Gordan Smith the new chief of the SFA

[general jack o'niell]

to go to hell you first have to believe in the other place, luckily i don't, so if i get run down by a bus tomorrow, my last thought will be "how the feck did the ring and ride get in my front door?"

[StephenJ]

http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/study_38_percent_of_people

[Bobbie En Tejas]

lol .. very good.

It is my opinion that the percentage of unqualified people is considerably higher

[king of kilcousland]

i saw fergie and baxter and grieg and cooper play for rangers, jinkie and mcniell and hood and dalgliesh play for celtic, buchan and harper and miller and mcliesh and jarvie play for aberdeen, donald ford at hearts, sturrock and malpas at dundee utd, willie pettiegrew at motherwell, hell i even saw best play for hibs.

its not that i don't care, i stopped caring long long ago

what exactly is your point here? As soon as scottish football has a rough spell you suddenly stop caring about it and instead concentrate on another league? if only the rest of scotland had an attitude like yours eh!?

[Trapper]

or better still, the only honest man in the game, stephen pressley, a great ambassador for integrity and fair play

Stephen Pressley......honest......integrity......fair play...I haven't laughed so much in ages.

[A Horse called Juan Face]

or better still, the only honest man in the game, stephen pressley, a great ambassador for integrity and fair play

if that isnt sarcasm, then the gen has just proven he knows f all about ball and foot

[MJ]

I see Mr Smith is turning blind eye to the offensive and sectarian chanting by the Rangers travelling support in Inverness, which was clearly audible on Setanta.

Where is the fine?
Where is the duduction of points?

None

What is the solution?

Punish the smaller clubs by banning Rangers fans from away matches, depriving them of valuble income.

Yet again I'm not surprised.....

[daftdog]

I see Mr Smith is turning blind eye to the offensive and sectarian chanting by the Rangers travelling support in Inverness, which was clearly audible on Setanta.

Where is the fine?
Where is the duduction of points?

None

What is the solution?

Punish the smaller clubs by banning Rangers fans from away matches, depriving them of valuble income.

Yet again I'm not surprised.....

I don't think the SPL has powers to ban a full away support from away matches (and i don't ever see them getting it, as every team outside the old firm relies on the income generated, thus wouldn't sanction giving such power to the SPL)

It is Rangers themselves who are considering banning their own supporters from away grounds by not taking their allocated share of match tickets from the rest of the SPL teams.

As for the fine and deduction of points etc you are looking for... The match was only played 3 days ago and the referee has to officially submit any incidents in his official report to the SPL, so give them a chance to read the report and then take action.

The match commander has reported the Rangers fans to the SPL as well, but where are the reports of action being taken at the match??? Surely any incident that warrants being reported must be worthy of action being taken there and then first…

In my opinion: Instead of refusing tickets for their away support, why do Rangers not “police” their own supporters and the home team foots some of the bill (up to 10% of the away support gate) with Rangers footing anything over that in costs (the home team pay for police costs etc). That way Rangers can actually identify and weed out the scum the same way they do at Ibrox. This way the smaller teams are not going to feel it so hard financially the way they would if they didn’t have away support in their ground.

If this is something Rangers would consider and the smaller teams didn’t agree with paying some of the costs, then by all means, do not accept the away allocation of tickets. Rangers can not do this alone. The teams need to work together. I know teams like Caley don’t have a sectarianism problem, but if they and teams like them don’t acknowledge they are responsible for what happens inside their ground also (fans singing shite inside their ground) by not doing something visible to either remove the offenders or cease the offending chanting, they are in some way condoning it. Clubs like rangers who have a problem element need help at away matches and if they don’t start working with the home teams and get co-operation, they may have to resort to refusing ticket allocations.

[ionnsaigh]

" Were up to our knees in Fenian blood ".
Hello hello we are the, (People of Scotland) who have to endure this type of grotesque mentality week after week, year after bloody, year. The Billy Boys where a Glasgow gang, formed purely on a number of common traits, albeit chiefly on religious grounds.
All male, all protestant, all white, all working class, all uneducated, all sharing a bigot ethos. The Billy Boys.
The connection between this gang and the Fascist Right Wing, are adequately documented. The Second World War
was a war against fascism. Our people fought and died in the fight against fascism, Spain being the classic example. Yet we continue to make excuses for what is after all crossly insulting, to all those who fought against.
Loyalty and Servility are indeed bed fellows, each sharing a common theme, that is subservient in nature.
As a working class atheist, humanist, as a Scot I stand angry shocked, and ultimately deeply embarrassed by the apparent support for histories shames.
Hello hello is an anti working class anthem, one that glorifies slaughter, one that the scabs of the Great Strike sang. Grow up Scotland grow up, cast away these negative Presbyterian tendencies, that serve only to blind and feed the appetite of hate and sectarian division.
Lets all become Atheist.

[Sweltered]

By it's very nature, a division has 2 sides, why only bring up one side?

Back to the topic. I don't understand why there is such clamour to punish the team. Why has there been no (well, none that I have seen) condemnation of the lack of action by the Northern Constabulary? Why weren't these morons arrested? From what I can gather, it was only a handfull doing the singing.

And MJ the SPL can't impose sanctions such as deducting points immediatley without a proper investigation. If that were the case, there would be groups of Celtic fans singing Rangers songs at all the Rangers away games

It's instances such as this, that prove that the ban on alcohol at football grounds should continue. Those singing at the the Caley Thistle game were not football fans, but morons who thought they were being smart.

[ionnsaigh]

Aye that's right ,a division has two sides a right and a wrong.

[general jack o'niell]

i'll ignore the snipes regarding "elvis" my comments weren't an opinion on his football skills, just my view of the type of man he is, maybe the fact he signed for celtic says more about the snipers colours than anything i could say, likewise the nae sayers who were quick to condem gordon smith before he even took up his post, he was never going to get a fair go, as highlighted by comments regarding the "away" fans in inverness. from what i can see glasgow rangers have finally woken up to the problem after many years of complacency, the threat of banishment has that effect.

they can only be reasonably expected to root out this dwindling rogue element at home games and thru teir security staff, make other teams aware of the ones who are banned from ibrox, then it is up to these teams to deny this lot entry when rangers visit. not going to happen, simply because thats where the majority of their revenue comes from, playing the old firm at home, they rely on a big travelling support from the two glasgow teams to fill the coffers, money talks, bigotry, does not walk (except on the first two weeks of july).

i think you'll find that "away" fans are a completely different breed to "home" fans, that said i visited parkhead last august to watch celtic play man utd, the small group of man utd fans that appeared to have travelled up for the game were subjected to all the usual "munich" based chants, the retaliated by singing "rangers" songs, spoiling what was meant to be a friendly, but it was the celtic fans that started it, all because the man utd fans booed when "you'll never walk alone" was sung, it being heavily associated with liverpool.

theres a few that post comments regarding the old firm bigotry that i suspect are far too young to remember it at its worst, i do, and i wouldn't subject my children to the type of behaviour that i witnessed when i was their age and younger, as my son asked me "what has this got to do with football?" the answer? an emphatic "NOTHING!!!" all it is is ignorance, learned behaviour from morons who have never seen the inside of a church or chapel, who if were questioned on the history of such things would show their ignorance, for fans of two scottish teams to show allegience to england or the republic of ireland in this day and age highlights the level of such ignorance and makes a mockery of that cheap "run away when the going got tough" comment of a previous poster. i never ran away, i stayed right where i am, i just stopped going as soon as i was old enough to realise that the match was secondary to a majority of rangers fans, this was brought home to me in a glasgow pub owned at the time by one of the greatest ever world players who happened to have twice played for rangers, the joy of mine host and assorted hangers on and cronies turned to horror when they found out that the piper they had been praising and rushing to buy drinks for was a "tim" did it bother this honoured son of campbeltown? not one bit, such sentiment was beneath him. it bothered me tho, to see attitudes change in a flash just because of someones religion was beneath contempt, have attitudes changed? not much if recent events are to be believed!!!

i'll wish gordon smith well in his post, i have a feeling that he is a decent man and given the powers can only do good for the game in scotland and hopefully influence the world game, meanwhile i 'll stick as i have done since 1967 to man utd at all times, any scottish team when they play in europe(except if they are playing man utd) and on a league basis? well we decided on gretna when they entered the league, no real history, just a passion for the game, oh and old firm games? i'm aye ready!!!! despite my concerns, i spent last night shouting at the telly, just as much as if it were man utd playing, willing them to score that vital goal and rejoicing when they did, old habits die hard!!!

[general jack o'niell]

i forgot all about stephen j and his poll on opinions, i hope that wasn't a dig at me, you told me us bass players had to stick together!!!!!

[ionnsaigh]

Only one small, although crucial point into allegiance going to England and Ireland. The later can at least claim some remote legitimacy by Celtic association, alas we have no genetic allegiance to the, Anglo- Saxon group.

[general jack o'niell]

as highlighted by the pitch battles involving travelling rangers supporters in england during the seventies and eighties!!!