I read Michael Lewis’ Moneyball 13 years ago. It was an exploration of key metrics missed by most of baseball and exploited by the then Oakland Athletics general manager, Billy Beane. The lesson from the book was that while each sport has a standard set of metrics the vast majority of coaches and execs follow, if you want to over-achieve against richer opponents, you need to find different, better, metrics.
Adopt the same operational rules as everyone else and over any period, you will punch your weight, not more and no less. Oakland (the A’s) understood this and chose a path less worn. They sold their most saleable assets and bought better players from the unfashionable counter. Some with awkward gaits, overweight or for various reasons just didn’t look right to the rest of elite baseball.
If Billy Beane was working in football today he would sign Leigh Girffiths in a heartbeat. Read his recent rap sheet, he is the most Moneyball player on the planet. The new manager is likely to take a look at the headlines and shrug, which is a pity.
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I’ve backed horses in the Grand National for 10 years
Last year I picked the winner
Therefore, I knew, in advance, who was going to win the Grand National. Why could the rest of you not see this?
PS that was meant to be PS
hh
CELTIC40ME on 22ND APRIL 2021 1:09 PM
Ziggydoc1
Totally agree with you both. Just good basic coverage by Aberdeen telly and those who were doing the talking
Even managed to politely point put what we all know, Collum is a **** referee as they laughed at his imaginary foul after giving us a corner for an imaginary touch.
HH jg
it was a managad operation
societal balance and all that
we did not manage the shiteoot well.
neil1 ronnie neil2 oversaw Dermots managed decline.peter doing his bidding.
continually pausing and holding back so that the new washing machine huns can have unlimited supply of funds from? and with ffp on hold the cheating hun defaults to taking advantage.
Dermot got his wish.he has got the shatoot identity all over him.well they are a great club with great traditions,the main one being cheating so they carry on just as it was pre liquidatiion and the 8 years since the 49 times convicted criminal.with no money to be made and debts to repay.
HH
managed
SFTB
How do your choose the horse?
Look at form, potential and who’s running?
Or just pick one you know and find in the shower?
I take it we’ll find your unused copies of the Racing Post in the same bin that PL filed all those CVs he didn’t look at!
🤷🏼♂️😉 HH jg
Clatterfart’ (16th century): a prolific gossip.
The sheer number of expressions for gossip over the centuries, from ‘conjobbling’ to ‘jangleress’ shows our impulse to share news will survive
By Susie Dent
April 22, 2021 6:00 am(Updated 9:12 am)
Conjobbling. It’s a word I’ve been waiting to use again for a year or more.
In 19th-century English dialect, it meant to get together for a gossip, usually over a bite to eat. Now, finally, we are able to conjobble (albeit shiveringly al fresco) and re-flex our small-talk muscles. Could we have forgotten how? The sheer volume of words for gossip in English suggests not, and that the impulse to chinwag is hard-wired.
Most gossipy words are local. Dialect embraces the earthy, everyday aspects of life. It delights in terms for being hungry, tired, cold, or fed up, while its arsenal of insults is the biggest you can find. The number of words for being bandy-legged, knock-kneed, lazy, or stuck-up shows the extent to which we relish a dig at others in our exchanges with friends. Consequently the act of gossiping itself has attracted its own vocabulary, ranging from now-widespread expressions such as gabbering, yaddering, gasbagging, tattling, and nattering, to the still-regional jaffocking (Lincolnshire), chamragging (Wiltshire) chopsing (Berkshire, Staffordshire, and Gwent), hamchammering (Somerset), and cloncing in Wales. There are hundreds more.
But all is not equal in the world of chit-chat. The word “gossip” itself demonstrates the long-held assumption that it is women who do the talking. In Old English, a “godsibb” was a godparent (“sibb” meant “relative”, which eventually narrowed to our modern “sibling”). Specifically, a gossip was a woman invited to be present at the birth of a child. Clearly it was assumed that she and the new mother had little better to do than have a good natter, and so the godsib was considered to be a prolific clatterfart, bablatrice, prattle-basket, and jangleress: all words applied to female gossips over the years.
With gossip traditionally comes tea. For centuries, the stereotypical view of a tea gathering was a group of women congregated around the teapot exchanging tittle-tattle. Francis Grose’s 18th-century collection of slang, the brilliant Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, lists various terms for the drink, including “prattle-broth”, “cat-lap” and “scandal potion”.
To pour tea, meanwhile, was not just to “play mother” but also to “bitch the pot”. Tea had become the conduit for loose morals as well as loquaciousness. “How the blowens [whores] lush the slop. How the wenches drink tea,” one 19th-century dictionary exclaimed. A bitch or tabby party (again, the image of cattiness) was a highly gossipy gathering.
Any self-respecting male would therefore ensure that his wife and daughters stayed away from tea. The pamphleteer and political writer William Cobbett insisted in 1822 that “the gossip of the tea-table is no bad preparatory school for the brothel. The girl that has been brought up, merely to boil the tea kettle, and to assist in the gossip inseparable from the practice, is a mere consumer of food, a pest to her employer, and a curse to her husband, if any man be so unfortunate as to affix his affections upon her”.
Some of these associations percolate through English still. “Spilling the T”, a borrowing from the vibrant lexicon of drag, is today’s byword for gossiping. Whether or not the T here stands for “truth” or a hot bevvy is up for debate, but either way “weak tea” has come to mean a story that doesn’t quite hold up.
The vocabulary of male chat is noticeably different: there is “banter”, of course (or what in the 17th century was known as “badinage”), while the historical dictionary also offers “disport”, “raillery” and “rap”, the first meaning of which was lively, improvised repartee.
The stereotype persists that women talk a lot more than men, even though many studies demonstrate that there is negligible difference in either direction. Not for nothing perhaps was the word “garrulous” once (wrongly) interpreted as an etymological relative of “girl”.
All of which is a long way from the friendly conjobbling we are currently celebrating. Lockdown has proved that the withdrawal of the opportunity to share news is highly painful; that chatter is as fundamental to the social animal as touch.
If the word “gossip” has gone down the plug along with the dregs of tea, there are plenty more to choose from. For anyone planning to indulge in some extensive badinage this weekend, English has your back.
Susie Dent is a lexicographer and etymologist. She has appeared in “Dictionary Corner” on Countdown since 1992
SFTB
PS to continue your analogy, we had a ‘cash out’ option around October last year. Instead our board backed their hobbled horse.
HH jg
BSR
Quick-fire poetry
I would have no problem joining a British League, we are hated in this country by every club, with a couple of exceptions, all they want is our support to fill their stadiums twice a year,the game is so stale in this country.
I would join a British league to get neutral refs
JHB @ 1.35
Despite any hysteria Celtic still dwarf the league we play in, and are still way ahead in terms of financial stability. If we need to go into the red for a while we will.
The whole thing depends on Celtic’s next moves, being the right ones . There will be enough money to put together a squad capable, of winning in its first season IMO
!!BADA BING!! on 22ND APRIL 2021 1:49 PM
If you’re worried about being disliked England is not a great place for Celtic to play football
Know who else woulda been a kinda Moneyball-inspired keep for our defensive sieve, Paul?
Mr Simunovic.
Glass-kneed, brain-farting, pass-muffing Jozo offered some moderately priced robustness for all his faults.
But naw, our gurus saw potential wage savings by shipping oot him and Jonny (right decision IMO btw)
Ahhh Jozo – we’ll always have yer Kenny Miller tackle in wur hearts.
hh
Goodbye to the Polish Paddy – I hope you go on to do big things.
Buckfast at Tiffany’s is a tremendous monicker 👏🏼 😂👍🏼
“The lesson from the book was that while each sport has a standard set of metrics the vast majority of coaches and execs follow, if you want to over-achieve against richer opponents, you need to find different, better, metrics.”
Or apply the current metrics in a different manner, because as we know stats without context mean nothing. Scott Brown probably has the best pass completion rates in the SPFL, but what does it mean if he’s constantly passing around our defensive third with no threat to our possession or the opposition goal.
Football metrics have become an industry in itself, and the level of scientific data attainable from the industry is pretty much the same for any manager in the game. Where manager’s earn their money is in interpretation and application of those stats in precise and specific circumstances, sometimes dynamically in the middle of a game. The raw stats alone will never do this work for you, and this is where science becomes art.
When losing Rodgers we lost a manager who had that art, and in Lennon we had a manager who could only see the stats. And the problem with stats, or “KPIs” if you want to give them a relevant term, is that they can be manipulated. As an example, Microsoft can now provide managers with “activity reports” for their staff harvested from their Office365 profile. So they know how long their employees spend in meetings, on Skype, away from their desk, etc. So what do bright employees do? Put some dummy meetings in your diary, phone your colleague for an hour and talk football. When stats aren’t applied correctly they become nothing other than numbers, and less sophisticated people then naturally fixate on the numbers above all else.
I’m in little doubt that Celtic players have some of the most impressive stats in the league, yards run, passes completed etc, but what does it mean if it’s not applied in the right manner to turn those elements into goals scored and none conceded. This is when we see the form of exhibition football we’ve witnessed all season, with a group of players who think they’re doing everything right (cos stats, right?) but just can’t turn those stats into winning games. The players and the manager are left bemused, unable to comprehend how this isn’t working. I’d cite just about any of Lennon’s post match interviews for evidence of this, as throughout the season the underlying message became increasingly a head scratching “I just don’t understand it.”.
CELTIC40ME on 22ND APRIL 2021 1:54 PM
!!BADA BING!! on 22ND APRIL 2021 1:49 PM
If you’re worried about being disliked England is not a great place for Celtic to play football
####
With one or two exceptions most trips to England have been OK. There certainly isn’t the ingrained hostility that you get in most of Scotland.
It’s surprising just how many people of Irish extraction live down there.
Deniabhoy earlier,
Yes the fact that we will be able to attract the top players if we are in the British league, and should be challenging for it in a few years, is the main attraction.
I’m still torn though as I like playing against other Scottish teams. I like that we are help them pay their bills and help keep community clubs open when we play them in the cup. I like talking football and winding up fellow supporters of local clubs.
I worry about where it ends. Why stop at Britain? Next stop Europe, then the world…
Again though, I’m still undecided 🤷🏽♂️
SFTB,
I think for your analogy to work, the people who wanted rid of Neil Lennon would have had to have wanted rid of Rodgers too.
Your suggesting it’s a numbers game, whereas maybe some people were looking at the evidence – checking form as Jamesgang described it – and forming an opinion from that.
CELTIC40ME on 22ND APRIL 2021 1:09 PM
———————-
Agree with almost all of that – good post – thanks.
Also agree with the Aberdeen RedTV stream last night – was a pleasure compared to the usual stuff (either hi-tech, brain-irritating flashy crap, or overly partizan club TV).
Few camera angles, no swishy sound effects, both commentators (and I never managed to find out who they were) were good, simple, fair – knowledgable about how the game was being played.
HH
BGFC
ERNIE LYNCH on 22ND APRIL 2021 2:12 PM
“It’s surprising just how many people of Irish extraction live down there.”
Not to those of us who are and who do :)
England is full of very angry young men at the moment. Anti-Irish sentiment might not be as strong or widespread as you claim it is in Scotland but it does exist in a particular form among some groups of football supporters. At the weekend I saw a photo which showed fans of a small football league club who had sneaked into an away ground, being photographed in front of a St. George’s Cross with a poppy and “lest we forget” on it. It wasn’t a surprise.
I’m not arguing with you that it does or doesn’t exist, but how much of the hatred towards us is because of our Irishness and how much is because of anti old-firm feeling or because of twenty years of winning everything? Last night the Aberdeen commentators were laughing at Collum giving us free kicks – “that’s just what happens with the old firm.” United were hated by everyone for years in England, largely because of their size and because they won more titles than anyone else.
I doubt we’ll be hated more in England but we’ll not be welcomed by a lot of the fans, and especially when we start winning things.
I asked on here earlier re ST renewal. If there were any replies, I didn`t see them so contacted Celtic. This is what I received in reply:
“At this time, we have no information on season ticket renewals.
Once confirmed, details will be sent by email to current STH.”
Pre-Covid, when was the usual renewal date?
Share price gaining 1.32 today one year high
British super league or a new share issue to finance revolution in football dept
Leigh Griffiths ? Overweight with fitness and diet issues, 31 yrs old has trouble with reliability completing a season
Crazy gambling on stats
Bournesouprecipe @ 1:64
The whole thing depends on Celtic’s next moves, being the right ones . There will be enough money to put together a squad capable, of winning in its first season IMO
If we need to go into the red for a while we will.
————-
If I may answer your two main points in reverse order, as above.
Yes our next moves need to be right – the title is worth c£40m next season. Will there be enough money to rebuild the squad to the required standard – I hope you’re right, but I have doubts.
Regarding “going into the red” – it is not a position that slts well with those who run our club. We have a facility in our bank account for a £13m overdraft – that may not be included in any rebuild finance – why? – because Covid will still be restricting match day income next season – the facility will be there to smooth running costs rather than capital expenditure, i.e. transfer fees.
So if we want to spend over and above what we generate in outgoing transfer fees, which will be a lot less than some folk think, the question I ask is – where will it come from? Who will be lending multi-millions at this juncture to a Scottish football club – a club now making losses and with a barren season behind it?
We don’t, as far as I know, have a queue of rich fans queueing to buy regular issues of new ‘confetti’ shares to the tune of some £80/£100m, as is the norm at Ibrox.
Apologies if anyone feels I’m belittling their experience of anti-Irish racism or sectarianism, or suggesting it’s not a serious issue in Scotland. Not my intention at all
This is how far we have fallen.
Pining our hopes on an over weight, unfit and unprofessional Leigh Griffiths.
Should have been chased in the summer
HOT SMOKED on 22ND APRIL 2021 2:45 PM
I renewed last year on the 11 of March 2020. The renewals must have come out before then.
Cheers and HH.
CELTIC40ME on 22ND APRIL 2021 2:57 PM
People of our persuasion, culture & outlook – our ‘kind’ to use a word that some on here seem to take unusual exception to, have more likeminded friends in the UK than the entire population of Scotland.
KIND:
a group of people having similar interests, beliefs & characteristics.
HRVATSKI JIM @ 1:24 PM
Good one.
Would personally love to advertise Mary Meals on our shirts (for free) rather than having an odious bookmaker as our shirt sponsor.
JHB – we had money in the bank before this season?
Memory lane stuff. Played football long time ago (not very well).
Our striker was a terrible footballer.
Slow, terrible first touch, couldn’t pass.
But near the goal the ball would hit various parts of his body …
…. and go in the net.
It’s the most important and most difficult thing to do in football.
If it was easy you’d see it happen more often than every 35 minutes (on average).
Go on Leigh.
Hail hail
Keep The Faith
We’re Not Half of Anything
st tams
oh am sure had leigh been fit and knocking them in it may have lightened the girn…not stop it :-)
Brexit: Tory MP backtracks over food scarcity in Irelandhttps://www.irishtimes.com › news › world › brexit-tor…
8 Dec 2018 — Priti Patel: “Let’s take back control of borders, laws and money.” Conservative MP Priti Patel has said her comments about Britain … Labour MP David Lammy also referenced the Famine: “The starvation of innocent Irish men, …
JHB
can you define exactly what you mean by
our kind?
hh
define what you mean by “our culture”
hh
James Gang
“How do your choose the horse?
Look at form, potential and who’s running?
Or just pick one you know and find in the shower?
I take it we’ll find your unused copies of the Racing Post in the same bin that PL filed all those CVs he didn’t look at!”
———————————–
It does not really matter whether my pick or my opinion was random or guided by science; my success rate was 1 in 10- that’s what you must deal with. So why can’t I claim foresight and clairvoyance because I got it right at last?
As for your extended analogy- you cannot cash out of a league race or cup- you can only get beat. Whether you do so with a new jockey, or in Sevco’s case, a new horse, your odds and likelihood of winning don’t change much. Anyway Real Madrid won’t sell you their jockey and Barca wn’t sell you their horse.
Griffiths is a disgrace to the jersey he wears. Has been unfit most, if not all of the season – his lack of professionalism should never have been tolerated in any season but in this one especially. Hopefully the new manager will have no time for guys like him…
Majestic Hartson
While there was no great clamour to sack BR- the last time somebody stated that no-one had a bad worfd to say about BR in his time here and no-0ne feared a league loss- I just went back to the relevant period of BR’s final season and plucked around 10 CQN comments (anonymised) from that time.
They showed clearly the level of dissatisfaction with his playing style and the fear that Sevco and other teams had sussed him out.
Of course, with the evidence of genuine failure having actually happened this year, posters have forgotten and denied they were ever critical but just read CQN on a match day where BR’s team dropped points and it will all come flooding back.
We are suffering from Big Yellow Taxi Syndrome- “we don’t know what we got til it’s gone!”
Wee Gordon Strachan had to suffer form post-MON regret and Neil suffered from post-BR regret.
We are just going to have to become more resilient about getting dumped. We should be used to it by now
James Forrest has just posted a piece about Kris “big Boydy” Boyd. I too am surprised that Sky have now let him loose on an English audience who will undoubtedly marvel at his complete lack of insight. They’d been as well sticking Jimmy “the bigot” Bell on.
Maybe Boydy patronising Victor’s Wig Boutique has affected his judgement but, of course , there is no law against anyone nailing a worn out hall carpet to their heid if it makes them feel better about themselves.
I don’t think Gary Neville has much to learn from the bumbling Kris.