting my erse in my hand tae play with. 54? thanks bud. There's always a couple of knuckledraggers <cough> edge and ian </cough> who need things explained 4 times before they haven't understood it the first! I'm looking for questions of laudrup11's standard or of the level of: name 24 players who have played for Rangers and Everton - WITHOUT looking up the answers on line. Answers guys! Uncle Mac needs answers!

I've got an old uncle who's getting on a bit and his life is spent around Rangers. A year or so back I gave him a quiz on the number of different nationalities to have played for us and ever since then he's been at me "huv ye got any mair quizzes fur me?" He's never touched a computer in his life, so the answers he comes up with are from his own remaining memory and from asking guys in the pub. So, any quizzes and answers that anybody might have, would be very greatfully received by an old man. And by my uncle, too.

easy money for a lazy piece of writing. The only point of any real interest in this is no.17. Who was the RTC blogger? Where did he get so much private info, to which he had no right? Who was working on the inside of HMRC feeding him this info? Why is nobody on your newspaper, or any other investigating that? A possible criminal act, not to mention a potentially fatal breach of trust, has been committed at/by/(for?) HMRC and nobody in the media thinks it wise to look into the matter? Much easier to crack funny at 6 month old Rangers stories.

it's not really complicated, bud. When it's to our disadvantage, we're oldco. When it's to their advantage, we're newco.

he certainly went down very easily

Ok, I'll bite - but be warned, this will be my only post on the matter. I just couldn't bring myself to get involved in a debate about how good Stein was. The reasons why my second paragraph is far from being tosh are as follows: Get yerself a cuppa and prepare to learn a bit about fitba. First, No comparison can be made with Stein and Struth. Struth won titles and cups domestically only and yes, you can only beat what's in front of you but he *was* leading the biggest and richest club in the country, with no great opposition to speak of; he never played in Europe and never managed anyone else. We have no method for comparing Scottish football to that of other countries during Struth's time - although it is interesting to note that immediately after Struth's time, Scotland and England got given a right doing whenever they played teams from other countries. I have no reason to believe that Scotland turned from world beaters into mince overnight; so I have to think that we were mince compared to other countries during Struth's time as well. But it's all speculation. Therefore, m'lud, I would move to strike the prosecution's reference to Mr Struth as being inadmissible. The same cannot be said for Stein's time. Stein assembled a team which had to face a Rangers side which would, in any other era, have gone down as legends - and beat them for 9 straight season's. This Rangers team had the likes of Baxter, Henderson and Greig playing for us and enjoyed unparalleled European success. Had the present day Champions League been in existence, there is no doubt that we would have frequently featured in the latter stages. The Rangers team of the 60s was an excellent team by any standards. As for Fergie, given the wealth at his disposal, Ferguson has won far fewer European cups than he should have and his European performances should have been better than they were. Stein in 9 years reached two European Cup finals; Ferguson, despite having vastly more resources available, has reached 3 in 27 years. I'm sympathetic to the case for Fergie being the greatest ever, but I still think Stein edges it, considering he did far more with far less in a much shorter time. Stein's other clubs were Dunfermline - where he won the Scottish Cup and Hibs, where he was so successful (taking them from fighting relegation to fighting for the title) he landed the second biggest job in Scottish football. He spent something like a month and a half at Leeds if memory serves, so I'd say we can ignore that one. Unlike fergie who took forever to get going, Stein hit the ground running and only got faster. And if your case against Stein rests on the Scotland team, well let's just call a duck a dog and try to milk it. in 82 we went out on goal difference after Alan Hansen and Willie Miller got involved in a cock-up worse than the Darien Project. Without that piece of schoolboy football, we qualify for the second round for the first and last time. Stein did his job in getting us to the point where H&M could screw it up. Stein was indeed, in charge of some very good players (and where did they come from?) but apart from Jimmy Johnston, none were brilliant. A few were excellent, Lennox and McNeil for example, but the others were nothing more than good to very good. So what - or rather who- made them such a great team? The defense rests - but if you find my client guilty, I'm not too bothered, tbh

of all the rats who left the sinking ship who have denied being involved, one name is conspicuously absent - and his was the first name that sprang to my mind when this action was announced. Anyone?

I feel sorry that leggat is associated with Rangers. What a rancid little man he is! Who gives a toss if Stein was a womaniser or a gambler? I mean, seriously. Is there any one in this forum that feels they can start pointing fingers at the 'moral' behaviour or misbehaviour of others? He was Scotland's finest ever manager - Ferguson included imho - in charge of Scotland's finest ever team. Let's get over it. After all, we're proving right now who Scotland's finest ever fans are; we don't need to have anything to do with gutter writing like this. FFS.

my thoughts exactly, bossy (am I married to you, btw? Your name seems familiar;) ). Peace and reconciliation only ever happens when both sides in a conflict have suffered so much that they finally decide it isn't worth the candle to carry on has they have been doing. So far, the suffering has only been on one side. At the end of the day, we will eventually have to make nice with the SFA - but the SPL (and the BBC) is an entirely different matter. We have some unfinished business there.

I'm no expert in industrial law but I would be surprised if that were true, given that a basic tenet of unionism (small 'u') is collective action to prevent an individual having to put themselves into vulnerable situations - and even if it were true, you would only need one ex-player with an eye for a buck (and there's no shortage of candidates) to ask that the union take action, which it would then do on behalf of all members involved. Maybe someone can clarify whether the union undertook the action of its own back or if it was asked to do so by a particular individual?

That's not really how a Union works. The Union has a duty to act in the interests, or perceived interests, of its members. The union believes that its members could be owed some additional payments from the time of the takeover and it is therefore obliged to try to get that money for those members. It's also debatable whether, if successful, they would be able to get that money for some players (e.g. lafferty) but not for others (e.g. Jig). I have no problem at all with the players union trying to do this. However, I do question whether they needed to act without consulting beforehand those members who are still at Ibrox . Also, some ex-players are coming in for a ton of grief for something they know nothing about or have any control over.

or, to put it another way, the biggest, richest sports franchise in the world has won The Big One once in the past decade. Their victories in the AL East are of little real value since they only ever play against one opposing team of quality at a time (usually the Red Sox). More indicative is their performance in the AL championship series against the winners of the other AL divisions. In all that time they have reached the World Series twice - once fewer than the St Louis Cardinals and the San Francisco Giants and the same number of times as the Phillies, Rangers and Tigers - all much smaller teams. Unlike the EPL, you can't buy your way to success in Baseball because the playing field is so comparatively level....because the money is shared around more evenly and the leagues are designed to promote competition (see their draft system). Scottish football should look at how MLB organises itself if it wants to see how to run a sport properly.

"As usual, there were the offensive sounds decent people have come to abhor. Unfortunately there was no evidence to suggest these chants are belted out by only a handful as some Rangers people would have you believe." "They surged in several times clubbing everyone within reach. Although the fans who were spewing their sectarian bile probably deserve a good hiding, innocents would also have been taken out." Can't disagree with a single word.

Great appointment, if for no other reason than he'll have to give up hosting Your Call - at which he was, bloody awful. I'll be sad to see him go from Sportsound, though. Traynor is a heavyweight and Green isn't appointing him for his diplomatic, defensive conciliatory qualities. Looks like Green may have a plan after all.

well, you have very little positive to say about Rangers, the team or the management and you seem more intent on stirring trouble among Rangers fans than in seriously addressing issues, so - and forgive me if I'm wrong - but I tend to read your posts as being from an 'observer', shall we say, rather than from someone who has a dog in the fight. Maybe you're a real Ranges fan, but maybe just a Victor Meldrew type, who moans and criticises first and thinks later. Maybe.

What is in it for the SFL if the SPL takes all their top teams?

you don't think what? You don't think that some Rangers fans use 'Tim' to mean Catholics or you don't think you were OTT in calling dB stupid and ridiculous?

You might not agree with it bud, and the majority of us might use it to mean a Celtic fan exclusively - but there are those who do use it to refer to Catholics as well. So my point is that you're being a bit OTT for having a pop at dB for misunderstanding what you meant.

Calling dB ridiculous or stupid for thinking that Kuznetsov *may* have meant catholic is completely out of order. Face facts; there is *still* a sizeable swathe of our support who *are* bigoted and for whom celtic fans and Catholics are one and the same and who use the term Tim to mean either, interchangeably. I'm not for a moment saying that Kuz is doing so, or that Kuz is in any way bigoted (nothing he has ever posted would make me think that) , but the post to which dB refers is phrased in such a way that it *could* be taken as such. So people who are having a pop at dB should take a deep breath and have a wee word with themselves. forlans sister? Well, I could give my opinion on him but I'd be banned from the forum - as I think it would breach at least one of the house rules;).