Lex

Sinner wins it in an epic five setter over Medvedev. He went two sets down and won it in five, remarkable stuff. The first of many slams for the young Italian I’m sure. Him and Alcaraz are going to dominate the remainder of the decade at least.

FT 0-1 Frustrating, didn't play anywhere near as well second half as we did in the first, but I still think we deserved a point. Just got no one to score. Three home losses in the league in a row now, after not losing any of our first nine. Need to turn the home form back around quickly or we won't be getting top six.

HT 0-1 Actually played quite well, don't think we deserve to be behind. But the familiar tale of a severe lack of quality in the final third is hindering us, we've had three clear cut chances but no cutting edge. The goal is poor by Hemming again, he's got to come and get that. Still very much in the game however.

McMenamin not in squad. That midfield two of O’Hara and Kwon going to have to cover a lot of ground in this 5-2-3 formation we seem to be going with. Big chance for Jamieson.

I’d love to believe this will stop certain Saints season ticket holders buying tickets for their old firm supporting friends and family for the home end. It won’t, though, and there will be a whole host of unfamiliar faces all around the stadium today. Anyway, expectations are low. Therefore, I have a good feeling about this. All of our results against those two come when we are least expecting it.

Sinner beats Novak in four sets We will have a new Australian Open Champion for the first time since 2014.

After three quarter finals it looked like we would have seeds 1, 2, 3 and 4 in the semis, but it was not to be. An upset of sorts happened in QF number four, Norrie's conqueror Zverev beating Alcaraz in four sets. The smart money is on a repeat of the US Open final in August, Djokovic v Medvedev. Sinner will have one of these breakout wins against Djokovic one day, but probably not here, maybe in 2025. I can't see how Zverev beats Medvedev on the hard court to be honest, but stranger things have happened.

Obviously not the draw any of us would have picked, but we certainly have an outside chance. With doing away with the replays it makes the home draw much more of an advantage. Let's hope we can at least make a game of it and not be two goals down inside the first six minutes, like we were a few weeks ago. 0-0 AET Saints to win 3-1 on pens.

TV games nap: Friday 1945 Aberdeen v Bonnyrigg Saturday 1215 Airdrie v Hearts Saturday 1730 Rangers v Ayr Sunday 1600 St Mirren v Celtic

Ties to be played weekend of 10th February. Kilmarnock v Brora/Cove Rangers ICT v Hibs Aberdeen v Bonnyrigg Rose Greenock Morton v Motherwell Airdrie v Hearts Rangers v Ayr United Patrick Thistle v Livi St Mirren v Celtic Celtic for the second year in a row in the last 16 for us. FFS.

Yeah that was a great chance for him yesterday, and he was disappointing, again. He can’t really get a game when everyone is fit, but because of injuries he got his start yesterday in his favoured attacking position at home to a lower league club. He did nothing and it was no surprise he was the first to be hooked. We improved markedly as soon as he went off, Jamieson just looked far more interested. If we had got him on a free transfer there wouldn’t be this kind of scrutiny on him, he’s a decent enough squad player. It’s the fact we paid big money for him and he’ll be on a big wage that’s the problem. I think we all hoped we were getting another McGrath/Ronan type of player. A technician that would get regular goals and assists and would win us games of football by themselves, as they both did. It became clear early on he was nowhere near the level of those guys, he has one goal all season, and that was in a game we lost. I expect it will be back to the bench for him at the weekend.

Draw to take place Sunday 21/1/24 live on BBC Scotland from 1915. Teams in the hat as of right now: Aberdeen Heart of Midlothian Hibernian St Mirren Airdrieonians Ayr United Bonnyrigg Rose Greenock Morton Inverness Caledonian Thistle Kilmarnock Livingston Motherwell Patrick Thistle Rangers Celtic Brora Rangers/Cove Rangers I’ll take Buckie Thistle away.

The gift that keeps on giving

FT 1-0 Job done. Bit of quality was the delivery from the corner from Greg Kiltie, bullet header from Gogic and that’ll do it. Had other chances, smacked the bar and the keeper made a good save low down from Kiltie but 1-0 is okay. The kind of game that when we lift the cup in May no one will remember.

0-0 and a tough watch all round. We did have the ball in the net from a rebound, offside. Queens hoofing a lot of long balls and fair play to them it’s working. Few shaky moments from our back line with the bouncing ball. We are going need a bit of quality and guile in the final third to win this. Something we have been lacking all season.

Challenger tour back in Glasgow next month for the first time in years. It's a decent day out and there's usually some names you've heard of playing along with the usual youngsters and jobbers. Best part is it's free to go along and watch. All the big names through today, but Djokovic did drop another set against the Aussie Popyrn before winning in four. He will play the conqueror of Murray. Etcheverry, in the next round. Tiafoe the highest seed to fall so far.

The reality is that unless something unusual happens, Trump will win in November. The republican primaries is just an elongated coronation of him as their candidate. Unless Sleepy Joe does the right thing and step down - which doesn’t look likely - he will lose and it will be a landslide.

What's happening to Andy is perfectly normal and happens to almost all pro tennis players. They peak late 20's, then their body starts to breakdown and by the time they're in their mid 30's they're no longer competitive at the top level. This has happened to all but three of the major winners of Andy's generation, Del Potro, Cilic, Wawrinka are all in a similar boat. I remember the great Pete Sampras retired at 31 and that was not unexpected, he had injuries mounting up, was past it and it was time for him to quit. Nadal, Federer and Djokovic, who all won slams after their 35th birthday, is the abnormal thing here. They're the three oldest slam winners of the last 50 years. I suspect their freakish longevity is having an influence and making other players carry on a bit longer than they should have. Murray, Wawrinka and CIlic all grand slam champions, all mid to late 30's, all still plugging away, and all three of them lost in the first round of the Australian Open in the last 24 hours. Del Potro did retire but he's trying to make a comeback. They should all have packed it in years ago, but it also wouldn't surprise me if they all kept going for another year or two, and why not.

Murray out in straight sets, 6-4, 6-2, 6-2. Sair yin considering it was a kind draw against a player who has no realistic chance of getting beyond the third round. Looked like he didn’t want to be there in that last set. Have to expect that will be the last time we will see him at the Australian Open.

Murray two sets down to Etcheverry in intense Melbourne heat. He looks done, needs a miracle.

Djokovic through in four sets against 18 year old Croat Dino Prizmic. Took him over four hours, which is his longedt first round slam match of his career apparently. Prizmic definitely looks like a player that we will be seeing a lot more of, there’s not many 18 year olds that have taken sets off Novak in grand slams.

Interesting one. A midfielder who joined Celtic in the summer and hasn’t played for them since. Hope he’s good.

To be fair Olusanya comes off the bench more often than he starts, so it should be him benefiting from tired defences. He just doesn't have same the impact when he comes off the bench that Grieve has. Thought this was quite interesting - he's been given offside the second most in the entire league. Given he's not played a full game once all season - he's either been subbed on or subbed off (or sent off) in every game he's played - and we aren't exactly a team that's on the front foot often, that is an absolutely remarkable stat. Not only does he not score, he's breaking down loads of our other attacks because of his poor positional play. But like I said, we have six strikers who all started games in December, we clearly have to get rid of at least one of them. I don't believe it's been a decision to keep Olusanya over Grieve per se, I just don't believe there would be any other clubs interested in taking him. Why would they be? His numbers are awful and he flopped at Arbroath. Whereas, there were clubs interested in taking Grieve on loan, so it's him that leaves.

Kind draw for Andy, in the first two rounds at least. If you’re going to get a seed in the first round you’d want someone like Etcheverry. He’s a clay courter who’s never been beyond the second round of a slam that isn’t the French Open. I expect Andy will win that and he will probably get Monfils in the next round, which will be more of a challenge. The Frenchman is long past it too - he's even older than Andy - but will still carry a threat. If he wins that it does get a bit tougher, Murray is in line to play Novak Djokovic in round three.

One of our strikers was always going to leave, would much rather it was Olusanya than Grieve but here we are. After all Grieve has more goals than Olusanya this season despite playing far less minutes. I guess there weren’t any Championship clubs willing to take Toyosi off of our hands after his unsuccessful spell on loan to Arbroath this time last season.