Seeing red
FANTASTIC win by Liverpool the other night against Barcelona. It somehow reminds us of the Provost of Fife no less, Jim Leishman, the former footballer and manager who once spoke at a charity dinner in Glasgow and explained: "As a young player I could have signed for Liverpool, Manchester United, or Chelsea." Jim added after a pause: "But none of them wanted me, so I signed for Dunfermline."
If Liverpool go on to win the European Championship, Jurgen Klopp will be regarded as one of their greatest managers, alongside Scotland's Bill Shankly of course. The book Scottish Sporting Legends told of Shankly berating forward Tony Hateley for his lack of talent. Defending himself, Tony declared: "You have to admit I'm great in the air." But Shankly tartly replied: "I'll grant you that son, but so was Douglas Bader, and he had two better legs than you'll ever have."
Driven to it
MORE on student days, as John Crawford in Lytham recalls: "Years ago I was on a packed train travelling to Glengarnock. The only vacant seat was beside a drunk who took several swigs from a half-bottle, before offering me a swig that I politely declined. On learning I was at Strathclyde he said, 'I bet you're one of these students that only drinks beer?' I agreed. He then pulled out a can of Tennent's, tore off the ring-pull, took a deep swig and said, 'This one's yours'. It was only with some difficulty that I managed to convince him that my car was parked at the station – it wasn't – and I never took drink when I was driving."
Trumped
THE New York Times reported that President Donald Trump had personal business losses of more than $1 billion over a 10-year period from 1985. We asked one of his supporters in Newton Mearns to comment and he replied: "You see, I told you he was a billionaire."
Bottled it
IT sounds complicated, but the Scottish Government announced it is going ahead with plans to introduce a deposit scheme of 20p on plastic and glass drinking bottles as well as cans. No doubt grandfathers will be reminiscing with their grandchildren about making a fortune collecting bottles at football grounds after the games – although you had to be careful with any full of a warm liquid. One reader even told us about his local shop only taking back bottles they had sold, and to prove it, would have them stamped with their own sign. Enterprising kids would cut a similar stamp out of a potato, dip it in ink and recreate the sign on any bottle. We think the film The Great Escape had a lot to answer for.
Speedy response
HAVE been dodging a certain colleague for a while but he came over yesterday and declared: "I'm doing a story on rejected questions from Scottish examination papers. One of them began, 'A car is going at constant speed of 70mph on the M8 from Glasgow to Edinburgh.' I mean, on what imaginary universe is it in?"
Under pressure
WE mentioned the enjoyment men get from using a pressure hose in the garden. A reader phones to tell us: "Yes, they are good fun – until you are almost finished washing the patio and the wife comes home and bursts your bubble by asking you to show her the bit you think is done."
Read more: 1968: The photograph that means so much to two 60-year-oldsHard to face
AFTER The Herald news story yesterday that said people are having less sex these days, a reader phones to explain: "I blame all these pictures of Nigel Farage on the television news."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here