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Yes, I’ve completely gone against what I said in my last post - this blog gets neglected more than my hair does. I’ll try and post a bit more regularly, but I’ll make no promises!

Today’s post will be about why I hate Manchester United. Hate’s a bit of a strong word - strongly dislike is probably more appropraite.

Many fans across the country will tell you that they are the number one team they dislike (actually some will say Leeds, but I’m not so sure that’s the case any more). Many foolish United fans will tell you this is because they are successful, or that they have loads of decent players - they’re wrong.

Most people hate Man Utd because most of their fans don’t come from anywhere near Manchester - that’s true about other teams, but United fans are mainly made up of glory hunters and people from foreign countries who’ve seen them on the telly.

Alex Ferguson is one of the biggest arseholes this side of America, so add that to the list (he spends so much fucking time looking at his watch you’d think it was broken).

The fact that sections of the media in this country love nothing more than banging on about how good United are (so good they were beaten by Coventry, who are so shit even Iain Dowie couldn’t stand staying there).

Eamonn Holmes supports them. And he is a cunt.

Roy Keane used to play for them. And he too is a cunt.

The bullshit excuses you get when they lose or draw "unfairly" really piss me off as well - I’m sick of seeing Carlos The Jackal on Match Of The Day whenever they drop points as you can near enough guarantee he’ll blame the referee, Arsene Wenger, Jesus, Bob Marley, Albert Einstein or Adolf Hitler.

There’s probably more, but I thin you get my point - everyone will probably hate Manchester United well in to the future.

And they have nobody to blame but themselves.

First off, apologies about the very patchy posting schedule - too much to do, but I promise I’ll post more from now on!

Anyway, I want to prattle on about how this season has been for both of David McFarlane’s teams (technically I should be doing this after the Premiership season is over, but what the heck).

I’ll start off with Dunfermline. Much was expected of The Pars once they left the SPL - unfortunately, nothing went to plan. Stephen Kenny showed that he really wasn’t up to the job (the fact that the team flirted with a relegation dogfight says everything) and was booted out before he could do any more damage. Jim McIntyre was a slightly surprising choice as his replacement, but he’s shown that he’s more than capable towards the end of this season. I can honestly see Dunfermline making a strong push for promotion next year, so here’s hoping I’m right!

Moving on to Newcastle now. After getting a new owner in the shape of billionaire Mike Ashley, the Toon Army were hopeful that this season would finally be the one were their team won some silverware. A promising start to the season made everyone rejoice, until things started to go badly wrong for Sam Allardyce - the capitulation against Portsmouth in November seemingly the catalyst. The writing was on the wall for Big Sam, and he was show the door (so not only do both my teams wear black and white, they like sacking their managers).

Speculation was rife about who should take over the club - would it be Alan Shearer, or a foreign coach? In the end there was only one man for the job, and his name is Kevin Keegan. Although he seemed to struggle initially with adjusting back to football, King Kev has shown how good a manager he really is over the past few weeks.

An 11th place finish looks likely, which is actually a bit better than many would have predicted earlier on - however, next season I believe we’ll see a different Newcastle. I can see them going for the top five, but I’d be more than happy with a European place (and a cup, please!).

I’ll leave you with a video that shows you how much passion The Messiah has, and why I believe he will lead us on to glory (it also helps that he’s taking a pop at that shitebag Ferguson).

Cheerio.

After I’d all but written off his chances of turning Newcastle around, King Kev is finally delivering the goods. Some excellent performances over the past few weeks have seen the Magpies begin to flirt with the top half of the table - which would have sounded pathetic at the start of the season, but now sounds absolutely fantastic.

The players seem to have their belief in their abilities back, which is a key factor in the recent turnaround. A player who is short on confidence and doubting whether he’s good enough is about as useful as a one-legged man in an arse kicking contest. To see that the Messiah has even managed to get Joey Barton performing half-decently is enough to make a grown man cry (almost).

Although Newcastle drew 0-0 with Portsmouth yesterday, it wasn’t as though they turned up looking for a draw - quite the opposite, in fact, as Mickey Owen could quite easily have won the game if it hadn’t been for the imposing figure of David James in the Pompey goal.

This change in fortunes highlights one thing I’ve thought for a while now though - if you have belief in your own abilities, you can achieve anything.

If you ever feel down and in need of a pick-me-up, just remember one thing - it could be worse, you could be Titus Bramble.

Goodbye.

If you keep up-to-date with Scottish football, you’ll more than likely know about Gretna (the team currently bottom of the top league in the country) and their rise up through the divisions over the past few years. It was announced yesterday that the club has gone into administration and I don’t have an ounce of sympathy.

To correct that statement slightly, I have sympathy for the people who work behind-the-scenes at the club and who will probably lose their jobs - I have no sympathy for the personnel who make up a huge chunk of the reported £20,000-£30,000 a week wage bill (i.e. the playing staff).

It’s simply idiotic to be running a club which up until five years ago was lucky to attract 50 people to a game on such crazy sums of money. Yes they have a millionaire owner in Brooks Mileson, but this is no excuse for bad management. We’re talking about at least a million pound a year being spent just to keep the club afloat - even Dunfermline were never that mental!

Some may think it’s sad to see a club in such a state, but why? The people running the club must have had some idea about running costs in the Premier League, so they should have budgeted properly.

The ones I feel sorry for are St Johnstone - I’m sure that they would never have got into such a situation had they been promoted last season instead of Gretna.

But instead we’ll probably get sob stories for the next few weeks about how sad the whole thing is - I for one will not be shedding a tear.

I watched the Newcastle game against Manchester United and genuinely thought that they might have won. How wrong I was.

They started off badly and got progressively worse as the game went on. Even at 2-0 you could tell it was going to be another rout, although 5-1 did flatter the Mancs a little bit. I really don’t know what to make of the shambles that is Newcastle United at the moment - they don’t look capabale of winning games and Kevin Keegan looks as though he’d rather be anywhere else than St James’ Park (and who can blame him?).

I’d like to think that we’ll see a turnaround towards the end of the season, but I have my doubts. Don’t get me wrong though, I’ll stick by them through thin and thinner!

In better news, Dunfermline beat Clyde 2-1. Yes, The Pars are back in town!

Back tomorrow.

Well, it’s been another mixed bag for British teams in Europe this week.

Manchester United scraped a fairly lucky 1-1 draw away to Lyon in a game they were expected to win easily. I couldn’t believe that Boumsong, who’s now at Lyon, actually managed to PLAY WELL! Why he didn’t do that for Newcastle I’ll never know. I expect United to win the return leg at Old Trafford comfortably though.

Chelsea drew 0-0 at Olympiakos, which is actually quite a good result. Greece is a very difficult place to go to and to come away from the game without conceding is great. I also see Chelsea beating Olympiakos quite easily on the way to the next round.

Arsenal were also playing at home and they too drew 0-0, this time against AC Milan. On paper this looks not too bad, but the reality is that the San Siro is  an incredibly hard arena to score a goal in, never mind win! Unfortunately, I see Milan winning the return leg.

In the final Champions League game involving British teams, Celtic lost 3-2 to Barcelona at Parkhead. This brings to an end Celtic’s unbeaten record in home meetings in Europe, and I can see them going out of the competition in the next leg as well. They played very well on the night though, and were very unlucky to lose.

As I type this, Rangers have qualified for the next round of the UEFA Cup by drawing 1-1 away at Panathinaikos (they go through on the away goals rule after drawing 0-0 at home in the first leg) and Aberdeen have been humped 5-1 by Bayern Munich to the suprise of nobody.

Bolton, Tottenham and Everton are still playing - as it stands right now, they will all be going into the hat for the next round.

For any depressed Aberdeen fans, here’s a video of the first leg to cheer you up (it’s in German, but what the heck).

No Newcastle game this weekend because of the F.A. Cup.

Which reminds me, let’s all laugh at Liverpool! Imagine losing to a Championship team that couldn’t win away from home at your own ground! Ha, ha, ha, ha!

Enough of that, we’re talking about my teams here. Newcastle were knocked out of the cup by Arsenal in the last round, the second of two back-to-back 3-0 defeats. The brilliant news is that next Saturday they face Manchester United, although it’s a home game so I’m quietly confident of an upset (sort of).

Dunfermline, meanwhile, drew 1-1 with Partick Thistle. They were actually leading for most of the game, until Kevin Harper got sent off on the 50th minute whch probably rejuvinated Thistle to come back and equalise with only 17 minutes left. Ah well - we’ll win the First Division next season!

Not much else to say (on a Sunday my brain turns to mush), so I’ll leave you with what I’m looking forward to most at the moment - the return of Rambo!

Cheerio.

Now make me make this clear - I’m not a fan of Sepp Blatter at all. The man has put his foot in it about lots of different things over the years (women should play in tighter shorts, not turning up for the opening of the 2006 World Cup and letting the 2003 Confederations Cup continue after Marc Vivien Foe’s death being, amongst others) and has also overseen the introduction of such ridiculous rules as booking players for over-zealous celebrations and the ill-fated "silver goal" extra-time decider.

When it comes to this nonsense about the F.A. Premier League wanting to play a 39th game in a foreign country though, he’s 100% correct. Blatter said "I thought it was a joke at the end of the carnival season. But it seems it is really not a joke. I will ask the national associations not to accept such an initiative."

People like Brian Barwick and Richard Scudamore should remember that football is not about making money. Football is an escape from the stress and strain of everyday life, not a theatrical performance with highly paid actors - although watching Cristiano Ronaldo may have you convinced otherwise!

We, the average football fan, do not want your stupid ideas implemented. I can’t for the life of me understand why you have to tinker with something that’s perfectly fine as it is. How about concerning yourselves with the more important issues facing our game, i.e. the depressing amount of English youngsters coming up through the game?

Take your 39th game and stick it where the sun doesn’t shine.

My God.

Both Newcastle AND Dunfermline both got royally fucked yesterday. I honestly can’t believe that Newcastle were 1-0 up at half time, but managed to get humped 4-1! And as for Dunfermline, 3-0 away to Hamilton would have been unthinkable this time last year - now it’s an unfortunate reality.

I think that the reason both teams are doing so badly is obviously down to a lack of confidence. It was obvious that as soon as Aston Villa scored the equaliser, they would go on to score again.

I’ve got bog all else to say because I’m bloody annoyed, so goodbye!

So, the football transfer window is now shut until the Summer.

Fantastic.

I’m not sure which simple-minded idiot came up with the idea, but I’m certain that he should be hung. Harsh, but fair. It essentially contravenes European Union laws by restricting trade (i.e. the players themselves moving between clubs), but do we hear anybody even mentioning this? Do we feck!

It wouldn’t suprise me one bit if that prize prick at FIFA, Sepp Blatter, was the person who came up with this ridiculous notion that players should be happy to either sit on the bench or languish in the reserves for six months if they fall out of favour.

We really need to scrap it - and at the same time go back to offside being offside (not this nonsense about interference with play).

I doubt that with Herr Blatter at the helm we’ll see any changes any time soon.

And he wonders why people don’t like him?!?