A Swift Kick In The Co-Efficients

On the surface, this week’s results in Europe might look to be the same old same old poor results for Scottish teams.  Yet with the exception of the Hearts result, things are not all lost.

Hearts were always going to have a difficult task against Tottenham, who have been there or thereabouts in Europe and in the “Champions League” places.  They had to play well, which is precisely what they didn’t do.  Spurs were only too happy to take their gifts, which have pretty much put them into the first round proper.  Part of me thinks that this result was always likely especially given the aftermath of the sacking of Jim Jeffries two games in.  It’s not that Sergio is a bad manager, it’s too early in his time at Tynecastle to make that kind of judgement.  It’s just that in his 4th match in charge, a game of this magnitude has come too quickly in his tenor.

For both half’s of the Old Firm, they may have had bad results but are not out of things yet.  Celtic’s draw at home to Sion is not a great result. However there is the added bonus of not having conceded an away goal.  A score draw will be enough to see Celtic through.  On the other hand, Rangers loss is leavened by the away goal they scored in Maribor.  Rangers should be good enough to put the tie away at Ibrox, with a 1-0 win good enough to see them through.

All of our sides suffered poor results that will affect the Scottish co-efficient, the ranking system that determines the amount of teams eligible to play in European competitions.  However once again, it’s the Old Firm in the best position to reverse some of the damage inflicted by the other teams.