Glasgow Rangers 2: the 50,000 sellout match

'How these curiosities would be quite forgot, did not such idle fellowes as I put them down.'

- John Aubrey


Welcome to my wee photoblog on Glasgow, where we feature the  joys and unjoys of walking and cycling through a fascinating, beautiful and often badly run city. For the blog's origin and a  list of all posts see the  'Introduction' post  -

http://glasgowalbum.blogspot.com/2010/02/introduction.html


Today is Saturday, 18 February 2012 and we are heading to Ibrox stadium to take pics of the crowds before the Kilmarnock game, which starts at 3pm.

Yesterday we took a walk from Cessnock to Ibrox to Govan, to set the scene. See

Glasgow Rangers 1: the Ibrox Park Triangle, from Cessnock to Ibrox to Govan
http://glasgowalbum.blogspot.com/2012/02/glasgow-rangers-1-ibrox-park-triangle.html

This is the pub you see when you emerge from Ibrox Underground into Copland Rd. The quote is from the Rangers manager, Ally McCoist

Heading down Copland Rd

Now turned into Mafeking St; Ibrox stadium in view

Looking back down Mafeking St

Heading down to Edmiston Drive

A lot of horseshit; left by horses though, and not (for a change) by the Rangers owner, Craig Whyte

Cameraman from Rangers TV

Nice policewoman: I am standing where she wants to be,  so I drift for a few yards

We have wandered across the road to a flag seller's pitch

Horses nicely in step

The Kilmarnock team bus maybe?

A message to Whyte

Note the two young female tourists (or students) on left who have wandered into the scene

Book stall of Rangers heroes

Fans' march approaching

March over there is apparently by 'the Blue Order'

The Blue Order are heading to the club entrance to make their feelings known  to any directors who may be present

Sky getting appropriately dark and threatening

A crop of above

The Red Hand of Ulster

As they say, the camera can lie or be misleading. This may look like  a fascist salute in front of the  Israeli flag,  but in fact the bloke with the fag was just shouting at a mate.

Photographer getting a pose right. All around us photographers are in search of their Holy Grail, attractive young women doing amusing things. Note drookit bloke on right. Sudden blast of rain has hit us.

Portsmouth are another club in and  out of trouble. Not sure what their connection is with Rangers apart from that. It emerges that Whyte has - quite remarkably -  sold off Rangers' historic holding of Arsenal shares. one of the oldest and proudest of the  club links

Note flag bottom left.
From Wiki
'http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faugh_A_Ballagh
Faugh a Ballagh. . .(also written Faugh an Beallach) is a battle cry of Irish origin, meaning "clear the way". The spelling is an 18th-century anglicization of the Irish language phrase Fág an Bealach, also written Fág a' Bealach. Its first recorded use as a regimental motto was by the Royal Irish Fusiliers in 1798. It remains the motto of the Royal Irish Regiment today.'

Going back up the other end as it may be drier - rain coming  in squalls

A couple of Rangers suits survey the scene

John Grieg - shadow by Giacometti

Leicester City Foxes

Through a gate we can spy a bit of the pitch and the team mascot doing something cheery

A team from  the One Show are interviewing fans

We've wandered out the stadium for a moment

Apparently Chic Young on BBC Sportsound has surpassed himself by telling the Kiliie manager that his team are a 'sideshow' today.

If you are not familiar with BBC Sportsound, Dear Reader, it is a radio programme whose presenters are somewhat divorced from reality. When Roy `Keane played his first match for Celtic - against Clyde - a BBC voice assured us that the Clyde players would be cowering in the tunnel, afraid to come out.

Of course Clyde came out and played Celtic off the park; Keane hardly saw the ball.  The main problem with  BBC Sportsound is not even  the weakness of its sports coverage, but that few of the presenters seem to have any notion of human nature. Old maids living in Blairgowrie who have never seen a football match could have told them Clyde would be up for it.

Back in the stadium; going to head off now

Ah the mounted police - we'll pop over, they were brilliant

If only people were like horses

Cold blue light

Back on Copland Rd

Kilmarnock win 1 nil. But it's the fight for the very survival of RFC that will be the sairest fecht. I was involved in  the Save the Jags campaign when Partick Thistle were in trouble (my name is on a Firhill board  with 99 others) and the reaction of most other fans to your club being in trouble is simply to gloat (I except some Hearts fans who who wished us well). The stark truth is, however, that fans are abandoning the game anyway - over 600,000 in the last few years. Combine that with incompetent and corrupt management - as has  happened at Rangers - and you have real trouble.

Feel free to drop me an email with suggestions, offers of £20 notes etc. The address is damnyouebay@gmail.com

My other wee blogs are

http://parkeddogs.blogspot.com/

http://buddhasblackdog.blogspot.com/




Reviews of Scotland: 1000 Things You Need to Know


RADIO AND TELEVISON

'I love it - I'm giving this copy to a friend and buying another for myself' - Darren Adam, Presenter, Radio Forth, 17 November 2008

‘It’s a great wee book’ – Stephen Jardine, introducing Edwin Moore on Scottish Television’s Five-Thirty Show

'A fantastic book' - Scott Wilson , talk 107 Breakfast Show host

'A great read' - Dougie Jackson, Drivetime host, Smooth Radio 105.2

THE PRESS

'Despite its apparently humorous format, this is a serious and extensive dictionary on all things Scottish; from Jean Redpath to Lorne sausage, from Flodden to the Corries. Is particularly good on history and minutiae. There's a useful chapter on famous Scottish legal cases and another on literature. Excellent' - Royal Scottish Legion, Feb 2009

'This is the ultimate Scottish reference book' - Waterstones Christmas catalogue, 2008

'This is a fascinating look at the history of Scotland: its languages, politics and great achievements, from its origins in the ancient landmass of Laurentia 400 million years ago, to devolution and Billy Connolly. Edwin Moore has collected a thousand important facts about this beautiful country, covering Scottish history and culture, correcting misconceptions, and examining the mysteries of haggis and bagpipes with insight, warmth and impressive attention to detail' - The Good Book Guide, November 2008


'This is a recipe for revealing how horribly ill informed you are about your country. Although, if you are skillful, you can nod sagely as you read some new fact and mutter 'Ah, yes!' as if recalling the information from your excellent schooling. Where else will you find a real recipe for making haggis from scratch side by side with a potted biography of David Hume; a section of the Declaration of Arbroath and the curiously touching fact that Lulu was only 15 when she had a hit with 'Shout'? The whole thing is of course, silly - but oh so addictive.' - Matthew Perren, i-on Glasgow, December 2008


'. . . well crafted and witty' - Bill Howatson, Aberdeen Press and Journal, 18 October 2008


‘While most of Edwin’s entries are entertaining and scholarly – he writes like a Scottish Bill Bryson – it is when he takes an interest in the backwaters of history, the details lost down the back of the sofa, that he is at his best’ – Jack McKeown, The Courier, 27 October 2008


'History, it is said, is written by the victors. Trivia, meanwhile, is written by the guys with the smeared spectacles and the breathable rainwear. The first discipline is linear and causal; to quote from Alan Bennett’s play The History Boys, history is “just one f****** thing after another”. Things look different, though, when viewed through the prism of trivia. The past is reduced to one big coleslaw of fascinating facts that in their randomness tell a more mixed-up tale entirely.
The first approach leads to big, frowning books by the likes of Tom Devine and Michael Fry. The latter results in small, cheerful books such as Scotland: 1,000 Things You Need to Know, Edwin Moore’s valiant attempt to navigate the more trivial contours of enlightenment and clearances, crown and parliament, dirt and deity.
Moore proceeds from a sincere and controversial first principle: Scotland is really a rather pleasant and interesting place. . .As a work of popular scholarship, though, it’s in a different league to the Scottish novelty titles that get stocked next to the bookstore tills as potential impulse purchases, those little handbooks of parliamo Caledonia and regional braggadocio, such as Weegies vs Edinbuggers.' - Allan Brown The Sunday Times, 21 September 2008

'In his book, Scotland: 1000 Things You Need to Know, Edwin celebrates all that sets us Scots as a race apart - our language, law, flora, food, and of course, our people. From our poets, architects and inventors, to our artists, entertainers and fighters. But he doesn't shy away from the more unpleasant aspects of our history. . .' - Robert Wight, Sunday Post, 14 September 2008

‘We think we know all about William Wallace, Robert the Bruce and the Union of the Crowms. However, according to Edwin Moore, author of , Scotland: 1000 Things You Need to Know, we’re still in the dark about many aspects of our history and culture. . . The Big Issue looks at 20 of the most astonishing examples of secret Scotland.’ – The Big Issue, 18-24 September 2008

'What's the connection between Homer Simpson and Larbert, and why are generations of lawyers grateful to a Paisley snail? Need to know more? Author Edwin Moore has gathered 1000 facts like these about Scotland in a quirky new book. Brian Swanson selects a few favourites. . .' - Scottish Daily Express, 13 September 2008

'The palm for Christmas-stocking books seems to have passed recently to popular science, with best selling titles every year such as Why Don’t Penguins’ Feet Freeze? This year there has been a gallant attempt at a historical fight back. Scotland: 1,000 Things You Need to Know(Atlantic Books, £12.99) asks (and answers) such post-turkey questions as ‘How many kings of Scotland died in their beds?’, ‘Who on earth decided that the Declaration of Arbroath was the cornerstone of modern democracy?’ or ‘Why is iron brew spelled Irn-Bru?’ Mark Mazower,History Today; The Best of History in 2008, December 2008

'A real treat for the serendipitous Scotophile' - Reginald Hill


FROM THE INTERWEB


www.Booksfromscotland.com (on the new paperback edition)
Book of the Month, May 2010
'Whether it's Scottish lochs or Enlightenment philosophers, the facts of the devolution referendums or the mysteries of Irn-Bru, myths will be debunked and truths revealed in this light-hearted but rigorous overview of Scottish history and culture.'

Also available for download on Amazon's e-book store is my 100 Brief Encounters (only £3.06!)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/100-Brief-Encounters-ebook/dp/B006CQ8G84/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322393003&sr=1-1

Here are some reviews of the print edition (published by  Chambers in 2007) -


Edwin Moore's quirky collection of a hundred encounters between (mostly) important historical figures is a gem of a book. Where else could you get concise enlightening accounts of Henry VIII wrestling with Francis I, Geronimo surrendering to General Miles, Ernest Hemingway presenting Fidle Castro with a fishing trophy or (as seen on the books cover) a baby faced Bill Clinton shaking hands with John F Kennedy. A marvelous 'little window on human history. ' - Dominic Kennerk, Waterstone's Product Planning and Promotions Co-ordinator (From the Waterstone's 'We Recommend' list for 2008)


Witty, light and packed with information -- The Sunday Herald


In 1936, in the wake of winning a clutch of gold medals at the Berlin Olympics, the great athlete Jesse Owens was snubbed by an imperious leader, on racial grounds. Popular belief would have it that the leader was Hitler, who is said to have stormed off, furious to see a black man beating European athletes. In fact the man in question was President Roosevelt, who worried that paying attention to Owens' triumphs might be a vote loser. Although Owens and the German Chancellor never talked, Owens claimed that Hitler greeted him with an enthusiastic wave. Such near-misses, shakings of hands and ships-in-the-night meetings are the subject of Brief Encounters – Meetings between mostly remarkable people, a likeable new book by Edwin Moore (Chambers £7.99). Flicking through the index, you will find some expected encounters (Dante stares at Beatrice, Corday stabs Marat, The Beatles strum along to a Charlie Rich record round at Elvis's house), and the book's intriguing and memorable cover shows a baby-faced Bill Clinton manfully gripping the hand of JFK. But Moore has navigated past some of the more obvious collisions, collusions and confrontations of history (there is no Dr Livingstone, I presume) and much of the book's pleasure derives from lesser known incidents.

Inevitably, some of the accounts of earlier meetings are somewhat sketchy but Moore offers some piquant speculation, laced with humour (the book is tagged Reference / Humour, rather than History and this feels right, but the book, though wry and opinionated, never stoops to wackiness). I was intrigued to discover that, though Attila the Hun did die on his wedding night, it was not in drunken and lecherous debauchery, as his enemies maintained, but supposedly because he was generally a simple and clean-living man who had a few too many which brought on a particularly bad nosebleed.

Moore's book is full of such tales – it would be wrong of me to steal the tastiest morsels of his research and pepper this article with them, but look out for a subsidiary reason for the Gunpowder Plot (too many dour and powerful Scots in Parliament); a great meeting of great beards, as Castro wins the Hemingway prize for sea-fishing; Dali bringing a skeptical Freud round to the art of the surrealists; Buffalo Bill's wife claiming an aged Queen Victoria had propositioned him; Oscar Wilde getting a kiss from Walt Whitman, while Walter Scott was more taken with Burns's charismatic eyes. This is an enjoyable and vigorous rattle through some fascinating and believable yarns. My only quibble is that it's a little on the short side – let's have Volume 2 please Chambers! - Roddy Lumsden, www.Books from Scotland.com