[ad_1]
It’s frowned upon if you say anything good about Malky Mackay these days – but here goes anyway. In recent weeks, it has become increasingly clear that the job the Ross County manager has been doing in Dingwall is pretty remarkable. County may have flirted with the relegation zone for most of the campaign but, due to the compacted nature of the tranche of teams between fourth and 10th in the Premiership, the Highlanders have flown up the table with a series of wins in recent weeks.
They signed well during the summer – even providing prospective new players with information packs on places to live, eat and see in the Dingwall area – and those new arrivals alloyed to some of those already there have responded with loanees Joseph Hungbo (Watford) and Ash Maynard-Brewer (Charlton) excelling particularly while Regan Charles-Cook has scored more than some of the supposed biggest-name strikers in Scotland.
Such is the nature of the cinch Premiership that County now sit one win off fourth place and a possible European berth next season, incredible given the perception that they were struggling a few weeks back. In truth, they have been playing well for most of the season, even when results were going against them.
That is testament to Mackay. It is not entirely surprising that the 50-year-old has prospered in the job. His record in the Sky Bet Championship was impressive winning manager of the year in 2013 after taking Cardiff City into the Premier League for the first time to add to an appearance in the League Cup final a season earlier.
In private, he is an interesting, engaging individual who knows he made a mistake but who underwent equality and diversity training and yet continues to pay for that error. Of course, the concept of rehabilitation has been a hot topic in Scottish football in light of the ongoing David Goodwillie situation and there will always be those who have a problem with Mackay. But the two text messages he was ultimately censured for feel very much at the lower end of the scale especially when compared to someone such as Davie Martindale at Livingston who has been given redemption by fans and authorities alike following a drug dealing conviction.
Hoyle should stick to politics
Interesting to note the intervention of Sir Lindsay Hoyle into the row surrounding Josh Taylor’s controversial points win over Jack Catterall last week. Catterall is a constituent of Hoyle’s in Chorley and the MP expressed his outrage at the result in a tweet last Sunday which read: “It was a disgraceful decision by two of the boxing referees. I will be speaking to the sports minister. The result is a travesty of justice.”
Fast forward a day and the British Boxing Board of Control announced it was launching an investigation into the fight.
Hoyle, of course, doubles as the Speaker of the House – a job he has seemed utterly incapable of performing without resorting to some highly dubious decisions and cock-ups of his own.
In November he apologised for wrongly calling a British Asian MP “Mohammed” during a debate on racism in cricket, then he had a bigger problem with Ian Blackford calling Boris Johnson a liar in parliament than Johnson actually misleading parliament itself. There are more alas the list is heading towards the same size as the number of Russian oligarchs who have secreted money into British society over the past two decades.
Red Star warning
Red Star Belgrade warmed up for their Europa League last 16 encounter against Rangers with a thumping 5-0 victory over Novi Pazar yesterday afternoon. There’s not much to read into that, of course. Dejan Stankovic’s men have lost just once all season and were 4-0 up after 21 minutes against the team that is rooted to the bottom of the Super Liga table after 26 matches.
Former Rangers and Serbia defender Gordan Petric appeared in these pages in recent days claiming Red Star had little chance against Rangers over the two legs, the first of which is on Thursday night. But one only needs to look at the Serbian side’s form to see that they will be no pushovers. They have lost just once in 15 matches and topped a Europa League group containing Braga, Ludogorets and Midtjylland – Champions League conquerors of Celtic – to reach this phase.
Yes, the expectation is that Giovanni van Bronckhorst’s side will have too much for Red Star but they have exited Europe twice in recent seasons at the hands of teams (Rapid Vienna and Slavia Prague) who, on paper at least, have looked inferior.
Weary on Wearside
When Alex Neil succeeded Lee Johnson as manager of Sunderland on February 11, the Black Cats sat in fourth place, a mere two points behind the automatic promotion places.
Sunderland had been very active during the January transfer window bringing in a number of high profile players including Jermain Defoe from Rangers and the former Celtic winger Patrick Roberts and Johnson, once of Hearts and Kilmarnock, paid the price for a 6-0 defeat at Bolton Wanderers.
But since then it has hardly been a rose garden for Neil, who had been out of work since his sacking by Preston last March. The defeats have dried up but Sunderland have won just once since the Scot took charge and now find themselves outside of the play-off spots and 11 points adrift of the top two. All is not lost but at a club as neurotic as Sunderland it would be little surprise if Neil’s efforts for the remainder of this campaign will ultimately be in vain.
Warne deserves more respect
It took all of an hour for the announcement of Shane Warne’s death on social media to turn into a commentary on how he was once the boyfriend of Liz Hurley and lavish praise subsequently followed.
This is the man who had more than 700 wickets and 3000 test having his list of greatest achievements reduced to the time he “ploughed” an English actress.
Then there were those debating his vaccination status for some political point scoring. Newsflash: people died prematurely of heart attacks long before Covid.
The overwhelming conclusion when venturing online to read comments these days is that more often than not that those making the observations have been untouched by any kind of personal tragedy themselves.
There is nothing wrong with a bit of levity when it comes to death, of course. But it seems that the times when the demise of a sportsman or woman was greeted with the kind of respect it deserved are long gone.
5
The number of games without a win at the Tony Macaroni Stadium that Celtic ended following victory over Livingston yesterday. It is one of the peculiarities of modern football that no matter the years that pass or the change in personnel, teams have droughts for inexplicable reasons against particular foes. Psychological factors can be the greatest opponent a player or team can face in any given match but this Celtic team seems to be made of stern stuff.
[ad_2]
Source link
