Celtic’s run of 27 games unbeaten in domestic football came to an end yesterday as Kilmarnock surprised even their own fans, who bought fewer tickets for the final than they did for the semi-final, perhaps anticipating a reversal.
The bedrock of that magnificent run has been incredibly strong defensive performances; even when Aberdeen scored to take a point earlier this month, their goal benefited from an enormous deflection and the interaction of two debutant defenders.
Kilmarnock’s goal yesterday benefited from no such fortune. Ki didn’t match the forward run of Lee Johnson and Kelvin Wilson didn’t attack the cross. It was, however, a good goal, exploiting the expansive Hampden pitch with some fine passing and excellent movement.
Cammy Bell deservedly won Man of the Match but none of his many saves were spectacular. It could be argued that the stop from Gary Hooper five minutes in turned the match but it was a gift to Bell’s highlights DVD.
Celtic looked like a team who have run out of steam. Profligacy in front of goal and a momentary lapse in defence was all Kilmarnock needed to secure the cup.
I didn’t get a good view of the Anthony Stokes penalty incident at the game, it was Hampden after all, but on the radio going home I heard the evidence clearly confirmed it was not a penalty, which Neil Lennon would realise after he calmed down a bit, despite his initial reaction on seeing a replay.
Television evidence could not be clearer. Michael Nelson went to ground to tackle Stokes and didn’t come within 2 feet of the ball but clipped the Celtic player’s ankle while he was in the process of controlling a fast moving ball.
There was no dispute that Stokes ankle was clipped. No claims were made that Nelson played the ball, or even got close to playing the ball. The incident was an indisputable foul.
When you are running at speed the contact required to force you to lose to lose control of the ball is slight, more than enough contact was made on Stokes to hugely reduce his chances of scoring. Nelson made a rash and ill-timed challenge which should have resulted in an injury-time penalty.
Our sincerest condolences to the Liam Kelly, his family, Kenny Shiels and the Kilmarnock players on the death of Liam’s father Jack in the minutes after full time.
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Surely time for a musical interlude on Five?
“Sorry seems to be the hardest word”
“No regrets”
Awe naw …..EXACTLY…!!!!!!!!!
250,000 in Manchester….jesus that number climbs every month…..This guy is a complete Turkey
Awe Naw
Well put lol
This is great, they are really mad!
when does the flute band come on?
My, moonbeams are addictive.
Cowpat – taking Uncle Tim status to an entirely new level tonight….disgraceful stuff.
The rest of them are deluded currant buns….”a world brand”! Help ma boab!
T4
250,000?
Not a mention about riots, Manchester 08 sounds like Woodstock 68!!!
Ned Nevins outing himself as total Hun….whit a wee rodent.
He’s the Woody Allen of football commentators….without the wit…
tommytwiststommyturns
He grovelled for Britain there…. ‘someone who’s not been mentioned this evening … grovel, grovel … a genius … audible a**rse-lick etc etc’
What an unmitigated merde !
Ghents why are you torturing youselves listening to such drivel
they are deluded fools who think the world owes them
this whole saga has caused many masks to slip
As for Nevin …. He needs a good hard kicking … Rat
“Moonbeans Over Govan” : The Musical
seville67
how are you so sure regarding hmrc not
uttering a word
Correct me if I’m wrong but were Marseille not dis-qualified for bribing refs in the French league?
Was told years ago, when I was one of his constituents, that Ian Davidson was a wee bigot. Well, obviously I’m the bad one because I want his team to die.
Rangers Tax-Case @rangerstaxcase Reply Retweet Favorite · Open
This is sounding like: Operation Mend Fences between Rangers fans & BBC. Myths and PR lies allowed to dominate.
Definitions
if nothing else we have this:
noun
1.adherence to moral principles; honesty
2.the quality of being unimpaired; soundness
3.unity; wholeness
Over the past month I thought I had grown immune to listeining to drivel, courtesy of Clyde.
But I couldn’t keep listening to this R5 nonsense. I gave it less than an hour.
I watched a fair chunk of Dundee Utd v. them at the weekend.
They are very limited tactically.They play the long diagonal high ball endlessly looking for knock downs,fouls and corners.These are the tactics we need to plan against.In my opinion we should play our biggest,hardest team available with 5 in the midfield.NOT a game for Izzy,James F eg.Height and strength at the back should see off their limited game plan.
Make no mistake,they will boot everything that moves on Sunday.We need to put out a team to match them physically.Win the battle first,then win the football match
Springtime for Wattie and Hunnery…..!
fritzsong/PF – thankfully, I’ve only listened to bits of this crud tonight. I couldn’t stomach listening to the full program.
Some guys on here said that they were attending tonight, but they must be hopefully outnumbered and keeping schtum!
T4
Why don’t Rankers just up stakes and move to Belfast?With their belief-system as it is,I’m sure they could levitate the midden to there. If not levitation,psychokinesis or telekinesis. They have the technology,don’t they?
Only askin’….
theweegreenman
Correct me if I’m wrong but were Marseille not dis-qualified for bribing refs in the French league?
No. They bribed a number of Valenciennes players to ‘go easy’ on their players in a crucial league match which was also prior to the CL final
It is a Hun myth that Marseille did anything improper in CL games that season
It was investigated by UEFA at the time and no proof could be found. The French League stripped them of their title and subsequently they were not allowed to defend their CL crown
Kayal33
Where is the Pied Piper when you you really need him?
Sounds like I didn’t miss much on radio 5 live lol, utter hun love in.
Did anyone even mention Rangers paying their tax?
Reading through RTC and tweets online, the lack of basic knowledge of the big tax case is unreal
They keep askin’ the deluded panel what they “want” for Rankers…..dear God….we all ‘want’ that which we can never have. How about ‘needs’?
BTW, Hately sounds totally bevied….nasty orange coloured numpty.
Interesting views by them on Marseille. It’s good to see they agree that teams caught cheating should be punished appropriately. Division 3 seems fair. At least we can all agree on that.
Rangers Tax-Case @rangerstaxcase Reply Retweet Favorite · Open
A discussion about a bankrupt club that breached SFA rules descends into a fan rally! Waste of time. “it was Whyte that did it”
Cheers TMWTL.
I knew it was something that had happened in their own league……
Has anyone in the audience yet grunted ” the big house must stay open”. Comedy gold, funniest line I’ve heard since Blazing Saddles…
Mawdling mawkish moonbeaming mendicants.
Meanwhile back on planet Earth Manchester University won University Challenge.
The team comprised: Luke Kelly,Tristan Burke, Michael McKenna, and Paul Joyce.
I blame the schools.
Trasparent Huns? I’d rather they were invisible…
Why has the reality of the Huns cheating the tax man been forgotten
no mention whatsoever of their cheating
Disgraceful news management with media complicity
jesus wept, i cant believe for a minute that the big tax case has been agreed, the verdict surely has to be made before it can be agreed. if they have agreed a cva, it cant include the big tax case. i hate rangers, but not as much as i love celtic
here’s a thing, if rangers somehow manage to survive via long term payback and a cva, i think we should agree with all clubs in the spl, new rules in which domestic t.v money is split equally with all clubs and clubs only get 50% of profit generated from european football with the rest going to a shared pot to be split between all clubs in the spl. this will make sure they cant gamble on winning competition money and an unequal share of t.v money.
think that will slow any progress they think they will/ can make
lennie’s got real selection dilemmas after yesterday before ibrokes
stick sammi up front
if no vic in defence who goes there, is wilson up for a big big game
is commons matchfit enough for the bench
if brown and vic are in mid where does ledley go
izzie – izzie injured by the way
how do you support the forrest and inevitable chop chop a la healy
will we stretch rangers without sammi and jf on the wings
nosolutionsonlyproblemscsc
Ernie
Michael McKenna is the son of a former workmate of mine…
Rip Pauline McKenna.(Beckitt)
Some hun on R5: I know wee boy (11) who told mum, ‘Let’s not go to Florida this year. Let’s give the £2,000 to Rangers.
Mum: Overcome with emulsion.
Dad (Swelling with pride): Don’t worry son, we’ll still go to Florida … AND … we’ll give £2,000 to Rangers.
That’s the tenor of this much heralded BBC ‘investigation’.