Escapism

The last couple of weeks have been nothing if not frustrating. On the one hand, we have lost ground in the league, and Saturday’s defeat at the Rock meant that we were unable to capitalise on Cowdenbeath’s slip-up. In the Cup, meanwhile, it was infuriating to lose the game to such a ridiculous goal: I watched it several times on Sky Sports that evening, and it looked progressively more bizarre with each viewing. Positive thinker that I am, however, my intention is to put our current trials and tribulations to one side, and to focus on Stenny players of old – specifically Roddy McKenzie and Chris Innes, now team-mates at Livingston. It seems an eternity since either was at Ochilview, so it might come as a surprise to many to hear that neither has yet reached the veteran stage of his career – Roddy is 33 whilst Chris is one year his junior. Innes spent two seasons with us in the late 90s before moving to Kilmarnock for the healthy sun of £45 000, whilst McKenzie’s became an instant legend in November 1995, when his remarkable performance in the shoot-out helped us secure the Challenge Cup. My interest in Livingston’s fortunes is based not only on their ex-Stenny stars, but also on their Italian contingent. I recently spent a year living in Italy, and was thus pleased (if a little bemused) by Angelo Massone’s decision to invest in Scottish football. His ‘grand plan’ seems to have turned a little sour of late, with the sacking of his compatriot Roberto Landi as coach, not to mention the ongoing financial difficulties. I will nevertheless be hoping that Livi recapture the form they showed in Landi’s first few weeks as coach – it would be great to see Roddy and Chris back in the SPL next season. Closer to home, meanwhile, our attentions turn to next week’s clash with Montrose. Whether or not the Diack transfer saga is resolved before Saturday, this game is crucial to our title hopes. Here’s hoping we get back on track…

Ducking Hell

Another cup run comes to a limp close. After another uninspiring 90 minutes we were finally undone when Willie Lyle decided enough was enough - a trip into darkest Fife to Cowdenbeath is bad enough, but there was no way he was crossing that bridge more than is absolutely necessary - and therefore, a midweek replay against East Fife was out of the question. So, he ducked. Our priority is obviously the league, but it would have been nice to go on a wee cup run and maybe get one of the big diddy teams (as opposed to the a wee diddy team). Sure enough, East Fife got a match against the team managed by Diddyman Extraordinaire - Jimmy Calderwood, whose opening gambit on Sportscene after his team had struggled past Alloa was that the pitch was a "great leveller". So, on days when every grass pitch became a paddling pool, before it became a mud bath, Aberdeen played Alloa on the proverbial "bowling green" and Alloa pulled Aberdeen down to their level!!

Plastic Fantastic

As this afternoon's 'Homecoming' Scottish Cup ties began to take shape (am I the only supporter who actually likes the new name for the tournament?), my focus was, as ever, on events at Ochilview. Amongst the other ties, though, I found myself taking a particular interest in the clash between Alloa and Aberdeen at Recreation Park, and allowed myself a wry smile when the home side equalised just before the break. (I'm writing this at half-time: it's currently 0-0 between Stenny and East Fife, and 1-1 between Alloa and Aberdeen.) Why this enthusiasm for Alloa match, I hear you ask?

My interest stems entirely from the attitude shown by the Aberdeen boss, Jimmy Calderwood, towards Alloa's artificial playing surface. Earlier this week, he admitted he was considering resting several of his star players, since the risk of injury on the plastic surface was too great. I have always had the utmost respect for Jimmy Calderwood - he is a terrific coach - and to be fair to him, he retracted his comments after holding a training session on the surface. Nevertheless I was surprised he didn't make more of an attempt to get his facts right before speaking out in public. His scepticism about the playing surface presumably stems from Dunfermline's experiment with a plastic pitch - the only one in league football in the country at the time - whilst he was the manager there. Yet whilst there was widespread opposition to Dunfermline's surface - perhaps with good reason - it is well-known that those artificial pitches installed more recently, such as Alloa's and our own, are made to a higher-quality specification.

From my own perspective - and I'm sure most Warriors fans would agree with me here - the plastic pitch has been a great success. Our old grass surface used to cut up every winter; the new surface looks fantastic all year round, despite being used much more heavily. Hiring the pitch out to the Shire, not to mention making it available for private hire, provides a valuable source of revenue for the club - clearly this would not have been feasible with a grass surface. With regards to the quality of the surface, meanwhile, these 'new' artificial surfaces are FIFA Grade 2 approved, i.e. Champions League approved. That makes it seem all the more ridiculous when managers raise unfounded safety concerns, or, last summer, when the SPL forced newly-promoted Hamilton to replace their top-quality artificial surface with a (quite possibly lower quality) grass eqivalent.

As I come to the end of my article, we're now well into the second half, and unfortunately Alloa are trailing the Dons by two goals to one. More importantly, however, we are level at 0-0 with East Fife, and thus in with a fighting chance of reaching the fifth round. The BBC website's claim that ours was a featured match on 'Final Score,' on BBC1, appears to be nonsense, so I will stay tuned to Radio Scotland and keep my fingers crossed for the last few minutes...

Some things never change...

...or so the saying goes. 2008 was undoubtedly an eventful year for the Warriors, but as the New Year dawns, we find ourselves celebrating in time-honoured fashion: the obligatory handsome win against the Shire. Perhaps, though, it means even more than usual this year, for two reasons. For one thing, the day before the match, over a pint in a London pub, I discovered that one of my new work colleagues was a Shire fan - so the match was inevitably going to take on an added significance within our office.

The other major difference between this game and previous derbies, of course, was simply that few people were expecting a three goal margin of victory. The Shire have hit form for the first time since the Bronze Age, and are beginning to look like genuine promotion contenders. Their pre-match preparations were disrupted by the loss of their regular goalkeeper Jamie Barclay, but rumours of a 12-year old stand-in proved to be unfounded: Jim McInally had managed to recruit Barry John Corr, the entirely competent ex-Celtic and Stranraer keeper. So from a Warriors point of view, Saturday's result was nothing if not impressive.

Whilst it may not have been a classic, the players showed their quality and demonstrated their capacity to grind out a result. The first two goals were extremely well taken: Dalziel showed great predatory instincts after ex-Warrior Craig Tully worked his 'magic' in the Shire defence, whilst Motion's goal was something else. Surely he is the first player in history to perform two overhead kicks in such quick succession, including one after going to ground! Shirra also looks to be on top of his game going forward, whilst at the other end Bennett did all that was asked of him. All in all, then, an excellent afternoon's work, and all the more reason to look forward to next Saturday's clash with East Fife.