Fearchar

It's a conspiracy............obviously!

And quite often has examples of that in the shop.

Congratulations to all - club, players and support! Champagne will be broken out tonight.

Does anyone else here think that we should invest in a coach for goal-scoring? The defence (from all over the park) has been tightened up, but sometimes I wonder if we're now missing the specialist coaching that Simon Donnelly brought.

Some of these clubs seem to have finances that are unsustainable in the medium to long term, but they keep going and disregard their dependence on one person's largesse or a forgiving financial institution that thinks it can't afford to let them fail. Interestingly, one of my colleagues said yesterday there shouldn't be so many football clubs; I responded that the small clubs all pay their way, and so was he considering letting Kilmarnock, Aberdeen, Hearts and Dundee United go to the wall? SPL supporters don't generally see the wood for the trees. What would the chances be of sustaining these clubs if they were judged to be too over-dependent on one source to service their debt? Their gearing is the stuff of accountants' nightmares, yet they continue as going concerns.

It may help others to follow what I did: I decided on some criteria for which I'd award marks. (Mine were control, speed, movement and teamwork, but yours might be different, as might the marks be.) In the end the final one, Erskine's against Livingston, impressed me most - partly because the teamwork lifted it above the others, especially the understanding between Doolan and Erskine.

All good sides are built on the basis of a solid defence. A well-known, knowledgeable football reporter of my acquaintance echoed my own thoughts when he mentioned this to me recently, after I had explained what our recent defensive record was like. (Do mhuinntir na Gàidhlig: bha sin dìreach mun do nochd mi fhìn agus Uisdean MacIllFhinnein air prògram spòrs madainn Disathairne sa chaidh.) We've had a great season, but without the addition of defensive strength under Archie, there would have been no promotion this season.

Nice red and yellow motor!

The day he played Marco as a wing-back was the day I realised that Campbell was not actually interested in and would never manage to understand this (simple) game.

Jammy, but maybe that's part of the definition of a champion in Scottish football. If Archie really does feel he must play 2 strikers, he'd be as well playing Conrad up alongside Doolan - linking brawn and a commanding aerial presence with guile and positioning. The Craig-Doolan partnership has been tried before, and never succeeded.

I think that part of the idea is to spread a sense of ownership across a wider section of the support, as well as to increase income from them. After all, we've all seen how effectively sugar daddies (whether corporate or personal) have been in ensuring a rational management of finance in football - not to mention the marvels that our captains of industry and their political cheerleaders have, er, wreaked on the economy.

You didn't tell the whole story. Ian Maxwell introduced GH to make the draw, which had a season ticket as one of the prizes, and told everyone that GH was hoping to win it, since it would be his best chance to see some SPL action next season.

It's worth bearing in mind that financial considerations for any player don't merely consist of the pay. The costs of travel (in time and money), the opportunity to play at a higher level (and next season Dundee Utd will be at the same level as us), relationships with coaching staff and players, job security and development opportunities (inside and outside football, as it's a short-term career) all count in a player's decision. Remember Tuffey?

Not at all! That's sickening news.

I've run out of likes, but I agree completely. I'd love to see Erskine and Doolan playing for us at the top level here in Scotland - and beyond. (Interestingly, we owe Ian McCall for signing these two talented players.)

The Jags Trust is also the connection with Supporters Direct Scotland.

What goes around comes around: the Centenary Fund was set up, among other things, to consolidate various means of channeling funds to the club. Now it looks as if new methods are being introduced to reverse that.

This attitude is one that will come back to bite the club on its collective bum: the Jags Trust is a major shareholder, and practically the only one capable of counterbalancing shares that are in the hands of members of the former board. Now, when the going is good and everyone seems to be willing to cooperate, is the time when the current board should be reaching out to the Jags Trust (and fulfilling the commitments made in good faith between it and the old board, which led to the creation of the Centenary Fund). Otherwise, when at some stage things begin to go awry, a recalcitrant major shareholder will be a potential weak spot. There are already links between One Thistle and the Jags Trust, and it would be foolish not to use these. On another, practical point, my trade union has some experience of a "walled garden" approach to web access. It hasn't been a success - and has put off people that already pay for benefits, who then feel they're excluded. It's hard to judge how to balance increasing income against worsening PR.

Penalties may usually be a "lottery", as LambieIsGod has said, but a little bird has informed me that there is a certain goalkeeper playing for a Lanarkshire club that makes a habit of saving them easily; perhaps we could buy him from that impoverished club and keep him on the bench to be substituted whenever we get to penalties. :-D

A warm welcome to any guest wanting to contribute to sensible discussion.

Nonsense! It was obviously deliberate - a masterstroke to devise a 10-man team: it rests more players for the rest of the run-in and we showed on Sunday that we play better with 10 men on the park.

That run of games one after another has had its effect: the players are running on empty. It has been obvious since the visits to Cowdenbeath that Lawless needs a rest, but today O'Donnell and Muirhead showed the same: both were punting aimless balls up the park as if they were the ones playing in the Second Division. The pattern for that was set in the first half, and wasn't changed enough to win the game in the time remaining. Will Muirhead not be due to miss the next game anyway? Elliot can run fast and force defenders into mistakes; he has also developed a good understanding with Doolan. Unfortunately, Doolan failed twice to connect with Elliot's crosses into the goalmouth. Elliot could easily have walked with Muirhead late on. It's fairly obvious that the QoS players were told beforehand to put Erskine out of the game, and the referee bottled showing a card to the perpetrator early in a televised game. As a result, Erskine played the rest of the game with an injured back. Taking Bannigan off was a mistake: he was the only one looking for the ball in the first half.

Actually, it's MnE that produce the football coverage, and BBC ALBA only broadcasts it. (BBC ALBA is a joint venture between the BBC and MG ALBA, which was set up to manage the public funding for Gaelic-language broadcasting.) It does mean that you can record it from Freeview, though. :-)

Razzista!

The part-time supporter (son no. 1) is coming from Goslar in Niedersachsen, Germany. However, two gentlemen were supposed to be coming from Shanghai, which seems a fair distance.