The Mantis

I was at that game. Bill Mullan the ref was the Heidie at Dalkeith St David’s.

Must have lost a lot of fencing in the gales: the pitch was never visible from the back car park before.

Back down the road on Saturday and just in time to catch the kickoff at NDP. Rose 0 Spartans 1. Bonnyrigg unlucky not to get at least a point in a tight struggle although they relied overmuch on the long punt and lost out to a bit of quality from Blair Henderson with about 5 minutes left. Crowd a very healthy 1017.

Not very random but my season ticket doesn't do much work these days. Anyhoo, a superb evening in the Sneck and a fine opporchancity for fetching out the drone. ICT 0 Raith Rovers 1. MoM shared by Dabrowski and the woodwork.

Thought you might be interested in this photo from 2004. Took the train out from Berlin for a nosey…

I wouldn’t put WW in the same basket as the other two tbf. They were always a viable LL club till Bonnyrigg joined the pyramid and quickly became the giant club in Midlothian, just 2 miles down the road. Over 1000 at their game yesterday. That was the nail in the coffin for me, plus old stalwarts dying off, starting with Derek. In a sliding doors moment, it could have been Nitten in the SPFL as they were the big team in Midlothian for years but they fell away and actually went down from the EOS Premier along with WW.

Another thing that’s really tragic about our league is a consequence of having only 2 big clubs that can win the league instead of 3 or 4. So for them, every game is effectively a six-pointer. If say Killie or St Mirren beat either of them, it’s obviously because they want to help the other lot rather than just win for themselves.

That's not what jumped out at me: I'm no English teacher, but the Rangers win is the future tense as if it were expected, while Dundee's is the conditional tense (or whatever). They should really both be in the same tense.

Glasgow Perthshire 1 Cumbernauld Utd 4. Keppoch Park, WOSFL Div 2. Shire take the lead early on but that was as good as it got. The East was pretty much washed out so got myself a ticket to Queen Street, couple of pints in The Raven and The Pot Still, then across the road for a quick run on the 75 bus up to Possilpark. Took the chance to get some aerial shots of Saracen Park as I never managed to get to an Ashfield game there. A bit of chaos on the trains but caught the 1615 back to Embra and a had a visit to the Halfway House between trains, only to discover that the Borders line trains were off and had to get a bus out to Midlothian. Chatting to 3 youngish guys in the pub for half an hour, only to find that one of them was the son of my ex-boss and I had last seen him 20 years ago when he was about 10. Drony notes

I’m a cash rich pensioner. Tell them I want a stand named after me. Either The Mantis stand or the f**k Gardiner Stand, whatever’s easiest.

Don't worry, you'll probably be witnessing it first-hand.

A toxic presence at every club he has 'served'. The concert fiasco last summer should have been an automatic dismissal.

As an occasional watcher I always feel that the squad has improved on paper in the past 2 seasons but have been going backwards, somehow they've never matched in spirit etc the team that won the LL (appreciate it's a higher level). In recent weeks Kerr Young has been a bad loss, a real leader on the park. I think Robbie should have been replaced early in the season, I can understand him getting kept on after keeping them up but they've been going nowhere this season. Last season I enjoyed the novelty of league fitba about a mile from my house, but this season it has been a real chore. There's a post somewhere where I listed even more forwards than you have, there were 7 or 8 in total.

I’m going over there with my mate for a few days end of April. Nae fitba though, just whisky & wildlife. Will be up in Lewis before that though, and the season should have started.

Sitting with the Total Network Solutions fans? Booo! Thank feck for Airdiree!