Week 38: Fin-tastic!!!

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more...to Pittodrie where Aberdeen clinched the final Uefa Cup place, and a money-spinning glamour trip to Tbilisi, with a convincing 2-0 win over Rangers.

Fortunately for the Dons, Walter Smith's side seemed to have already settled into the departure lounge ahead of their imminent post-season stateside friendly with the out-of-this-world LA Galaxy. David McCarthy in the Daily Record reckoned "Rangers had put their tools away all right but Aberdeen turned up with their donkey jackets on and their desire to get the job done was always going to outweigh the visitors' on a pulsating afternoon." The Herald's Ultimate Football Writer Darryl Broadfoot also thought "Rangers' token motivation ultimately proved insufficient to sustain them against a rabid Aberdeen side", after a "tepid start disguised as a contest that simmered gently before coming to a compelling boil." Did you see that - tepid to simmering to boiling? Fantastic stuff. I'm going to miss it.

At Easter Road Hibernian managed their first win since the discovery of Jupiter's moons, with a 2-1 victory over Celtic, in a match dominated by reports of the majesty of Scott Brown, who wasn't so majestic last week but that was before he was an Old Firm player. Elsewhere, Kilmarnock broke Hearts...I felt compelled to do that...with a 1-0 win at Rugby Park, while Dunfermline "got savaged" according to Scotland On Sunday's Tom English, by 3 goals to zip by Falkirk at East End Park.

Elsewhere though, people paid good money in expectation of a decent savaging, but were ultimately disappointed. Frank Gilfeather, who I feel for a great deal as he seems to have witnessed some of the worst games of association football ever recorded, was forced to sit through another dreadful 90 minutes of goalless action at Tannadice featuring the combined 'talents' of Motherwell and Dundee United, and could only conclude in his report in the Herald that "in the end everyone was happy to head for the nearest television set to watch the FA Cup final". Its quite quaint that Frank still thinks in terms of television 'sets' which conjures up images of chunky brown boxes with a big dial and three channels, which he probably has, underneath the flying ducks. Either that or a 60-inch Hi-Def Samsung, the other side of the hot-tub.

Sadly, Frank wasn't the only one left dissatisfied after the final game of a very, very, very, long, hard campaign that only a blind, and rather simpleminded, mother could love. The Herald's Graeme Telfer watched Inverness CT beat St Mirren by a single goal at Love Street before delivering this Beckett-esque pearl, which perhaps sums up the entire SPL season 2006/2007:

"The bulk of this contest was played to the backdrop of torrential rain and a howling wind that diminished any notion of entertainment to a cruel, schadenfreudic pleasure at seeing professional footballers reduced to thrashing around hopelessly in the maelstrom."

Ah, the press pups are hard to please it is true, for they are nothing if not critical.

Week 37: Do Dandy-droids Dream of Electric Sheep?

Neil Lennon's latest, but sadly not last, "big adios" to Scottish football took up most of column inches in reports of the penultimate weekend of the season. Apart from proving that the 35-year-old midfielder should perhaps consider a touring career as an insult comic, his almost-farewell gig also provided an example of the ugly, unacceptable divide that permeates the SPL, not just in the West of Scotland but across the entire nation - those journalists with book deals and those without.

Witness the following descriptions of Lennon's performance in Celtic's 2-1 defeat of Aberdeen at Celtic Park:

1) Martin Hannan in Scotland On Sunday and ghostwriter of "Man and Bhoy" the autobiography of Neil Lennon -

"Lennon was peerless in his holding midfield role."

2) Darryl Broadfoot in The Herald and not ghostwriter of "Man and Bhoy" the autobiography of Neil Lennon -

"It was hardly a vintage display."

Remember it's all about opinions, as listeners to football phone-ins are always reminded, in a vain bid to add some credence to the huge quantities of aural bile swilling around the regional, brackish backwaters of digital radio.

Luckily the sideshow of 90 minutes of football which accompanied Lennon's almost final farewell gave the assembled hacksters something they could come to some sort of agreement on. Patrick Glenn in the Observer thought it "one of the liveliest games seen in the premierleague in recent months", while the Sunday Herald's Natasha Woods noted "an entertaining encounter; the result not certain until the very end."

St. Mirren's 3-2 away win over Motherwell contained a similarly healthy suspense-to-minute ratio, featuring a suitably impressive rally from the visitors at 2-0 down, and, of course, guaranteed the Buddies another year in "the big-ish show". Sadly for their supporters, Motherwell are also condemned to another year of SPL football although there might not be that many of them around to watch next season as the Daily Record's Colin Duncan touched on in his report. "Fir Park was littered with seasonticket books at the final whistle," noted Duncan, "as the disgruntled home crowd expressed their disgust at a pitiful collapse by tossing them on to the pitch." Quite a gesture - throwing away your pass at the last home game of the season. As a protest, certainly right up there with Gandhi's best work.

Similarly unloved, although well-scarfed, Hibernian manager John Collins probably wishes he could throw away his entire goalkeeping staff after another mistake from Hibs No1. Andy McNeil contributed to a 2-0 defeat at Tynecastle to burly city-sharers Hearts. In fact the Sunday Herald's Alan Campbell reckoned "a whole new defence may be required after this dismal performance", while the Herald's Rob Robertson thought Hibs "were played of the park". Rangers also turned in a jaw-droppingly average performance to lose out to Kilmarnock in a 1-0 anti-thriller at Ibrox, while Falkirk bettered Dundee United 2-0 in a similarly meaningless affair.

Paris Hilton may be facing a 45-day spell in the cooler for her crimes against intelligence, but her plight pales in comparison to poor old Dunfermline who now face at least a year before any chance of parole in the Abu Ghraibh of soccer that is the Scottish Football League. The Pars conceded two late goals to lose their match with Inverness CT 2-1, but more importantly they gave up their Premier League status as well, just when it seemed they might just do enough to save themselves from the drop. Scott Davie in the Scotsman thought Dunfermline "metaphorically mimicked Steve McQueen crashing his motorcycle into the barbed wire just when he looked to be home free", in what was one of the slightly better "Great Escape" references of the day.

Sadly though, there was only one successful breakout at the weekend and he just walked out the door - quite slowly though, despite his little legs going like the clappers.

Week 36: Vote for the SPL! Independence works!

At a time when Scotland continues to reflect on the inability of her 'leaders' to organise an election, or indeed the proverbial brewery knees-up, it was comforting to note that the staging of decent football matches also appears to be somewhat beyond the borders of her ambition.

Witness the rather remarkable outpouring of angst by sportswriters following Falkirk's 1-0 home win over Inverness CT, a torrent of reflection not seen since the Buddha decided to pause for a while under a rather shady fig tree. In saying that, at least he got a religion out of it.

"There comes a point in every football supporter's life when they wonder what on earth drives them to bear witness to grown men toiling around a patch of grass," pondered Ryan Taylor in the Herald, the knife only inches from a major artery. Still he can always go round to Darryl's and watch grown men toiling around a patch of matting in a cage, which should be of some comfort. Nevertheless poor Ryan was not alone; an unhappy press pack were lining up to bash what little football was on display. The match inspired Alan Gallacher of Scotland On Sunday to bemoan "season by season a spirit-crushing league formation kept together by greed-fuelled self preservation, with scant, if any, regard given to the paying punter who has to pay hard-earned money to watch this sort of tired, jaded borefest." The game also led the Sunday Herald's Dave Hammond to put forward an end-of-season theory of his own: "Football does not have to be dull. Even end of season run-outs should contain something of interest. This is, after all - whether you like it or not - part of the entertainment industry."*

*I agree with 1) as I have been fortunate enough to see football played anywhere else other than the SPL, and I can confirm that despite warnings circulating to the contrary, it is possible to make three consecutive passes without exploding. As regards 2), how about a seal who can do keepie-uppies with a haddock. Sadly 3) is too weird to even speculate on - imagine Scottish football being 'entertaining'?

In a country which struggles to put a cross in a box, it was refreshing to see the Polish master of the art, Artur Boruc, make another tit of himself following Celtic's ignominious 2-0 defeat to Rangers at Ibrox. Sadly Boruc's post-match flag show - now that's entertainment - failed to distract attention from another poor performance from the visitors, and the assembled scribes were in no mood to let a prime opportunity to criticise slip through their slightly mangled and most certainly grubby paws.

Patrick Glenn in the The Observer watched "a defeat that betrayed the Scottish champions' frailties as currently incurable" in "a largely pedestrian and untidy contest", while The Scotsman's Glenn Gibbons thought Celtic's "lameness of their resistance to Rangers' ambition dishonoured their status as champions". Phil Gordon in the Independent On Sunday carried on the shoeing, seeing the performance of Gordon Strachan's side as "a meek and shoddy capitulation to their rivals that will be unacceptable to their fans", and the Daily Record's Keith put it in all it's tabloid short-sentenced glory: "This was not just a defeat. This was an embarrassment." Take that.

Talking of embarassing, Hearts were unable to put any further pressure on Aberdeen for a UEFA Cup place following the 1-1 draw between the sides at Tynecastle, while St Mirren enhanced the likelihood that they will be playing SPL football next season - lucky them - with a 2-0 away win at Dundee United.

Sadly these games didn't produce any tears unlike Kilmarnock's 1-0 win over Hibernian at Easter Road. "How [this] Hibernian side did not win this match is beyond comprehension," wept a disappointed Richard Moore in Scotland On Sunday. "Seldom can a team have had so much possession, showed so much skill, energy and ideas, only to end up with absolutely nothing." Much like the Scottish Senior Citizens Unity Party then. Sad times.