St Johnstone vs Kilmarnock 4-3: Scottish Premiership Recap

And it's lights out and away we go!

Podcasting from Studio 2520, somewhere near Akron, Ohio.

This is a special Saturday morning edition of Tackling the Chicane, bringing you all the latest talk in the beginning of the soccer season and pretty much the last, last, what, third of motorsport?

So that's a sampling of what we'll be allowed to use as backing track music until we start paying royalties, I guess. I actually kind of like that one. Yeah, I'll stick with that for a few podcasts until I get bored of it. That is from the YouTube audio library, which I'm sure is going to defeat me at some point with an ad or something stupid like that. Which it is doing right now.

Um, but we'll try to work through it. Um, I'm not prepared to pay another subscription to be able to use music, so we'll just have to deal with it. And like I've said, I, I'm pretty sure I've said it on the show, we always— not always, but occasionally Spotify, I don't know, they, they get bored and they just sift through podcasts and ding for copyrighted material, but I've never actually lost a claim. I always just click the I'm allowed to use this button and like it— I, it— I win every time. Yeah.

So I don't know what hap— like, I don't really get it. It's probably an, uh, it's a bot. Yeah, it's AI or something saying— it's not someone like listening and being like, well Right. Yeah. So I don't know, do we— do you roll the dice or do you just try to go with the stuff that's not licensed?

Like, the first 2 years of this show, nothing ever happened and we played copyrighted material like every single episode. And then they started going crazy with the, uh, you know, like the bot or whatever. But what I've noticed is You can like— I'll win that claim every time. I'll just get the fucking email every single time too. So it became really annoying, and that's why we shifted away from it.

Uh, but we continue to learn more and more rules. Uh, no, no, um, backing tracks to actual songs apparently, like Katrina and the Wave. No, we tried to do songs with the lyrics removed. I got dinged for that. And some of it could be like we just use too much of it, um, but whatever.

Yeah, I don't know. Oh well, whatever. Copyright law, which is not what this show is about, so we, we will move on. Yep. Uh, yeah, Saturday program here, of course, in the awesome world of corporate America.

I was supposed to work a thing Thursday night, and then I got a call Thursday saying that said event was not going to happen. So, oh well, because I had already planned to come down and I didn't feel like shifting again. So here we are on a Saturday, which is fine. Yeah, as you teased, Soccer season kind of back, at least partially. Um, Scotland is back and in full swing, so that's where the majority of our focus will be today— the first round of the Premiership and all of the fun that came with that.

I'm sure many of you listening are eager to hear discussion about, of course, Celtic and Rangers' start to life, but we We'll, uh, spend a lot of time on a couple of teams that maybe you weren't expecting to bring a lot of entertainment to this season. So we'll get into that. Uh, currently looking at some first round of the League Cup action here on our, uh, studio television, uh, down in England. The Premier League season is still 2 weeks away, so we're we got a few episodes before we have anything to discuss there. Um, but I guess we can kick off the show.

We are of course on an IndyCar race weekend after a little hiatus from IndyCar, and it's kind of going to be pedal to the floor until their season's over. I think 4 races in as many as 4 weeks or something like that. Portland, uh, the Freedom 250, we'll see how that Gets on Milwaukee doubleheader, and then, uh, it's 5 races, and then finishing off in California, uh, I believe the first weekend of September. What about, uh, DC? Yeah, the Freedom 250.

Oh, okay. Yeah, DC. What do you think? How do you think that's gonna play out? Well, I I know what your thoughts are on having a race in, in the capital.

Um, I, I don't know. I, I think it'll be fine. It'll be like any other intercity, uh, course. Yeah, it'll be just— not just like, but it'll be similar to Detroit. Yeah.

Um, there'll be limited, um, you'll if you're going to the race in DC, you— I can't speak today— you'll have limited visibility of the race like we did in Detroit. So you pick a stand and you get to see 150 yards of the track. So pick a good corner, pick one that has a screen nearby. It's just a different experience. It's a fun experience.

I think the— if anybody If you live in DC and you've never been to any kind of racing event in your life, or you've never been to an IndyCar event, then that's a perfect, uh, opportunity. Yeah, I, I've heard that there's quite a lot of ticket requests, um, maybe unexpectedly a lot of ticket requests for the actual race, um, I don't know. I obviously very skeptical of, um, of the event. Anytime that you kind of slap together a race in a few months, especially a street race, I worry about the product just as a racing fan, let alone whatever else surrounds the event. I have sources that have told me that this has been quietly in the works for much longer than the 9 months that, that we've known about it.

Yeah. Um, so I'm sure the infrastructure of everything has been planned, uh, for, for longer than a few months, but we'll see. Look, if they can put up an F1 track in Vegas, like, anything's possible, right? So Yeah, Portland this weekend, um, practice later today throughout the afternoon, and then qualifying starts at 7 PM with the Fast 6, I believe, is scheduled to be at 8:30, and then the race is tomorrow at 4. So, um, F1 is in a full stop here until the 21st of August, so we won't be speaking, uh, to that much because there's not really anything going on.

Um, yeah, so this, this might be a 45-minute podcast because we, we don't have a lot of racing content to speak of there. Of note, we found out, uh, late last night that, uh, 2, 2 cars are— have been penalized, uh, for the Portland race. One unfortunately being the number 12 car of David Maloukas. The other is Caio Colette, the Foyt car number 4. Uh, they knew they were gonna get this penalty, I think, because it was an engine change.

Yeah, unauthorized, because they both freaking binned their cars. Yeah, last time. Yeah, so 6th position penalty. The best we could hope for is that little Dave gets the pole or close to the pole. And actually, let's be honest, in a road race, it's not bad to be in, in that first wave.

It's sometimes it's better not to be in the top 3 positions on a road course start because it can get ugly. At least in 6th or 7th, you can sit back a little bit and watch everybody else crash into the first turn. Yeah, I, I can't sit here and say I remember how the, the Portland race started last year, but certainly a possibility that someone takes a corner, the first corner deep, and chaos ensues, and then you can cruise around. So we'll see. Um, Lucas practice 1 results, take that with a grain of salt.

I think he was in 9th. Mr. Palou, of course, in 1st. Um, don't know if you saw any content of this, but the IR28 hit the track this week. Um, thing looks pretty fucking nice. Thing looks pretty nice.

I did not, um, I didn't see anything, and usually I'll get a pop-up or something. Is there footage of the car anywhere? Yeah, if you go on the IndyCar Instagram, you can probably find it fairly easily. Um, but yeah, they were testing on the Indy road course. I think Palou was one of the drivers.

Um, are they liveried cars yet or no? No, it was like a generic black livery, I think. Uh, but yeah, it looks really nice actually. Um, people are comparing it a lot to sort of the last gen F1 car, which I can kind of see. Um, the side profile to me looks more like a, like a Formula 2 car, which is a great— I've said in the past, yeah, that That's a really good-looking car proportionally.

If F1 could get their shit together and make a car that didn't look like an insect. Or was 30 feet long for some reason. Oh my God, it has the same wheelbase as a Suburban. Yeah, I don't get that. I don't know why— this is a tangent, but it's like, I don't know why— why did the Formula 1 cars just get bigger and bigger and bigger?

And then actually, this one is marginally smaller, but— virtually no difference. Yeah, it's— I really like— I'm looking at some renderings here of the IR-28. A couple of things that they, they improved vastly. Number one, the aero screen looks a lot better than the previous version of the aero screen. It looks more, um, integrated into the design.

I think the other aero screen was like a tack-on type thing. I mean, it literally was This one looks a lot better overall. Um, the side pods are, are really sharp on this car, and, um, the rear open rear wing is, is pretty cool too. So looking forward to seeing these in person at some point. Yeah, uh, in 2 seasons, I guess.

Years. Yeah, uh, but that'll be here before you know it. I also like the position, uh, display. That's kind of neat. I mean, especially on, on big ovals where you get bunched up and— yeah, and people are lapped and whatever.

Right, right. So yeah, that's cool. That's sort of a throwback to, uh, like late 2010s IndyCar with the, the virtual display that I, I was not following IndyCar at all at that point, so you could speak to that better than me, but I heard that was sort of a failure. Yeah, I don't think it lasted longer than maybe one, one or two seasons. The only— the only— in the last 15 years or so, the only thing I remember was the Dallara chassis, and that might have been around that era when they did the rear side, the rear pods.

I, I know what you're talking about. So the, the rear wheels were encased with like— it wasn't fully encased, but it was like there was a front pod or like a front section in front of the rear wheel, and then there was a rear section. And yeah, it looked better on paper than it did in person. It wasn't a very good look, and they, they didn't— they ran that for maybe 2 seasons and then ditched it. Yeah, ugly as shit.

Well, it caused a lot of problems when they're— even when there was light contact Oh yeah, you know, it was just another thing to hit basically. Yeah, that was a really odd era of IndyCar, uh, in terms of the chassis. I actually don't mind the one they, they run right now, but it does— the aero screen very clearly looks like it was slapped on, which it was. So I, I'm glad we are moving towards a chassis where the aero screen is is designed part of the initial design and integrated. Yeah, the thing looks really good.

The, the, um, I love the wing that they run, uh, the, the back wing looks really nice, uh, at least the road course configuration does. I don't think— I don't know if we've seen much on the speedway yet, uh, but obviously we're gonna see more about this car as the months go by. Well, not only visually, but Technologically speaking and with the idea of safety, the car is lighter, stronger, faster, has more capacity to store energy, has a better system to process the storage of that energy. So better deployment, better harvesting. And hopefully better racing at the end of the day.

Yeah, that's all that really matters to me. So I guess we won't know until 2028, but for now we can at least, um, be hopeful in the chassis. I'm hoping we get a look. I'm sure they'll have a, a car of some sort at Indy next year to look at. Oh, you would think.

Absolutely they will. Yeah, they will. Yeah. And probably the next 2 Indy 500s they'll have something. Well, 2028 will be— well, that's true, running the car.

So I keep— yeah, yeah, '27 is next year. So yeah, uh, usually they will have a static display in Gasoline Alley somewhere, or at this, uh, right behind the pagoda. Yeah, is probably where you'll see that. But yeah, and they'll be Uh, we should go on a Saturday to see it because if you wait till race day, there'll be 100,000 people gathered around that. So yes, yes indeed.

So Portland this weekend, as in today and tomorrow as we record, probably the Palou show, but we'll see. Looks like he is marching towards 4 in a row, so in the era of Palou dominance. Maybe the new chassis will switch that up. Yeah, I don't know. Um, the buzz has been that Melukkas is fast enough to catch him now from 6th or 7th position with any luck.

I don't know if that's the case, but we'll see. Uh, as you know, pit strategy in IndyCar is everything. Yeah, it's almost even more important than being really fast. Yeah, we've seen races won and lost in the pits, um, many, many times. So regardless, looking forward to it.

Indy's always a fun watch, um, great racing, good passes, entertaining. Uh, typically you don't see 30-second gaps. Not, not often. Not often, if ever. So, and I'm not, I'm not down on F1, but boy, they, they need to change some stuff for sure.

We talked about that before. Yeah. And we'll talk about it in the future because let's face it, the product's not great right now. No. Um, I still enjoy watching the races, not, not to the pitch that we did when we first started this podcast though.

And I can't new. Can't figure out what it is that's different except for— I think the car is just worse. Yeah, I think so too. I think the— their evolution of that car has gone sort of in the wrong direction. The car is worse.

I think it also has come with a much keener interest of the IndyCar series than when we started. Uh, we basically didn't talk about IndyCar on the show that much. Um, so yeah, I mean, I, I've had fun this season. We've got to go to 2 races. I think seems like Detroit is probably on the, on the cards for next year again, maybe, or maybe something else.

I don't know. Yeah, I don't know if we should pick another race, um, and, and experience what, what another race would be like. Yeah. I would be down for that. We'd have to check the schedule when it comes out and see what would be, what would be the best strategy to do that.

Um, but yeah, I would be, I would be open to doing another race, and it might even work out better if it were a few months from May. Yeah, that is tough to do. The double weekend is, is a little tough with a little draining, but yeah, I It was definitely well worth it this time to experience it. And yeah, I would, I would go back to Detroit if that's what we ended up doing, but we shall see. There's a lot— IndyCar is quite a diverse calendar.

So we got like St. Petersburg, Florida to kick off the year, Arlington, Texas. Like, we could— you have quite a few options. So Uh, we will see about that. I think that'll do it for, for motorsports unless you have anything else you want to discuss. I do not.

All right, well, in that case, we will shift gears into the world of soccer here. And as I said at the jump of the program, we are not at the point where we're talking any, uh, Premier League action Still, uh, about 2 weeks away from the start of that season, um, which is totally fine. It feels like when, when it's a World Cup summer, it's kind of just 12 straight months of stuff as opposed to getting that summer break. Um, but certainly well worth it for this, for this World Cup. But it's back to the league action now.

And we are of course going to be following the Scottish Premiership again this season. And I promise to do sort of a little, little preview of each team, nothing major, um, before we get into games. But I think our— weirdly, and I wouldn't have said this before, uh, this past weekend, but I think St. Johnstone and Kilmarnock ended up being our sort of marquee matchup here. Yeah, I don't think anyone, including the, the broadcast team, expected that match to, to be as, um, exciting— I guess exciting as it was. Um, but yeah, it started out a bit slow, as a lot of these matches do, but once the tea got spilled, it was— yeah, it was crazy.

It was one of those games where you're watching it and you're like, oh, okay, okay, and then a few goals go in and you say to yourself, you know what? This is actually a really good game. So St. Johnstone, what's up with them?

They're the newly promoted side this year in the Scottish Premiership, which means anytime a team is newly promoted, it means that they're usually also the favorites to get relegated. So St. Johnstone are going to be battling, uh, against relegation probably the whole year, many expect. Um, they have this foreign manager— foreign in the respect that he is not Scottish— Simo Vauhakari. He's a Finnish manager, um, and actually has been with the club for almost 2 years now. Took over in October 2024.

Um, they were relegated that season from the Premiership, but then he got them to bounce right back up at the first time of asking. They pretty much cruised in the Second Division last year. And Kilmarnock, um, they were one of the teams that of course had the ugly fake AstroTurf pitch. That is gone for this year, and Celtic travel to Kilmarnock tomorrow, so we'll get a the first look at that new lovely grass surface. So they mentioned that this game was at St. Johnston, right?

They have new turf, or new— they, they have a new surface now. I don't know if it was grass or not. Yeah, it was grass, but this is a new grass surface. And what we saw in the World Cup and is now kind of slow— it's been in the Premier League too because obviously, but kind of slowly integrating into our, our maybe less wealthy leagues is that half real, half synthetic blend of grass that doesn't get torn up as easily and destroyed throughout a league season. So that is what they used in the World Cup.

Um, like they had some plastic blades and then real grass. Yeah, grass would grow around it. That's weird. Yeah. So technology and science, I guess.

Right? Yeah. Yeah. So also a new surface for St. Johnston. And I think these are 2 teams that I would expect to be near the bottom of the table, but if they continue to score at this rate, who knows?

So like you said, bit of a slower start, but Fowler got it going in the 16th minute. That's Josh Fowler. Um, you actually have timestamped notes. You did better than me. So if you want to run through those and then we can kind of circle back.

Yeah, I sometimes I hate to, to take notes in that style, but it's really the only way to— if you don't, if I don't put the, the minute down, then it all gets jumbled together. Yeah. And I can't figure out where I'm at with this stuff. So, um, that was the 16th, uh, the Fowler goal. Um, they almost scored in the 11th, but they were— there was an offside call.

Um, a big save in the 28th minute for Kilmarnock. Um, it was basically a bullet, and, and it was intercepted by the keeper. Um, so It stays 1-0, uh, through until the 37th. Um, John Jewels to Kilty. Yeah, Greg Kilty.

John Jewels is a pretty dynamic player. Um, if I had to pick one of the guys that I was sort of keeping an eye on, uh, in this match, he would be one. Unfortunately, he took one hell of a shot to the head. I mean, and I honestly think that was a direct— did you see the replay on that? Um, I'm struggling to remember that.

I don't recall. Let me see if I, if I wrote down. Oh, he goes off in the 45th minute. For 40— the— yeah, the collision occurred in the, um, 41st minute in inside the, uh, the box, right? John Jewels and Stewart from St. Johnston.

I mean, this is hard as, as hard of a hit I've seen a guy take to his head since I've been watching this, basically. And it wasn't a flop either, you know. And clearly, uh, it was enough because he tried to return, uh, in the second half and was not able to. Yeah. Um, so there was +3 stoppage.

Uh, Jules, he was actually off and couldn't continue at the end of the first half, and then he tried to come back out. It didn't quite work out. So We go into the half, uh, all even, 1-1. 47th minute, uh, St. Johnston, uh, off of a set piece, Diabate. Yeah, 2-1.

So this is where it kind of went into overdrive in terms of goals flying in, and you're like, oh, this is actually probably going to be the best game of the weekend. A lot of back and forth here. So Diabate takes the lead for St. Johnston, but they would hold that lead for 2 minutes. Right. We had a 3-goal swing within 6 minutes of this match, which you rarely ever see that happen.

But 47th, I just said Diabate, 2-1. 49th, Uh, Hugel for Kilmarnock from a mile out, it felt like. Yeah, he bombed that thing. It was on a, on a string. Um, 2-2 for the equalizer.

Uh, and then just 4 short minutes later, um, Holt. Yeah, for Kilmarnock, own goal, own goal from St. Johnston, right? So Kilmarnock go from a 2-1 lead to down 3-2 in 6 minutes, and that maybe felt like the— you know, you, you'll see that in games, uh, like a gut punch, like, uh, it's gonna be tough to come back from that. Fear not for this plucky St. Johnston team. Um, million percent butchering the other own goal here.

Uh, Shoning Larson is what I'm gonna go with. Okay. Uh, the left back for Kilmarnock, uh, from Estonia of all places. Uh, yeah, own goal for him. So we had 2 own goals in a row.

Obviously this match wasn't one you'd watch to try to teach youngsters how to defend.

Um, yeah, they— but it was entertaining nonetheless. Um, yeah, and I think that is my main concern with both of these teams having seen the first round of matches. Um, looks like defense might be a bit of an issue for both sides, and if you're struggling in a relegation battle, which both of these teams could be a part of, obviously that is not going to help you much. Um, I guess we'll just have to— maybe that'll be something that we, that we monitor and touch on if we see a pattern. Yeah, of non-defense from both of these teams.

Number one, you'll know that the match may be entertaining because they're just going to try to shoot and score as much as they possibly can. Uh, that remains to be seen, but it is definitely something that we can watch. So lucky for us, Celtic travel to Kilmarnock tomorrow, so we will 100% be watching them. What time is that match? It is 8:30 AM here in the United States.

Are you here tonight? No. Or no? Okay, I will be watching it at PJ's, but I can't really— I can't hang for a while because I have a work thing. Yeah, in the afternoon.

Yeah, yeah. Um, okay, so we're tied up here. Equalizer, uh, in the 69th. Um, that was a Lloyd goal for St. Johnston, I believe, and he was on the pitch for about, I don't know, 8.5 seconds before he just basically bombed one in there. Yeah, just been subbed in.

Yeah, that I believe was the, uh, goal that was chalked off. Uh, for VAR. Yeah, I'm not mistaken, it was. Yeah, Lloyd. But he, he does— he was literally on the pitch for 8 seconds, uh, before unfortunately VAR came and chalks that one off.

80th minute, it's Fotheringham for St. Johnstone to take the 4-3 lead, and that would be the last goal of the game. And I really like— I like when they televise games that don't involve Celtic and Rangers for a number of reasons. One, just because obviously the entire league isn't just Celtic and Rangers, um, especially kind of smaller teams that maybe you aren't gonna— how many St. Johnstone matches are we gonna watch this year? Probably not a ton. So it's nice to see some of their more like dynamic players and guys that maybe could pop up later in the season, or maybe if they have a good season for a team like St. Johnston, will go on to bigger and better things.

Uh, you mentioned John Jewels for Kilmarnock. I really liked the look of St. Johnston striker Josh Fowler. Uh, he had a goal and an assist in this one, and just, he looked like he had some nice pace to him. Maybe it would be a handful if, you know, you think to some of those, those matches. It, it's a, it's a December and you're away to St. Johnston for, uh, Celtic, and he could be a guy that pops up and deals a sucker punch.

Um, their attacking mid Jamie Gowan, 2 assists in this one, so he had a hell of a game. Uh, and this just was a great match. So St. Johnston come out as the victors in this one, uh, which is a big 3 points for them in, in a match where you're thinking, you know, maybe these are 2 teams that might be rooted to the bottom of the table come May. So obviously incredibly early, um, but moving on, I'm sure many of you want to hear how Celtic and Rangers did, and it was definitely a mixed bag for both of these teams. Now Rangers, um, are kind of Hearts now, and here's why.

Derek McInnes, the Hearts boss from last year, went to Rangers. He is now the manager for Rangers. Laurent Shankland, the Hearts, uh, striker Uh, of, of many goals last season and years before, plays for Rangers. Cammy Devlin, um, dynamic midfielder for Hearts last year, plays for Rangers. So Rangers basically just went, okay, Hearts, let's see, I'll take your manager, take your striker, we'll take your best midfielder.

And, uh, yeah, well, that doesn't— so that's going to be a challenging Um, table for Hearts then. And Hearts, uh, okay, so Hearts have had a horrible start to their year. They've been playing European qualifiers to get into some tournament. We don't— looks increasingly like it's going to be maybe the Europa Conference League. Uh, let me just run through Hearts's results, uh, this season's thus far.

We talk about a hangover from last season sometimes. Obviously Hearts, no pun intended, heartbreakingly lost the title with about 5 minutes to go in the season. So their results have looked like this. Um, 4-0 loss to Austrian side Sturm Graz in Champions League qualification. The return leg, they lost 2-0.

Then they went to Aberdeen last weekend and had a 1-0 lead until the 90th minute. Aberdeen hit them for 2 goals in stoppage time. Wow. And they lost 2-1. And then Hearts, after dropping into Europa League competition, you'd think, oh, maybe you'll get an easier Uh, team.

No, they got Benfica, who are a powerhouse in Portugal. They went to Portugal and lost by 6 goals to 1.

Yeah, so really, really horrible start to the year for them, and their new manager is already on the hot seat and needs a win tomorrow against Dundee United. Um, to maybe temper some of the, the boo birds. All of this to say, Rangers have brought in about 100 players compared to Celtics' 2, carrying on the tradition of spending no money. Yeah, so we'll get to Celtic, but Rangers have about a million new players, as I just said, uh, completely new look. Obviously they finished 3rd last year, which is pretty much completely unacceptable if you're from the blue side of Glasgow.

So how did their league season kick off? Uh, tricky little fixture away to Dundee United on the first match of the Scottish Premiership season, and it would prove to be tricky. 38th minute, Lachlan Rose scores for Dundee United, um, and really Rangers first half. They were sluggish, slow, not really in it, not creating a lot of chances. And it culminated in Dundee United, kind of a smash-and-grab goal.

Um, but they did actually have 11 total shots, Dundee United, so it's not like they weren't creating anything. Um, for Rangers, Taylor Asgaard, who is a pretty key component to Norway in the World Cup equalized in the 56th minute to make it 1-1, but Rangers were not able to find a winner, so they dropped points in their first fixture. Um, so we've seen some rocky starts from, you would think, Celtic's biggest title competitors, but I'm not super convinced in Hearts. Actually, I'm not convinced at all. At all that they are going to be a factor.

Um, and Rangers are still Rangers, it looks like. So are we— we're just the first— this is the first week. Yeah. And it's— this weekend will be the second round of— yeah, of matches starting tomorrow. Uh, there's games today, but none of them are televised here.

Uh, so The 2 televised matches that we'll cover this week, uh, Rangers are at home to Hibernian and, uh, Celtic are away to Kilmarnock, and those are both tomorrow. Uh, as for Celtic, um, same old Celtic. It seems like a, a laborious 1-0 win against Dundee at home Benjamin Nigrin scores, pops up with a header in the 52nd minute. And that is about all there is to say about that match. 2 new signings for Celtic, both strikers, and both of them played.

That is Kasper Hu from Denmark, and then Camilo Durán, who is Colombian. He was actually playing on the right wing. I don't think he'll be doing that much longer, hopefully. But yeah, Celtic, 16 players have left. Some of those not actually a part of the squad last season, but yeah, 16 players have left.

2 signings in.

And we are still nickeling and diming teams for— I mean, we were in for a midfielder from Germany for about £5 million, which isn't really that much.

They couldn't agree on a fee because Celtic refused to meet their valuation of the player of five million. Celtic refused to go beyond four point seven. They were haggling over three hundred thousand pounds. Mm-hmm. I see no.

Indication of improvement. In fact, it's more likely they maybe got worse. We shall see. I think tomorrow is going to be a serious test. Home, first match of the season against Dundee.

You can ride the buzz a little bit to a win, but it was, it was laborious. It was a tough watch. It wasn't entertaining, um, and it felt like Celtic were just huffing and puffing towards the finish line. Are we going to see a management change, or is, is this guy locked in now? Martin O'Neill, uh, is, is locked in technically for, uh, a year.

For somebody who was supposed to be a temporary solution. Oh well, yeah, you know, but maybe he's— he probably doesn't take a huge paycheck either. So I don't, I don't know. Probably not. But here's the thing, if you're Martin O'Neal, first off, at 75, there's no fucking way I'm managing a professional football team.

Oh, just from the standpoint of, you know, it's 15-hour days probably, or whatever, a 10-month season. I'm good, uh, personally. But, um, I guess he wants to do it. The thing is He's 75. The tactically Celtic play as if a 75-year-old manager is managing them because there's no style of play that you can really latch on to, seemingly no tactical, um, nuance for the team.

It's kind of just play hard and hope that you score more than the other team. Um, I, I think this is again looking like a season where it's going to be a tough watch for most of the games. I hope that isn't true. And Jesus Christ, can we make some fucking signings? I don't know why it takes 3 weeks to sign a player that we've been linked to.

What I, I just— it's the same problem, so I don't feel like going into a whole spiel again. Yeah. Does that seem to be the consensus amongst supporters? I think so. That was locally— that was very much the vibe at PJ's.

Uh, no one was really impressed with the performance. Um, you know, we, we've got Alistair Johnston maybe signing for a Premier League team. Engels seems to be out the door. Negren maybe too. So we could be losing even more players here.

And again, like, you— the starting 11 that we rolled out for this particular match was decent, but we've lost so many players that then you turn to the bench and it's 36-year-old James Forrest, it's Sebastian Tenecte who scored like 1 goal last year, Colby Donovan, Luke McCowan. Like, these aren't guys that are you turn to the bench and you, you fear as an opposition?

Um, well, it's very early. Yeah, but we touched on this last year.

I think this is a, an organization that needs to lose. Yeah, I, I mean, it wouldn't even be that painful No, because you would think that the result of an unsuccessful campaign would be some major changes. Now, whether or not that's actually sound logic, I don't know. I don't know. It is a— it is probably a theory that more than one Celtic fan has, I would say.

Yeah, again, let's— I mean, the tale of the tape of last season was the worst season they've had in a while. Um, you're basically— you won the title because Rangers were worse. Um, Hearts took you as far as Hearts probably could have gone, um, which was the last day of the season. But yeah, we talked about it last season. Would Celtic losing the title be so horrible?

Because when does change— just in general, change happens because something is so bad that change has to happen, right? So I think, I think the board got bailed out by the playing— by the players, essentially, last year. The players round into form at the perfect time and, uh, were able to win the title. But now we have 38 matches of them playing potentially like they did last year or worse. Um, and again, it's week 1, so there's no reason to write off Rangers or any other team in the league.

Um, if Rangers especially though find form and, you know, hit their stride, this could be a potentially ugly season again. For Celtic. So I, I don't know why it continues to, to be that way in terms of the board and their, um, cheapness is the best way I can say it without, you know, being offensive of some kind. So same old, same old. Again, I think a real test tomorrow against Kilmarnock, uh, to see what the team's made of and how they compete in a hostile environment.

So we will know more next time out. Um, additionally, I think Motherwell are going to be good again. They, they beat, uh, Hibernian last weekend. St. Mirren got a 2-0 win against Falkirk, and I think Falkirk are not going to be as good as last season. They finished 6th.

They don't look nearly as good. Of course, this is all conclusions I've drawn from one match week, so time is on the side of all these teams.

If you don't already have a second team that you follow, maybe this year we should each choose another team to really pay attention to, just— sure, because I think it would it would benefit us in the fact that it would give us more, more things to talk about in the league. But I also think it would be, um, well, it'd be fun to have another team. Do you have anybody in mind? And I'll, I'll need to do some research before I choose a team, but do you know the league? Yeah, inside and out.

I don't know if you already have a team that you, that you would follow secondly, or— I think there's teams that are really interesting that probably don't get the spotlight they deserve in this League just because of the fact that Celtic and Rangers kind of pay the bills. But I really like watching Motherwell. Um, they have a new manager. They were super fun last year. Um, but they look to be fun again.

Um, so I will probably pick them to be my uh, team of choice. Alfred Johansson is the manager for Motherwell. He is 35 years old. Wow. Yeah, super young, uh, Swedish manager.

And they've got some players that already kind of caught my eye, um, in the first match of the season. So, uh, that'll be my pick, I think. All right, I'll take a week to do some research and I'll come back on the next episode with my pick. Okay, sounds good. And yeah, obviously not every game is on TV, so, uh, highlights are your friend.

And highlights, you can find highlights to any game on YouTube. So yeah, yep, that'll be Fotmob. If I follow the team on Fotmob, I'll at least get the notifications that there's a match and what what the results are. Sure. Actually, I think that's a fun idea, and maybe we can do that in the, uh, the Premier League too.

Just like a— yeah, I don't really— I, I don't really have a, a number 1 Premier League team. I mean, obviously Man City because you follow Man City, but yeah. But I mean, I mean, I would take that as number 1 and then pick a number 2 just for— even, even then, for me, it's kind of a tapered just you know, this is a more Celtic-minded show nowadays, so— and I probably watch more Scottish football these days, but I, I think there's a lot of interesting teams in the, the Premier League this season, especially ones that have been promoted. So yeah, that's an interesting thing. So, uh, come back in a week and let me know your, your selection, and maybe we can do that in the Premier League team, uh, Premier League this season as well.

Alrighty, well, we got a barn burner going on here in Portsmouth. Little League Cup action here. West Ham, of course, relegated from the Premier League last year, uh, so that big behemoth of a stadium that you're seeing, the London Stadium, holds about 60,000, uh, will be playing second-tier soccer this year. Well, Yeah, interesting. Yeah, yeah.

Well, in the fictional program Ted Lasso, it's Richmond who, um, makes it to the big show and, um, consequently loses their assistant manager to West Ham. Really? Who's part— the owner of West Ham in the series is portrayed as an evil type person. You just scored. Um, yeah, so the folks that have watched Lasso— I'm 2 seasons behind, so I'm sure, okay, everybody's over it.

That's kind of funny that West Ham would be portrayed as evil. I think they're kind of a club that people don't really have any beef with, so that is kind of a funny— well, the thing, the title character is the coach of Richmond. Yeah, so it's all farce. Far as they, they, uh, I think in the show their stadium is actually Crystal Palace's stadium in real life. Could be wrong.

I've never seen the show. You would be able to tell right away. I, I don't know. I suppose if I watched a CP match closely I could figure it out. But do they— I've, again, I've never seen the show.

Do they ever play Crystal Palace? Do you know? I don't remember if they did or didn't. Yeah, I feel like that the actual football is— yeah, 0.5% of— yeah, well, maybe not that light because they do inject some, some drama into the matches, um, as well. But, uh, yeah, it's moderately entertaining.

Yeah, so 2 weeks from the Premier League returning, will Arsenal be able to defend their title? I guess we will find out. Uh, more Scottish football content to come next week. IndyCar is back after a brief hiatus, so we will have that to discuss. In F1, uh, all of the drivers are on yachts somewhere in the Mediterranean.

So yeah, that's a long break. Yeah, really. I don't understand why they do that other than the fact that it's probably really, really rigorous flying around the world. Yeah, yeah. Albeit most of them are on private jets and whatnot, so— but I mean, hours in the day are hours in the day.

Yeah, regardless. I, I get it. Uh, it just— this year has been bad because we had that initial bump at the beginning of the season where 2 races got shitcanned. Yeah, so it feels like they've been— they've had like 100 breaks, right? So maybe we can find some rhythm here in the second half.

I hope for the love of God that when this series, or when F1 goes to Vegas, we don't see another Lego car thing that— where they— well, first of all I don't— we'll talk about this on the next podcast or when we get closer to Vegas. There's a lot of things they do in Vegas that are cartoonishly stupid. Yeah, so I get it, they're trying to be flashy and all that, but it's just there's so many things that they do wrong at that race, ceremoniously speaking. Yeah, yeah, it seems like every American race gets some sort of stupid Treatment that no one asked for, including Americans, right? Yeah, I agree.

Yeah. All right, well, oh well, we, uh, we're able to grind out 54 minutes here. We actually did pretty well, so that's not bad. Uh, more to, more to come, uh, next weekend with, uh, well, we still don't have an F1 race, but we have IndyCar. So IndyCar is back, and lots to talk about with soccer.

We're going to choose a, a second team in both leagues to watch. Hopefully that's not a mistake on my part because I have a hard enough time trying to keep up with what we cover, but I think I can do it with this app and YouTube. So highlights are your friend. Yep. All right, if you're ready to go, I'm ready to go.

Yep, let's get out of here.

For executive producer Richard Tanaka, this has been Tackling the Chicane, copyright 2026. Tackling the Chicane is recorded using Rode microphones and a RODECaster Pro II console. They don't pay us yet, but maybe someday they will.