Gazzetta Football Scozia

Total attendance at all Partick Thistle 2003/04 SPL home games: 89,497

Seating capacity of the Camp Nou stadium in Barcelona: 98,800

Number of Partick Thistle players sponsored in 2003/04 by theharrywraggs.com supporters website: 1

Who were still at the club at the end of the season: 0

Number of league goals scored in 2003/04 by the top two goalscorers who still play for Celtic: 30

Number of league goals scored in 2003/04 by the top two goalscorers who now play for Rangers: 31

Size, weight of Bobo Balde: 1.90m, 90kg

Size, weight of Jean-Alain Boumsong: 1.92m, 88kg

Winner of 2003/04 SPL fair play league: Aberdeen

Bottom: Hibernian

Number of the three Lothian teams in the bottom three positions: 3

Number of East coast teams in the bottom five positions: 5

Most indisciplined players in Division One: Jason Lee (Falkirk), Stuart Malcolm (Ross County)

Rank of Ross County in average attendance in 2003/04 in Division One: 1

Average attendance at Ross County home game and population of Dingwall, respectively: 3,202; 5,228

Latitude of Dingwall: 57.59°N

Difference in latitude of Dingwall and London in degrees: 6.23

Difference in latitude of Dingwall and Torshavn, Faroe Islands, in degrees: 4.46
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Moldovan boy band produce hit song called "Dragostea Din Tei". Get used to it as it may well be everywhere in the 'dova when we're there. [cheers to Ally on the TA List]

Listen - O-Zone

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One of Gazzetta's many fans recently visited Singapore where he discovered Gemmill Lane... and he has it "on great authority" that it was named so after the great one. [cheers Kenny]

A bit of research among the NYC Tartan Army fraternity turned up the following translation, by the Chinese assistant to a Finnish cancer researcher (I know that sounds like the intro to a joke but it's true):
My Chinese is a little rusty but I got help from my technician:  the first character separately would mean 'people' (in context of another word), the second character means 'beautiful', and the third is 'narrow street'. I think, the idea has been to make it sound like 'Gemmill' (as those two first characters do in Chinese, well at least about, namely 'ren mei') rather than suggesting that Gemmill is a particularly beautiful person. Naturally, different interpretations are welcome.

My interpretation is definitely that Gemmill is a Beautiful Person, so it fits perfectly.

Another homage to Archie Gemmill can be found on the East Village Tartan Army website... a song written prior to the Euro2004 play-offs against Holland. Follow the link for the full story.

Listen to - Tartan Specials
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So the "Jakie Tourney" [(c) Kenny from Kazakhstan] looks like it might provide some footballing pride for Scotland - with an undefeated streak so far, including a 9-2 battering of Brazil and a 12-1 creaming of Canada (not reported here but confirmed today). Normally those numbers are odds against a Scotland victory...

I gleefully forwarded on the match report to a Brazilian colleague of mine - this was his reply:

many surprises for me here...

I did not know such a cup existed
I did not know there were any homeless people in Sweden
I did not know it was possible for Brazil to lose by such a score in any type of soccer game

And I am curious to know how the homeless Brazilians were chosen because I
am sure there are much better homeless players in Brazil.

Congratulations. Well done.

I suspect he added the last bit because he's just started working for me and doesn't want to annoy the new boss.

Read - Scotsman

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Especially after last season, an article entitled "Where it all went wrong for Celtic..." is a joy to behold for us poor Rangers fans.

I was talking to a Killie-supporting friend tonight about this (he was at the game, caller) and made the point that Celtic fans should be a little worried at this juncture - I'm not saying Rangers have turned it round or anything but with a week and a half before the start of the season, there is no Larsson replacement (and unlikely to be one of comparable quality); the defence is a shambles; the strikeforce is thin (Hartson and Sutton are both injury-prone, Beattie and Maloney are unproven); and Lambert is surely past it now. A couple of injuries (Thompson and Balde?) and poor results could easily follow.

But, perhaps this result has come at the right time - it wouldn't surprise me if O'Neill has engineered the situation to force his board to come up with more cash for new players... I'm sure that's what the tongue-up-his-arse Scottish press are going to speculate on in the next day or two, especially if the saviour flying in from Scotland doesn't produce a decent result against Man U.

Read - The Herald

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Not McLeod, but Dawson, is running a team to compete in the Homeless World Cup in Gothenburg. Given the Scotland support's long-standing appreciation of Swedish women, I'm surprised there isn't a large support in attendance.

Poor bastards have to not only play four-a-side on a five-a-side field, but the fields are concrete - surely the only surface worse than the notorious 'Glasgow ash'. Maybe we stand a chance of improving upon last year's "category B" win.

Read - Sunday Herald [cheers Kenny from Kazakhstan, although calling it the 'Jakie Tourney' was maybe not in the spirit of things]

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Check the videos on this site - fantastic! Stuff dating back to the qualifying rounds of the World Cup of '74... right up to the Estonia game in May of this year. Superb job and 'nuff respect to the Bishopton TA.

Bishopton Tartan Army

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There's a phrase in the north-east of Scotland: "Awa an bile yer heid." Literally, it means "Go away and boil your head," but it is usually used as a way of saying "F*** Off".

I think Aberdeen's "football executive" Willie Miller is using it in the latter sense to Dunfermline chairman John Yorkston - but I think Yorkston should offer the 'tached one outside, because he does have a fair point.

Read - Press and Journal

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The guy pictured on the bottom left of the Spekkles home page - with the FK Velez flag thing in his hat - is the infamous "Maurice fae Forres", a pharmacist from the north-east who is virtually ever-present at Scotland matches. I first met him at Heathrow airport on the way to Sarajevo - on the meetup instructions he said, "You'll know me as I'll be the one wearing the ocelot waistcoat."

He used to live in Plymouth, and when the queen came visiting one day, the locals lined the streets to greet her. Bold Maurice (a furious and intelligent Scottish nationalist) waited patiently until her car came by, then gave her the viccy and screamed "Republic Now!"

No word on what the loyal subjects of Plymouth did, but they were probably more scared than the Queen's bodyguard. Power to the people!

Take me to - Maurice fae Forres

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I recommend this to all Dunfermline Athletic supporters - it might distract attention away from the fact that you're a Fifer.

I've met the man behind 'Spekkles' a few times - mainly on Scotland duty but he also came to New York to set up distribution of Irish glasses for Paddy's Day. He's engaged in a lawsuit at the moment, as someone else is claiming to have a patent over this idea... he's desperately trying to find photos of Spekkles-like glasses from the late 90s to prove that the patent is worthless and these things have been around for a long time.

So get your Spekkles now before they disappear from the market...

eBay item 5110520757

View - Spekkles site

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In my search for info on the Scotland-Portugal match I did stumble across this - the 1983/84 league table from Romanian Division C - with 14 of the 16 teams separated by only two points.

Now it was Romania under Ceausescu, and they definitely fixed it so Steaua won their top league every year, but surely even they wouldn't have bothered to fix Division C?

Read - rec.sport.soccer Statistics Foundation

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This has been annoying me for a while now. I've listened to a lot of talk about Portugal's "Golden Generation" who came so close to making real history in Euro 2004; what is always mentioned is that they were first recognised as a class apart at a very young age.

I've been trying to find out exactly which of their team played in the Under-16 World Championships in Scotland in 1989, because Scotland beat Portugal 1-0 in the semi-final at a packed Tynecastle. [The game was cash at the gate and I managed to get in before they started turning people away.] I'd like to compare the later careers of the Scotland team with the Portugal team, but I can't find a match report or team listings anywhere.

The FIFA website has more information than most, but not much. It did confirm that Figo played in the tournament, so probably in the Scotland game. The only two players from that team I can recall making a later impact were John O'Neil (Dundee United and Celtic, I think) and Paul Dickov - and only the latter acquired full Scotland caps.

The really scary thing is what has happened to James Will, the goalkeeper who won the player of the tournament award - very deservedly. He was from a town just up the road from my hometown (different school district though, so I never played with or against him) and was on schoolboy forms with Arsenal. I know he stayed there for quite a few more years, but never made the grade, and I can find no trace of him now. I would guess he's playing somewhere in the Highland League, or the junior leagues in the north-east.

Read - FIFA.com

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Don't want to get all 'Hello!' magazine on you but a wee reminisce about Gregory's Girl is no bad thing.

I suppose it wasn't really a football film as such but still, any film with football in it is usally pish so it was definitely an exception. Haven't seen this new 'Miracle of Bern' film about the 1954 World Cup, but it's supposed to be good so I'll get round to it someday - if anyone has seen it, post a comment on whether it's worthwhile.

I can see the day when we have the 'Miracle of Soweto' about Scotland's victory over Brazil in the 2010 World Cup final... Directed by Lars von Trier, starring Stellan Skarsgard as Berti?

Read - Sunday Herald

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If you had a dig around on the Scotland collection site mentioned yesterday, you'd find that not only could you buy yourself Scotland's third top, you could also drop 23 quid on a full kit for a one-year-old.

At first blush that looks pretty bad value but I'd argue it's better value than paying #117.01 on eBay for a shirt worn by Derek Whyte at Euro 92.

Now I was at Euro 92, and while I did imbibe quite a bit (especially before the Germany game) I didn't recall Mr Whyte taking part. So I checked my trusty Evening Time "Wee Red Book" (last year's model, the new one's on the way [thanks Ian]) and the highlights of Derek's Scotland career are thus:

12 caps; debut in the 87-88 season vs Belgium (either a 4-1 away loss or a 2-0 home win - it seems even the Wee Red Book has its flaws, as it's impossible to tell which); only a couple more games until the Euro 92 warmup vs the USA in Colorado (1-0 win); he played against Portugal in the 92-93 season so may have taken part in the notorious 5-0 hammering in Lisbon, where Ally McCoist broke his leg (but it could have been the home game - 0-0 draw); he played in the Kirin Cup in 1995; and then one game in each of the 96-97, 97-98, and 98-99 seasons, with that last game being the Germany friendly where we beat them in Bremen.

So, he didn't actually play in Euro 92, other than in the warmups. If you look at the item listing it does say "all match shirts have been either worn or were issued to the player concerned" so this is clearly one of the "issued to" variety.

eBay item 5110030524

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Interesting but not earth-shattering article; absolutely worth mentioning though because it describes Celtic as "institutionally parsimonious". Is this the Sunday broadsheet way of saying they keep their money in a biscuit tin?

I guess it does repeat one of the ongoing frustrations with O'Neill - he doesn't half keep his cards close to his chest. I guess it's all part of the game, and a way of managing, but if I was a Celtic fan I'd want a little bit more clarity on his long-term plans and vision for the club.

Read - Sunday Herald

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The explanation for the lack of transfer activity by CelticFootballClub over the summer period has been made known to Gazzetta by a Parkhead insider.

With the deep-seated commercial and institutional changes made by Fergus "The Bunnet" McCann in the late 1990s, Celtic's legendary "biscuit tin" was widely believed to be a relic of the past. However, Gazzetta can exclusively reveal that the real reason for their uncharacteristic transfer-market largesse was that the biscuit tin was lost during the demolition of the Victorian-era Celtic Park "stadium".

The Celtic board were told by the demolition contractor that they had forgotten to remove the tin from its hiding place - taped underneath the old television gantry above the jungle - and it had been crushed in the debris following the collapse of the roof. In actual fact, the cowboys builders who undertook the work were Celtic supporters and one of them had taken the tin as a souvenir; he used its contents to buy himself a couple of cans of Irn Bru on the way home.

Without anywhere to stash cash receipts, and coincident with the massive increase in purchased-by-credit-card season tickets for Parkhead due to glory-hunters returning to the fold after the barren mid-90s, Celtic resorted to honest business practices of declaring all income on tax returns and investing decent levels of supporters' money in the team.

Earlier this year the man who took the biscuit tin home died; the tin was found within his possessions. His will indicated that he wanted it returned to CelticFootballClub, and his wishes were respected.

Cash has been piling up in the tin since April and it is now believed to contain all of next year's season ticket money; a fair chunk of Henrik Larsson's testimonial receipts; and an IOU from Setanta. The tin's location is kept secret by the Celtic board, who are taking advice on financial management from ex-Chairman and legendary tightwad Jack McGinn.

Martin O'Neill has remained in Glasgow during Celtic's tour of America because he thinks it is hidden in the boardroom and he intends to sneak in one night while the directors are on an all-expenses-paid-by-Celtic trip to a Philadelphia strip club. He hopes to find enough cash for a Larsson replacement; he is well aware that if all he has is the money already promised by the board, he'll get stuck with a rapidly ageing dodgy-kneed carthorse like Alan Shearer, and he already has two of them up front.

Read - Sporting Life - Robertson says money can't guarantee success

Disclaimer: investments may go down as well as up and historical return is no guarantee of future performance. Gazzetta in no way endorses the purchase of shares in the companies mentioned in this article.


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The BBC are reporting that Diego Armando Maradona Jr. has turned down the opportunity to play on East End Park's lush artificial surface, with one of his coterie of minders describing the Pars' offer as 'derisory'. What else does he expect from a bunch of Fifers?

Gazzetta has a mole inside the Maradona camp, and can exclusively reveal the terms offered to the bastard offspring of the portly drug-addled footballing genius:
- seventy quid a week on a Youth Training Scheme
- unlimited use of Davie Hay's Volkswagen Passat when he's not using it himself, unless the wife needs it to take the kids to the pictures
- all the fish suppers he could eat from Gennaro's Fish Bar on Robertson Road
- a Nokia cameraphone with $50 in usage credits
- free passes to the "Club Life" disco on Kirkgate, and the manager had promised not to check his ID either
- a "Fife Rover" bus pass - unlimited travel within Fife (excluding Glenrothes), except during peak hours (8.30am-4.30pm on pension day)
- a Setanta season pass and free installation of a Sky dish.

Now you or I may think that's not a whole lot on offer, but remember the youngster grew up in Naples which is in some senses the Kirkcaldy of Italy, so he was prepared to accept these terms. However he had a last minute chat with his genetic father, who insisted on being crowned "King of Fife" which scuppered the whole deal as Jim Leishman was not prepared to renounce the title.

Read - BBC Sport
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I'm sure you've all been thinking, "I have my Scotland home kit, and my Scotland away kit, but that's not enough to satisfy me." Well come August 1st you're in luck, because Scotland will be releasing their third kit!

Not quite sure why a team that plays, what, a dozen games a year needs a third kit... in fact, why does any team need a third kit. Rumour is this will be worn for the Hungary home game on August 18, just so everyone knows about it.

The annoying thing is, I quite like the look of it. The yellow recalls the glory days of the early 80s, when we had a yellow away top; and it has a clean and simple design, unlike the various Umbro abortions of the late 80s and early 90s. But I probably won't be buying it because it doesn't look like you can get a long-sleeved version.

In Glasgow back in April, I spent a fruitless two days combing the sports stores of that city's shopping citadels trying to find a long-sleeved home top. It shocked me how many 'sports' stores contained next to no sporting goods, and were going for the 'leisure wear' market - I think JD Sports was the prime offender. Many others didn't have the Scotland top at all, and I was incensed at one store which had the England top in the window but no Scotland shirts in stock. Grrr.

See - The Scotland Collection
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Here's quite a decent article on the state of the game in the USA, with one eye on the upcoming 'Champions World' tour in which Celtic are taking part. Also, Rangers confirmed at their recent North American supporters conference that they would be touring in 2005.

Read - Guardian Unlimited Football

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What's it doing here? Well, he does mention Hibs.

Read - The Observer Magazine

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1 - Blogger has screwed up the publishing of the Gazzetta web page and I'm hoping another post will fix it
2 - I went back to work today after a six-month break so posting may be a bit less frequent, at least in the short-term

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And I say he's talking out of his arse. Calderwood will get them to top-six at best; the weight of expectation is too high and they don't have enough cash to bring in players who can handle it, leaving them with three-quarters of a squad full of kids who are either too used to being rubbish or simply not good enough in the first place. Levein and McCall will provide competition that's too strong, and if Hibs can come good again, Killie rebound from their recent rubbish, then the Dandy Dons will be struggling for top six.

Don't read - Daily Record

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I am still holding on to some hope but the reports are coming thick and fast these days - it does not look good for the SPL's Setanta PPV deal. I've dealt with Setanta in the US and they are far from the most professional organisation - although they do manage to broadcast games across North America, there have been enough incidents of amateurism to make me wonder. And they don't have deep enough pockets to endure a year or two of a loss-making deal.

The terrifying prospect is what this could do to the finances of the already-bankrupt SPL. How much are teams already counting on the money (as the English Football League teams did)? If they're spending the $$$ already, a scary future is in the offing.

Read - Scotsman
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That was the subject line of an email I received recently; I was pretty sure it was spam but I decided to take a look anyway - could it be about Gary McAllister? This was the content:

Unlike so many bonbons who have made their hairy ball bearing to us.When you see bubble bath about, it means that rattlesnake for flies into a rage.Unlike so many boys who have made their polite traffic light to us.Wyatt, although somewhat soothed by for senator and toward pickup truck.beyond minivan make love to beyond taxidermist, because football team about pine cone share a shower with roller coaster of.Wyatt, although somewhat soothed by of minivan and looking glass for.
moonlit anywhere millionth berwick edwin raze

Now that looks like garbage, but if you look closely, there are many football references: "bonbons" are sweet, like the Tartan Army; "ball" (or, perhaps, a reference to the kilted male's prominently displayed "hairy ball"), (post-match) "bubble bath", "rattlesnake" has a sting, like football; (player who) "flies into a rage", "so many boys" (a football team), "football team about pine cone" (the Scottish team, as Scotland has many pine trees), "share a shower" (post-match again), "roller-coaster" (ups and downs of being a supporter), "Wyatt" (Wyatt Earp - a wild-west lawman - i.e. a referee), "somewhat soothed by" (captain calms down the player who flies into a rage), "berwick" (a town bordering Scotland and England).

The email was sent by one Erika Kraft - bbrhl@kataweb.it. Not an Italian name, really, but an Italian web address. Perhaps she doesn't speak English so well? Perhaps she's really trying to get a message through? But what could it be? And why to Billy?

I've thought long and hard about this; there's only one possible answer.

Erika Kraft is an illegal, probably Albanian, immigrant into Italy. She was irreparably mentally damaged by a flood of psychic waves in the summer of 1996; she had always had psychic-like tendencies, although her mother maybe died when she was young so she'd never been able to develop her powers fully, or even understand them.

The psychic outpouring was caused by Yuri Geller; remember, he had the English nation thinking of orange while watching their TV screens at Euro 96? When McAllister was taking the penalty, the ball moved, causing him to miss. Geller claimed the credit, on behalf of the English people.

I am certain that Erika Kraft received the collected thoughts of the English nation at the moment McAllister struck the penalty. This caused her to have a nervous breakdown from which she has never recovered; she's most likely walking the streets of Rome or Naples or some other Southern city, wearing rags and collecting empty bottles for change, which she uses to buy grappa to soothe the pain. Her mind is full of crazy, mixed-up images, angry images, which she doesn't understand; she babbles incoherently causing people to avoid her in the street.

Sometimes she meets a kind young outreach worker, who tries to help; one who feels her pain recently introduced her to the web, and tried to help her get her message out. Erika talks too fast, in fragments of sentences; but the young worker managed to comprehend the words above, and addressed them to the world, myself included (after running them through an Albanian-English translation website). Erika, I am sorry, I feel your pain too but I cannot change what happened.

Geller, and England, your selfishness has destroyed a life. Hang your heads in shame.

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You've probably seen this elsewhere but just in case, here's the link again. I can't believe someone would seriously pay 25,000 EUR for this.

The thing that really makes me sad, though, is the English description: "the penalty [...] that left the UK out of the Europe Cup." England/UK, same thing; see, Unionists, that's a direct consequence of your politics.

eBay - Balon Oficial Eurocopa del Penalti Fallado por Beckham

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No, that's really the headline. Could this be bigger than Caniggia signing for Dundee?

Read - Maradona arrives at Dunfermline - The Herald
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I ordered a copy of the Gazza book from amazon UK when it was available; speedy shipping, but it sat on my coffee table for a few weeks until I woke up at 3am on Sunday morning. I read the whole thing that day, and it's not a short book.

The Follow, Follow review is fair - and I also like the antipathy displayed to the Scottish football hackerati. The first 80% or so of the book is an above-average, but standard-issue biography; the chronological tale of Gazza's career. Because it's Gazza's career, it is more interesting than your average player-biog.

Where the book really shines is in the final few chapters - where Gazza opens up and admits to all the sh*t he's done over the years, and tries to understand why, and tells us he wants to not do it again, but he can't promise. Davies has done a good ghosting job because it definitely feels authentic (see the Observer article for his take on the task).

I've never met Gazza, but I've met a man who has. After a wedding (of a Celtic-supporting friend) near Loch Lomond, a taxi driver took myself and Mrs Williamson to Glasgow Airport. This guy used to drive Gazza around a lot and couldn't talk highly enough of him. He'd run around on a Sunday morning and play footie with the local kids; he was unfailingly polite; he was very generous all round. But he was drunk an awful lot. Seems to be what you hear about Gazza - great bloke, shame he can't control himself.

Gazza himself has few regrets - he knows he's had a brilliant career, regardless of what people think he could have done. [His one - major - regret is the wife-beating incident.] Comparisons with George Best are way off the mark; Best was never a penalty shoot-out away from a World Cup Final ('90), or a European Championship Final ('96), and though Gazza lost a lot of playing time through injury, he still had a longer career than the Northern Irish genius.

Overall, I'd put it up there with the Cascarino autobiography, way ahead of the pack. Get it if you're a Rangers fan; I suppose you can wait for the paperback if you're not.

Read - Follow, Follow review

Read - Observer Sport - Hunter Davies on being Gazza's Ghost

[Oh and did you know he was named after Paul McCartney? His middle name is John, too. His mum couldn't decide on Paul John or John Paul... I wonder if he'd have ever joined Rangers if she'd gone with the latter? Sad that I have to wonder about that.]
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There are stattos, and there are super-stattos. Bert Kassies is possibly the king of the super-stattos. His website has details of all the club and country coefficients used by UEFA in their seeding process for the Champions League - a terrifying amount of data as it's based on five years' worth of results in all European competitions. It also has details of how the group stages will break down, who is likely to be seeded where, what order the games are played in - a fantastic wealth of information.

If I was UEFA, I wouldn't bother paying my in-house stattos, I'd just use this guy's site; maybe that's what they already do. I know I would.

Read - Bert Kassies

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In case you're wondering, as I was:
Read - Aberdeen Evening Express (where else?)

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Back to when I was a nipper... at the age of about five or six, one of the main football chants sung by my Aberdeen-supporting mates was "John Greig wears a bra, tra lala lala" to the tune of Boney M's "Brown Girl in the Ring" which was in the charts at the time. Us Rangers fans would retort with "Joey Harper wears a bra, etc etc". This would go on for weeks at a time and it was great fun.

Joey, I'd just like to say, I take it all back on the strength of this column of yours from last month. Spoken from the heart, no pussy-footing around, whether or not you agree with the sentiment you have to admire the candour.

Read - Aberdeen Evening Express (again)

And don't miss the next week's column either:
Read - Aberdeen Evening Express (yet again)

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For all the claims of central Scotland media bias against Aberdeen, you have to feel sorry for the readers of the Scotsman and the Herald because they miss out on joys of parochial reporting such as this. I'm really not sure if it's genuine or not, but it could well be.

For those not familiar with Aberdeen's social topography, Torry is a well-dodgy area near the harbour, or at least it was when I was a nipper. It's one of the more likely places in Aberdeen where a professional player could go to buy a gun, which could then be used to shoot a club manager who had perhaps slandered his intelligence.

Read - Aberdeen Evening Express

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A website, entirely in Swedish, claiming that the 1958 World Cup was a CIA & FIFA conspiracy, filmed in LA. Apparently (I don't read Swedish) it has proof, too.

Read - Konspiration 58 [thanks to It's Up For Grabs Now]

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Expect another four years of frustration with doom-mongers, pessimists, and naysayers saying "we cannae dae it - we're no big enough". Personally I think we should forget the Irish and go it alone. At least this time Graham Spiers might be on-side.

Yahoo! Sport - Irish keen to try again with Scots and bid for Euro 2012

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In a similar vein to the previous post, Berti Vogts expresses his frustrations with Scottish football and what he believes needs to happen.

Read - FIFA.com

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Interesting article about a kid who was taken in for a trial by Rangers. He didn't make the cut, but learned some good practices and is determined to make it back for another shot.

Read - Follow, Follow

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The Dandy Dons pull a fast one, and are introducing a #175 charge to become a mascot at one of their games - previously it was free, with a raffle used to pick the (un)lucky youngsters.

To be honest it doesn't sound like a bad deal - four tickets and a full kit must run to well over a hundred quid - but I'd bet on canny Aberdonians to know for sure; and it does smack of the comedy incident a couple of years back when AFC got rid of their dressing room toaster to save costs (it didn't make much difference, you'll be shocked to learn).

Also note the writer of the piece - is this the son of Scotland great Martin Buchan? Has the former Dundee United defender's career come to an end, and he's forced to write for the venerable P&J? Will Jamie Buchan be the next Doug Baillie?

Read - Press & Journal

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Saw a beautiful quote from the Greek soccer daily Sportime after their Euro 2004 victory:
"God, please give us more tears so we can keep crying from happiness."

I'm no Gazza but I'll freely admit if Scotland won the World Cup or even the European Championships, I'd be a blubbering wreck of a human.

Read - Sportime

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Interesting and opportunistic move by the Hearts chairman George Foulkes, using his MP status to corner a couple of Thai MPs into visiting Tynecastle - though I heard they only agreed to it after assurances Walter Kidd had retired.

While it's always good to see creative ideas in Scottish football, don't expect Gorgie Road to be bouncing with top-class Thai talent in a hurry - there isn't any (footballing, at least). I was in Thailand just recently, and the day I arrived Thailand were gubbed 4-1 at home by North Korea in a World Cup Qualifier.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra (he of Liverpool FC fame) promptly voiced concerns about the direction of Thai football; secured the resignation of the team manager - an Army general; and replaced him with - you guessed it - a different Army general. As I was leaving the papers were reporting on the PM's thoughts that perhaps Thailand would be best served by Thai players being sent abroad to learn the game as the local league is too weak; so perhaps the Tynecastle visit will bear fruit, but this would need to be a long-term (5-15 year) agreement to be worthwhile for Hearts - unless Shinawatra decides to send some investment along with his youth squad.

Scotsman.com Sport - Hearts out to Thai up talent

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Some gossip from a media trade mag (surely, where you'd expect the best goss): Rob Maclean jumped to Setanta before he was pushed by the BBC; and Craig Levein/Hearts are in the midst of a falling-out with the Edinburgh Evening Times. Oh dear.

Read - ALLmediascotland.COM
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I've added a subscription service, so you can have updates mailed to you in digest form [cheers Kenny]. You'll get the first part of the story with a link to the rest; you still have to visit the site, sorry. This service is provided by bloglet.

I've also added a google search facility, so you can search Gazzetta for (eg) all occurrences of the phrase "Aiden McGeady is a wank".

If you get problems with either, let me know.

A more comprehensive site redesign is in the offing - but no promises as to when this will happen, especially as my time off is nearly over and I have to go back to work next week. However if there's anything you'd like to see in a redesigned Gazzetta, let me know.

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Notable article for two things:

• didn't know Grampian TV had a website - it's not bad, if a little predictable ("Aberdeen swimmer named in Olympic team")
• I like the eye-catching graphic to illustrate the story, which appeared on the google news page - but it's not really best to have the word "Scotland" next to a big arrow pointing down on a popular web news portal...

FIFA rankings are of interest as a talking point, but really, not much more - as Greece just proved. Maybe they'd get more interesting if there was a futures market based on them - so you could make predictions on teams rising and falling. That would be a pretty interesting market - taking into account the teams to be faced, quality of the opposition, surprise friendlies arranged, likelihood of top players dropping out, etc. And you'd need to be aware of what's happening in Africa, South America, CONCACAF, etc. Ooh I'm getting all excited.

Ladbrokes, if you're listening, I'm available...

Read - Grampian TV
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Nothing of interest here, I just want to confirm that quotes are made-up or at the least, "refashioned". A Motherwell fan I know called in to make a point, saw his name against a quote that was nothing to do with what he said. But did you really believe any different?

Don't Read - Daily Record
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I don't think he does but I hope Jack McConnell reads the Herald sport pages today. Graham Spiers points out that, yes, a wee nation can successfully host a major international sporting event (and we don't need to buddy-up with another small country to do so, either). Perhaps if Scotland had A BIT OF F*CKING CONFIDENCE IN ITSELF we'd be looking forward to Euro 2008 with automatic qualification as hosts and the opportunity to show the world that Scotland is a nation, not an adjunct of the English Crown.

Also if you look closely (well, not that closely) you'll spot a large slice of hypocrisy from Mr Spiers - the cowbell-tinklers, the helmeted Vikings, the cloggy flatlanders are "increasingly-lovable" and "given to self-deprecation" - in fact, the epitome of "the modern football fan". Yet Spiers is never slow to label the Tartan Army a boozy embarrassment to the nation. If we didn't invent, nay, perfect, lovable self-deprecation, then who did?

Maybe there's a link between the last two paragraphs. Rise up and be a nation again? Not likely, with our talent for putting ourselves down.

Read - Herald Sport

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Have been in Budapest since last Thursday with no access to internet - normal service to be resumed from Wednesday. In the meantime, this is what turns up second in the google rankings for "Hungarian Soccer". (Apparently the Magyars have a promising team at the moment, too.)

Read - Hungarian Soccer's Finest Hour?


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