Andy’s Sting In The Tale (28/03/25) “Our ‘F Harry’s Toe’ Moment?”

(Photo:@Homesoffootball)

Andy’s Sting in the Tale

28/03/2025

Our F Harry’s Toe Moment?

Nai n Ochi?

Looking back to last weekend we played a game of four halves and while we got off to a flyer in Piraeus and murdered Greece in the first 45 minutes we were second best in the next three halves.
No complaints but another jarring reality check.
Steve has moulded us into playing as a tight club side and that counts for a lot but the reality is the Greek football machine, from a nation not much bigger than our own, is producing better players than our Scottish one.

But we all want success and we want it now!

So the easiest thing we can do right now is collectively gang up, blame the manager and bring in a new coaching team.
That will keep our chattering media happy enough filling their allocated daily page load but won’t change the reality that Scotland is not producing enough top level talent for whoever is/are the manager/head coach of our international team(s).

The stark reality we collectively face is we need change and changes or all we will get is more of the same old, same old.
I’ve lived through enough disappointment and can see that replacing the manager now or in a couple of years might be the easiest reaction but it won’t change our long term international team prognosis of a Scotland constantly snatching ‘defeats from the jaws of victories’.

We need re-invention and long term strategic thinking.

So maybe a gubbing by Greece, the home of strategy and philosophy, is a sign from the gods and a steer and maybe we should be thanking them.

I know the Ancient Greeks, without google on their phones, created and venerated ‘strategy’ to achieve objectives and ‘philosophy’ to make sense of their world using reason.

We need both and we need it as soon as to make a difference.

Heraclius said, back in his day, that the only constant in life was change and the key part of change is sacrificing what you have for what you want.

Holds true today and sums up our internal battle that if we want real change we need a plan for new thinking.

I don’t have all the answers but know we need a ‘longer than the next game’ strategy and that starts with vision, and whatever we do needs sustenance along the way, and that needs money.

I think we need to look back to look forward too.

I know my baby boomer generation played football free in Schools, Scouts/BBs, Youth Clubs, local clubs on local pitches provided by councils free or at peppercorn rents.

It produced a constant stream of teams and talent the likes of Celtic 1967, Rangers 1972, Aberdeen 1983, and Billy Bremner, Dennis Law and more.
It filled our clubs with naturally-honed talent.

Now we live in a different world where a club membership, if you can find one for your kids, will cost parents £40 plus per month per kid.

Billy and Dennis, both from poor homes wouldn’t have made it past our first financial hurdle.

The Horns of Our Greek Dilemma

Do we continue with what we have knowing where it will take us?

Or do we learn from other more successful countries and fashion what will work for us?

Cynical Andy thinks nothing will change because it is easier not to.

But maybe just maybe, Mike’s ‘Pitching In’  project with Westminster ‘Levelling Up’ monies replacing what our councils used to do for our communities at no cost to our game will take the message from our ‘Hellenic Humiliation,’ turbo charge the movement, and start asking the right questions at all levels.

Philosophically we know that such a move would require vision, sacrifice, realignment and συνεργέω (sunergeō).

‘Synergy’ to you and me

So is this our ‘Efharisto’ moment leading to the right response?
Should we be thanking Greece for the very stark insight they have delivered?

Or is it just another ‘Yiamas’ moment and an excuse to buy another round to drown our constant sorrows and play the part of centrally-cast ever-friendly drunks?

 

Andy’s Sting in the Tale

1. FIFA’s Financial Obscenity
2. Very Real World Politics
3. Pyramid 11 Years on
4. Enough Already

 

1. Infantino’s Cup Runneth Over for Some

The Fifa club world cup starts in just 78 days in King Donald of Mar-a-Lago’s fiefdom.
12 stadia including two with angry sponsors.
Atlanta’s ‘Mercedes’ and Washington’s ‘Audi’ Stadia whose name-sponsors have this week been hit with 25% tariffs by King Donald.

In June, 32 Clubs will take part, that is if they manage to both replace Club Leon from Mexico who were recently expelled, and simultaneously to negotiate the current Leon- induced court procedures for reinstatement.

Don’t ask me how they, (Fifa) chose the clubs playing and no it wasn’t fair or equitable.

Fifa say it was a mix based on ‘Sporting and Commercial’ criteria but in reality it’s a handicapped melee that is more akin to a flapper track.

The monies are divided unevenly already too with Real, Man City, Chelsea and Bayern getting more than Auckland a newly formed club from NZ who are aspirants to play in the new cross country league down under.

Ahead of the imminent competition with little/restricted  fan interest so far, press releases are everywhere.

“FIFA will neither retain any funding for this tournament, as all revenues will be distributed to club football, nor will it touch FIFA’s reserves, which are set aside for global football development through the 211 FIFA Member Associations”.
FIFA president Gianni Infantino is said to have said that when confirming that the winners will bank a maximum of $125M should a team go all the way, which means seven matches, but only if they are European.

European clubs who will be taking home the majority of the pot, as they will receive between $12.8m and $38.2m just for being there.
Clubs from South America get a flat fee of $15.2m.
CONCACAF, AFC and CAF clubs will get $9.55m.
Auckland City from Oceania receive a much smaller $3.58m.Why the iniquity Gianni?
Why two English clubs and no Scots or Scandis?

Bribery, to get them to come and play is the simple answer.
Gianni needed them.

And here’s a final B.S. quote from Infantino’s press release, “

“The FIFA Club World Cup reflects the pinnacle of club football with the biggest-ever prize money for a football tournament”.

So now we all know.

The reality that isn’t press-released is this over funded competition is really Infantino challenging Uefa ‘s Champions League success and boy is he trying.
Very trying.

The money is obscene and I hope the competition limps rather than flies.

Throwing money at the big clubs selected will just exacerbate national differentials and hasten the game towards some kind of ‘World League’ or ‘Cup’ where USA owns the franchises and the big clubs have forgotten who they are or where they came from.

In a week where Swiss courts said Infantino’s predecessor and his right hand Frenchman are somehow innocent of ‘corruption’ I would be pulling my hair out if it had started to grow again after my recent encounter with Melphalan.

Fear not.
My hair will come back but corruption and world football are intertwined and ugly beneath the veneer and the dollars.

2. Wanted in Zurich: The Wisdom of Solomon

This week we have a hat trick of sport and politics conundrums with simple and fair solutions that won’t be the outcomes.

The Afghan Women’s Football Team, in absentia for obvious reasons, have asked to be recognised by Fifa against the wishes of the ruling Taliban who I guess support their men’s team.

Palestine have asked that Uefa or Fifa or both ban Israel for war crimes against Gaza and ingrained aggression against the Palestinian people.

And Iran have just qualified for a world cup in America and will be asking for visas for players and fans to King Donald’s country.

Maybe Gianni will get given a new house in each to go with his growing collection?

3. Eleven Seasons of a Worthy, Overdue but Badly Thought Through Pyramid

Kilby look to have run away with the Lowland League but who will they meet in the play offs and then who faces the possibility of the dreaded drop from SPFL2.
At the wrong end of the Lowland it looks likely that Gala Fairydean will head the wrong way like fellow Borders giants Hawick Royal Albert did a few years back.

The Highland League only has 3 games to run and the ‘Wee Rangers’ from Dudgeon Park, Brora, are neck and neck with Brechin City on 73 points from 31 games.
Brora’s goal difference is +77 compared to Brechin’s +46 so it’s theirs to lose.
Saturday’s game in Brora against 3rd placed Banks o’ Dee is a huge test.Fans like the pyramid and there should have always been a bona fide upwardly mobile entry point but there has to be protection for what happens next because the 10 team league means in reality 7 clubs in SPFL 2 face relegation at the start of each season.
That puts a priority on survival rather than football and communities.
The evidence is stark.
Of the 5 teams that have fallen out, Brechin, Albion, Cowdenbeath, East Stirling and Berwick, only Brechin have come close to a return and the others and the communities they used to feed so well are floundering.
And making it worse, some of the clubs who aspire to replace them have poor community linkages and no plans for change.Time for a Review?

Fans want larger leagues.
Clubs need stability rather than panic stations from November onwards.
Aspirational clubs and their communities want fair access to better their station.

Not easy but the time is overdue to make it all work better.

4. Empty Apologies?  

“Keep Woke Foreign Ideologies Out, Defend Europe”.

Nobody I’ve heard from understands what was meant either but I can confirm almost 100% agreement with fans being fed up with the song books and if Uefa can control them with ‘Strict Liability’ then the SPFL and SFA should replicate it in our domestic game and the main stream media should start reporting it all.

Enough already.

 

Andy’s Sting is: Something I sit down on a Friday morning and try to capture some of the stuff that is going on around us all.
Coffee helps.
Football itself, and all the media hangers-on who fan the gossip flames are essentially short-termist in everything they do because the focus is always next week’s game, the ups and downs, the opinions of the transient team managers and even the signing of an old player who’s been round the track so long that his legs won’t have the spring they once had.

I think we deserve better.

My weekly disclaimer is that the opinions expressed are mine and I hope they get you thinking.
And as always you’re welcome to disagree with any or all of it.
Many of you seem to be like minded and appreciative and that keeps me going.

Have a good weekend.

 

The Beatles : Abbey Road

I was looking for a track in my collection to welcome back the daylight and disappeared down a few dead ends like ‘Summertime Blues’, Eddie Cochran and The Who; ‘In the Summertime’, Mungo Jerry’; ‘Summer Breeze”, The Isley Brothers; ‘Summer in Siam’, The Pogues; and ‘The Hissing of Summer Lawns’, Joni,.

Eventually I hit pay-dirt and reacquainted myself with something I used to know so well.

‘Here Comes the Sun’ and the album Abbey Road by a band who once played Dingwall Town Hall to 17 people.

The ‘Sun’ track written by George Harrison just about sums up the very real end of winter with daylight a certainty and the occasional ‘taps aff’ spell a constant hope and dream.
George’s lyrics are incredibly simple, maybe with none of John’s acerbic insight or Paul’s innate lyricism but they work.

Little darling
It’s been a long, cold, lonely winter
Little darling
It feels like years since it’s been here

Here comes the sun
Here comes the sun
And I say, it’s all right

I hadn’t played this album for ages because like most I carry this all round in my head and just take this Liverpool band for granted.
That is madness.

Abbey Road, was recorded a long time ago, in the pre-King Donald, Nixonian days, in 1969 at EMI Studios after George Martin had pressurised the record company into gearing up with the latest ‘8 track’ recording facilities.
Allegedly it took ages to put together and produce because the band were in a state of growing animosity and apathy and some days didn’t even like each other.
Amazingly the melee of tracks from all four is magical.
Critics at the time were not universally amused.
The British Musical press, Melody Maker and NME both approved but those who like to be offended especially in the USA were just that, offended.
Nick Cohn a Brit writing in the NYT called it  “Pretty average stuff’, and went on to say, “The words are limp-wristed, pompous and fake”.
Rolling Stone’s Ed Ward said, “A rather tenuous line between boredom, Beatledom and bubblegum”.
And some gadge called Goldstein writing in Esquire called it “A Pastiche of Dissonance and Lushness”.Like the Union Bears ‘Woke’ TIFO banner last week I have no idea what any of that really means but the album ‘flew’ off the shelves back then and retrospective reviews soon realigned into critical acclaim and a consensual upgrade.

I don’t really have favourite tracks because it really is an Eton mess of enjoyment but ‘Here Comes the Sun’ sums up this weekend and I love George’s light-inspired optimism.
And ‘Something’ also on the album is arguably George’s finest ever track.

Finally the Lennon/McCartney synergy in ‘Carry that Weight’ is profound in its simplicity.

And even the album cover became a reason for countless fans like me to visit the street and cross THAT zebra crossing.

I didn’t steal or even contemplate stealing the road sign like many others have done over the years since.

But I did wonder for years why Paul was in bare feet and only found out much later on a radio interview that it was because his shoes were too tight.

So now you know too.

Welcome back to the daylight, welcome back to the sun and welcome back to an amazing collaboration.