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[glensmad]

Top-level domestic football in Wales will cease immediately after having elite status rescinded as part of efforts to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
 
At last the penny’s beginning to drop

And the same in Northern Ireland. That is because the scientists and government authorities deem it to be necessary. In Scotland, they haven't come to that conclusion yet.

[Ginaro]

51 minutes ago, Lobby Dossar said:

Top-level domestic football in Wales will cease immediately after having elite status rescinded as part of efforts to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
 

At last the penny’s beginning to drop

You're right. It's probably best to stop football when you have areas around South Wales with over 1,000 cases per 100k in the past 7 days, and a countrywide positivity rate of 15%. (see map below and the map at https://www.travellingtabby.com/uk-coronavirus-tracker/local)

Fortunately we're not Wales - no local authorities in Scotland are above 200 per 100k and our positivity rate is 4.55%.

Edited December 21, 2020 by Ginaro

[Lobby Dossar]

6 minutes ago, Ginaro said:

Fortunately we're not Wales - no local authorities in Scotland are above 200 per 100k and our positivity rate is 4.55%.

Let’s hope we keep it that way !!!!

Don’t think playing friendly’s will help us 

[not man of the match]

So tell me what is the end game for all those playing this season apart from maybe bankruptcy 
Take it Clydebank are praying that they get a shot at the playoffs so they can take another step to try and reach their holy grail of reaching the big leagues.
You were there once before and made a rip roaring c**t of yourselves so just content yourself with trying to be Billy Big Bass at the level your at.

You’re making a rip roaring c**t of yourself everytime you post on here just now.

Clydebank will be just fine. The only thing we’re praying for is for the rain in California.

[gaswork]

The three main bedwetters in here are pathetic. 

One a Talbot supporters who doesn't go to any games. 

One a Pollok supporter who goes to very few Pollok games 

One a Lesmahagow who goes to very few games all have openly admitted to this on here. 

All preaching and take the moral high ground telling grown men be it players, management and committee what to do in a controlled outdoor environment all within the legal framework of the laws. 

Players,  management,  committee men and the west of scotland leadership are all fighting to keep the competitive  non league game alive and going , to give us  all something to look forward to in a small way on a Saturday , to keep our clubs in a small way relevant in these times , the importance of the  game of football at all levels should never be underestimate no matter what there doom and gloom merchants say  . 

Nothing but proud of all those involved and the vast majority of everyone involved in the non league game will feel the same make no mistake about it. 

Edited December 21, 2020 by gaswork

[jimbaxters]

40 minutes ago, gaswork said:

The three main bedwetters in here are pathetic. 

One a Talbot supporters who doesn't go to any games. 

One a Pollok supporter who goes to very few Pollok games 

One a Lesmahagow who goes to very few games all have openly admitted to this on here. 

All preaching and take the moral high ground telling grown men be it players, management and committee what to do in a controlled outdoor environment all within the legal framework of the laws. 

Players,  management,  committee men and the west of scotland leadership are all fighting to keep the competitive  non league game alive and going , to give us  all something to look forward to in a small way on a Saturday , to keep our clubs in a small way relevant in these times , the importance of the  game of football at all levels should never be underestimate no matter what there doom and gloom merchants say  . 

Nothing but proud of all those involved and the vast majority of everyone involved in the non league game will feel the same make no mistake about it. 

Another one getting hung up on who I am. 

Your sentiments on the game at this level are as admirable as they are common among posters on this area of the forum. The best interests of the game are something we all uphold. It's just that right now it's flying in the face of the plight of the nation, despite you beating your chest.

[Dev]

4 hours ago, Lobby Dossar said:

Top-level domestic football in Wales will cease immediately after having elite status rescinded as part of efforts to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
 

At last the penny’s beginning to drop

If you check the covid figures for Wales you will see that it is a covid disaster zone in the south and the west. The figures are hugely different from Scotland's.

You may also check a little further and you will see that only16 clubs plus a small top Ladies League have played at all this season. Are you even suggesting that football was in any way responsible for the covid situation in Wales? 

[cmontheloknow]

7 hours ago, gaswork said:

The three main bedwetters in here are pathetic. 

One a Talbot supporters who doesn't go to any games. 

One a Pollok supporter who goes to very few Pollok games 

One a Lesmahagow who goes to very few games all have openly admitted to this on here. 

All preaching and take the moral high ground telling grown men be it players, management and committee what to do in a controlled outdoor environment all within the legal framework of the laws. 

Players,  management,  committee men and the west of scotland leadership are all fighting to keep the competitive  non league game alive and going , to give us  all something to look forward to in a small way on a Saturday , to keep our clubs in a small way relevant in these times , the importance of the  game of football at all levels should never be underestimate no matter what there doom and gloom merchants say  . 

Nothing but proud of all those involved and the vast majority of everyone involved in the non league game will feel the same make no mistake about it. 

I really don't care at all about whether or not the season goes on, just glad my own club - backed by supporters and committee - withdrew as it was not going to be affordable. What the rest if you do is up to you. If that's bed-wetting, you've a strange definition of it.

[Lobby Dossar]

9 hours ago, gaswork said:

The three main bedwetters in here are pathetic. 

One a Talbot supporters who doesn't go to any games. 

One a Pollok supporter who goes to very few Pollok games 

One a Lesmahagow who goes to very few games all have openly admitted to this on here. 

All preaching and take the moral high ground telling grown men be it players, management and committee what to do in a controlled outdoor environment all within the legal framework of the laws. 

Players,  management,  committee men and the west of scotland leadership are all fighting to keep the competitive  non league game alive and going , to give us  all something to look forward to in a small way on a Saturday , to keep our clubs in a small way relevant in these times , the importance of the  game of football at all levels should never be underestimate no matter what there doom and gloom merchants say  . 

Nothing but proud of all those involved and the vast majority of everyone involved in the non league game will feel the same make no mistake about it. 

Not a Gow supporter, if Motherwell are away from home I check Gow, Larky, Albert, Carluke, Lanark and Forth fixtures and decide which one to go to.

3 playin and 3 not playing and the decision to play cost one of their management teams to resign.

As you say the importance of football for the local community at this level should not be underestimated but explain how the community can look forward to something they cannot attend on a Saturday ??

This new strain is 70% more infectious and everyone is being advised not to make unnecessary journeys or travel between local authorities. At the moment Scotland has relatively low numbers with the cases mainly in Glasgow and Lanarkshire areas. No one is saying playing football is the problem it hundreds of people travelling unnecessarily all over the West of Scotland that is the problem,all for a game of football (friendly) that counts for nothing at the end of the season. 

Perhaps if these team had any respect for their local community they would suspend playing till new strain was under control.

Oh if your under any illusions on how bad things are take a trip to Wishaw General, there is not a spare bed in the place and they have been turning ambulances away for close on a week.

Edited December 22, 2020 by Lobby Dossar

[Hillonearth]

2 hours ago, Lobby Dossar said:

Not a Gow supporter, if Motherwell are away from home I check Gow, Larky, Albert, Carluke, Lanark and Forth fixtures and decide which one to go to.

3 playin and 3 not playing and the decision to play cost one of their management teams to resign.

As you say the importance of football for the local community at this level should not be underestimated but explain how the community can look forward to something they cannot attend on a Saturday ??

This new strain is 70% more infectious and everyone is being advised not to make unnecessary journeys or travel between local authorities. At the moment Scotland has relatively low numbers with the cases mainly in Glasgow and Lanarkshire areas. No one is saying playing football is the problem it hundreds of people travelling unnecessarily all over the West of Scotland that is the problem,all for a game of football (friendly) that counts for nothing at the end of the season. 

Perhaps if these team had any respect for their local community they would suspend playing till new strain was under control.

Oh if your under any illusions on how bad things are take a trip to Wishaw General, there is not a spare bed in the place and they have been turning ambulances away for close on a week.

With regard to the local community, every team had its own unique set of circumstances and a tough decision to make based on them, with no right or wrong involved , as either way was unfair on the fans...does a club carry on in full knowledge that for the foreseeable the fanbase have to support from afar, or shut up shop and basically pin a tweet to the club twitter saying "Have a great year and see you next August...maybe." Either way sucks.

The ones that decided to play are doing their level best to engage with the support - in our case our (free) live streams are averaging 7-800 viewers and our (free) online match programme averaging 4-500 downloads per issue. Granted, at best it's a poor excuse for a matchday experience....don't ever say it's nothing though.

If you'd been at a game, you'd know how seriously the matchday protocols are being taken - it's possible that a minority of teams are taking a cavalier approach, but based on the evidence I've seen everyone seems to be following the rules to the letter... I could even point to one instance of them being slightly over-zealous in their approach. In terms of travel etc. everyone likely to be travelling has been supplied with an exemption letter from the SFA, so it's all legal, above board and officially-sanctioned whether you agree with it or not.

I also notice you've made the same tiresome wee "friendly" barb about four times now. There are still league titles to be won, and they're being as fiercely contested as ever regardless of what it counts for at the end of the season....I'd be keen to hear your rationalisation of how that materially differs from the last century of league competition when the winner of the top division habitually battered their head off a glass ceiling ?

That being said, part of what you say is correct - it's a fluid, constantly evolving situation and events could well overtake us to the extent that competition needs to be suspended.

And if that proves to be the case, at least we can say we tried.

 

Edited December 22, 2020 by Hillonearth

[Sortmeout]

14 hours ago, Dev said:

If you check the covid figures for Wales you will see that it is a covid disaster zone in the south and the west. The figures are hugely different from Scotland's.

You may also check a little further and you will see that only16 clubs plus a small top Ladies League have played at all this season. Are you even suggesting that football was in any way responsible for the covid situation in Wales? 

I think any event where people can gather will have an impact on the Covid numbers. So work, shopping and football will all have an impact on the numbers in their own way.

[Dev]

29 minutes ago, Sortmeout said:

I think any event where people can gather will have an impact on the Covid numbers. So work, shopping and football will all have an impact on the numbers in their own way.

I agree that anything can have an impact on the numbers but Test Track and Trace hasn't shown that football matches with no fans in attendance has contributed. There have been players who have been tested positive but then they've self-isolated and or matches have been called off.

In Wales there have been about 35k positive tests in the last two weeks and two days. This compares with approx 90k cases since the start of the pandemic. Incidentally the WP claims that there have been around 400 cases of the new variant covid identified out of the recent 35k positive cases. This was considered sufficient to close down football in Wales except for the four clubs which play in England.

Given that the new variant covid is being regarded as quicker to spread it is a real concern.However, to create the impression that football is in anyway responsible for the disastrous increase on the number of recent positive cases of the non-variant covid virus is clearly ill-considered. Could it be part of the hapless WPs attempt to regain control of covid by creating an atmosphere of fear? After all it is hard not to come to the conclusion that the WPs efforts so far this autumn and winter have landed Wales in this mess.

[clash city rocker]

On 21/12/2020 at 09:09, passbackdave said:

Aye cos use play great football on grass lol use aint the great passing tommy bryce side anymore

Mon the papers

In fairness to Bankies plastic might just aboot be a tad better than the grass pitch yous had...a wee bit safer and softer.

[BANKIEBILL]

8 hours ago, clash city rocker said:

In fairness to Bankies plastic might just aboot be a tad better than the grass pitch yous had...a wee bit safer and softer.

How very dare you  ... Holm Park pitch had come on leaps and bounds. Its used 7 days a week now though and that couldn't have happened previously . 

[passbackdave]

In fairness to Bankies plastic might just aboot be a tad better than the grass pitch yous had...a wee bit safer and softer.

Stookie worked hard on our grass pitch in i thought it was 1 of the best in the league considering 2 teams played on it. The grass pitch at the vale is lovely tbh

Mon the papers.

[tell_me_more]

On 15/09/2020 at 12:08, LongTimeLurker said:

The idea of a vaccine arriving to save the day was mainly being used in the first half of the year to give people the idea that they could somehow stay safe and would be able to avoid being exposed to the virus as that helped them from a mental health sort of angle. Anyone who understood how exponential curves work when an R0 number is well above 1 knew better, so the explanation they got for the lockdown was that the active infection numbers curve had to be flattened so ICU capacity wasn't completely overwhelmed when the first wave hit its peak. As it turned out it wasn't and the peak on fatalities was about an order of magnitude lower than originally feared.

Despite all the recent media hysteria the number of daily deaths is still a flat line close to zero, so the "second wave" is mainly a result of a lot more testing being done now on mild cases than was the case back in April. There is nothing inevitable about not having a season at WoS sort of level in other words, because the pandemic is now most likely largely over in a UK context and most people have already had their chance to play Russian roulette with it. In most cases that will be unknowingly because they were asymptomatic or had some sort of cross-immunity from earlier coronavirus infections.

The politicians still need the "second wave" to start going down now before lifting more restrictions though because a large chunk of the population doesn't understand any of that and still thinks vaccines are important in all of this because they don't realise the horse has long since galloped away for most people in terms of being exposed to the virus meaning there would be little to be gained now by bolting the stable door with a jag in the upper arm.

So how did all your theories pan out?

 

[holmparkheroes]

8 hours ago, passbackdave said:

Stookie worked hard on our grass pitch in i thought it was 1 of the best in the league considering 2 teams played on it. The grass pitch at the vale is lovely tbh

Mon the papers.

Easy to have a great pitch when there’s nae fitba played on it. Not that this is the first season...... Kiddin’ !

[LongTimeLurker]

11 hours ago, tell_me_more said:

So how did all your theories pan out?

Vaccines arriving on the scene that actually worked at Phase 3 was extremely good news even if a large chunk of the population already got their chance to play Russian roulette with the virus in the first half of the year.

There is even less excuse not to have a season now as much more effective herd immunity can be rapidly built up that way once more than just Pfizer is available. At that point the media and politicians won't go into hysterics again over relatively minor secondary infection waves when society tries to open up as it will be much less likely for R0 to rise above 1 in a sustained national rather than temporary localised manner.

MHRA has the full data set from OxfordAZ now so approval may come as soon as Monday setting us on a trajectory towards full normality:

 

Edited December 24, 2020 by LongTimeLurker

[tell_me_more]

You were heavily on the side that the virus would be over by November at one time were you not due to the large chunk of the population being exposed tothe virus earlier in the year? That disn't pan out too well unfortunately.

On the contrary rather than playing out a pointless season which will be over before the players are anywhere near to gtting vaccinated and with the new more virulent strains I would close it today at lower levels help stop the spread throughout the wider more vulnerable community.

[LongTimeLurker]

30 minutes ago, tell_me_more said:

You were heavily on the side that the virus would be over by November at one time were you not ...

January was a more realistic starting date than October was my posture as far back as August because I knew there was going to be an apparent "second wave" when the economy was opened up. The new and probably more contagious variant they are talking about on the news is a legitimate second wave that would need significantly more infections to happen in the absence of a vaccine before herd immunity starts to kick in naturally when R0 dips below 1. I didn't see that one coming as all the indications had been that there was a low mutation rate.

What we had previously was just the delayed tail end of the first wave when opening up the economy again meant more infections were going to be needed to achieve herd immunity again as people got out and about more creating more scope for transmission. The more lockdown measures imposed by the politicians the longer things were going to be dragged out on that, which is why I suspected it would take until at least January before Nicola S would be comfortable on letting crowds in given how cautious she has been. It was starting to happen in some areas before the new variant kicked in with Kello Rovers already OK that way given they are based in D&G.

Given it is only a new variant in the SE of England rather than a new strain there are unlikely to be issues with vaccine efficacy at this stage, so still looking good for a reasonably rapid trajectory towards normality if OxfordAZ gets the nod on Monday.

Edited December 24, 2020 by LongTimeLurker