calscot

The nearest I can think of is that News Now are advertising for staff...

You are one deluded weirdo...

You just won't stop repeating the same made up, weirdo crap will you? I've defended Rangers all my life against those who make up stuff to attack the club, and you are probably the worst I've had to deal with. Go back to watching your "beloved Chelsea" (don't hear you slagging them off, even though they are known for negative football), as you already said you wouldn't be watching Rangers as you don't enjoy it. Oh, but how can you even be a Chelsea supporter if you don't go to all the games? Admin, do I really have to keep putting up with this sort of stuff? It's continual trolling and is really boring for everyone - except perhaps SBS, who seems to get a childish kick out of it.

Your question once again is a very weird one and is completely irrelevant. Please try harder to grasp what is being said instead of trying to start another pissing contest about who goes to the most games. Playground stuff again. Like I've said before, you can take a monkey a to every game, and it will not mean he has any insight into football. Why do I need to go to any specific games to be able to understand generally what sport is primarily about? Maybe you need to pay more attention to what goes on around you and actually think about it, rather than assuming knowledge due merely to your proximity - probably in front of the telly. I've not told anyone what they can and cannot appreciate about the current Rangers team. Why do you always insist on making stupid stuff up to start or prolong an argument? Make sure you actually understand posts before replying.

That seems to me to be a label rather than a calling. It's a semantic argument, but the point for me is that an entertainer is someone whose primary goal is to entertain. Their entertainment is necessarily contrived. You can be entertaining without being an entertainer just by doing what you do well - if people are entertained by that. No, it's using extremes to get people to see the direction their arguments are pointing. It begs the question, "what is entertainment?" in football and should players be spending their time in trying to work that out - or should they be concentrating on football excellence that leads to winning and success? The whole entertainment thing is erroneous. Are you entertained when your team lose? The boos at Ibrox suggest not. But unless it's a draw, one set of fans is not going to be "entertained". Football like all real sport is not entertainment in itself, it's more of an experience of the competition, and when you support someone or a team, there is also an emotional reaction. In that way it's more art than entertainment. To use what I've said previously, would you rather some guy tried a rainbow flick every five minutes, or a team that creates intelligent, flowing move after move, using a variety of skills at appropriate times to attempt out fox the opposition, as well as being tactically astute about defending, and putting in robust challenges when necessary? If we have the latter then I'd not be disappointed if I never seen a rainbow flick again. I want to see skills and the odd trick when appropriate if the player thinks that the surprise will work and create an opportunity, I don't want to see them used randomly in the game just to get a cheer from the crowd. Tricks are by definition difficult to pull off, and if you get used to using them just to please the crowd, a decent team will punish you. I've seen guys down the park doing tricks all the time that you rarely see top professionals do - there's a reason for that, and it's not because they are incapable of performing it, or because they are boring.

Then your reply is incredibly strange and pretty meaningless. No I didn't. I said if you focus on entertaining you'll be taking your focus off winning, your strengths will be compromised. It's far better to entertain by playing winning football - that's what Warburton is trying to achieve, and it's a pity you don't appreciate that. Do you really think that doing a rainbow flick every few minutes is going to win games? The last one didn't even work, all that happened is we gave away a foul and possession. Most will have found it amusing but will have been far more entertained by the goals. But then trying and failing with a flick is easy, scoring goals not so much. Do you think we should base all our training sessions on tricks or do you think we should be practicing things that help us win games? Do you think players should be thinking, I've got a tap in here but that's not entertaining so I'll try something more spectacular? Do you not think he now has more of a chance of missing? Do you not even see that thinking about how to be entertaining is distracting when you should be focusing on scoring a goal? Are you likely to win if you encourage players to try and beat three other players trying all the tricks they know, every time they get the ball? The irony is that rainbow flicks and such are only entertaining by their rarity. If it was the first thing every player did to try and beat a man it would become very mundane, very quickly, and will not be entertaining at all if it never works - which is likely. And guess what? You'd have people saying, "we should stop this and mostly play the ball on the ground." You need to go and watch the Harlem Globetrotters or watch some contrived sports film. You obviously don't find real football that enjoyable. Most Rangers fans disagree with you, which is why so many went to Manchester, instead of spending their money on something more "entertaining" - or even going to a game with Messi in it. But the thing is Messi is not an entertainer, he's a great footballer, and people find that entertaining. He doesn't sing, dance or tell jokes when the crowd look bored, but he plays football very well. People have been entertained by great games for example the OF ones - and at no time in those games did the players think, "I need to entertain the crowd". You seem to want something very contrived, where it's all choreographed and it's written in the script that your team win - maybe the opposition could be more entertaining for you if they stopped trying and let your team run rings round them? But most people are entertained enough by watching a real match where two teams are using all their skills and tactics in trying to get the better of the other. I don't remember Davie Cooper trying to entertain, and if he did he was obviously a massive failure at it most of the time. What he did was use his skill to try and score or set someone up, and his level of skill, when it came off, was highly entertaining. The thing is, there are 42 teams in Scottish football and they all have some fans, despite the fact that most of the standard is not that high and it's impossible for them all to win all the time or even most of the time. These fans appreciate the sport as sport for what it is, it's a shame some people would rather it became some sort of circus where teams are judged on entertainment rather than how good they are at winning.

I take you didn't even begin to understand my post? No idea why you quoted it...

Great goal and all the more enjoyable as it wasn't "solo" at all, but a nice, patient, multi-passing move.

Flair in football to me, is not about entertainment, it's about the application of skill and intelligence in a variety of ways, leading to sporting excellence, and ultimately winning games. The entertainment for the fans comes from appreciation of that excellence, and also the vicarious feelings associated with your team winning or doing well. If you think you're an entertainer rather than a footballer, then you're probably not much of a winner, and you'll have no idea how to close a game that may require some boring but clinical tactical choices.

PS You really have to wonder what the boards of the clubs must be thinking these days when they look at their balance sheets. They are missing one or two games where Rangers fans filled their grounds, Celtic fans are not filling the stadiums anymore either, some are going from a guaranteed three OF paydays, to a watered down one, the TV and sponsorship money has been slashed, and their own fans interest in what must be the most boring and predictable league in the world has diminished. They have put our national game in the toilet with our supposed top clubs easily disposed in Europe by unheard of clubs from the back of beyond. Aberdeen once won the Cup Winners Cup and Super Cup, now look at them.

I have a feeling that Celtic fans are still boycotting Kilmarnock for the temerity of abstaining on voting us out the league... Other clubs feared this which contributed to us being voted out, meaning Celtic rigged the voting. Every title they win without us in the league is basically down to this cheating. Ironically they would probably have won them with us in the league due to the board we had, but tainted titles is the Celtic way.

Seems to me that the board have been incredibly astute so far with their choice of manager, and along with the re-engagement of the fans, this is creating a golden circle where the better we are, the more money we make, the more we can spend and hopefully become even better. Warburton seems the perfect fit for us so far, producing the ideal antidote to make us strong again after the board cut out most of the cancer at the club. The fans have no reason to boycott any more but perhaps needed a stimulus to get them back and that's what's been given with everyone excited about the football again despite still being in the second tier. I don't think we need to spend quickly and after dispatching both our biggest rivals in our league with dominance in the first few games, we are at a good enough level for our position already, with more to come. We are still running at a loss and so judicial spending seems prudent, but if we continue with such large crowds, our finances will improve in time to enhance the team with perhaps a few higher value players in the summer transfer window and allow us to compete well in the SP. Of course a large share issue will be a pivotal factor to the affordability. I already get the impression we'd be capable of second place in Scotland, and if we progress as we are, I'd start to be more confident of a decent result against Celtic in one of the cups. The players we've signed so far may be low key, but they seem to be of the quality we require right now, and are not extravagantly priced. I feel that we're currently on an exceptional path both on and off the field, but there is patience still required.

Wondering how Full House Friday compares with Sell Out Saturday...

Due to Whyte giving millions to Ticketus, and obviously syphoning money off for himself and his cronies while not paying tax, and also the millions to D&P and BDO, with more to the solicitors on a no-win no fee, meaning huge fee, I think the outstanding debts could still be in 7 figures...

I think there as some good points made by people about the good side of loan players. I'm not a a great fan but I think it depends what situation the club is in. When we were a bit more in ascendancy and trying to conquer Europe we were more the lender than the borrower. But while we are in the second tier, not even breaking even, it makes sense to get some loans in if they are quality, as cheap, temporary squad fillers. We've already been burned on scrabbling around for decent squad players, who by the nature of our position were mercenaries, who didn't give a crap about professionalism. The problem is that when you go for freebies, it's who's available at the time - you can find a couple of gems and the rest is dumpster diving. The great thing about loans is that you can sometimes find quality players pretty cheap, and if they don't work out, you just send them back instead of having to pay off the rest of their contract. It therefore allows us to be a lot more patient with our long term squad building, where we can be a lot more picky. I can't see a better time than now to embrace this supplementation of the squad, as we are now in the rebuilding process many have been dreaming of over the last few years, and this is a great tool to help our management team do it properly as they build momentum.

I think that clubs should publish both "attendances", the tickets sold and the number actually at the game which is something they have to give to the police anyway.

For a hostile purchase, the "fair" price is obviously too low. If you don't want to sell your car and someone offers you say the Parker's price for it, why would you sell? If he offered you 50% more than this fair price then you might have something to think about. But in this case the fair amount becomes what people are prepared to pay - so *IF* a couple of clubs truly offer say £375k and we offer say £250k, then is it "fair" for them to only receive our amount due to the player only wanting to come to us? Not only that, they get the added insult to injury in that he then comes back to try to help defeat Hibs four times in the season. Looking at it objectively, I personally don't think that sounds fair, and would think the same if the boot was on the other foot. I agree, but something like £350k might be more in keeping with how the market seems to size him up. I would be happy with that if we offered what we thought he was truly worth to come a year earlier. I just don't want us to be underhand, I've had enough of that from the likes of Ashley. Thinking about it, handing in the transfer request lessens his value as he won't get a cut of the fee - we will have to pay him a signing on fee instead. He could negotiate his full share for a team he doesn't want to go to, but not Rangers so actually, we should probably be offering something like 15-20% less anyway. That's hard to disagree with...

I don't think we look very good in that after 3 bids another club has outbid us by a long way. We look like we're strong arming Hibs because the player wants to play for us. That could save us money in the short term, but I've always believed that's not good business practice in the long term, as you get a bad reputation and so people don't want to deal with you. Long term business is usually about keeping both parties reasonably happy in a transaction. Looking out only for yourself can work for the likes of Sports Direct in maximising income, but I'd rather we weren't that type of business. If the guy's market value is say £400k then I think our third bid should have been around that - unless we're not really interested in paying for him at all, but as DB is saying, we're just showing him intent that we'll sign him next season on a free - and he'll be compensated by a decent signing on fee.

Wasn't very impressed with Houston: he seemed to personalise the situation too much instead of educating the audience why we think there is an anti-Rangers agenda from the likes of English, McLaughlin and the BBC in general. I know it's not easy on air but he should have researched well and gone in armed with a ton of examples. He was easily cornered by the sly use of fallacies by English and making it look like the problem was we were banning someone who wrote accurate things that we just didn't like. I can't even believe he conceded that the BBC were "accurate" when there is plenty of "new club" examples to counter that. But the main point is that you can avoid any accusations of inaccuracy while completely misleading your readership by exaggerating some things and neglecting to mention other things. It's also easy to use words like "could", "may have", "perhaps" and "up to", to get around the technicalities of mistruths, but that easily persuade the reader to think the worst is true. It reminds me of the film "How to get a head in advertising" with Richard E Grant as an advertising guru who develops a conscience. He is on a commuter train listening to a bunch of city types talking about a newspaper article: Businessman on Train: [reading a newspaper] I see the police have made another lightning raid. Paddington drug orgy. Priest on Train: [Irish accent] I suppose young girls was involved? Businessman on Train: One discovered naked in a kitchen. Breasts smeared with peanut butter. "The police took away a bag containing 15 grams of cannibis resin. It may also have contained a quantity of heroin." Denis Dimbleby Bagley: Or a pork pie. Businessman on Train: I beg your pardon? Denis Dimbleby Bagley: I said the bag may also have contained a pork pie. Businessman on Train: I hardly see how a pork pie's got anything to do with it. Denis Dimbleby Bagley: All right then, what about a large turnip? It may also have contained a big turnip. Priest on Train: The bag was full of drugs. Denis Dimbleby Bagley: Nonsense. Priest on Train: The bag was full of drugs, it says so! Denis Dimbleby Bagley: The bag could have been full of anything. Pork pies, turnips, oven parts. It's the oldest trick in the book. Priest on Train: What book? Denis Dimbleby Bagley: The distortion of truth by association book. The word is "may". You all believe heroin was in the bag because cannibis resin was in the bag. The bag may have contained heroin, but the chances are 100 to 1 certain that it didn't.

I don't think it's a good idea to keep coming back with higher and higher bids - it just says to clubs that they should keep rejecting bids until the window almost closes to get the best deal. If we're putting in more than 3 bids then it could be inferred that our initial bids were a bit insulting. That doesn't sound like good business. For me the third bid should be the absolute final offer and probably a bit more than we really value the player at, but we've decided to take a gamble that there could be extra potential. It should therefore also be a rarity.

Used to look forward to games against England, now dread them. But then even recently, we've usually given them a decent game and not been bulldozed, so maybe not so much to fear. We always play better against them, and with the way Strachan has the team playing, we could perhaps get a result at home.

It is funny how Aberdeen are "helped" in Europe for an almost nothing game, and yet a certain Scottish team with a (very rare) chance of winning a European trophy was not deemed very important...

Ah sometimes threads morph - the drinking picture should probably have been in a new thread as it wasn't relevant... However, I think the issue is pretty topical and worth discussing. Can mods split the thread?

As has been pointed it, that's just meaningless, sensationalist rhetoric. I would contend that food is more destructive than alcohol and it's overuse is killing or adversely affecting the lives of far more people. Doesn't mean we shouldn't eat. So Italians don't drink you say - not even a glass of wine? I always found it weird the number of Italian players that smoked, when I've never seen that in Scotland in the modern day. The studies I've read show that drinking is pretty high among elite footballers of many countries. Something around 75%. Don't think it's a UK only thing. However, I think your beliefs are clouding you to issue, where you will only listen to stuff that supports your beliefs - like that terrible article. BTW I take it you are teetotal, have a really clean diet and perform a top class conditioning regime?

Alcohol reduces hand tremors... That's why it's used for darts and sometimes for shooting. It can also reduce performance anxiety.