JohnMc

I've not heard much of them recently so it might not have been mentioned but where does Cosgrove sit with the up coming "The Rise and Fall of Anti-Catholicism in Scotland" by Professor Tom Devine? From the previews and interviews I've read it seems the eminent Professor is playing down 'sectarianism' and saying it's really not much of an issue anymore. Indeed the quote I read he said the issues at football aren't sectarianism but simply hooliganism. Seeing as he's widely recognised as the leading historian in the country just now he might even know what he's talking about. I can't imagine that's going to sit well with some.

Ah, now c'mon, Patrick Hamilton was a Glaswegian, when he went to the East coast you lot martyred him. Maybe he asked for vinegar on his chips? Now Gonzo, you know the one thing that unites east and west coast Scotland was the referendum, we all voted to remain in the EU, remember? ?

It must give you all heart to know that despite your funny voices and, I assume, many genetic problems, you can come west and not only survive but indeed thrive among normal people. I feel particularly proud this Friday afternoon.

Glasgow has always welcomed refugees into our bountiful arms, just don't speak...

"Bairns"? I demand all supporters go through a Govan elocution lesson! You'll be slipping 'ken' into articles soon if we don't intervene Frankie, this is for your own good... Great stuff, eastern patois apart, enjoyed it.

Finally got round to listening, good stuff guys and gal. Sorry to hear about Ross, hope everything is okay there.

This is on the BBC website today. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-47459485 "The safety of fans at Scottish football stadiums is to be highlighted as a key concern in a review on match policing, BBC Scotland has learned. The report, due to be published on Wednesday, says inconsistencies in stadium checks by local authorities could leave fans at risk." The authors and their chosen 'fans' contributor aside the pertinent point is alleged inconsistency from local authorities over stadium security. It's sort of relevant to the thread I thought.

Rudden's doing well in a poor Falkirk side it seems, that's a great goals to games return. All the academy players will benefit from playing first team football but is their much to be learned playing at Lowland League level? I really hoped Hardie would push on and become a first team regular at Livingston, but it doesn't seem to be happening. Shame.

They're hardly strawmen. The biggest problem "safe standing" has is the people who'll use it and the people charged with managing it. How's that a strawman? There are simply too many previous examples of the people in charge of football supporters not doing their jobs properly. If you've not experienced being treated like an animal by stewards, police or other clubs then you've been very fortunate.

It wasn't supposed to happen in terraces either, but it did. I understand that the design is different and the 'barrier' for every row is meant to reduce the possibility of surges, usually the most dangerous aspect of terraces, but my concern remains not so much with the design but with the humans who'll be managing and using it. As Pete says I think it's inevitable at some match somewhere more people than are meant to will get access. It's simply harder to police and to manage than seating is.

As I said above it's all safe until you cram too many people into it or you don't maintain it correctly. My experiences have led me to mistrust organisations charged with keeping football supporters safe.

Are you confusing engaging with agreeing?

There was a nuclear reactor in England called Windscale, there was a fire there in the late 1950s causing a level 5 radioactive leak into the atmosphere. It was a big scandal, not only around the danger to health but also accusations of Government cover up and ongoing concerns around nuclear power. You might not have heard of Windscale because when the nuclear industry did research into public opinion some 20 odd years later they discovered many people distrusted it and whenever they heard the name Windscale they immediately associated it with nuclear leaks and safety concerns. The nuclear industry in the UK did what all clever businesses do when faced with this issue, they changed Windscale's name. So instead of Windscale today we say Sellafield. It's the same place with the same history but for anyone under the age of 35 the name Windscale means very little and Sellafield is a place where schools go on trips. Changing the name is a great marketing trick, it's surprising how many people accept something is different just because the name is. You call it 'safe standing' if you want, it's terracing, pure and simple, that's what it is whatever you choose to call it today. It's a tiered standing area with concrete steps and crush barriers, that's a terrace RS, same as it ever was. I don't think terraces are intrinsically dangerous, but people can be, and as long as people are involved in their upkeep, policing and management it's a hard no from me.

He was, almost all of the United Irishmen were including a number of clergymen. Wolfe Tone was dead nearly 60 years before the Fenian Brotherhood was formed though, he had nothing to do with it. This is the problem with words, their meanings change. I suspect many people who use that word use it as a derogatory term for RCs, some use it to simply mean Celtic supporters, others use it refer to violent Irish nationalists and lastly some use it as a term to describe anyone they see as anti-Rangers. If we look at Steve Clarke it's hard to argue those calling him a "sad Fenian bastard" were referring to his strong views on historical Irish history, because as far as I know he's never spoken publicly about these views. So maybe not everyone who uses that word is as concerned with its origins, just what it means to them today. I was in Belfast yesterday, my first visit for pleasure for a while. I used to live there back in the 90s and it was interesting to see the changes since then. I went full tourist and did the did the bus tour, it was cold and wet but still interesting. The tour guide explained that he couldn't describe the various paramilitary organisations as terrorists, because the bus went through areas where they were still quite prominent and they didn't like that word. So he called them "combatants", they were okay with that word he told us. Now some people I know would be furious at that, they're terrorists pure and simple and no other word should be allowed to dignify them. I know others who see them differently, indeed they perhaps even view some of them honourably. Words matter and how people take their meanings matter. Whether you mean it or not, indeed whether those singing it mean it or not, the word 'Fenian' is taken to mean Roman Catholic by many, many people, that's just a fact. On that tour yesterday, towards the bottom of the Crumlin Road there was republican graffiti. Amateur stuff, not the organised murals, just spray paint marking territory. It caught my eye because it contained the short three letter phrase "KAH". That's an abbreviation for "Kill All Huns" and you'll see it throughout Republican areas of Northern Ireland. There are people here who'll tell you that the word 'Hun' isn't sectarian, they'll give you some convoluted meaning, saying it can't be sectarian because they use against Novo and McCann. But be sure that the guy who wrote that phrase on that wall in that particular area meant it to be sectarian, he meant 'Protestants' when he wrote it. The meaning of words changes, and there's very little any of us can do about it, accept it and move on.

I'm guessing here but I think the club has decided it's time to publicly address this as part of a new strategy to eradicate it or, be seen to be trying to. I think this statement, if it's ignored, will be followed up by 'action'. I expect persistent offenders will find season tickets being cancelled, perhaps parts of the ground might be closed, very public acts by the club to demonstrate their anger around this issue. There are a number of reasons for this. Firstly I genuinely think the directors are deeply embarrassed by it. King in particular must scratch his head and wonder how this can still be happening in 2019. I doubt the Park family are comfortable with it either. Secondly it's commercial kryptonite. Nothing repels possible sponsors like an MSP publicly criticising the club for sectarianism. Steve Clarke's recent press conference where him and Boyd spoke about this had one very telling point I thought. The revelation that he was approached by Rangers, or by an intermediary, about the managers job last season was interesting, what was disappointing for me was that he felt he had to ask if he'd be accepted by our support as manager because of his religion. Now I genuinely don't know any Rangers supporter who would reject the signing of any player or manager on the grounds of their religious upbringing. Had Clarke been appointed our manager I think it would have been largely welcomed on the back of what he'd done at Kilmarnock, and any criticism of it might be around his style of play or perhaps not being a big name. But I can genuinely say I doubt anyone on here would have mentioned him being a childhood RC as an issue. Yet he felt it still might be and then a couple of weeks ago he was vindicated in thinking that by the singing of that song at him. That kind of negative publicity gives sponsors sleepless nights. Thirdly nobody in the media or business world has the stomach to get involved in a 'free speech' debate around this. That fight was lost a long time ago, whether people like it or not. If you want to shout obscenities about the Pope in public then society has already decided you've lost any possible counter argument you might make in mitigation. Fourthly, and most importantly, I believe this no longer represents the support as a whole. Most of us left this stuff behind a long time ago. The Roman Catholic church is no threat to our way of life today (if it ever was), like most organised religions here it's struggling to engage with people and it has systemic issues around child abuse, treatment of woman and abuse of power. It's slowly killing itself, it doesn't need someone tanked up on Buckfast belting out about Fenians to push it over the edge. Be under no illusions though, if we want the club to stick up for the support when we're unfairly treated by the media or politicians, we need to accept that the club will also have to criticise and punish those who still indulge in the FTP bollocks. The club has recently shown a willingness to take on our enemies, it would be good if us as a support recognised what we can do to help them, rather than hand a loaded gun to those who hate us and paint big targets on our backs.

Do councillors ever change? Do council priorities ever change? Does policing ever change? Do police treat football supporters the same as other parts of society? As for Rangers, well I hope not and have no reason to suspect they are. However, I wouldn't have trusted some of the people who've 'controlled' us in the recent past and none of us know what the future holds. I spent my formative days watching football from terraces. I had a season ticket for the Enclosure whilst it was still terraced, I get the nostalgia trip some have for it but it doesn't change the fact that seated stadiums are safer than terraces. The day of the Hillsborough disaster I was at Parkhead watching Rangers in a cup match. We were in the 'Jungle' as it was called, an infamous terrace frequented by Celtic's hardcore support. It was my first visit to that end of the ground. The place was a death trap, how nobody died accessing or leaving that place I'll never know. That day, when 96 football supporter's were crushed to death because the police viewed them as sub-human, and because the people whose job it was to ensure safety were, at best incompetent, at worst negligent, I saw Rangers supporters literally punch each other to try and escape a crush leaving Parkhead. The worst of it RS is it wasn't a big surprise, I'd seen that before and I saw it again after. At Brockville I was in a crush that saw people hospitalised, I've no proof but I'm fairly sure turnstyle operators were allowing more people in than they should have, people can be greedy without thinking of the possible consequences. I was in a crush at East End Park at half time where a woman broke her leg. I can still hear the snap sound, everyone within 20 feet of her heard it, followed by her cry of pain. Ambulance staff couldn't reach her and she ended up being passed down over supporter's heads. I saw crushes at Easter Road on one of our very first matches on the 90s, we greeted the new decade with a return to the 1940s complete with police who didn't even try and hide their contempt for us far less help. The irony is once the danger passed, you laughed about it, shrugged it off, cursed the shithole ground you were at and walked back to the bus or train, adrenaline and camaraderie doing their jobs on your mindset. Yip, I know, it's different now. It couldn't happen today, things have changed, standards are higher, people are different. Well I don't buy it. Football fans, ours in particular, are still viewed as sub-human by some people, people in positions of power too. The thing I always keep in mind is there were 25 people killed at Ibrox when a stand collapsed in 1902. We changed the ground after that, at great expense to the club both on and off the park. Yet, despite that it happened again, and more people died. I'm fairly certain those in charge said this can never happen again after that incident, I'm sure they meant it too. I'm not inclined to find out if it could happen.

Well I don't trust Glasgow Council who'd be issuing the Safety Certificate, I don't trust Police Scotland who'd are ultimately responsible for public safety and policing of events and, in truth, I don't trust any football club to put safety over money, not even ours. As you know 66 people didn't come home from one of our matches, it wasn't the first time either. Our ground has been one of the safest in the country since then, I can think of no good reason to start reversing that. I'm sure when it was first opened it would be pristine and well regulated and under scrutiny, but after a few years it would become part of the furniture, and if money got tight maybe they could do the barrier work every other year, it'll be fine, and perhaps we could fit a few more fans in there and so on. I was brought up on terraces and I saw the worst of them first hand. I don't welcome them back.

As Bluedell says the style and fashions of the 'young' are for them to decide, there would be something wrong with them if someone closing in on half a century like me could relate far less approved. Great post by Tannochside Bear. I'm also firmly against 'safe' standing and glad it's been rejected by the club.

Well this has been unexpected fun. A slip tonight or at the weekend would certainly add a bit of pressure to a club who don't always seem like they know how to handle it. I'm pleased Rodgers has left them. He's clearly an accomplished manager working with a big budget (relatively) and experienced players. I've always felt he might crumble if he was put under real pressure, but I thought it might require more pressure than one derby loss and only an 8 point lead! Lennon's an interesting appointment. From their perspective he knows the club and knows the league, he's inexpensive and available. From our perspective we won the league in his first full season, then came second when Administration hit us. His league wins were either when we were broken our no longer in the same league. I think he demonstrated at Hibs that he has the ability to motivate and organise a side who can compete, at the same time I don't think he's as good a coach as Steve Clarke. If we can keep building momentum we've got a real chance this season because Celtic will have stumbles. Rodgers being in England might come back and bite us in the summer. I could see him being interested in Alfredo for example, and Kent too. At the same time I expect he'll consider bids for some of Celtic's first team too. There's never a dull moment and the reaction of some of the celtic support has been a joy to behold.

Look at the ages of these guys. If you've reached the age of 41 and you're spending your time sending death threats to strangers over a football match then it might be time to accept you're one of life's real losers.

Not as far as I know. I understand that BBC Scotland have exclusive radio commentary rights.

On the subject of organised follow up Gerrard is quoted in this morning's Herald backing Robertson's statement and there's an article from Archie MacPherson where he says that BBC Scotland are not fulfilling their broadcasting obligations.

It's radio coverage that's missing. For example tonight's match, a big cup tie on a Wednesday night, when a lot of supporter's might struggle to attend and, as far as I know, a match that isn't on TV, would, for any other side get full focus along with commentary. That's something tens of thousands of Rangers supporter's deserve.

He spoke well and made his point. His "we're being treated differently from every other club" line nails it. Interesting to hear that the BBC wanted to come back and cover matches but not interview players or managers. Whilst the lack of coverage of our home matches angers me I support the club in saying 'no' to that. As Robertson says, just treated us the same way you treat every other club. I said last night I thought Gerrard should say this, but I'm delighted someone has said it.

Joking aside that's what happens in countries like Brazil where it's traditional to have both the mother and father's surname as well as a given 'first name' and countless middle names. Then you get given a nickname, like Pele or Ronaldo etc. and that's just what everyone calls you for the rest of your life. Expect British footballers in 20 years or so to go by one name only.