Victor von Doom

I wouldn't support mass shootings in the Bahawalpur sense, but a visit to UEFA HQ by a Martin Bryant, Michael Ryan, Derick Bird, Baruch Goldstein, Anders Breivik, Brigadier Dyer type of head-the-ball wouldn't go amiss... assuming the Nyon branch of Rentokil is too busy to deal with the vermin. "Offensive" / "Sectarian" / "Racist" singing. In a supposedly Western / Enlightenment culture. Displaying banners? What will they say? "Iesus Nazarenus Rex Judeorum"? Or maybe just "Jude" on a yellow background. f**k UEFA. f**k Scottish football. f**k what Scotland has become. f**k this forum. I'm out of here.

I've just had a look at your profile and recent posts. Admit it, man - you're Bob Beckman, aren't you?

What the actual feck!?!?!? I don't even know an SNP voter who'd be moronic enough to use that phrase. Bolton get similar gates to the Sheep, Spoonburners & our tribute act... if they're doing OK. They have/had players on £20k per week in the very recent past. They - and every other English Championship club - receive gargantuan TV fees! How is that anything to do with Herr Thatchler's "Trickle Down" bullscheidt?!? I can just about tolerate SNP voters being thick, national socialist parasites, but insulting folk's intelligence with scheidt like that is a step too far. I suppose I should be grateful that Palestine and homophobia weren't mentioned.

Gubbing in the Wee Cup or not, I'm sticking with ROSS COUNTY this week. "Yah! Boo! Pish!" to the "New Manager Bounce" theory, I'm going with ALBION ROVERS. And partly for the smirk Fraser Fyvie has given me this week, I'm going with COVE RANGERS as well. Still, look on the bright side: Fraser's post-cup-winning career's gone better than the career of the man he passed the ball to to set-up THAT corner... and a lot better than my recent tips.

Well said. This whole thing is a comedy show. It's almost surreal that the two clubs and their fans can be universally portrayed as "victims", but society in general and the media in particular seem to need the catharsis provided by empathising with "victims" on a daily basis. Fans of other clubs will already be out of pocket. When the fixtures came out, many will have gone straight on the Trainline website and booked trains to Manchester - and maybe hotels in the Greater Manchester area - for their teams' games at Bolton and Bury. Those fans have done their dough. Other clubs who've had their games against these two postponed will now have to trek to Lancashire in midweek, possibly in mid-winter, with games being called-off due to weather, when they may be on a cup run and might be suffering from fixture congestion anyway. These are two commercial businesses that have been appallingly run, been trading insolvently and have now reaped what they sowed. It happens every day. The only "victims" for whom any sympathy should be felt are the staff doing "normal" jobs at the two clubs who might be on the bru for a while... and even they would've been aware that their employers were sailing uncomfortably close to the wind, so the P45 won't come as a complete shock. And of course, the really laughable thing is that nobody connected on the football side will suffer at all. The players, coaches, physios, etc. will get their money and will soon find other clubs. The fans will love it. Their club will re-form next season as "Bolton Wanderers 2020 FC Ltd" or "AFC Bury Ltd" and will be back playing again.... at the ground they currently occupy. So long as they retain access to the ground, with the attached guarantee of a massive level of support, any punishment will be almost meaningless. I believe current FA regulations state that new clubs should not be admitted to levels above Division 10, though Bolton in particular might successfully plead that the size of their support could create Health & Safety issues at that level, so they may get in a wee bit higher. In Lancashire, Division 10 is the regional divisions of the North-West Counties League. The fans will have a great time. They'll be going to quaint villages, with village greens and good pubs, within 30 miles of Manchester. They'll get there with no more than an hour's train/bus journey or drive, so no expensive away trips hitting the pocket. They will be welcomed throughout the league as a novelty. They'll win every week. The club will also presumably be allowed to contest the FA Vase - meaning "Jolly Boys' Outings" to quaint villages, with village greens and good pubs, over the Pennines in the early rounds and "Dahn Saaaf" later on, with a strong possibility of a trip to that Scheidt-Hole-on-Circ Stadium in a scummy London suburb that English fans gets so misty-eyed about. Season Two of "2020 FC" will see the NewCo club sluice the North-West Counties Premier. Season Three will be a triumph in a regional division of the Northern Premier League. Then they'll be up to the Northern Premier proper, where they'll be facing the types of club they'd currently meet in Round One of the FA Cup: clubs at the level of top Juniors in Scotland, pulling 200 to 800 fans. That league currently includes FC United of Manchester, who were relegated last spring, and the re-formed Scarborough. Normal service will have resumed. Of course, things will be interesting if both the basketcase outfits do indeed go belly-up and arrive in the same regional division of the North-West Counties League next August. The English "Pyramid" is re-organising at the minute, but there will likely be steps to negotiate at which there are no play-offs and only the champions get promotion. When Rangers went belly-up, I endured a drunken rant by a Sheep fan that had a lot of merit. He lamented that Rangers would be back in the Premier in three years and went through the list of points above: good days out at quaint wee towns, winning every week, Challenge Cup triumphs, etc.... some of which actually happened. His pished solution was that Ibrox, or any ground of a team in a bankrupt situation, shoud be subject to a compulsory purchase order from the relevant local authority and demolished! A community sports facility should take its place, thus ensuring that the new club really would have to start at grassroots level, without the guarantee of a series of swift promotions that access to the Football League calibre stadium provides. That'd be a huge disincentive to insolvent trading. Throw the pair out. Now!

F*** me! 2 a.m. Sunday/Monday & I'm pished as f*** and just read this thread for a laugh. I was in Hungary a couple of years back. That Prime Minister of theirs, Orban Viktor, has some great ideas. I lived in Putney in London many years ago. Gwendolen Avenue. There was a Tourist Board blue plaque on a house about six along from mine. It was to commemorate the Czechoslovakian leader, Edvard Benes. He had some even better ideas than Orban. Europe ought to re-adopt the Benes Decrees extensively... starting with some free train tickets to Holyhead, with onward ferry connections, for quite a lot of posters on this thread. I quite like Ben's videos generally, but he did exceptionally well to capture the specky, balding gobscheidt with the erectile dysfunction problem. A pity neither Polis Glesca nor a Benes Decrees Immigration Service are unlikely to capture the welt. Difficult not to at least hum "The Famine Song" to myself even reading this thread, while watching Specky makes me want to buy Michael Stone a drink.

Hibs unlikely to have their winter of discontent turned glorious summer by this son of York they have in dugout.

Racing Post tips in today's paper are Ross, Peterhead & Airdrie.

Well, that was £20 donated to Bet365. The fat, inbred, bad-tempered Tassie bogan averaged 83... which was still a point-&-a-half better than Snakebite... but Wright won 6-4. The player who had bookies running scared as he recorded eye-watering averages when beating Phil Taylor Down Under and winning that UK Open qualifier seems to have vanished. In the same way the player who tore Tav a new ersehole at Hampden three years ago has vanished. Do they play darts in Iran? Is Cadby maybe related to Anthony Stokes? They share a few traits. Including problems acquiring visas and whacking people in bars. Damon Heta averaged a tick under 100 in pumping James Wade 6-1. He was 9/4 to repeat last week's win over Helen Chamberlain's ex-toyboy. Not quite as good value as Accies at double those odds to repeat last week's win over Killie, but not bad nonetheless. Five 180s in seven legs and 6/8 on doubles. Respectable MvG average in caning an Ocker; less reapectable Cross average in doing likewise. Under 100% books on two of tomorrow's QF's, before the arbers move in and the prices come into line. Heta 31/10 v. Cross - the biggest price of anyone in the last eight, despite beating him last week. That looks worth a bet. There's some 4/11 about Cross and even a bit of 2/5. The alleged spoonburner (not Anthony Stokes) is 7/4 v. MvG and that could be value too. MvG a best 8/15. Gurney 8/15 and Whitlock 13/8. The other arb is Wright as big as 1/2 v. Barney with Sky and Betfair, while Hill's go 23/10 Barney. Free money is just so tedious. Especially in invitational tournaments and glorified exhibitions.

Big Kyle misses two darts to level up at 4-4 and the staunch Ulsterman wins 6-3. The alleged spoonburner whitewashes an Ocker. Whitlock through comfortably. I've had £20 on the fat, inbred, bad-tempered Tassie bogan at 33/1. He was only 34 on Betfair. About to get underway v. Snakebite just now. They really ought to introduce a whole new bunch of sharks into the Bass Strait to stop Tasmanians making it to the mainland. (Europe could do worse than adopt a similar policy in the Med.)

The token invitee/retiree Barney averages 106 in wiping the floor with the token invitee/Maori. Superchin & Big Kyle about to toe the oche. Gurney may be value for the event but Anderson arguably value at 15/8 for this match.

Co nor McN****r at it again, I see. Some lads should be gelded. Kindest thing to do. It annoys the hell out of me that Mayweather & the boxing authorities allowed him a fight. Without that money he'd be back in a craphole in Crumlin inside five years, struggling to make a living as a plumber between bouts of drug abuse. May still happen anyway. I live in hope.

They are not invitational, at least as far as I know. The PDC lot are invited to play, but the top 8 appear to be pressured to go down there to some extent. (Top 7 as Barney is on a farewell global tour.) Melbourne in August is not Barbados. The locals have to qualify through various tournaments. You can say anything other than an open event is "invitational."

Finding a sponsor outwith the Bunco Booth industry might be difficult... but I'd take odds of 1/10 that Doncaster will be slated wildly whoever the sponsor is and whatever the deal might be.

Hmmm! As someone who used to work in the betting industry when it was about gambling, for the Tote and Mecca, I must beg to differ. Bookmaking is an honourable occupation. It involves making a book and profits are dependent on the accuracy of the analysis of a variety of information that resulted in that book being made. If mistakes have been made, informed gamblers will take down a bookmaker's pants. "Bunco Booth" schemes that provide guaranteed, risk-free profits from numbers rackets and glorified one-armed bandits have nothing to do with bookmaking and arguably nothing to do with gambling. They are targeted at the downtrodden, the desperate and the destitute and are played in disproportionate numbers by vulnerable people of low intelligence and mental instability. Numbers rackets that provide risk-free profits for private companies should be banned. Such schemes should be solely for the good of charitable causes or a mechanism through which the government raises money. All the big firms of modern so-called "bookmakers" are gutless, parasitic vermin. Personally, I'd nationalise off-course bookmaking tomorrow.