Sow good. The championship season.

It's been a belter. Obviously for those of us who watch the fitba through maroon-tinted goggles it was unexpectedly painless, at least in the league. The cups were another story but if Robbie Neilson's plan was to concentrate on the league then it worked a treat. The three-horse race with Hearts, The Rangers #2 and Hibernian didn't work out. Instead, Hearts had the league sown up before Valentine's Day with Falkirk and Queen of the South in particular forming a cluster of four some distance behind.

I was lucky enough to be at the Whisky Fringe when news of Sow's last minute winner at Ibrox came through. Probably the most important goal of the season. It instantly dented the unfounded and undeserved self-regard of Sevco Rangers and their lapdogs in the media. From that game on, they were trailing Hearts and proceeded to go to pieces. That was followed up by another important defeat of Hibernian who after the previous season's farce hadn't really got going yet.

Hibs then lost two on the bounce to Falkirk and Alloa while Sevco dominated all teams until they too met the unpredictable Alloa with only a late goal saving them from defeat. More points lost to Hearts though. The gap was to grow even larger after Hibs visited Castle Greyskull and handed Salary McCoist's overpaid duds a 3-1 defeat. Hibs had looked uncomfortable at first, barely able to string a pass together, but then the Sevco defence imploded and Sevconian FC were fortunate to keep the score to 3. In typical Hibs fashion though they followed up that satisfying win by drawing at home to Raith Rovers. The much ridiculed Christian Nade creating havoc in the Hibs defence. Hearts were still undefeated when they met Hibs for the first Easter Road derby. Hibs were up for it and Hearts despite having possession and chances didn't look like scoring. Hibs did, Hearts got a man sent off and Hearts were heading for defeat. With the Hibs fans bouncing and taunting, the Hibs players inexplicably gave Hearts the freedom of the pitch. Ozturk took the ball and this happened... 

Late November and Hearts hammered yet more nails into McCoist's coffin with a 2-0 win at Tynecastle. Rangers turned up with a mission to hurt and that they did. Incredibly, only one of them saw red but young Kevin McHattie was forced out for months after a horrific kick from Kenny Miller. Hibs meanwhile lost again to Falkirk. Mid December saw McCoist have his ass handed to him in Dumfries after a convincing win for Queen of the South against 'The People'. Hearts marched on regardless. The start of December saw Sevco in a cup semi-final and plucky wee Alloa. Surely this would bring some comfort for Salary and his well-remunerated players? Maybe not. One of the results of the season... 

Ally McCoist then became the first(!!!) Rangers manager of the season to leave footballing duties in favour of 'gardening leave'. With a glum Kenny McDowall now in the throne, Sevco's defence went all LibDem and things could only get better...

  

High-score of the season is an easy one to call. Again, an important win came when Da Rangers were labouring to draws with Falkirk and er... Cowedenbeath the week following this mauling.

  

In March, Stuart McCall who had done a grand job leading Motherwell into danger took over at the Ship of Fools and went on an unbeaten run. Or in other words, a series of draws against teams in the second tier of football whose player budgets would barely stretch to buying a pair of spades for both of Rangers' gardening-leave managers.

Hibs meanwhile were looking good and were now the closest of 'the other two' to Hearts. When they met Rangers at Easter Road on March 22 anything other than a Hibs win would give Hearts the title. As per usual in games of high significance, Hibs went to pieces and McCall was the toast of the Blue Derry Boys of Billy Union Orange or whatever the Rangers' fans sing about themselves.

When the fixtures were announced, the Hearts/ Rangers match on the final day of the season was seen by some to be the title decider. In the end, Hearts won it without kicking a ball. In the middle of March. All that were left were the play-offs. Alloa deservedly secured their Championship status while the formidable Queen of the South narrowly lost to Rangers. The idea of Da Rangers back in the top flight was as appealing to most of us as being caught in a sandwich between Eric Pickles and Jackie Baillie. Could Hibs stop them? No. Only Motherwell, who had under Stuart McCall, been sacrifical lambs for Die Rangers stood between the Premiership and the Forces of Dunkelheit.

In the end, all's well that ends well. Sevco were trounced over two games and their cartoon defender Moshni is facing police action after giving Motherwell's Irwin a bit of doing after the final whistle. At least for another year, Scotland's top flight will be spared the violent play of Rangers players as well as the violence, sectarianism and racism of their fans. Some further financial woe is not out of the question. 'Glib and shameless' Dave King who had a hand in the previous Rangers going bust is now at the helm. What could go wrogn?

Football celebs vote in #GE2015!

We all know that Alex Ferguson is a Labour man, whatever their policies are. Also that ex-Hearts and Hibs red-card junkie Michael Stewart is an intelligent advocate of independence and is backing the SNP. Terry Butcher is, or at least used to be, a Tory. But, let's face it, fitba celebs rarely put their heads above the parapet on the political front.

Tocasaid will hazard a few guesses though.

So, with the election upon us and episodes of mindless sickening violence (see above) now in the past, let's enjoy some 90-minute nuggets...

First up is house-favourite Leigh Griffiths. Hibs fan and righteous Celtic FC forward has been banging in the hat-tricks lately. His ongoing hat-trick seems to be the triple-grudge of racism, homophobia and Islamophobia. That's surely makes him a Ukip man.

Moving slightly to the left, we have Ally McCoist. He's a well known Unionist and with Oldco Rangers having corned the right-wing conservative market for fans in recent decades, he's sure to be a Tory. In fact, I reckon he's so taken with Scottish Conservatism that he's morphing into Ruth Davidson.

Anne Budge of Hearts and Leanne Dempster of Hibs are two independently-minded women with clear visions of what their respective clubs should look like. They also thrive in an otherwise backward-male environment. That makes them SNP fans of oor Nicola.

Robbie Neilson. Young manager who's quiet demeanour has nevertheless yielded spectacular results for Hearts this season, albeit in the second tier. They won the league by a country mile as the SNP are predicted to do on May 7th. SNP again for this winner.

 

Lee 'Elbows' McCulloch. Past the sell-by date footballer and vicious hardman of The Rangers FC. Even his own fans don't like him. Other fans detest him. Referees don't know he exists. He's not very popular. He must be a Lib Dem.

Alan Stubbs. Used to be a likeable guy but has grown into one hell of a bitter man this season as Hibs yo-yo all over the place - one minute they're horsing Sevco and the next allowing Christian Nade of all people to dance around their defence and score. Given his bitterness towards other teams and fans coupled with the fact that his team finished a very distant second to winners Hearts, he has to be a Labour man. No Jim Murphy though as Stubbs is just bitter, not evil.

Inverness Caledonian Thistle. Hell, we may not all support them but most of us have a soft-spot for them. There's Yogi for a start who's gone from buffoon to manager of the year. And, there's the excellent Twitter account. The Frankie Boyle of the football Twitter world though not as foul-mouthed. They also love beating the corporate-corpse of Scottish fitba - Celtic FC. I'm sure they're partial to a few jars and a 'wee smoke'. Defo a Green Party team and what's wrong with that?

Angry denials or accusations of hate-speech here? Contact the Daily Mail. Corrections or suggestions? Post below.

Vote early, vote often, vote SNP.

A season like no other kicks off

Though I still think of it as Division One, the new Scottish Championship is where it's at this year. The Club Formerly Known as Glasgow Rangers having emerged from its pet cemetery made short work of winning Scotland's third tier to gain promotion. Hearts having being handed a 15-point penalty on top of having Gary Locke as manager were always likely to go down.

Hibs though, like they have done so often in recent years, took the word misery and made it their own. Big style. Hard as it may be to remember, but a year ago Pat '5-1' Fenlon took the Abbeyhill club to new depths with a 9-0 aggregate loss to mighty Malmo. In stepped Tory Butcher who took a bad thing and made it worse. Hibs saw the cliff of relegation some distance away and raced headlong towards it. The final flourish of woe against Hamilton in front of a home crowd attracting gasps of amazement and guffaws of laughter from supporters of wee clubs around Scotland.

Hibs to their credit, played well against The Rangers last week in the minor Challenge Cup that these wee teams have to compete for despite losing to a badly organised Neu-Ibrox XI.

The farce known as 'The Rangers' will be the focus for most us - even for us supporters of The Other Teams. Their woes have multiplied though mostly off the field at this point. Their dire display against Hibs though to the backdrop of a near empty Ibrox will surely boil over into more rage should they lose to Hearts' youngsters on Sunday. It appears that Rangers 2.0 have lost more than £70m in two years. How?! The Rangers debacle is too complex and labyrinthine to enter into here, so I'll leave that to others.

Scotland's other establishment club, Celtic, have not played well either. After finally overcoming the part-time footballers/ fishermen of Iceland, they were royally humped by Legia Warsaw. Fortunately for Scotland's Walmart of Football, Legia were found guilty of some minor infringement of the rules and Celtic were awarded the exact scoreline they needed to progress. This, is the second time in a few years that their embarrassment on the pitch in Europe has been salved by Europe's footballing high-heid yins.

O Connor - a diet of coke and pizza.

In other worlds, Leigh Griffiths continues to revert to form with rumours that he'll be back at Hibs in the not to distant future. Surely, they wouldn't take him back? One of Hibs' other troubled children, Garry Jos... O Connor is now funding his habit plodding the turf for... Selkirk.

I have no predictions but do hope that... The Rangers are forced to spend another year in the lower leagues and that's if they survive financially at all. Hearts could beat them to the title but I'd imagine their youngsters to be too inconsistent. Hibs, currently with about 13 players to their name but with a new manager are bound to improve on last season's misery. I wouldn't put money on it though.

In the SPL, I'd love Aberdeen or Dundee Utd to take the title. On current showing, Celtic are... shit. But, money talks. Especially to the SFA.

Oh... and Lambie is out for a Yes vote.

BBC London - what abuse scandal?

Some say that aspirations for Scottish independence are insular. Ditto the demands for a 'Scottish Six' national news service. However, one look at British television, especially in the company of someone from abroad, and the Anglo, London-centric nature of it stabs you in the eyes.

When Hearts met Hibs in the Scottish Cup semi-final in 2006, the novelty of an Edinburgh derby in a major game was deemed to be of some importance in Londum. The guy in the studio turned to the video link and announced that 'our reporter is at Hampden Park in Glasgow...er or is it Edinburgh...no, Glasgow...'.

The general modus-operandi of the BBC and other channels based in London when assessing the value of a story seems to be one of:

1. London
2. The rest of England
3. The US
4. Anywhere else, if the body count is high enough

The latest child-abuse scandal and subsequent cover-up involving the Roman Catholic Church is one such example. BBC Scotland, to their credit, uncovered another saga of sickening child abuse at the former Fort Augustus Abbey School. As one of the offenders was allowed to flee Fort Augustus and to carry on his activities in his native Australia, the story has an international dimension. A dimension that failed to make it dahn sath though.

On a day when BBC Scotland's various media outlets were dominated by the story, the 'British' output from London neglected to mention it. We did learn though about increasing numbers of jelly fish on the west coast and of a project in Cornwall that teaches kids to swim in the sea.

As long as 'national news' continues to mean 'Britain' meaning 'England' meaning 'London' we'll be treated to 'news' that doesn't concern us - Scottish devolution, indeed the ins and outs of the Act of Union, has yet to seep into the London consciousness.

Boycott Scatchland, Arsene Whinger, Diageo agus Scots' fitba

What a start to the new fitba season. Compassion is the IN-WORD. Having shown compassion to Al-Megrahi, I now call on Scots' Justice Secretary Coinneach MacAsgaill, he of good Isle of Lewis stock, to show equal compassion to Gary Caldwell of Glesgay Celtic, Christian 'Nada' Nade of Hearts and the high-heid-yins of Diageo. For they aint getting SFA from me.

The last 2 or 3 weeks, have seen Gary Caldwell outshine himself as an arsehole at every opportunity. Fine for Celtic, but his performance in Scotland's 4-0 drubbing by whale-killing alcohol-taxing Norway is unforgivable. Christian Nade has apparently been a professional footballer and striker for 9 years in which time he has 'amassed' 19 goals - that's 2.1 per annum. Why are cash-strapped Hearts paying this dud's wages and giving him games? His lumbering around the centre circle in Hearts' first leg game against Dinamo Zagreb was an embarrassing advert for Scottish football. Diageo are looking to sack hundreds of whisky jobs in Kilmarnock, simply because their profits are 'down' to £2billion.

On the bright side, the Yanks have realised that boycotting Scotland is not feasible. Refusing to use tarmacked roads, penicillin, television and phones has proved to be a step too far for the 0.0003% of Americans who could place Scotland on a map and have actually heard of Al-Megrahi or Lockerbie. Hearts' redeemed themselves in the second leg against Zagreb. I also hear from a Lochend Jambo and local punk rocker that he terrorised some 'Hibee Yahs' who were cheering on Dundee United in Mathers a few weeks ago. Apparently Hibs are the 'flair team' of Auld Reekie and Hearts are too un-PC. So, the 'Sex and the City' question this week is... Would Ben Fogle support Hibs?

Also, was good to see diving cheat Eduardo get collared by UEFA, much to the chagrin of Arsene Whinger of Arsenal. Now, let's see if the ugly sisters of the Old Firm promote the same justice when playing their fellow Scottish clubs.

As festival time draws to a close and thousands of zany Ben Fogle clones head back to the Great Satan, i managed to catch the free Rough Cut Nation exhibition of graffiti at the Portrait Gallery. It wasn't as intoxicating as the excellent Whisky Fringe two weeks ago but i was fair chuffed to see someone had captured Hibs' new forward line - see above. They might even score more goals than goalie MaKalamity can flap into his own net, but they won't get into many Edinburgh 'nightspots'.