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As mentioned on the other thread, Sean Dillon. Might be a long one this. I got a couple of tickets for a Montrose vs Airdrie game back in 2019 and took a guy I know with learning difficulties who loves football as I thought it might be a decent wee day out for him. The guy is a Dundee United fan and asked if he would get to meet Sean Dillon, I said yes and unbeknown to me he filled his wee bag with about 30 pictures and other assorted bits of memorabilia, mainly from Dundee United's Scottish Cup win and asked Sean Dillon to sign them. I was a wee bit embarrassed and thought 1 or 2 would have been alright but this was a bit too much. Dillon on the other hand stood there for a good 45 minutes talking about the final and going through each of the pictures indivually, talking about the players involved and since there was some of the pictures that were signed but some of the cup final squad but not all of them, he said to message him nearer to the time of the cup final reunion last year and he would try and arrange to have the signatures completed. I fully believe that he would have stood there for hours knowing how much it meant to my pal but if I remember correctly, he had to head off to Brechin as he was going to visit an elderly Dundee United fan on his way home. To some folk it might just be a few pictures getting signed but this guy got to spend a reasonable amount of time with one of his heroes and his been nipping my head asking when I'm taking him back to another game[emoji23] TL;DR: Sean Dillon=Gid c**t

He gets a bit of stick from certain people but a real heartwarming story I feel I should share about Leigh Griffiths. Some of you may be aware I lost my 16 year old daughter last summer, a mate of mine knows Leigh Griffiths and his mum quite well and he, off his own back called LG up and told him about my families tragedy and the wee man gave my mate Chris a pair of signed boots by himself, a signed matchworn Celtic shirt signed by himself and a couple of team mates and a pair of boots signed by Tom Rogic to pass on to me for us to sell or auction for charity in her name. I have these items at home and we are planning a charity fund raising night in her memory in our local once lockdown is over with monies raised probably going to the Mermaid foundation, a charity that helps children who are LGBT and have suffered and have additional mental health issues connected to this, will probably be a race night with a raffle etc and will likely auction these items on the night. Leigh Griffiths did this and donated these items off his own back when he heard of my families tragedy and, by all accounts has made similar gestures in the past without seeking publicity for it, it is something I was incredibly moved by and are eternally grateful for.

Liam Craig. Just an absolute gent of a man. I knew him from his time at Falkirk, and when Honest Saints Fan was going through her transplant in hospital and having an utter shite time of it, he got in touch to say if there was anything he could do to help just say the word. I asked him to make a wee video on his phone with him and Tommy Wright just saying they were thinking of her and it wouldn't be long before she was back at McDiarmid and he went totally above and beyond. She ended up with a 5 minute video with half the squad individually wishing her well, profesionally produced by the media team. I honestly was hoping for a 30 second clip wishing her well but he just knocked it out the park. It really lifted her spirits and was so touching. He also arranged a signed top for her and sent it up and always asking after her. He's a fucking diamond. Indebted to him. I was greeting when I saw him lifting the league cup.

I had some spare time earlier and was sad enough to look into this in more depth. Was keen to see the last time we beat all the lower seeded sides than us. The group sizes vary from 5 to 7 teams, and obviously our seeding changes meaning we've had anything from 2-4 teams seeded below us. However your point turns out to be completely correct. The last time we beat the lower seeds home and away in a group was 2002 WC qualifying, but this was a 5 team group and Latvia and San Marino were the 2 teams we managed to beat, so it was hardly a big ask. The group came down to the results between us, Belgium and Croatia - thanks to chucking a 2 goal lead against Belgium we didn't qualify. The time before that was Euro 96 where we beat Finland, Faroes and San Marino home and away. We managed to qualify above Greece, alongside Russia. So basically apart from 2002 when we managed to beat Latvia home and away, it's 25 years since we beat all the lower seeded teams in a qualifying group. This is clearly why we do not qualify. We didn't even manage it in France 98 qualifying but crucially beat Austria and Sweden at home to make up for it. If we'd managed to win these games against lower ranked sides we'd have either qualified automatically or got play-offs for the following tournaments - 2004 (We'd have finished as group winners ahead of Germany had we beaten Faroes and Lithuania!), 2006, 2008 (potentially, would have gone to goal difference or head to head) 2010, 2012 (again, would have been goal difference or head to head) 2014, 2016, and 2018. These are tournaments we missed out on because we didn't take maximum points in double headers against teams like Lithuania, Macedonia, Faroe Islands and Georgia. That is why last night was so frustrating to me. It wasn't that we didn't win, it was that there was a clear lack of appreciation over how crucial it was to win that game. The last 25 minutes should have been us throwing the kitchen sink at Israel, risking our point to get 3 because we know from the last 20 years that dropped points against lower ranked sides is what has stopped us qualifying. Instead the substitutions and the lack of urgency suggested a point wasn't too bad. History shows us that for us to qualify we need to beat every lower team home and away, and if we do slip up in one of them we have to make up for it by having the upper hand in head to heads with your qualifying rivals. This is obviously easier said than done, but again it is the seeming lacking of awareness over how important it is for us that has frustrated me (over the last few years under Strachan and Levein, not just Clarke) and lots of other fans. For all the debate over our ability to produce players over the last 20 years, it is actually our inability to beat teams that have worse players than us that has cost us, it is a mindset and mentality as much as anything else.

Scott Brown once held a door open for me. I've never mentioned this as I've always thought him to be a thuggish oaf. For no reason at all though my opinion has recently changed and I'd like the world to know what a gent he is.

To be honest, if all Alba achieve is educating swathes of SNP voters that their second vote counts for shit and it would be far better placed with smaller, pro indy parties then it will have succeeded. I will be watching the polls and placing my list vote accordingly. I was one of 120,000 who wasted my regional vote in Mid Scotland and Fife in 2016 and I wont be doing it again.

When i was struggling badly with my mental health last year. Boyle sent me a message on Instagram asking if I was ok and if i needed any help. Top man!

Except that's not all that he said. Maintaining social distancing is not 'keeping an eye out', it is a ruinous social and economic restriction.

i'll be controversial here. I like interacting with others at work. I'm currently part time WFH and in the office . when I am in the office others are on their WFH days so it's only about 20% full. I find this & full time WFH both to be very isolating . and absolutely shite for learning and experience gaining, when your all sat together you can look over to someone to see what they're doing before you ask them a question, you just can't call someone on teams multiple times a day without becoming a pest. . we never really went for pints as a team but we did do such basic every day shit as getting rolls for breakfast and sitting together to eat them. The people here are not my "mates" as such but it's better than sitting yourself all day - either at home or in the office

Tony Fitzpatrick does genuinely seem to be an absolute diamond of a person. I know he gets a bit of stick on here with the memes etc. but hopefully it’s in jest. I mentioned it on the St Mirren thread that a friend of mine owns a small cafe in Paisley, and Tony paid a visit one day just before Covid hit. He ordered some food and a coffee and asked to speak to my friend to see if he would be interested in being part of a group of local small businesses that St Mirren were trying to put together, helping those people less well off in Paisley and surrounding areas. My friend is actually a Rangers season ticket holder who wouldn’t have been able to pick Tony Fitzpatrick out of a line up of Tony Fitzpatricks before he walked into his cafe that day, but he phoned me the minute that Tony left his shop to tell me what had happened, and was genuinely taken aback by his positivity and sheer will to help others in our community. What is even more commendable is Tony has messaged my friend 3 or 4 times since the start of the pandemic; asking how the business is coping, asking how his family are keeping, offering any assistance to him where he is able to provide it. I’m certain it’s not only my friend that Tony has kept in touch with, and that he does the same to many others, but I think that’s going well above and beyond his role as a representative of St Mirren, and a very good indicator of what a nice man he is.

Dear Mr Cormack, there are too many formations these days. Please eliminate three. I am not a crackpot.

**Fantasy Golf Week 12** So slow, so slow, we are the Billy Boys After 4 days of great golf and one extremely long and boring one, Billy Horschel is crowned the world's most annoyingly slow and boring golfer, finally edging JB Holmes off the top spot. Over 4 and a half hours for 16 holes, get in the sea pal. His WGC Matchplay win takes him to 17th in the world and now in with a shout for a Ryder Cup place. Organizers are now looking at contingency plans for extending the Cup to the Monday as Horschel's singles match may take a while to complete. Elsewhere, one of the numerous South Africans populating the Euro Tour won again in Kenya, and the fantastically hatted Joel Dahmen won his first PGA title on his 101st start in the Dominican Republic. @J_Stewart remains in pole position, just, going into the last week of the Road to the Masters. He has 3 big guns in DJ, Finau and Matsuyama all playing this week. The chasing pack will need to hope that one or two of the likes of Ancer, Fowler, Champ, Grace, Munoz etc. can pick up a win and/or 2nd place. Standings 667 (40) @J_Stewart 661 (95) @Mr Kane and the lemon cafe 642 (24) @die hard doonhamer 581 (10) @Tartan Dave 576 (50) @alta-pete 558 (93) @Henderson to deliver ..... 537 (20) @lichtie23 525 (10) @Ro Sham Bo 477 (10) @peasy23 403 (36) @Honest_Man#1 396 (10) @Distant Doonhamer Only 1 tournament this week as the players either look to sharpen their game for Augusta, or grab a place in the field for the years first major. We're heading to the desert for the Valero Texas Open. TPC San Antonio, designed by none other than the Great White Shark himself Greg Norman, is the venue. Typical PGA fare for the most part, but a strong finish, the short uphill par 16th is only 350 yards, the par 3 17th is a copy of the 'bunker in the middle of the green' 6th at Riviera, while the 18th is a par 5 with a creek splitting the fairway and running all the way up to the green. Anything from a 3 to an 8 possible there, which should make for an exciting finish.

I will start this post with the statement that I am a football dinosaur. After watching Aberdeen and Scotland this season, get this 3 at the back, 2 wing backs , 4 central midfielders, and some poor lonely b*****d up front, IN THE F*CK*NG BIN. I want teams that I watch try to win games by playing football, and to me that is getting forward by turning and passing upfield to a player in the same team, going down the wings to try to hit the byline, cut the ball back for players in the middle to try to score. People these days w*nk themselves into oblivion with formations, particularly 3 (5) at the back, but why don’t they just concentrate in trying to win football matches. 4 along the back with 2 fullbacks and wide players, who are actually wide players, to get at the opposition full backs. Rather than set up to nullify the opposition, make the opposition change their tactics to combat our team. I’m just pissed off at all the negative play that I’ve watched, and the recent Scotland performances have pushed me over the edge.

I thought I explained it in the post, but I'll repeat it again anyway. The back three system Scotland have played for the last year, which I was initially critical of but have come around to, allows the wing-backs to basically play as midfielders, basically giving you either a 3-4-3, 3-5-2 or 3-6-1 depending on the personnel. In addition to that, if you have Hendry and Tierney (or McTominay and Tierney) you've got two centre-backs who are comfortable progressing out of defence with the ball, and indeed are encouraged to do so. That gives a lot of flexibility in the number of players in attack and the angles which we can attack from. The Faroes are clearly going to sit back and be stuffy, so having a system where they can't really match us up man so easily seems like a good idea. The change that you might make would be to have Fraser as RWB rather than O'Donnell for a game like this (ideally it would be Forrest if he was in the squad). If you play a back four then your centre backs are always more reluctant to get forward and join the midfield because the system doesn't offer them the same amount of freedom. You saw how restricted Tierney was last night in the second half when he basically had to play as only a defender. Getting tied up in "oh he's a defender" is unhelpful, you want to be looking at what the player does for the team. It's just the same as people judging centre-forwards entirely on goals, it's not how football works in 2021, particularly when you don't actually have any centre-forwards who are going to be regular goalscorers at this level. It's why I felt McTominay should have been kept as a centre-back even if he had been playing very well for Man Utd in midfield. I was revisiting that opinion on the basis of how well he played on Thursday, but I thought he was very poor last night which definitely makes me think we should consider pushing him back when Jack is available. It shouldn't really matter whether we play a three or a four against the Faroes, we should be winning anyway, but if we want to play the three at the Euros then it would make sense to get a bit of continuity. It's not like playing a back four against a Pot 5 team is really going to help us decide whether it's something to switch back to later on.

Over the past year the SNP have managed to push support for YES to over 50% consistently for the first time ever, the slight but significant fall in such support coinciding with the Salmond saga. Yet folk wanting to propose that Salmond’s new party will be the saviour of the Independence movement? What unadulterated pish. It just goes to show that there are still gullible fools and contrarians about wanting to claim the roll of ‘real nationalists’, albeit probably fairly small in number.

Pick worse players. Bloody hell, their all out tonight

Never met Bertie Auld myself, and was far too young to ever see him play, but had obviously heard the stories of old Celtic teams and he was always mentioned in high regard, as a person and a player. The company that I served my apprenticeship with took on two graduates for a couple of months work experience and one of them was Bertie Aulds grand daughter. I happened to mention to my Uncle that Bertie Aulds grand daughter was working along side me, and he ran out the room and came back with a framed photo of him and Bertie infront of the Parkhead tunnel, along with an old Celtic jersey he had. He asked if I could get the photo and jersey signed and I said I would ask the question but not promising anything. When I took them into work and asked the question to his grand daughter she said yes of course she would get them signed and back into me the next day. Not only did she get them both signed, she asked if my Uncle had any plans for the weekend, and that her Grandpa would like to invite him to the hospitality at Parkhead as his guest. I didn’t get to attend myself, and have never actually met Bertie Auld, but my Uncle was absolutely delighted, to say the least. Bertie was a hero of his growing up and he still speaks about him like he’s a member of the family, and even though this happened around 2006, he talks about the day he had at Parkhead almost every time I’m with him. I didn’t actually do anything of note but I’m proud my chance encounter ended with my Uncle getting a day in Bertie Aulds company.

A lucky 10/10 for Monday. I have never heard of that musical.

Yep. If there's one thing I can say about Inanimate Carbon Rod it's that his posting over the last 12 months has been indicative of an SNP fanboy. There definitely aren't dozens, if not hundreds, of posts lambasting Sturgeon and the SNP.

Always thought Areola was a bit of a tit when I met him

Quite happy to see the back of as much of this squad as possible.

I don't believe Scotland would be out of the EU for a minute if it were independent and neither does anyone who works there. Being out of the UK should make literally no difference to freedom of movement of goods, people, services or capital between Scotland and the rest of the UK, but unfortunately the little Englanders who currently run the UK see it otherwise so I have to accept that they would impose controls. We're talking about people so backward they're happy to risk violence in Northern Ireland just so they can pretend to be in charge. You may be happy to be beholden to such regressive, xenophobic, parochial, nationalistic attitudes but in general those who support independence seem to be considerably more outward-looking. To me the main advantage of independence is not being run by those people and not being dragged down the social and economic toilet with them. The UK is already the least wealthy nation in our neighbourhood because of American-style economic policies and decades of decline in comparison with those around us are about to accelerate rapidly.

The Brexit Party won the European elections in 2019, leading to the Tory cabinet telling May it was time to go and the Tories replacing her administration with a much more Eurosceptic government led by Johnson who tried to force a no deal Brexit and eventually settled on a deal that was much harder Brexit compared to May’s deal which they then went to the public and won support for at the December general election. It’s wrong to say the Brexit Party were a vanity project. Their successful outflanking of the Tories genuinely helped drive a harder Brexit than May would have gone for and thus their raison d’etre was achieved

I dont necessarily think its fair to suggest what’s quoted there makes him a ‘weirdo’ hes overly cautious because his focus is infectious diseases and I genuinely think there will be a need for testing etc for the next wee while, he’s not talking about shutting down travel etc there, its imo as close to a realist position as you are going to get from someone on the science side of things. I dont agree that domestic vaccine passports are necessary if we maintain 90% odd of the population taking up vaccine offers, from a purely economic standpoint is that even worthwhile (unless there’s a tory donor who can profit off this??). But internationally i think its reasonable so long as there is testing for people who medically cannot be vaccinated. Especially for travel to countries with a slower vaccination rate.

We would've won that game if the old firm colts were in league two.

KB Jr: “But daddy, I don’t even like gymnastics! Please don’t make me go!” KB “Shut it. You’re going like it or not

McDonald exudes this energy:

Including "Large" after the McCormack one feels a bit redundant.

I've always thought that 'players shouldn't go out after a defeat' is ludicrous nonsense that only absolute thickos really believe.

The bit I think you're missing is that Johnson wouldn't get any negative publicity for telling the SNP to get stuffed in any media he needs to care about. He'll be absolutely backed to the hilt by the Mail, Express, Telegraph, Times etc. He wouldn't be criticised in any English-based media for it, because at heart they're all unionists apart from lefties like George Monbiot. Everyone from Ian Hislop to Eddie Izzard would be on his side, as would The Guardian. Keir Starmer will be completely onside too. Remember Lisa Nandy saying the Spanish had the right approach when cracking heads? Allowing an independence referendum is a vote loser in England. He can retain and gain votes by wrapping himself in the Union Jack and saying "I won't give Scotland up, not on my watch" while moving staff here, opening offices and spending money directly on projects here. Even in Scotland, a solid 20% want Johnson to tell Sturgeon to f**k off. One of them is going to red dot this post. They know they're never getting more votes and seats than they get here and that's fine with them. IMO the biggest danger to the independence movement is impatience. Get radical, go outside the mainstream and you'll scare a good 10% away from Yes. There is absolutely no way to independence that doesn't go through the centre and that's just how it is. The biggest threat to the independence movement is a cohort of Eck's zoomers in the Scottish Parliament talking about "taking to the streets" and scaring the bejeesus out of middle Scotland. And FWIW you should ask some people who live in England whether they think the SNP are radical.

For those still obsessing about case numbers, lowest Monday numbers, and lowest Monday positivity rate since the start of October.

Who was the last player to sign from Falkirk that was “done”? Probably our best midfielder of the last 3 seasons

10 for Monday. Pretty fortunate, but I'll take it

He’s maybe been told he can leave, or alternatively told to “go away” but can’t sign as a free agent because he was registered with Falkirk at the start of the window. I’m sure the on shift QOTS expert monitoring the Ayr thread will keep us right

Well we are alert about trends and mutations in flu as they inform the vaccination program so he’s right that we will need to do the same with covid, because each year with an ageing population more people will fall into the realms of being clinically vulnerable to covid. Its not a get a vaccine once and that’s it type thing, it will be recurring (in the vulnerable groups only imo) forever now along with flu vaccines. Continuing to monitor the virus will also let us be better prepared for any new epidemics etc too. Very little of this will actually impact your life, but it will dominate the scientific world and given thats the standpoint he is speaking from its genuinely not an outrageous position. If you ask a subject matter specialist an opinion on something that falls into their remit they will offer the most direct solution to the problem faced without taking into account other variables, which is exactly whats happening here, he’s working from an ideal scenario, some of which will happen, some wont due to pressures from outside the domain of science/competing demands.

Just a wee bit more stats digging. We've had 27 shots on target in our 11 league games this season (4,4,4,1,3,1,0,4,4,2,0) and have scored five goals. Obviously one of them was an own goal, so that means 27 shots = 4 goals, a shots to goals ratio of 1 goal for every 6.75 shots we have. We're currently averaging 2.45 shots on target a game.

Joke's on you, we're shite regardless of if we win and by how many.

So both games seemed to follow this pattern: -start shitely -tweak it after 45-60 mins -look more convincing -equalise -take it down a gear ... So was that last step just my interpretation? Did SC instead think keeping Fraser on the bench Vs Austria (and putting McLean on instead) was more likely to bring victory? Same Vs Israel - Adams and Fraser off for McLean and Dykes? To this naive mind, it feels like sabotage... but at the same time, losing either game would have been catastrophic. Either way, conceding 4 points in these first 2 games - even if it was a strategic concession - feels very risky. Frustrated.

Alba and the arseholes associated with it should be treated with the contempt they deserve.

We weren't playing a half decent team tonight. Teams who qualify for tournaments don't drop points against lower seeds. Israel are a team you need to take six points from six against, as Denmark and Austria will. Just as dropping points v Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Georgia, Macedonia, Wales, Lithuania, Macedonia, Georgia, Belarus, Moldova, Lithuania and the Faroe Islands has cost us in every group going back to 2004, not taking six points from Israel leaves us looking for snookers already. A draw at home to your direct qualification rivals isn't ideal but isn't necessarily a disaster. On the other hand every game v the fourth, fifth and sixth seeds is must win. Until we start taking 18 points from 18 against those teams, we won't be finishing in the top two of groups.

I'm all for having a wide range of views, but this is absolutely abhorrent. Govt stops someone from working. Then refuses to help feed the children made hungry by the govt's decision to stop the parent from working. Parent is unable to claim sufficient benefits which incidentally have been gutted by the current govt's (and preceding) own policies. The decision is in from @Dawson Park Boy - the right thing was done imo. Govt blameless. You beyond detestable c**t.

No-one is forgetting them, as you mention them at least 4 times a day.

Hopefully nothing bad's happened to The Kincardine, but he's going to be furious when he logs back on and finds out he's missed this pish.

New TV show idea...

That is very much against the non contact rules. Straight red.

Brexit: 500 Brit expats living in Spain fear being deported to UK by Wednesday (msn.com) Schadenfreude, but this guy in particular...