James

Believe it or not, he is cup-tied in the league cup. Made his only two starts for ra Sellick in that.

I have known of clubs where there are problems with players, managers, and board and the owners, but not to the extent of the interference there seems to be at Hearts with Mr Romanov. -- Gordon Taylor, PFA chief executive. Spin yer way out of that one, Mr Mann.

Apparently Hibs are now saying the game will be at Tynecastle on the Wednesday (31/1). http://www.hibs.co.uk/news/more.php?id=1844_0_1_0_M

The land value of Tynecastle has not gone up anything like as much as Hearts' debt will have in the last eighteen months. If he pulls out now they will be stuffed.

It's nothing to do with being working class. I don't think Pressley ever claimed that. That's just wrong. They had finished third in each of the two seasons before Romanov arrived, and haven't finished outside of the top six since the split was brought in. They've been a consistent top five club since Jefferies took the job in the mid-90s. They benefitted from an easy draw. Three matches at home, a weakened Hibs in the 1/2 final, and two second division opponents (Partick and Gretna) in the later rounds. The Old Firm were knocked out by others. That could just as easily have happened when Craig Levein was the manager. Now we have another cup competition where it is already guaranteed that a non-OF club is going to win the cup, so I think that puts Hearts' achievement in a little perspective. That had at least as much to do with Rangers dropping back to the pack, as it did with Hearts improving. Now we see a league table where Aberdeen are on the same points as Rangers, and a few other clubs are within touching distance (Hibs, Inverness, Killie). Hearts had the boost last season of a tremendous start under a quality manager (Burley). Romanov did run the club well in that initial period when he didn't have full control, but since he gained full control (October 2005), it's as if he had deliberately set out to ruin the club. And debt-free. For how much longer? Why should Pressley have to change employers? He has been tremendously loyal to Hearts over a long period, and is only a year away from his testimonial year. To compare Romanov with managerial greats like those is absurd.

By that logic, the Glasgow-based teams should never play semi finals or finals in Glasgow. Murrayfield would get a lot of business then.

But they do care about money. Hibs would probably fill the home sections of Tynecastle (13,500), but would struggle to take more than 10,000 to Hampden for a midweek 1/2 final.

They may have been jumping the gun? I can't see why anyone would want either game played at Hampden.

http://www.falkirkfc.co.uk/falkirk-news/cis-cup-draw-23.html Just says that the draw was made at Hampden. Dates, times and venues to be confirmed.

Good good. I meant to say that I checked the electronic guide, which only shows today's programmes. I was hoping that it would be on tomorrow instead. Phew!

I checked the schedule this morning, and the game from last night isn't there.

That may be true of the Scottish Cup (eg Gretna-Dundee last year), but not of the League Cup. There has been one semi final at Easter Road in each of the last three seasons. Livingston-Dundee Hearts-Motherwell Dunfermline-Livingston Tynecastle is the obvious venue. Maybe Dunfermline.

Should be on Rangers TV tomorrow, presuming some bitter *** doesn't pull the plug. A rare upside to Setanta subscribing.

http://www.dumbartonfootballclub.com/squad/?mode=squad&SquadID=1&id=100

The attendance was also helped by the fact the game was on a Saturday because both teams had been knocked out of the Scottish Cup in an early round. That was very much a one-off (for the reasons mentioned above, not Saints and the Coagies getting cuffed in the Cup!).

It looked to me like they were told at half time to go easy on the physical stuff to avoid giving Freeland an excuse to even up the numbers, but it was taken too literally. I can't remember one good tackle in the whole second half, despite the fact Dundee were getting more of the ball and more pressure.

I think Saints are a squad built to play 3-5-2, but the injuries in central defence mean they are having to play 4-4-2. Both Stanic and Lawrie are attacking full backs, Hardie and Sheerin are not wingers, and so on. So maybe it is a little unfair to criticise some or all of these players when they are having to adapt to different roles.

They didn't want to risk the draw when down to nine men. Odds are they would have lost the ball if they had crossed it into the box, and with a few players would have been committed upfield, it would have been a good counter-attack situation. Not that Saints ever passed the ball well enough in the second half to do that anyway. Hanging on against nine men...