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| <-Page | <-Team | Sun 06 Aug 2006 Hearts 2 Celtic 1 | Team-> | Page-> |
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| 77 | of 085 | Roman Bednar 49 ;Roman Bednar 87 | L SPL | H |
Trouble travels but club chairmen could silence the yobsDARRYL BROADFOOT August 08 2006 Dundee United and Hearts have given hope of another refreshingly unpredictable Bank of Scotland Premierleague season. Sadly, the Old Firm's away support already appear incapable of being coaxed out of their idiocy and are in danger of spoiling it. The treatment of Paul Le Guen, the Rangers manager, on a visit to Tynecastle on Sunday was reprehensible. The Frenchman has already encountered the element hell-bent on preserving Scottish football's sinister side. Le Guen, who sat without trouble in the Parkhead directors' box only a week earlier, could not, apparently, make the journey from the Hearts official car park to the ground without being spat on. It was also alleged that he had had his view obscured from inside his car by paper strewn across his windscreen and was forced into a three-point turn by a diligent police officer on the beat. Incidents like these must force civil, cosmopolitan individuals such as he to question the wisdom of leaving more cultured surroundings for a country in which parking offences are often deemed more serious crimes than neddish, neanderthal thuggery. Gordon Strachan is no stranger to what he refers to as the "pronounced yob culture in society", either. In his insightful autobiography, Strachan recalls a visit to a petrol station with withering contempt. Accompanied by his wife and mother-in-law, he was subjected to taunts of "three-one, three-one" [a reference to Rangers' winning scoreline] not long after his introductory Old Firm defeat last season. "Look, son, I don't blame you for being a moron," he said, "I blame the moron who brought you up to be a moron." It is, to the Old Firm's eternal frustration, all in the breeding. Inside the stadium on Sunday, a section of Celtic's visiting support showed their contempt for Brian Quinn, their chairman, by indulging in the songbook deemed "inappropriate" by the club only last week. Boys of the Old Brigade is not sectarian in its composition but its homage to the IRA is utterly out of place in a sporting environment, as is Up the RA. Are we such a primitive strain that we will be forced to spend more time debating whether the IRA represent a terrorist organisation post-gun amnesty than whether Strachan ought to have kept Neil Lennon on the bench? There is, of course, a simple solution to what is now perceived to be the biggest problem in the Old Firm's joint quest to defeat sectarianism, the inability to police properly their more troublesome travelling support. It involves the other 10 clubs banning them from their grounds. True, the right-minded follower will suffer but it has ever been thus. Now, Mr Chairman, mop your brow and take a deep breath. For once, you can be seen to be contributing to the betterment of Scottish football and not simply looking out for No.1. Yes, you will suffer financially from being unable to bump up prices for the visit of the Big Two but, since the SPL was conceived in a democratic manner (stifle laughs, please), perhaps you could agree a percentage fee from the venture that would enable the Old Firm to commit adequate policing to the problem and go some way towards saving us from the big UEFA baton. Setanta, this is where you come in. With Rugby Park to the Tulloch Caledonian Old Firm-free zones, the demands of Rangers and Celtic fans could be satisfied by the return of jumbo screens showing their away matches in the comfort of Ibrox and Parkhead. At, say, a fiver a throw, the Old Firm would be in profit and be able to compensate the rest for potential loss of earnings. Fanciful perhaps, but, if the club and the police authorities are serious, it may be the only way to eradicate a long-standing problem. It would also end the Old Firm supporters' groups complaints about being ripped-off by rivals. Mercifully, the start of the season has enabled football purists to ponder a sequence of unlikely results. Falkirk and St Mirren top of the league and the Old Firm's fallibility has been emphasised again. Now only if the moronic minority could be seen and not heard.  Taken from the Herald |
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