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ENTER SANDMAN
Just when you think there’s a quiet week in girls’ and women’s football…
THAT’S ENTERTAINMENT
Which games did I watch this week? Due to some untimely (and ultimately very expensive) car issues, I only caught one game in the past seven days and that was Saturday’s 14s East Lana Clelland league derby encounter between Dunfermline Athletic Reds and Bayside at Queen Anne High School. With several match options available to me, I plumped for this game simply because neither team is on Usqor and the quickest way to get the score would be to turn up and watch it. The Reds dominated and won 5-0 although the visitors suffered for not having a proper goalkeeper.
The dogs may be set upon me for what I’m about to say but it’s an issue close to my heart. I’m not sure what was more disappointing; hearing a home coach tell his girls to target the non-keeper with shots or the apparent lack of encouragement from the visiting coaches towards the volunteer between the sticks, beyond the odd shout of “Pick it up!” As a father to a goalkeeper, it pained me to see her struggle with some aspects of the position, although she gets major plus points for taking one for the team and she certainly showed good hands on any shots hit at her.
Outfield players don’t appreciate how difficult it is to be a goalkeeper until they have to play in that position themselves. This is why you should never criticise a goalkeeper, especially a temporary one. You don’t need to tell them they’ve made a mistake; they know! They’re often an afterthought and teams don’t seem to miss them until they’re gone. Give your goalkeeper(s) the technical and mental support they need, and they’ll stick around. If not, there are plenty of other teams looking for a keeper.
SOMETHING’S GONE WRONG AGAIN
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The German language has some great words when it comes to expressing an emotion or a situation. Two of my favourites are the well-known schadenfreude (pleasure derived from someone else’s failure) and the less well-known backpfeifengesicht (a face in need of a slap). Reading Revolutionary Spirit, the autobiography of Paul Simpson, frontman and songwriter of 80s bands The Wild Swans and Care, I came across a third great German word, namely Götterdämmerung. It might be a slight exaggeration to use this word in relation to the latest cup draw shambles emanating from the SWF, but the chaos element of the expression seems pretty spot on.
I’m beginning to lose count of how many times I’ve blogged or posted about the League Cup and Plate draws performed (and I use that very loosely) by the SWF this season. The latest “draws” for the 14s Central League Cup and League Plate, published last Tuesday (11 Jun) for games to be played just four days later on Saturday (15 Jun), eventually turned up. (Tuesday is also the day on which teams are expected to have informed their next opponents of the venue, kick-off time etc.) It took me approximately two nanoseconds to spot the latest problem.
To describe these draws as lazy doesn’t really do it justice. The quick turnaround for games is no excuse for the latest dog’s dinner of a draw. Maybe dog’s dinner is the wrong phrase because the draws aren’t a mess, in fact they’re neat. Too neat. There’s absolutely no pretence that any kind of random (and fair) draw has taken place. For those who still haven’t spotted the issue, I ask you to look at the draws pictured above and, starting with the first home tie, run your eyes down the list of home teams then, when you get to tie 8, look across to the away team and work your way up. Yes, that’s right. It’s just an alphabetical list of the teams who qualified in each competition. So if you’re lucky to have a team (or teams) whose name begins in the first part of the alphabet (Gartcairn, Holytown Colts and Milton Girls) you’ll be granted a home tie and if your team’s name starts later in the alphabet you get an away tie e.g. Stirling Albion, Rossvale, West Park and, the worst affected club, Phoenix, who had three teams in the Plate. They did the same type of draw with the 14s East League Cup and 14s West League Cup draw back in April.
In the Youth Regional League and League Cup rules posted on SWF’s own website, it states that, “The League Plate will be an all-in draw between teams eliminated in the League Cup from a
round(s) determined by the Regional Management Committee, or such other format [my emphasis] as directed by the Regional Management Committee in consultation with the Strong Quality Growth
Committee and Girls’/Women’s Policy Working Group, and ties shall be arranged in the manner
approved by the Regional Management Committee and shall be played on the dates arranged.” I can’t believe that this draw format would be given the go ahead by the RMC and/or String Quality Growth Committee.
As previously documented, this competition (and others) has been littered with issues and has been, quite frankly, to quote The Thick of It, an omnishambles. 68 planned group games (of which only 59 were played) took us from 37 teams to 32, split across two competitions. All these games to knock out just five teams! (Two of those teams to not even make the Plate were Tier 1 sides). I have no doubt the SWF will offer the excuse that the draw was done like this because a quick turnaround was required but it was an issue or their own making. Would it really have taken that much longer to draw two sets of eight ties in the traditional balls-from-a-receptacle fashion? I wonder if these draws are actually checked and deemed acceptable by fresh eyes before they leave Hampden.
One of the original groups (which I numbered as Group 4 because the SWF didn’t think to number them at all) had three unplayed fixtures (out of ten). I don’t know if teams were told when the original groups were drawn back in April that all fixtures had to be played by Sunday 9 June, or if this guidance was a last-minute, panic-driven, move-the-goalposts decision. Teams now had very little time to book pitches and prepare for the last 16 ties. One learned friend commented, “It’s actually quite insulting that they think that little of the girls’ game that this is how they decide a draw.” Can you imagine if they did this for the men’s Scottish Cup? Aberdeen forever at home, with St Mirren always on their travels!
Another issue with these draws is that there appears to have been no incentive for teams to win their respective groups. A reward might’ve been to avoid other group winners in the last 16. However, the Calderbraes v Stirling Albion Whites and Dunblane SC v Stirling Albion Reds ties put that notion to bed with four group winners in opposition. Solution: Put the balls denoting the group winners in one bowl, the group runners up in another. Pull one from each bowl into a third bowl, mix them and then pick one out. They’ll be the home team, the other will be away. That would’ve taken five to ten minutes to do.
Postscript: Following the weekend’s ties in the 14s Central League Cup and Plate competitions, I was asked by one club for a list of which teams had got through. Why? So they could put them into an alphabetical list and work out who they’d get in the quarter-finals! I kid you not. A club secretary from another region also asked me about the likelihood of this happening in their region. I suggested that if it does, they should ask for a re-draw.
Further Postscript: No sooner had I published this blog than the 14s Central League Cup and Plate QF draws were sent to me. Yet again, there were errors and those errors involve putting the wrong Gartcairn and the wrong Rossvale through to the quarter finals! On Saturday, Gartcairn (tier 1) defeated Rossvale Thistle (tier 3) 9-0 , while Gartcairn Whites (tier 3) lost 1-10 to Rossvale Reds (tier 1). However, the SWF has put through both losing teams. The error has been pointed out to them but they have exacerbated it by changing it to having both Gartcairn teams through! Wrong again! Somehow, the SWF has the result of the Gartcairn Whites v Rossvale Reds as a 3-1 win for Gartcairn, instead of 10-1 to Rossvale Reds! Eventually, the results were corrected and the right draw was posted but only after some frantic emails!
IT’S NEVER TOO LATE
It only took the SWF until the middle of June to realise that every region had a 14s Plate except South West. Better late than never.
YOUNGER GENERATION BLUES
The imminent moving of the age groups in the NextGen Performance League continues to cause ructions amongst players, parents and coaches. My DMs are full of disgruntled parents of unhappy players. I’m hearing tales of teams not fulfilling fixtures, coaches leaving, and many, many players looking for clubs.
Still, there is no public information available on the new setup. Mind you, they seem to have enough problems posting the kick-off times on the SFA website.
CONDITION RED
I saw a recruitment advert for coaches and players for a new Aberdeen Ladies team. I was confused. Isn’t there already an Aberdeen Ladies? “No, that’s Aberdeen Women, this is Aberdeen Ladies!” Huh?!
I did some research to find the answer. Aberdeen Ladies (aka Aberdeen FCL), were founded in 2011 following a merger between Aberdeen City, Aberdeen Ladies & Girls, Aberdeen University and East End Girls FC. In 2018, Aberdeen FC started the Aberdeen Women’s team (the SWPL1 team), with Aberdeen FCL taking over the running of the regional and NPL/NAP/NextGen (delete as applicable) girls’ teams. With Aberdeen FCL looking to join the SWF pyramid there might be some confusion, especially with the names being so similar. It reminds me of this section of Monty Python’s Life of Brian.
CRY ME A RIVER
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Saturday morning’s scheduled 16s East Caroline Weir league clash between Jeanfield Swifts Jags and Panmure fell foul of a waterlogged pitch at Riverside. Rumours that the cause of the flood was not rain but the tears from local Scotland fans following the national team’s capitulation to Euros hosts Germany on Friday night are, as yet, unconfirmed. Although the possibility of similar downpours on Wednesday and Sunday evening have been forecast. [Photo used with kind permission of Jeanfield Swifts]
On that note, I shall wish you all a good footballing week.
Paul
#GirlsResults
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