dennyc

And if Rangers are paying the Police costs is that not of financial benefit to Motherwell? I trust Burrows enough to believe that the switch will not have left us out of pocket. I doubt we will ever really know what the Clubs agreed between themselves, in private but approved by Spfl and Police. If we had been forced to change I'm pretty sure Motherwell would have made that known. Folk making a mountain out of a mole hill here, for whatever reason. And I can add two ST Holders who can now attend who were missing out on the Sunday.

To put bones on the Solidarity thing. From the total pot of £125m+ ( Dec 2019 figure) made available to the associate Clubs from UEFA’s income, 80% goes to the Associations who have a team reach CL group stage. The other Associations share only 20%. This season something like 15 different associations were represented in the CL Group stage so they will be allocated a share of £100m+ to share equally between their top division teams who have a youth policy that meets UEFA criteria. And some top division clubs in those countries do not have an acceptable youth policy, increasing the payment to those that do. A couple of our top division sides have lost out recently for that reason. We benefited. So much as it may pain us, we should hope for Motherwell’s financial benefit that at least one Scottish team does well in the Champions League. If the coefficient is boosted by Europa League success that will increase our chances of having two teams enter the CL each year, with one even going straight into the Group Stages if Scotland is ranked high enough ( or one of our teams qualifies by winning the Europa League).

The Police were the stumbling block. I was told they had already drawn up their rosters based on a Sunday match and placed officers on leave on the Saturday. To minimise wage costs as the try to avoid Overtime payments. That could not be forcibly changed so the only option left was for an overtime shout. Those costs had to be met from somewhere and Rangers were asked to stump up, perhaps by Motherwell and/or the SPFL. I can only assume they agreed so then the game was belatedly moved. I have no objection to the game being moved to assist a Scottish club in Europe.....after all we may well benefit from OF success in Europe..... although I get that some fans will be disadvantaged. No doubt some fans are also disadvantaged by a noon Sunday kick off and any other game that is rescheduled for SKY. But I do think the Club should and could have communicated better. But perhaps I am just not as bitter or Burrows obsessed as some on here.

Where do they say they are not including offside? The press release says they are implementing the same system as in England and setting up cameras at all 12 grounds. And the plan is to check every goal. That check has to include offside or there is no point.

So how come Spain had 5 teams in CL this year when their "Limit" is 4? Barca, the 2 Madrid Clubs, Sevilla and Villareal as Europa Cup winners. All in the Group stages. Might be a factor that Villareal did not qualify automatically via league placing so had to be fitted in. But it is not correct that limits cannot/will not be exceeded when it suits. Uefa tend to make it up as they go along. We will likely never find out in Rangers case but if a miracle were to happen then a decision would have to be made. It is not clear cut. It is also a factor that Uefa are looking to implement a "wildcard entry" to be given to teams with a good CL record that do not qualify automatically via their own League. Like Man Utd as an example. Again that would result in 5 teams from England taking part. If Russia and/or Ukraine clubs are not included it has been suggested those countries with 3 teams included might be upped to 4 teams each. But no firm decision has been made. We should really all be hoping Rangers and Celtic do get far in Europe as at the end of the day that benefits Scotland in respect of teams taking part and also those teams are more likely to reach the group stages. For instance, if Hearts win the cup but lose their first Europa Cup tie, they will drop into the Conference Group stages and rake it in. That is purely down to Rangers and to a lesser extent Celtic. The Livi manager was spot on when he pointed out how much a European qualification could mean to every club nowadays.

This year Spain got 5 teams in CL. The first four in their League plus Villareal. So I think yes. But don't bank on it given we are a wee diddy country.

Lamie should challenge the yellow card on the grounds of mistaken identity. Clearly he did nothing to incite the crowd (other than score) and he made no gestures to the Livi fans. Does the referee report not have to detail what the card was for?

The difference being that those players you list were nearly always played in their natural positions. That cannot be said of Lamie and Mugabi under Alexander. So it is not a valid comparison although I do accept that at times those players looked more secure.

Spfl site just posted up fixtures! Rangers H Utd A County A Hearts H Celtic A Not Good

Agree with this 100%. Lamie has been our best defender for months. Without question. And that after the merit of playing him was questioned by some on here insisting he would not be committed enough having signed a pre contract elsewhere. Lamie has been nothing but professional and certainly proven those doubters wrong. Compare Lamie's approach to that of Gallagher who I cannot believe has been touted as a possible resigning. If he can get out of the Dundee move I would be delighted if Lamie stayed with us. And that is based on his form over a prolonged period and his commitment to his present club. We could do a lot worse. But he should be played as a centre back instead of being forced to sort out full back issues.

SOD was our best defender by a mile yesterday, and I include Kelly in that. Yet he still gets crucified with folk analysing every move he makes in the hope of finding fault. There is absolutely nothing he can do to turn some fans round. Suppose if folk are fixated on him it takes the pressure off others. Charles Dunne attracted the same attention. Further back it has been the likes of Hateley. Has to be one target each season I guess. Mugabi and Lamie are our best centre back pairing and should see out the season. And Mugabi should never play right back again. Don't know if Alexander was trying to prove a point, but it backfired big time.

Finished 2-0. Ireland scored the second goal after a break away in the last few minutes. Sweden must wonder how they lost to be honest. Irish goalie was superb. Our boy played the full game and never stopped working up and down the pitch..

Ireland U21s away to Sweden live on RTE Player. Free to all. Tierney with a smart finish to put Ireland one up. Amazing what he can do when he gets a chance to play. Time to trust him. He needs a decent run in our team to see what he can do. Playing just behind the main striker. Having a good game so far.

Apologies, bad wording on my part. To clarify, I did not want Wright or Hughes to be appointed in preference to Alexander (or at all) and as such was delighted and exited by his appointment instead of either of those two. My excitement and delight re Alexander was what I intended to say was misplaced, given the shambles and and eye bleediing football I am being subjected to each week. Not to mention the excruciating pre and post match waffle that comes out of his mouth. At the time there were two others I would have preferred to be serious contenders but sadly one now has moved up in the world and is well set. The other may not be available for a variety of reasons. Other options are available though. I do hope Alexander proves my concerns are misplaced, but I doubt it. I have simply lost faith in him and his style of football and fear for what lies ahead if he continues on this path. As others have said, it was just about bearable when we were winning the odd game.......who didn't enjoy looking at the table?...... but now we are in freefall the reality of his approach is hitting home. And it's painful. I can now appreciate why the Salford Board opted to let him go, which on the face of it looked like a crazy decision. I suppose it comes down to wanting to enjoy watching football. Each to his own.

Given that his Dundee salary does not kick in until the Summer I find it disappointing that with a wee bit of forward financial planning we were not able/prepared to make him an offer that matched what was on the table from Dundee. We have a fair few out of contract in the summer and added to the Watt wage savings we will surely will have funds available. Lamie has been far and away our best defender this season and his attitude has been commendable. I'm not convinced we will replace Lamie with a similar quality player at any less than we could have offered to convince him to stay. Like many fans I am not convinced all is well behind the scenes and I suspect Lamie, O'Hara and Watt, jumping ship is not just about the cash on offer elsewhere. I also suspect that several others, and especially the creative players, will opt to go elsewhere in the hope of being allowed to express themselves on the pitch. As he is likely still to be in place, I dread to think about who Alexander will bring in to support his eye bleeding approach. Hands up. I was delighted and excited when Alexander got the job ahead of the likes of Wright and Hughes. I was wrong. I went to my first Motherwell game in the mid 60's and have suffered some dreadful teams in that time. But this current situation is as poor as I can recall....even thinking back to the Malpas, Kampman and Hynd eras. Watching what is currently on offer is simply not enjoyable and as a ST Holder I am even struggling to convince myself to attend home games. Away games are simply no longer worth the effort or pain.

Given the situation we are in, ask yourself - Who game after game instructs the full backs/wing backs to play narrow, surrender the wide areas and concentrate on defending the multitude of crosses that will inevitably come in? Who game after game instructs our defenders to hoof the ball forward in the hope the opposing centre backs cannot head the ball and we might even win the second ball? Who game after game instructs every player to come back to defend free kicks and corners, leaving no out ball should we win the ball? Even the expected hoof ball has no target in those situations. Who game after game sets us up to be outnumbered and overrun in midfield? In fairness, if you bypass midfield that might not an issue when we have the ball. Does anyone genuinely believe it is the players making those decisions? Who thought it clever to play a decent central defender but suspect tackler at wing back in an important cup tie? And then who acts amazed that one piece of poor control and attempted recovery tackle results in a red card? Who game after game leaves our most creative and/or energetic players on the bench or sitting in the stand? Who drops players to the bench that did well when starting the previous match? Who stands watching a substandard performance, chatting it over with his mate for 75 minutes before making a change? Even then any change is like for like and makes no difference to the style of play. Who is prepared to blame the players, pitch, officials, weather, bad luck for every shambolic performance rather than accepting that just perhaps a change off approach now and then might help? Who spouts the same rubbish game after miserable game, but actually says nothing? You can blame the players and the poor quality of Scottish football and our League all you like. But we are stuck with a Manager who is doing nothing to help and in many ways is hanging his players out to dry. His stubbornness, reluctance to attempt a fresh approach when his game plan is failing coupled with his perceived persecution of players who raise questions is harming our Club and turning fans off big time. Somebody said it earlier. " It is now a chore going to watch this team". It is also galling to have to accept that teams such as Livingston, Ross County and St Mirren play far more entertaining football than we do despite operating in the same marketplace and therefore being similarly hampered by the poor quality of player available and the League we have to compete in. We may well escape relegation...just... this season but if Alexander continues with his same approach then we are only heading in one direction.

Exactly this. So easy to blame Collum but the blame lies a lot closer to home. And if Collum really wanted to rub our noses in it he could/should have sent of Roberts as well. If he had booked Mugabi I think he would have sent Roberts off. If either of those tackles had been on our players we would all have been screaming red card. And to question whether there was any contact for the red card is nonsense. Hibs did over react though but that's football for you. We do it as well. I like Mugabi but he is never a wing back and putting him out there was an act of folly. Centre Back or nothing....and after Ojala and Sol's performances of late there was plenty of reason to justify playing him in his proper position. Were any of us really surprised to see him lunge in and force the referee to decide the colour of card? He has been doing that all season. Much as many on here will be in denial, SOD showed exactly how that position is best played. But yes, blame Collum. That takes the heat off the man who put that team out on the park and refuses to acknowledge the issues that most on here have been concerned about for months. I'll be happy if we avoid the play off. Thankfully games are running out and the gap should be too much.

McGhee after a defeat away to Falkirk ( a Higdon screamer) with his " I don't give a monkeys what they think" when asked about our fans booing him for taking off one of the only players who was playing well. Sums the arrogant twat up.

I agree. Especially as he was hung out to dry. Expected to cover all across the back line, even to the extent of right back. And when Celtic were rampaging down the left he received no help whatsoever from Goss, Donnelly and Carroll who spent more time playing hide and seek than tracking back. He did make a few mistakes, but at least he was willing to get involved and never hid. The others mentioned would do well to look at the way the youngsters applied themselves. What got me was not the defeat, but the manner of it. One poster said the players were no less committed than they were in the previous matches. Not so. Against St Mirren and County all the players put in the effort., even if the end results were poor. Sunday was just depressing.

The concussion thing got me thinking. Say our player got concussed with 15 minutes to go and we had not used any or only one of our subs but our opponents had used all their allocation or made three separate changes, could we insist the substitution of our player was routine so as to deny our opponent an additional tactical substitution?

Strange how folk view things differently. I thought the main reason Maguire had to check back so often was because several players were not making themselves available for a pass. Woolery and Roberts, for so called wingers, spent most of the match trying unsuccessfully to be centre forwards and Goss and Donnelly were just nowhere to be seen. If it was not for both (much maligned} full backs, Maguire would have had no outlet whatsoever. Maguire was the only midfielder prepared to go looking for the ball. In fact it was a re-run of Dingwall for much of the match. And I don't get the Goss love in either. Sure, he can make a lovely pass from time to time (the touch to Donnelly for the winner) but too often he passes the buck and plays others into trouble. I lost count of the number of times McGinley in particular was sold short and then moaned at for not getting a cross in because he was closed down. I expect more from Goss as he certainly has the ability. Van Veen, Tierney and Slattery had an immediate impact as we all saw. It's amazing what energy, movement and demanding the ball can achieve. Even then Tierney was often ignored as he found space to receive a pass. I hope Alexander finds a way to include all three of those substitutes from the start against Hibs, but I'm not sure where Tierney will fit when Alexander sticks to his usual formation. I think he would be best suited to slotting in behind two strikers, which is the position he excelled in before he joined us.

And if TW goes this month and continues his scoring run, there is a decent chance he will be called up by Scotland. Generating additional income for United and increasing his value. £100k seems low to me. If that is all we are asking for then we are being over generous. No reason we could not add a few extras, like additional payments based on goals, league position or a Scotland call up. And I'm pretty sure there have been recent examples of players moving early and an agreement being reached that they could not feature against their former club for the remainder of that season? Don't think there are any rules ruling out any lawful terms negotiated between clubs.

It is on the App. Shows up on the International Travel link. At least mine does. Took a couple of weeks for it to feed through but should now show up quicker. Not checked if it is on the paper copy.

According to the Gretna official Twitter page last night , the lad was awaiting surgery as a result of the injury. Sounds like a terrible accident and understandable that no more detailed information was made available. Everybody agreed the Officials made the correct decision to abandon the match. Hopefully all goes well and he makes a full recovery.

If that sums up your debating skills I'll just take it you have no logical contribution to make, Clearly you find hard facts hard to handle.