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FIRST QUARTER
They say that the quarter point of the season is a good time to assess how the season in question is going. By "they", I mean beleaguered managers who, a month into the season and on a string of unacceptable early results, are wondering where their reputation is going and where their pay packet will be coming from by Christmas.
"I’ll give him till Christmas" is another common phrase amongst the more understanding supporters. Whether this seemingly arbitrary cut-off point is based on it being at roughly the halfway point in the season or the practical benefits of turfing out an under-performing manager before the transfer window opens isn’t clear. But a little over quarter of the season (and 49 shopping days away from Christmas) our own under-performance is perfectly clear.
Having taken 2 points from the last possible 24 in a series of matches which included an 8-1 defeat by then bottom of the table Montrose, even Stuart Millar himself must be wondering how long his shoogly peg is going to last. In that time, we’ve slipped from 5/2 bookies favourites to win the league to a 33/1 price that doesn’t come close to reflecting the true chance of that improbable scenario.
 A win today against East Stirlingshire would lift us off what’s become a familiar spot over the past four years at the foot of whichever division we’re in. Defeat would leave us five points adrift. A "crunch match" apparently, to coin another over-used football phrase. But on closer scrutiny, there’s little difference between these two outcomes. One of them will buy the manager more time, but neither will alter expectations for the rest of the season.
By the time you reach that stage, you can’t help but think that the window of opportunity for decisive action has already passed you by.
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 Date
6 November 2010
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REUNITED WITH "ANCIENT RIVALS"
Sitting in the lavish surroundings of Hampden Park, it’s hard to understand why the resident club remain staunchly committed to amateur football and the perpetual under-achievement this policy ensures. The one-time forward-thinking pioneers of football who could reasonably boast to have invented the modern game as well as initiating international football and having the foresight to build what was then the largest stadium in  the world are, 120 years after every other club abandoned it, still clinging to the backward-thinking principle that they would be somehow tainted by introducing remuneration. Yes, there’s a place for tradition, but surely it shouldn’t be at the expense of progress and certainly not at the expense of success.
As it turned out, the game failed to live up to the grand venue. Decidedly flat for much of the first half, it was the perfect example of a game that needed a goal to bring it to life. When the goal came, it became the perfect example of a game that still hadn’t come to life. No doubt Queen’s Park will have been disappointed to lose to what looked like a below-par Clyde performance (or as disappointed as you’re entitled to be when you "play for the sake of playing") but we certainly edged it over the ninety minutes, much as it took some dogged defending in the latter stages and a slice of good fortune to ensure that we didn’t blow a lead for a second week in a row.
Highlight of the day has to be the Queen's Park official website describing us in the match report as their "ancient rivals". No, we think you're mixing us up with Vale of Leven there.
Still, three points in the bag, lessons learnt for our visit from the English club next Saturday, and a 100% league record in the Exiles away shirt. Got to be happy with that.
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Date
17 August 2010
Click here for match highlights from qphd.tv
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REALITY CHECK
Ok, we admit it. At 3:30 on Saturday afternoon, the Exiles thoughts were mainly on scoring enough to ensure that we’d start the league campaign in top spot and with a healthy goal difference separating us from 2nd place. By the time of the next text from Broadwood, the thought that McCusker had struck again for a first-half hat trick seemed a great deal more likely than the reality check that had actually been delivered.
 As it turns out, we’d had our chances to extend the lead and had it not been from a moment of madness from JC Henderson, the reality check may well have waited till another week.
The exiles perspective can be skewed at times. Matches are reduced to the bare bones of team line-ups, substitutions, bookings, watching the clock and the live league table, and (most of all) goals. Yes, we appreciate the updates of "who’s on top" at any given time, subjective though they may be, but the score is king. We never experience exciting 0-0 draws and, with a Clyde goal always just a simple text away, we never settle for them – much as the supporters at the game might see that that text is unlikely to be sent. That’s just one example. Settling for blowing a two-goal lead at home is even more inconceivable – perhaps as it should be whether it’s witnessed or not.
The defensive frailties exposed by Stranraer had commonly been acknowledged prior to Saturday’s game. The extent to which they will be rectified by the re-signing of Alan Lithgow remains to be seen, but we have every reason to believe our upcoming opponents will find it more difficult to find a way through now that last season’s Player of the Year is back in the heart of the defence. One down, thirty five to go - time will tell.
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Date
11 August 2010
Click here for match highlights from clydefc.co.uk
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TURNING THE CORNER?
One of the notable features of our downward spiral has been the absence of any false dawns. That's if you discount the three game blip late in 2008 which inspired our then chairman to give a two-year contract extension to a manager who had already stretched the patience of the Clyde support past breaking point.
 On the face of it, dispatching a First Division club with relative ease looks like proof that the club has finally turned a corner. But on closer inspection, Cowdenbeath are where they are courtesy of the play-offs from an appallingly weak Second Division last year. Out of their depth, they will almost certainly taste relegation by next May - and their starting eleven against us last Saturday was several players short of their strongest. That said, if McCusker can keep scoring goals of the quality of his double against the Blue Brazil, we should be setting our sights on the League Cup Final, never mind the Third Division Championship.
One thing is for certain though, with players and fans applauding each other after the full time whistle, the them-and-us mentality engineered by our previous manager for his own ends has clearly been dismantled. Turning that corner is good enough for me. For now.
 A last “pre-season” friendly tomorrow tonight against a full strength Rangers side at Broadwood before the Second Division campaign kicks off. Our opening day opponents conceded seven goals to Morton at the weekend so the optimists amongst us will simply be wondering just how many more McCusker can score if he repeats the form of the previous Saturday!
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Date
03 August 2010
Click here for match highlights from clydefc.co.uk |
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UNDETERRED BY CUP EXIT
An unexpected early outing for the Exiles-sponsored away shirt at Firhill. On enquiring as to why the change shirt had been used even when there was no clash, the Exiles were told "Have you seen the Thistle shirt? That monstrosity clashes with itself never mind any other shirt". Good point.
 In the event, as is customary in our derby matches, the touch of class in the ninety minutes came courtesy of Clyde – a Strachan free kick that’ll better any strike Firhill will see for the rest of the season ahead. It wasn’t enough to progress to the next round, but in a competition that has never sparked much enthusiasm in the early rounds, it won’t been seen as much of a loss.
There are plenty of positives to be taken from the opening competitive game. The performance was widely regarded as encouraging, the gesture from players and management applauding the strong travelling support was greatly appreciated, and the Clyde "choir" was back to its vociferous best. With little to sing about in recent years, that’s been sadly lacking.
Better times ahead?
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Date
27 July 2010
Click here for match highlights from ptfc.co.uk
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NEARLY THERE
Less than a week to wait before the competitive action starts and, with one creditable pre-season friendly performance against Ross County under our belts, the mood amongst the exiles is as it should be… unfoundedly optimistic!
Gauging a season’s potential on the basis of frendlies is an inexact science to say the least, especially when having to keep in mind the fact that though we enjoyed parity with last Saturday's opponents for the past decade (or should that be that they enjoyed parity with us?), John Brown’s legacy has put us two divisions below them. Still, good luck to Ross County – especially in your four games against Thistle.
 Next up is Everton – one of few English sides to beat us in the 1950’s, succeeding where the likes of Manchester United, Arsenal and Nottingham Forest failed. That may have been as a result of our squad being weakened by the inclusion of two Blackpool players as guests. Though, with one of our guest players being Sir Stanley Matthews, that excuse probably doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.
Rumour has it that Wayne Rooney was lined up to guest for us this time round until his recent performances in South Africa persuaded Stuart Millar that we’d be better sticking with what we have.
Interestingly, the programme for that game against Everton notes we had recently turned down offers of £20,000 each for McPhail and Ring. In total, in today's money, that's the equivalent of £2,670,000. Changed days!
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Date
19 July 2010
Official Programme from our last match against Everton. Played in Belfast in 1953
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HAMPDEN DEBUT BECKONS
With the fixture list for the 2010/2011 season published by the SFL today, we now know that the Exiles-sponsored shirt will make its first appearance at the National Stadium for our match against Queens Park on the 14th August. Diaries out... an Exiles gathering looks like an attractive proposition!
Early indications are that the game will not be all-ticket - even though QP fans bizarrely regard us as arch rivals.
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Date
17 June 2010
Hampden Park, home of Queen's Park FC
It's amazing how big a stadium you can build with the savings from not paying your players a wage.
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WELCOME TO THE "CLYDE EXILES" WEBSITE
 News of the new Clyde Exiles website has broken earlier than intended – so apologies to our visitors that it’s not ready yet. Progress on the site was hampered by the webmaster's traditional Hebridean sense of urgency (we don’t have a Gaelic word for "hurry" – we just can’t think of a situation where it would be used).
The Good news is that the sponsorship looks great on the new away shirt. The purple colour may be a break from the norm and ruffled a few traditionalist feathers, but it does do away with the need for a third strip on the occasions when our traditional home and away strip would both clash with another club’s colours.
The bad news is that the star-studded champagne reception planned for the formal launch of the website has been cancelled.
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Date
04 June 2010
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