Questions Needing Answered in Glasgow

I watched Question Time the other night. Before you all make judgements of me as a pretentious student desperate to earn a bit of social currency, let me explain further. The show was filmed in Edinburgh this week and touched upon one of the more controversial incidents in recent Scottish footballing history. Bearing in mind the numerous times our sports teams have managed to disgrace themselves recently, the Old Firm cup tie 10 days ago really did top the lot. And it's not going to be dealt with properly.

The question from the audience was this: "Should politicians be meddling in sporting matters and can Scotland's social problems be blamed solely on two football teams?" OK so the guy was taking liberties and asked two questions but the answers given by the panel were nothing short of astonishing. First up was journalist and broadcaster Nick Ferrari, who eulogised at great verbose length about the passion shown by the two teams, lamenting how the behaviour of the players in blue and green was so unlike that which would be found in English sports teams. And so essentially put a positive spin on a pretty unsavoury episode. To make light of the situation was pretty ignorant of the social issues that the players' behaviour contributes to - whilst not directly responsible, it doesn't half fan the flames.

Then we have Nicola Sturgeon MSP, the health secretary who qualified as an expert on the subject as Ibrox falls into her constituency. Poor lass, her job can't be all that easy! Anyway, her opinion on the matter was how sad the whole incident was, but that Rangers and Celtic are great sources of pride for both Glasgow and Scotland and had both done such sterling work in turning the tide against sectarianism. I'm not quite sure who she spoke to in order to come to that conclusion.

If politicians are to get involved in this situation, then they must stop burying their heads in the sand. This summit that has been called to discuss the impact that the Old Firm has upon domestic violence, secterianism and general unrest in Glasgow and beyond. As someone so wisely said to me in the aftermath of Celtic's 1-0 Scottish Cup victory, "Celtic and Rangers need to get over themselves, they're only 3.5 stars on FIFA". And therein lies the problem. The Old Firm have such an inflated sense of their own egos that the rivalry becomes that bit more intense because both sides and their fans feel that victory actually is worth something other than bragging rights. And the whole country, including the government, buys into it. The country stands still for an Old Firm game, the police presence is ramped up, the trash talking commences. This will never stop so long as the players continue to cause trouble. What reasons do they have to cause so much strife. Is Daniel Majstorovic a militant Catholic? Is El-Hadji Diouf a descendant of William of Orange? The geographical and social reasons that the fans have for hating one another (which really shouldn't stand in this day and age anyway) surely do not hold true for the 22 men on the park. The managers maybe, but McCoist and Lennon have been around long enough to not get involved in that sort of thing. It was idiotic and the touchline bans are well deserved.

There is no need for them to blow things so far out of proportion. They certainly shouldn't be ramping up the pressure to the extent they did last week. The issue of domestic violence is a different one entirely. This is something that happens behind closed doors and is probably a wider issue than reported. It is simply not acceptable in any way, let alone a sporting context. But if the government thinks that they can somehow change the hearts and minds of an entire city, they will find themselves neglecting the wider issues that Scotland currently faces.

So, in answer to the original question - politicians can be my guest and get involved in sport all they want. But they need to be realistic about the impact they can have - implementing sweeping changes will simply not be possible. As for pinning the blame on the Old Firm for Scotland's social problems - I don't buy it. These problems would exist no matter what, a football match is just an excuse for them to rear their ugly head.

Cue rapturous audience applause
RM