calscot

Very disappointing post from you, Craig. It seems after years of reading my posts it seems you donâ??t get me at all, but I also donâ??t see why you need to troll like this, itâ??s not usually your style. Iâ??ve just lost a detailed reply to the gersnet blackhole so that may affect the tone of this one. 1. I didnâ??t say Barca played anti-football, the point is that they implied it from their OWN pathetic accusations of Rangers. Rangers stopped them playing good football by being defensive therefore were anti-football, but then they closed our players down incredibly effectively removed all space and time to play good football also as well as starving us of the ball. They were actually BETTER defensively than we were so whatâ??s the difference? Itâ??s pretty simple but people donâ??t seem to be able to grasp it as it disagrees with how they think Barca play. A bit like not believing Mother Teresa ever farted. 2. We did NOT play like Barca against Peterhead so what is your point? In fact the biggest complaint on here is that we gave the opposition the ball too often and too much space to play. Following that logic we were playing the opposite of anti-football so are you arguing that we were playing â??total-footballâ?? 3. I believe anti-football is blatantly and cynically breaking the rules in order to win, so what is your point against me? 1. Where did I say Peterheadâ??s tactics were an excuse? I donâ??t think Pete did either â?? he used it as mitigation of our own play. Are you arguing with the right person? Heavy tackles are fine with me as long as they are fair. They should be going for the ball and not the man and also have enough respect for a fellow professional and for the sport itself to not be reckless in a way that could cause a bad injury. 2. The difference between Peterhead and us in Barcelona is that while our tactics were perfectly legitimate, some of their tackles were not in the rules or the spirit of the game. 3. While their tactics are not an excuse, if they were effective, is there not a possible reason to praise them and mitigate the slating of our own team? 4. I believe teams should be able to use any tactics they like within the rules and general sportsmanship. If that spoils the game then it is the rules that need to be changed rather than slagging the tactics â?? for example: the pass back. Why should I let go the most obvious evidence of the poor sportsmanship of that Barcelona team when they are being held as an example of the â??beautiful gameâ?? The reason it was worse than Lafferty is: 1. They had the hypocrisy to slag us off for anti-football when they are the ones that broke the most basic of rules. 2. Lafferty did not hypocritically slag off other players who had real injuries. 3. I think he apologised. 4. His performance in that game is not used on here as some sort of exemplar for how players should play. Youâ??re moral compass has certainly been affected by the Bermuda Triangle for that one. I donâ??t condone Lafferty (BTW why canâ??t YOU let THAT go?) and actually condemn him for it. I donâ??t see him as an example for our current players to follow. And I donâ??t have to counter many arguments on here that he should be a shining example so I donâ??t keep bringing that one up. Pretty simple. I have a lot to say on that subject but donâ??t have the time to repeat the post that was lost. In summation, Iâ??m all for playing the game fairly with integrity and look forward to the introduction of TV cameras as I want to win fairly and donâ??t want to lose unfairly. Seeing the number of bad decisions against us, I may at a pinch accept a dodgy one for us, while not feeling completely comfortable about it but would rather have a level and fair playing field. Iâ??ve also championed a code of conduct where the referee asks the player but I wonâ??t explain it now. Reading your post â?? right back at you! Please explain how Iâ??m being hypocritical as so far your post has been akin to the Self Righteous Brothers where youâ??ve made up a scenario of my behaviour that is not in my character.

The second one has a "Spierness" about it. We had anti-Rangers press in those days too. Or was it more a Daily Mail sort of piece?

Yep, Barca were pish and showed nothing of entertaining football - and had to complain about the legitimate tactics of the opposition as an excuse. Barry Ferguson got pelters for playing much better sideways stuff. They had to break the deadlock by the definition of anti-football by breaking the first rule you learn of the game - using an arm. What part of "foot-ball" don't they understand? Bunch of whinging cheats if you ask me. It really put me off that club. If we had played like that against a lesser side I can imagine the melt-down on here.

Surely this can't be true? I've been reading that it's only Rangers that make signings that don't work out... Liverpool must be a very badly run club with a shit manager.

Right now I'd rather join the Irish league than stay where we are...

Our transfer record seems to have resulted in us winning a lot of silverware - in what way has it been unsuccessful? Which Scottish club's transfers would you have preferred to ours seeing as they mostly must be better...? Our worst record seems to be during the Advocaat years where our outlay put us massively in debt for an average trophy return. I can't remember too many of our youths going to other teams and becoming great - except maybe Gattuso who admits he learned a hell of a lot at Rangers and sees his time here as an important part of his development. But perhaps we should ignore Italian world cup winners. Hibs have probably produced the highest number of quality players over the last decade but I wouldn't go back and swap our players for theirs...

England don't really count. At least two winners are purely due to sugar daddies which could happen any time in any country at any time. You could argue we're just as competitive as two rich arabs or Russians could come along and easily take two SPL clubs to the title by spending 200m a year.

well, we've already been talking about it for two decades so I agree it will probably take at least two more.

I also think that for a real solution that works, we need just one Edinburgh team and one Dundee team and a few other amalgamations - but that will never happen. We need another two to four stronger sides to push the top two all the way. But no amount of shuffling the same pack will ever allow a small country to compete with a large country while income is based on population size as is the case with the TV money. Our national game is at a dead end in this respect. We either just have to accept where we are or join a bigger league structure be it Europe or UK. All small countries have this dilemma, even the mighty Dutch.

The TV deal for the SPL is so low that I don't think a lower one will bite our budget that much and I'm sure if we were in the conference the TV rights would be picked up. Setanta used to show them which I think was partly to get English customers to sign up to watch the Premiership PLUS their local team. Most of the clubs would be of the size of SFL1 clubs with Luton the exception with an average crowd of 6k. If we will struggle to win that league then how will we win the SFL1 (or whatever)? League Two is more like the bottom half of the SPL and top half of the SFL1 but double the number of clubs. League One is more like the SPL without Celtic with double the clubs. So far the challenge is little different from promotion to the SPL and then finishing second. Now the Championship is a different story. However, not one club has much more than half our fans and we would benefit from the TV and sponsorship money they get. A third of them have a following between Dundee Utd and Hearts. The rest would be difficult but we should still be the best and a bit like Newcastle were there. They were down for one season and won the title by 11 points, and gained promotion back up. I'm not saying we'd do that but they are of an equivalent size and were in a shambles when they were relegated. You'd have to expect us to finish in the top two within a few years or at least the top six most years and eventually up through the playoffs. Sunderland are another big club who didn't have much problem winning that league. The cream rises to the top. Looking at that, I can't see us failing to get to the Premiership pretty rapidly with perhaps a few bad seasons getting in the way. But surely even a few years in the Championship would be a lot more interesting than another two horse race in a poor, messed up league with a lot of catching up to do with our one and only rival. I think we'd also attract massive investment to get us there as the rewards are easy to see. I can see a lot of rich Rangers fans wanted to get involved with the club for the last push into the Premiership - as well as ordinary Rangers fans if the money all went on players and maybe expanding the stadium.

I think you probably sense it's more for us as you are far more informed about our failures. When other clubs let unknown players go (or even famous ones) I'm pretty sure you don't take notice. Most of us are on a Rangers forum and check New Now for Rangers stories, you'd have to be doing the same for other clubs to get the same level of news exposure. Taking on an obscure 20 year old on a free and then letting him go six months later when it looks like he doesn't fit into the team is hardly big news. When you have a squad of more than twice as many players as the number in the team then there will always be one or two players who don't get a game for an array of reasons. Why play someone when you have an available player you think is better? You can't get away from the fact there is always a worst player at any club. Sometimes they look good on a trial but then don't deliver. Reasons could be failure to settle, lack of effort, bad attitude or just not fitting in and many more. We all make purchases that don't pan out but we don't all see ourselves as failures because of it. At least this time it didn't cost us much. I remember when Asprilla pretty much cost Keegan the title even though he was great player.

I think you're taking it too far. When you're scared of making small mistakes, you will most certainly start to make big ones. Entrepreneurs don't become rich by not taking risks.

It does seem to be a Scottish disease...

Money talks, in most of the leagues down there we'll have more money and better players than the opposition. The differential will be closer the higher we get but even in the Championship we'd be one of the richest - with only the clubs with parachute payments to match or better us, and the odd big club relegated. It will not guarantee promotion but the odds will be in our favour. We might temporarily lose some status - but our status is fast becoming akin to a foreign minister in a government of a banana republic - or even a former great country like Hungary. Perhaps it's better to be a formerly famous US senator. I don't think our hubris should sway us from our best chance of future prosperity and well-being.

I've failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed. Michael Jordan

Just thinking: perhaps we should stop slaughtering our own manager for the slightest thing.

Did McLeish get much slaughtering his signings for for being way ahead in the league? I don't recall so. McLeish was slaughtered for finishing third with no trophies and a budget that was huge compared to the rest of the SPL whom he struggled against in his last season. He lasted four and half years up till then. When you're more than 10 points behind (as he often was) then you're going to get slaughtered. McCoist may have far more resources that our current opposition BUT there is no chance of him finishing behind one of them. It's akin to slaughtering Eck in his first season and a half. Or even the Helicopter Sunday season. However, you're probably right - the criticism is so unfounded now that it's likely the same people would be slaughtering ANY manager for their signings, no matter how well they do. Oh wait, they did, Walter was an immensely successful legend and people slaughtered him all the time for his signings in both his tenures.

I'd be willing to take that risk.

You mean the only current signings he spent money on?

I think everyone is reasonably grounded, but there are doors with locks that are starting to look shoogly, which is enough to have a debate about the merits of breaking them open.

You're looking for players on our budget to stand out? In what way? 19 points isn't enough? How many points do we need to be ahead for McCoist's players to be a success?

There are seven chances of getting into Europe for the FA teams and so it's not out of the question. With our support we would quickly become one of the top financed teams in the EPL although will not be quite in the same league as Man U and Arsenal due to their massive and well established brands or Man City and Chelsea due to sugar daddies. However, I think we'd be bigger than most of the others and in the same category as Liverpool and Newcastle. The problem there is that Newcastle have had a nightmare and Liverpool have been struggling. So it's not easy even for the bigger clubs but overall the bigger ones are mostly nearer the top. However, I believe we could be bigger than them as I can see a stadium expansion and 70k average attendance. In the premiership our future catchment area would be huge compared to most clubs - and at the expense of other Scottish clubs. I think if you can get 46k for the SFL3 then you can expect a 50% rise for the EPL - especially if the fans are not priced out of it. Sponsorship would become massive and the 70m from TV would be very handy. It's the only way we'll be a huge club again as far as I can see - unless there is a successful European league. Europe is a false god now in my opinion as the only top class players you'll be watching will be for the opposition. In the EPL, we may win nothing for a long time but at least we'll have a high standard of team to watch against a high standard of opposition. Right now I'd gladly swap places with Swansea and I'd swap with them well before I'd swap with Celtic and their guaranteed title and a last 16 CL game against Juve. They are a much smaller club but doing amazingly well and have a manager that would have loads on here drooling. I've never been a fan of a British league before but things have changed dramatically. Comparing the EPL and the SPL is now like comparing an Aston Martin to a Chevrolet spark that's been in a bad accident and lost a wheel. Or maybe it's more like a Reliant Robin driven by Jeremy Clarkson that rolls over ever time it goes round a corner.

Well we could be playing in Europe as some obscure Scottish team with little finances and a dearth of local talent compared to similar countries. I can't see that being exceptionally exciting. Not only that it could take us three or four years for it to happen while playing in a terrible system and being given one handicap sanction after another. At best we'll have the odd run while the top five get richer, Russia and Ukraine get together and get richer, the Balkans get together and get richer, Holland and Belgium get together and get richer, while we have TV companies and sponsors offering a pittance for our crap product. Or we could be the one big Scottish club in a British league who have the adventure of playing our way up the divisions, playing teams we've never played before, most of whom are of a higher standard than 99% of the Scottish leagues and with far greater crowds. It would be another adventure BUT with the possibility of attaining the riches and glamour of the Premier League - which makes the CL money look like peanuts. Do you want to play Man U every ten years or every season? And add in the rest of that league with Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool etc. We may not play in Europe every season but with our Ghost of UEFA future showing us what we can expect, who really cares? The exciting thing for Rangers about Europe is to play the best on the continent on an equal level with a chance of going all the way. Not to get through a couple of qualifiers and then get out classed by richer clubs. I'd rather be even a medium team in the CL every year than be in the Premiership, but I'd rather be a medium team in the Premiership than a minnow in Europe. And I'd be prepared to be stuck in the Championship for ten years to achieve it. Football in Scotland has no light at the end of the tunnel and we're going downhill fast into irrelevance. The Premiership may be a house of cards but we're in a unique position to survive any crash especially after the lessons of last year.

He DID get a chance and blew it. Why play a player that is not showing he's up to the grade? Ally takes on a 20 year old for free, he's not showing he's good enough in training to get in the team, he wants to try his luck elsewhere and the manager let's him and that means the manager shouldn't be given money to spend... Or perhaps we can see that on a limited budget we're 19 points ahead. Some of his signings must have come good. In fact he only had one relatively big money signing and he looks pretty good. It's amazing that people think that a manager who is 19 points at the top of the league is terrible at signing players because he let a free 20 year old go...

Have you ever made a purchase you regretted or took back for some reason? Does that make you a clueless person? Really weird way of looking at things especially with the esoteric task of putting a football squad together. I'd imagine EVERY manager has brought in a young player and after a while of assessing him found him below the standard of the team. Or perhaps they should do a Souness and sub someone on and off in the same game due to a hoax recommendation. Sometimes something looks good, you take it on cheap for a while to have a look at it and then decide it's not suitable. I really don't see the problem with that. The guy is 20 and cost nothing. He just didn't show he was of the same standard as the rest of the squad. Why do we always seem to have bleeding hearts about this sort of thing?