Andy’s Sting In The Tale (06/09/24) “Reminiscing Ahead of a Big Game”

Date: 6th September 2024

(Photo:@Homesoffootball)

I had a very pleasant lunch today with some old and new football friends.
We were talking a little and a lot about all things football and last night’s game at Hampden was front of mind.
We agreed we were markedly better last night than in our recent German Euros sojourn because there was fire right through the team.
But, two daft/clumsy/schoolboy challenges and a few short seconds of marking inaction outside the box and an amazing strike mean we go into Sunday night’s match against Portugal with no points and no easy games ahead in a tough group. The conclusion we came to is Steve is doing well enough with the players available but we’d all like a better conveyor belt of top talent.
But every country would like that.
There are no secrets or secret ways in World Football and we just have to start doing the easy things well, maybe even the way we used to.
Simples
Not!

In many ways Germany 2024 was a great success and the Tartan Army really got behind the team and were a credit to the nation.

I was the oldest at the table and was able to talk about vivid personal memories from the last time we played in a major tournament in Germany, 50 years ago in 1974.
Yes we came home early, and yes our manager certainly had more choice because we were a hotbed of talent back then.

World Cup 1974: Scotland's undefeated campaign in West Germany - BBC Sport

I actually remember it all in black and white from the screenings on wee elevated goggle boxes in smoke filled front-rooms that smelled of McEwan’s Export and had Tennent’s World Cup squad posters on the walls instead of the usual framed pics of Loch Ness scenes or Spanish Donkeys with pannier bags full of oranges in a constant Dali-like conflict with the flock wallpaper.

Scotland was a very different place back then.

In football Ernie Walker reigned supreme through our game and live tv was frowned on and strictly rationed.

We had no football pyramid and therefore the Highland, Lowland and East of Scotland leagues were landlocked.
Women’s football was a curiosity and outlawed at SFA members grounds.
‘Juniors’ were at proud arm’s-length to the ‘seniors’ game with an invisible wall.
(They were good enough ‘hardening’ places to blood young talent though).

Atletico Madrid open old Celtic wounds as hatchet men to be heralded at scene of their greatest crime - Daily Record

In late August 1974 women were finally un-outlawed by Park Gardens.
Scottish men’s teams were more successful in all three Uefa competitions too and Celtic again reached the semi-finals of the European Cup against a team most of us didn’t know much about, Atletico Madrid.
Bloody hell, what a shock was awaiting for us all at the first leg in Glasgow.
aka Violence at Parkhead
Yes it’s a poor quality video but some horrendous tackles that still make me screw my face up 50 years later.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDElMvVdOK4

It is also scary to think that it is 50 years since I transitioned from being an S form signing at Inverness Caley to a right back berth at Aberdeen Uni at the windswept and not very interesting Balgownie complex.
(By the way, Caley, I’ve never been told my registration was being released so maybe I’m still an S form Caley signing with a lot of bygamistically/illegal clubs along the way since.
I miss the money being left in my shoes too, didn’t get that at Uni).Good luck Steve and boys, for Sunday at the ‘Estadio de Luz’, just be sure you’re not in Sunderland.

Andy’s Sting in the Tale

1. What a Goal?
2. The Wee Guys Lose Out Again
3. Middle East Politics and Football

1. If you Haven’t Watched This

Sometimes football is joyous and this is.
I don’t know where it is or anything about it but it made me smile out loud.
https://x.com/i/status/1831658555998396507

2. A Suggestion to the Majority of Uefa Members
Unite and Fight a United Corner

This week we saw a convoluted mini tournament played for access to the Women’s Champions League proper.
Celtic had an easier draw and have reached the final play off but Rangers were up against well-funded Arsenal.
I am not a fan of coefficients keeping the wee guys down at the expense of Uefa’s Big 6 nations.
Andy’s Suggestion
If all the wee guys like us in Uefa united and organised they could change the way the Uefa machine works.
This applies to the men’s game too.
A simple ‘back of a fag packet’ calculation will confirm there are more tv sets outside the Big 6 than inside, and instead of channelling the riches to the biggest clubs we should all be demanding change that sees the revenues shared around the countries rather than wheeching in grand Uefa style to Spain, England, Germany, France, Italy and Netherlands, or wherever.
Just think what that could do to develop the game in the smaller member countries instead of being tv cannon fodder.

3. Caught in the Middle

How does Fifa and Uefa deal with confused and confusing clashes between members like Israel and Palestine, or Russia and anybody?

I can hear you thinking, Badly.

It’s not easy.
Where is the sense that classifies Israel as European and Palestine into the AFC (Asian Confederation) where they drew 0-0 last night against Korea. (Australia are Asian too).
This week some of the more open football journalism sites talked about it.

Here is the report lifted from ‘Inside World Football’ (In italics and not my writing)

“FIFA kicks Palestine-Israel political football into October for Council decision

September 2 – FIFA is continuing to drag its feet over the crisis in the Middle East by once again delaying a review of a Palestinian bid to have Israel kicked out over its destruction of Gaza.

At the FIFA Congress in Bangkok in May, FIFA president Gianni Infantino mandated a panel of independent legal experts to assess the Palestine – Israel conflict but both the assessment and decision were postponed to allow Israel to compete in the Olympic football tournament.

The Palestine Football Association’s complaint should then have been addressed during an extraordinary FIFA Council meeting in July.

However, on July 19, FIFA moved the goalposts, indicating that the review by its all-powerful Council “for any subsequent decision” would take place “no later than 31 August 2024.”

But in the latest move that will have surprised no-one given FIFA’s past delaying tactics, the organisation said late on Friday it would now consider the Palestine Football Association’s (PFA) proposals to suspend Israel in October.

“FIFA has received the independent legal assessment of the Palestine Football Association’s proposals against Israel,” FIFA said.

“This assessment will be sent to the FIFA Council to review in order that the subject can be discussed at its next meeting which will take place in October.”

The Palestinian proposal accuses the Israeli FA of complicity in violations of international law by the Israeli government, discrimination against Arab players, and overseeing clubs established in illegal Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian territory.

Israel has rejected all the allegations but the PFA claims over 90 Palestinian players have been killed in the war, as well as football infrastructure being destroyed, its leagues suspended and its national team required to play World Cup qualifiers abroad”.

No easy answers and what does Fifa do when Russia plays friendlies like last night against Vietnam.

Way beyond my paygrade but I’m glad some journalists are vocal on Uefa’s dilemma on behalf of all fans who care.

Andy’s Album of the Week

Wings: Band on the Run

Like everyone my age I was a Beatles fan and still am.
My big sisters had most of the Beatles albums in the house in the wee shelves in the front room radiogram and my favourite was probably the White Album, but I liked them all.
I liked John Lennon for his insights and harmonies but my favourite Beatle was Paul and the sheer tunefulness of everything he did.
Yesterday, Blackbird, Hey Jude, Let it Be, Something, et al.
Our own Julie Fowlis singing ‘Blackbird’ in gaelic is truly amazing and I didn’t know ‘Blackbird’ was a protest song against racial intolerance.
Too clever by half that Macca.
No surprise, as a fan I bought the album McCartney, and then Ram, Wings Wild Life and Red Rose Speedway and liked them fine and still play them but then Band on the Run appeared in late 1973.

Fans still had issues with Paul and many blamed him for the Beatles split so the album was a slow burner until two hit singles ‘Jet’ and ‘Band on the Run’ meant that 50 years ago today it was number 1.

It was of its time and just worked then and still does.

Posted in: Andy’s Sting in the Tale, Latest News

Andy’s Sting In The Tale (06/09/24) “Reminiscing Ahead of a Big Game”

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