pozbaird

Scotland shipping four goals and being out of the game after sixty minutes. Pah, Alan Stubbs’ St Mirren could do it in thirty.

That photo is what it would look like if every St Mirren manager over the last eight years all got on the same bus.

We need him to be like Tommy Wright. Does a good job season after season, but sails under everyone else’s radar. That would be just the ticket.

Not at all. Our team finished third with 73 points. Were beaten for second place by another team also on 73 points, decided by a count-back on points scored on the back nine. The winning team had 75 points, so we were bloody close. Brian Rice is a 9 handicap player who was hitting the ball sweetly.... an excellent team effort, but we came up short. Always next year!

Twisted mind of yours.

I’m a happy man - just got the new remastered ‘The Song Remains the Same’ CD by Led Zeppelin. You know how we all (I assume) have an album that reminds us of a very specific time and place in our lives? Well, this is one of two albums for me. The other is the wonderful ‘Dare’ by The Human League. ‘The Song Remains the Same’ takes me back to the days when I was a younger chap than today, discovering rock music, bands, concerts, and the Glasgow Apollo. Led Zeppelin were almost mythical to a young rock fan like me. I never thought I’d get to see them live (but did at Knebworth in 1979), and, with a couple of mates in tow, to see the movie of the same name, it involved late night showings in seedy theatres normally showing blue movies. We sat transfixed. The live album and initial CD releases were frankly, rubbish. Dreadful sound quality, many songs cut from the Madison Square Garden shows, and the tracks that were used sequenced out of order that the band performed them. The original Jimmy Page approved studio album remasters were superb, but this album never received a proper remaster treatment, until now. The new release isn’t just an improvement, a better offering - it is transformative. Stunning. The missing tracks have been re-instated, the running order re-done. The mix is powerful, clear, warm, absolutely bloody wonderful. ‘No Quarter’ is spine-tingling. Magic.

Yesterday I was teamed up with Brian Rice at the golf day, and the bloke was top class. He could have hid, phoned in sick, blanked the golf day, but he didn’t. A really friendly guy, who is in the middle of something approaching a shit-storm at his place of employment. It’s easy to forget that these guys, and the players, are human beings. Which brings me onto the human aspect of this appointment. The bloke has family, a successful coaching role and a job outside football. Are St Mirren taking a gamble on Kearney? Of course we are, but so is Kearney. He’s now looking not only at coming straight into what is a pressured job, under a fair bit of scrutiny from all sides, but away from home, family, friends, and he will have a shitload of personal stuff to think about - housing, schooling, his affairs, never mind his new job. It’s a cliche ‘give the manager time’, but he really does need it, and I hope he is afforded it, it all works out, and hopefully Brian Rice can work alongside him. Welcome to St Mirren, and best wishes.

Allan Picken was on hand to record our new manager’s first meeting with the club BoD and SMiSA committee...

Wardlaw is my wife’s maiden name, and as it isn’t a common one, she liked Gareth when he played for us too.

Drum roll.... ker-tish!

I liked big Wardlaw. The bloke was a trier. That goal at Aberdeen was huge. Just a guy who had some talent and gave it a go. Good on him.

Good point, well made.

Punditry with BT Sport, standing with those brightly topped microphones beside BT Sports other ex-OF players... and Craigan. Will talk marginally more sense than McCoist, be marginally less annoying than Rae, and a lot less of a prick than Sutton.

Talking about new bands who sound like an older band, has anyone heard this new young rock band Greta Van Fleet? There’s a bit of a buzz about them, being the ‘new Led Zeppelin’ and a fresh new band ‘heavily influenced by Led Zeppelin’ etc... help ma’ boab... They aren’t merely influenced by Led Zeppelin, they sound like a tribute band, and could be a good one too, if only they were covering Zeppelin songs and not trying their own ‘original’ material, which a couple of tracks aside, is risible weak-as-pish second-rate retread shite. Anyone with an interest in Led Zeppelin, who hasn’t heard Greta Van Fleet - listen to the opening track on their debut album, and try not to spit your coffee across the room at 100mph while simultaneously pishing your breeks.

Good point. New management, new chairman, new BoD, new players, new staff, new supporters.... it’s the only way to move on from the mistakes we all make.

I have no idea where ‘the kids’ are at with music these days. However, if rock is the new jazz, then I’m taking my own life tomorrow. Rap, and jazz, IMHO, are just utterly, completely, and absolutely contemptable in every way imaginable. I have one ‘rap’ track in my 14,500 iPad song collection, ‘Lose Yourself’ by Eminem. I love it, but it negates my need to ever listen to any ‘rap’ song again. I simply have no jazz music in my collection, and the thought of listening to aimless and self-indulgent tootling, parping, and Buddy Rich drumming with facial expressions like he’s just shat his keks, gives me the dry boak. IMHO, he added, again, in case any jazz listening wallopers read this.

I agree and disagree with a lot you say here. If GLS and Fitzy ignored, or glossed over Stubbs reign at Rotherham, then shame on them. However, a football manager’s job has so many imponderables, unknowns, until the bloke is actually working day to day with the players, and everyone sees the performances / results with their own eyes. Stubbs, Guti, McIntyre, Kearney, Goodwin, Guardiola... every one of them would have been a gamble and no guarantee of being a hit... so I stand by my view that no matter how much due diligence GLS and Fitzy undertook, the fact their chosen candidate has pretty much crashed and burned will have burned them, and they will, as they care about our club, be hurting. I simply don’t subscribe to the view that they should be hunted down by an angry mob with pitchforks, and made ‘to pay for their mistakes’.

Clearly, the only solution is to get rid of Stubbs, Jackson and Rice for their mistakes. Get rid of GLS, the BoD, and any club official for their mistakes. Get rid of any players from the Jack Ross era who may or may not have been under performing and are making mistakes. Get rid of any players Stubbs signed who are perceived as ‘sub standard’ for the Scottish top flight and their mistakes. Get a brand new chairman, board, management team, and in January, once the squad is entirely, and I mean entirely, filled with new players of their choosing.... then we can all move on. Then, if it’s still shit, get rid of them all and start again.... and repeat. I don’t think it’s going out on a limb to suggest that of those interviewed, Stubbs did the best job of convincing the BoD he was the man. You often hear stories of actors going for jobs and when they are asked ‘can you ride a horse’ or whatever, they say ‘oh yeah, expert, horses? easy...’ having never been on one, but they need to get the job and they need to impress. Pretty sure Stubbs would have impressed with talk of contacts, quality loanees, and his Rotherham experience hardening him for the challenge, learned from his mistakes, fired up for the task, ready to pick up the torch from Jack, refreshed after a break from football, yadda, yadda. To some extent then, I feel Stubbs told them he was an expert horseman, oh aye, no trouble. I actually feel very sorry for GLS and Fitzy, who clearly, absolutely, must have been convinced Stubbs was the best candidate from those who applied, to take us on into the top flight. We are all sitting wondering how quickly feelgood factor can be blown out of the water, just think how those two men feel. They gave him the keys and he pretty much trashed their car for them. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but mine is that GLS and Fitzy have been burned and must be hurting, even more than us. Time to back them, and hope the next big decision they take works out.

He certainly knows how many months on average a St Mirren manager gets before the axe falls...

Stubbs went across to the St Mirren fans at Tynecastle and gave one of them a shoogly peg.

We should paint the away dressing room black. That’ll sort the basturts out. Get it round ye’ Broony, Griffiths and Tierney. Easy the Mirren.

You must know the guys on Radio Scotland though. Don’t you go blowing your media luvvy persona out of the water. We need you. We need Brookmyre. We need Leckie. We need, erm, chico, erm, ach fcuk.

He’s good, but Cheesy was the man. Gary Harkins was a real golfer - 3 handicap or something. Other players said that if football had allowed Harkins more time, he could have been a scratch standard player. Wee John Baird though... God loves a trier, but really, put the clubs in the garage son.

Does it for me. I want to be drawn in his team on Thursday... if...

Would disagree that the organisation of the team has been very poor from the start. I tuned into that Killie LC group game expecting something of a shambles, but the team were excellent, Coulson shone, we made chances, passed it around nicely, and were a coherent and good to watch team. The fact that it went from that to a team who cannot score, and can be gubbed after 30 minutes in games is the worrying thing. Clearly, a lot of stuff went on behind the scenes that only Stubbs, the players, and possibly GLS truly know about. Will be interesting to see how things go from here on in, and can that Rugby Park spirit, because it was indeed a spirited performance, be re-ignited under new management. I don’t wish Stubbs or Jackson any ill, but clearly, a lot was going badly wrong, and not simply results.