There’s been a lot of talk about the Lisbon Lions recently; you may have noticed. Go ask you dad about them, he’ll tell you they could take care of themselves. For all the pretty football, they still had to win the battles.
Consider also the team during Seville season. Thompson, Lennon, Sutton, Hartson, Mjallby and Valgaeren never failed to meet an opponent square on. They were all hard men. Don’t even ask about Bobo, he terrified opponents by the scale of his shadow, no opponent dared take him on.
All of those duties now fall to Scott Brown, he’s our hard man. It’s an important role and he doesn’t have much in the way of support.
You get the feeling there’s a notion that the rest of the guys can concentrate on being wonderful, in the knowledge that Scott will sort out the troublemakers. He was, of course, wrong yesterday, not for the first time, although red cards are not a regular occurrence.
Sky TV could not have hand-picked a better analyst of this situation than Barry Robson. Barry arrived at Celtic in January 2008, picked up the mantle of Sorter Outer in Chief, and stamped his authority on the league title. We all knew that, unlike a then often-rash Scott Brown, Barry could work within the lines and still get the job done.
But even the such a master of subtle intimidation can get it spectacularly wrong. Last year he lamped former Celtic team-mate, Scott McDonald, a minute after coming on as a substitute. If you want a hard man in your team, don’t go yelling about him when he acts like a hard man moments after being assaulted from behind.
The only surprise about the late penalty for Ross County’s Schalk’s outrageous dive and subsequent penalty was that it happened this weekend, not next. Set your watch for it, people, if you think the treble will be decided purely on meritocratic terms, you’ve not watched as much football as me.
Brendan’s about to find out the limits of his apparent powers in Scottish football.
BOOK AND T-SHIRT OFFER ENDS TUESDAY AT MIDNIGHT!
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Beyonce
I couldabin a contender.
But for those bliddy Aldi ads.
Dont let cheats win HH
Penalty!
The fact that yesterday’s ref might have gone to a RC school has no bearing on his refereeing.
Next Sunday’s ref was head of RE in a Catholic school, yet awarded the old died Huns a penalty, when he was looking the other way!
Anyone who wants to progress as a ref in Scotland knows that they have to fit in with the prevailing ethos in the SFA, which appoints refs.
I would imagine any other team in Scotland could put together a show reel of mistakes that refs have made in their games this season, though perhaps none as bad as yesterday’s “decision”.
Well any other team bar one. In all honesty I cannot remember the Zombies being on the wrong end of any such decisions!
The notion that the refs sit down and plan all this is one that I do not subscribe to at all, since there is no need for a formal planning session. They all”know” before hand what gets refs promoted and what doesn’t. As someone once said “You don’t need a conspiracy, when you have a group of like minded individuals”
HH
I blame…………………. Kafflik Schools
FTSFA
BMCUW
I wasn’t dissing yer mate, I was pointing out the absurdity of calling someone an assistant linesman, then allowing a ref to instruct them not to assist!
Assistant linesman??
FFS, he’ll be really mad now!
Celtic should smash this mob apart next week, honestly we should blow them away with the quality of our play. No excuses should be accepted, go and do it. Pummel them. Tavernier is a dud defender and they are going to play with two novices in defence. Get them pumped.
BEATBHOY
I know,mate. Hence the (!) after it. I canny do them emoji things,I’m afraid!
Celtic-daft,and his lad-born in The Centenary Season-is the same. I’ll get my reward in heaven.
I wonder just how blatant they will be.
I think we are being offered a choice — unbeaten in the league or the chance of a treble.
At least it is keeping up our interest right to the season end.
And when we forget about this weeks pen and next weeks comes will analysis be to forget last weeks worry about next weeks in league derby clash?
MWD
PAUL67
No complaints from me about the red card. Strictly speaking,it was. To point out the ref’s previous leniency for worse will be a waste of time.
Brown had obviously decided he’d had enough. Who wouldn’t?
I was surprised and delighted with the speed our lads were over there helping him out. Not before time.
Regarding yesterday BR needs to learn some of the basics.
New system and new players — asking too much of the team.
We were very disjointed at times — SA took a long time to get into the game.
CMcG was out on a limb and MD / ScS were pretty slow to get up to speed.
ES really is having a hard time.
Plus the lull after our second goal just allowed the MIB to gather their thoughts and plan our downfall.
Hartley bagged, ridiculous
ruud gullit for paul hartley
So next week we’ll be saying on a scale of One…………… to Alex Schalk how much of a dive was Kenny Miller’s
penalty?
One thing in the game that truely does ma heed in is the fact that Referees(or assistant referees) never EVER have to explain their decisions to the public. Yes of course they will have to explain in match reports to their superiors or in ‘private’ to managers, but they are never asked, on camera, “right Mr (insert fud), why did you make that decision”. Managers HAVE to give interviews, in the hope they say something inflammatory, to give SKY endless reruns and talking points for days. Refs, never.
RC were very poor in the first half.
We just played down to their level — the lack of chances was shocking.
Very low energy half with the goal coming out the blue.
The remedy to the institutional cheating of the SFA referees’ fraternity is to slam 5 past the huns next week and then have a right old chuckle when Gollum fulfils his mandate with their dodgy penalty.
Then rinse and repeat for Snake Mountain the following Saturday.
Beat them by playing beautiful, inventive football, as someone once said.
Paul Hartley relieved of his duties
From manager of the month in February to bagged in April
The Aldi advert is really annoying.
However I do really fancy a cheap Easter egg.
Decisions, decisions …
Robertsons religion/school is totally irrelevant
If RC had any integrity they would suspend and fine Schalk for the blatant dive, a deliberate and orchestrated dive to con the ref into giving the penalty (not that Scottish refs need much persuasion).
All this crap about anticipating the tackle etc… as if that in some way justified the dive. Utter crap!!
His body movement, in particular the movement of his left leg, was a well rehearsed and premeditated act.
Schalk should be banned from the game. Cheats like him bring the game into disrepute every time they play. They teach younger players that this is how ‘professionals’ behave.
There’s only one way to stamp this behaviour out of the game, ban him.
Oops. There was me thinking that the game was played with integrity. Forgot my geography for a moment….
If we can keep 11 men on the pitch over the next 2 weekends we should win comfortably.
As long as they have 12 men on the pitch they have a chance.
Business end of the season. Big matches – and honest mistakes- coming thick and fast.
HH jamesgang
The ‘highly rated’ Referee
BMCW @ lunchtime
We beat ourselves up.
We do not make up the rules.
If he had not been wearing Greman and White SB would not have been sent off.
We need to play / comment to the standards of the SPL — not be holier than tough and suffer in silence.
The KDS graphic from last night tells you everything you need to know.
MEA CULPA on 17TH APRIL 2017 12:18 PM
Barrie Robson said he would have done the same yesterday after the game, although tried to sweeten it by saying,”would have waited til i felt some contact”. a shocking thing for a coach to admit imo.
Good Afternoon.
Here are my latest offerings for anyone interested. One about the abysmal Sky coverage of yesterday’s game:
https://theclumpany.wordpress.com/2017/04/16/the-skys-the-absolute-limit/
One about Sevco’s latest link to a famous player:
https://theclumpany.wordpress.com/2017/04/16/relative-successes/
And one about bringing up religion on a football banner:
https://theclumpany.wordpress.com/2017/04/15/religious-observance/
B67- he was led into the comment by that fud Tanner, who was trying to justify the dive, agree he shouldn’t have said what he did mate.
MADMITCH
Oh,I’m not the holier than thou type. Far as I’m concerned,County player had it coming.
The only concern is refereeing consistency. We can’t use his previous as a reason for not giving a red. And we can’t say he only got sent off for wearing The Hooooops!!!!
As has been said,the club should have had this sorted a long time ago. Time to make up for lost time,Celtic.
Dundee hoping for the dead cat bounce to keep them up.
The only thing wrong with Broonies tackle was that it was on Boyce and not Schalk.
BMCW @ 12.28
There has been a thousand worse tackles in the SPL this season.
However there has not been 1000 red cards for those tackles.
SB only got sent of because he was wearing green and white.
It was a bad tackle — maybe it should be a red — but by the standards of the SPL this season it was not an ordering off.
However it is when we are involved.
The KDS graphic tells you everything you need to know.
Our players are getting targeted in some instances.
In other instances agrees ice players on the opposing team are going in harder than usual because they know the MIB is in full “Ludge mentality” mode and it is a free fire zone for them.
Having watched Sportscene last night, I would say the Schalk “penalty” award was the 2nd worst reffing decision in the SPFL this weekend.
I think Richie Foran and ICT suffered a bigger injustice with much more major ramifications. And the ref concerned is going to be reffing our semi-final at Hampden.
Both Robertson and Collum should have been demoted this weekend coming.
Sheff Utd giving McCall’s mob a doing just now, and playing good football too