Scottish Football 2019/20

[Lorric]

The League Cup Group Stage is over.

Seeded: Celtic, Rangers, Kilmarnock, Aberdeen, Motherwell, Ross County, Hibernian, Livingston
Unseeded: Partick Thistle, Dunfermline, Hearts, Inverness, Forfar, Hamilton, Morton, East Fife

Michael's Thistle almost got seeded, top unseed. The seeded section is all SPL this time, while the unseeded section only has two SPL clubs, St. Johnstone and St. Mirren crashing out, neither were worst runner ups, St. Mirren could only get third, St. Johnstone did even worse, 4th, with a miserable 3pts.

Well done to Forfar and East Fife, League One clubs making it through.

[Lorric]

It seems I jumped the gun. Didn't notice there's another game to play. Two actually, but only one of consequence. Dundee vs Inverness. Neither can get seeded, winner tops the group. East Fife need one of these teams to win in normal time or they'll be eliminated and both will go through. Since neither can get seeded, there's no incentive to go for that win. The draw puts both through on equal footing, so why go for the win?

The draw follows this game tomorrow.

[Lorric]

A big well done to Dundee, no rigged draw here, they won 1-0 and eliminated Inverness.

Seeded: Celtic, Rangers, Kilmarnock, Aberdeen, Motherwell, Ross County, Hibernian, Livingston
Unseeded: Partick Thistle, Dunfermline, Hearts, Dundee, Forfar, Hamilton, Morton, East Fife

Draw coming up...

[Lorric]

Hibs vs Morton

Partick Thistle vs Ross County

Motherwell vs Hearts

Dundee vs Aberdeen

Celtic vs Dunfermline

Forfar vs Livingston

Kilmarnock vs Hamilton

East Fife vs Rangers

Michael's Thistle got perhaps the best fixture they could have got, the newly promoted side at home.

[Lorric]

Celtic obliterated St. Johnstone 7-0 to start the season. Nice warm up for Cluj.

[V Yo-Yo]

I expect Rangers to push Celtic to their limits this season. It's still early though. If Rangers get knocked out before the ELGS they could focus entirely on the SPL, whereas Celtic will have European distraction.

[Lorric]

Rangers scraped a 1-2 win over Kilmarnock in injury time.

[Stumbler177]

Aberdeen v Heart of Midlothian: Aberdeen were in control in first half and scored a deserved goal, Hearts came back and went into a 1-2 lead, took careful aim and shot themselves in the foot, losing 3-2 in the end. Key defender Souttar went off with a twisted ankle in the first half, which could be a return of Heart's rotten luck with injuries.

[Lorric]

Well done to Celtic for not blinking on their demand of £25 million for Tierney. The negotiations have dragged on for weeks but Arsenal paid their price today, shattering the Scottish transfer record.

[Lorric]

Celtic with another goal fest, 2-5 win at Motherwell.

[Lorric]

Rangers respond by crushing Hibernian 6-1. I watched the game and the keeper kept the score well down, could have been double figures. And already, they are the only two teams with two wins. Aberdeen going down 1-0 at St. Mirren doesn't give any hope of overturning the Rijeka result.

[Stumbler177]

Further down the table, Hearts had their first home outing, starting their two recently arrived players against Ross County. County were organised and purposeful, lacking only the killer touch and outclassed the weak and timid hosts. Only a penalty off the post and miscued follow up denied them all three points.

[Lorric]

Yesterday, Hearts beat Motherwell 1-2 in the League Cup.

There were five more matches today, Livingston beat Forfar 1-2 and remarkably the other four matches went into extra time and all four were settled in extra time. Celtic surprisingly were dragged into extra time but ultimately won 2-1 over Dunfermline. Celtic had 36 shots and 23 corners. Dunfermline had 3 shots and 1 on target, so I guess it was just one of those days. Hibernian beat Morton 5-3, Kilmarnock beat Hamilton 1-0 and Michael will be happy, Thistle beat Ross County 3-2.

[Michael S Collins]

Michael will be happy, Thistle beat Ross County 3-2.

I am! And we avoided the dreaded penalties, of which we are abysmal. (Thistle once lost 4 cups in one season via penalties!)

A glimmer of light in worrying times for the club.

[Lorric]

Rangers won 0-3 at East Fife, and in another game that needed extra time, Aberdeen won 1-2 at Dundee.

Well, Thistle had the best possible draw last time, now they have the worst, Celtic away. Can they stop the quad treble? I doubt it, but the law of averages has to get Celtic eventually. The other ties:

Kilmarnock vs Hibernian
Hearts vs Aberdeen
Livingston vs Rangers