A few weeks ago, BBC Sport had a blog post all about the superstitions and pre-match rituals of football players. There was everything ranging from the traditional lucky underpants to eating the same meal every evening before a match. This got me thinking about my superstitions with Sport and it seems that I’m close to bringing rabbits feet to the match!

One of the superstitions I regret not abiding by related to the US Ice Hockey Team I support: The Philadelphia Flyers. During April and May of this year, they were in the knockout, best of 7 game playoffs that lead up to the Stanley Cup finals (also a best of 7 game playoff). In the first two rounds, the Flyers swept past the opposition. They lost the first game in both series however and I believed this was because I had a Flyers related wallpaper on my computer desktop. I changed the wallpaper both times, and the Flyers won the series. When it came time for the Sem-Finals, my computer had stopped working…with a Flyers wallpaper still up. I wasn’t able to get the wallpaper down and the Flyers lost the series to the most hated rivals, the Pittsburgh Penguins (The Hibs of Ice Hockey).  This only fueled my sports superstition.

Another example relates to my Dad. Last season, we went to see Rangers play Hearts at Tynecastle and the JT’s won 4-2 in what was quiet a thriller. This may not seem unusual, but my Dad had forgotten his Hearts scarf. So far this season, my Dad has been to see Hearts loose to Dundee Utd. at Tannadice 3-0, Hearts draw with Dundee Utd. 0-0 at Tynecastle and Hearts most recent draw with St Mirren and at all three matches he had worn his scarf. Now, just in case he’s reading this, I’m not saying my Dad is unlucky, just his Hearts scarf. So I’m tempted to ask him not to bring it next time.

If this sounds a little harsh, I have a self imposed ban relating to the Hearts strip. I happen to own both the home and away strips but I refuse to wear them to a match because I suspect it will be unlucky.

This may be a strange cornucopia of superstitions (I’ll be eating powdered horseshoe with my match day pie next…) but without them, Hearts might not be where they are now…

…although, Maybe Hearts would doing better without my superstitions? I hadn’t thought of that…

A Very Superstitious Believer

Whoops! Forgot to do a post-match report. I imagine everyone knows what’s happened. But here’s some bullet points of what happened:

• Average game, Hearts dominated
• M. Stewart was very poor, should not have started for Hearts. He was eventually subbed for Miko.
• Miko was fantastic when he came back on again for Hearts, helping to get Hearts first goal from Jonsson (despite making a hash of an Obua cross which would have been the winner)
• Hearts fell back to defensive style, unable to get the ball up the pitch and away from St. Mirren, leading to a Buddies goal in injury time.
• Referee was an absolute numpty, clearly not knowing the rules for corners or throw-ins, making a hash of both of them through out the match.
• Glen received a head injury and was subbed at Half - Time and Kingston was stretchered off after injuring his hamstring again.

So, in other words: it was poor, Stewart was the worst, Miko should play again, the referee was an idiot…but Hearts stay in 3rd.

On a lighter note, when you see the gaffer jumping up and down and shaking his fists, should we be worried? It can sometimes be entertaining to have a glance at Csaba during a Match, he’s often doing something odd.

My heart goes out to Dundee United after last nights agonising defeat in penalties to Celtic in the Wee-Diddy Cup Semi-Final. I didn’t watch the game, but reading the headlines from the Scotsman and BBC was enough for me to be shocked. Reading on, I discovered that it was a pretty even first half and the second half mostly went Dundee’s way. From what I can gather, Dundee played an extraordinary game against the Infirm side and was simply unlucky on the Penalty spot. With this in mind, I was a not at all surprised to find the little ginger man in the green jumpsuit Gordon Strachan claim: “I really thought we were terrific and I think the games should have been finished before the shoot-out.” This now means that there will be an all Old-Firm final for the Wee-Diddy Cup and all of us who have a brain function greater than a baked potato must shake our heads and sigh as the rest of Scotland goes unrepresented in another Cup Final (thumbs up to Queen of the South for last years Cup Final performance). Anyway, that’s my Old Firm rant out of the way for now.

Brain Function Higher Than a Baked Potato? That is for you to decide...

Anyway, the second point of this post is about the Daily Record. I was having a quick glance at their football section online (Who’s stupid idea was it not to put the Football section under “Sport”?) and I noticed they had printed a similar article to that in the Scotsman over Christophe Berra and the transfer Rumours. The Scotsman article stated that Berra was happy at Hearts but would eventually like to play in a better league. Understandable, who wouldn’t? (Well, me, but that’s besides the point). The Daily Record on the other hand stated that Berra needed to quit Hearts if he wanted to save his career….ummm, hang on a minute….those are two different articles, clearly someone isn’t telling the truth and I’m going to have to guess that it’s the Daily Record. So I must now condemn them to the sin bin and declare their version of the story to be worth the same as the best journalism that America can come up with: Worthless.

Edit: Gordon Strachan has been promoted from “Baked Potato” to “Stick of Celery” after his comments on the BBC Sport website over the English Premier League’s wage budget. He believes (and I’m forced to agree) that when given the choice between SPL and Premier League, Players will choose to play south of the border every time.

The full article can be found here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/teams/c/celtic/7857428.stm

The Gaffer

I thought I would kick things off by having a look at Hearts most recent saviour, the ever eccentric Csaba Laszlo (anybody know how to pronounce his name yet? Because I’m still guessing). I thought this picture was fitting to show off the JT’s latest manager.

An escapee from Soviet controlled Hungary (Transylvania apparently!), our new saviour has come out with some strange things in his time in power. This season’s slogan for example “Lets be Together!” and “Togetherness” seem a little odd when applied to Scottish football, but its certainly what the squad has been needing since last season’s disaster. I also remember a similar idea involving a pond and fishing, but I’m not all that sure what it was about as I was still trying to work out what he had said last. Aside from this, I would love to hear what Laszlo (or is it Csaba?) sounds like pitch side as his press conferences and interviews are often quiet, relaxed affairs (if not a little quirky).

As of this posting, Csaba Laszlo has put Hearts in European contention, given the Hobbos a good kicking about in the Scottish Cup and has started Jambos on a what can only be a fantastic future…assuming Vlad Romanov keeps his hands off. So lets be together and support Csaba Laszlo (see what I did there?)