Plenty of Nothing

Mushrooms

2015 Emperor's Cup, Round One

Wasenda Senior High School team, winners of the National High School Football Tournament, 1923. Source.

The Emperor's Cup returns for a 95th installment. This is Round One, featuring the prefectural champions. Let's watch:

Game No. 8: Mito HollyHock 4 - 2 ReinMeer Aomori

Game No. 14: Consadole Sapporo 5 - 1 Sapporo University

Game No. 16: Blaublitz Akita [3 - 0] Fukushima United

Game No. 20: Montedio Yamagata [7 - 1] Yamagata University Faculty of Medicine

Game No. 25: Grulla Morioka [0 - 3] Machida Zelvia

Game No. 28: Vanraure Hachinohe [0 - 1] Sendai University

Game No. 36: FC Gifu [2 - 1] Kwansei Gakuin University

Swedish Greenock

The Morton away strip for 2015-16.

Morton travel to Alloa to play The Wasps. Will both teams wear yellow?

The last time Morton and Alloa played in the same division, 2013-14, the Wasps won all four games. Alloa knocked Morton out of the 2014-15 Challenge Cup as well. Morton's last win against them came in 2011.

The Wasps are, of course, named after the play by Aristophanes. How many other clubs take their name from one of his Old Comedies? Lillestrøm SK are nicknamed Fugla, i.e. The Birds. Levante UD are Les Granotes, The Frogs.

Alloa have not collected a point in three league matches. They have scored two goals and surrendered eleven. They are out of both the Challenge Cup and League Cup.

When a club wins League One, how well should it do the next season in the Championship? Based on the historical record, going back to creation of the four-tier format in 1994, the likiest outcomes are 5th or 8th (four times each), then 7th or 10th (three times each), 1st, 3rd or 4th (twice each), but never 2nd, 6th or 9th. Partick and Gretna were the clubs that went directly from 1st to 1st. When Morton were promoted in 1995 they went to 3rd place the next year; when they were promoted in 2007 they went on to finish 8th.

In three league and three cup matches Morton have still not scored a goal in the first half.

Do teams in yellow receive more yellow cards? At season's end I'll count up Morton's yellow cards at home and away and we'll find out.

Luca Gasparotto has been called up for Canada's September 4th match against Belize.

Celtic have landed in Group A of the Europa League group stage, along with Ajax, Fenerbahçe and Molde.

Canadian Championship final second leg: Vancouver Whitecaps 2 - 0 Montreal Impact. It's Vancouver's first championship.

Yesterday it was Shelbourne 2 - 1 UCD.

[Morton win 0 - 1. Goal by O'Ware.]

Samsunspor [2 - 2] Karşıyaka. Samsun was part of the Roman province of Pontus, and was Kemal Atatürk's base of operations in the War of Independence.

Napoleon Cup the Second

Bonapartist porcelain.

It's the second edition of the Napoleon Cup invitational hockey tournament. Back again are hosts les Gothiques d'Amiens and les Patriotes de l'UQTR of Canadian Interuniversity Sport's OUA East Division, plus Tilburg Trappers from Holland and Anglet Hormadi of the Championnat de France Division 1.

France has at least three rival claimants to its nonexistent throne: Louis Alphonse for the Bourbon Legitimists; Henri d'Orléans for the heirs of Louis Phillipe; and Charles, Prince Napoléon.

[Anglet Hormadi prevail, followed by Amiens, UQTR and Tilburg in that order.]

St. Pat's That Was #2

The Boxer Codex

If like me you know basically nothing about the Philippines, a good place to start learning would be the remarkable Boxer Codex, a wonderfully illustrated volume from the 16th Century now residing at Indiana University and available to browse here.

2015-16 Scottish League Cup, Round Two

Bare legs doomed?

Morton travel to Dumfries to meet Queen of the South in the second round of the League Cup.

How do these rivals compare in League Cup play? Neither has ever won the trophy. Morton made it to the final in 1963-64, and the semi-finals in 1964-65, 1967-68 and 1979-80. QoS made the semi-finals in 1950-51 and 1960-61. But crucially Morton have never lost a game to QoS in this competition, although admittedly the last time they met in it was 1979, 36 years ago (see above). More than half the history of the tournament has taken place since then.

This the 70th year of the League Cup. In that time, which trophy has gone more often to the Old Firm, the Scottish Cup or the League Cup? Rangers have won the League Cup 27 times, Celtic 15, for a total of 42. In the same time period Rangers have won the Scottish Cup 23 times, and Celtic 21, for a total of 44. 12 non-Old Firm clubs have won the League Cup. Concurrently 11 non-Old Firm clubs have won the Scottish Cup. So the League Cup is slightly more friendly to clubs outside the Old Firm.

SPFL is looking at returning future League Cups to a group stage format.

Queen of the South's Palmerston Park is one of three fields in the Championship with an artificial surface. The spread of abrasive plastic grass through the SPFL (there are currently 13 plastic pitches) is bound to have an effect on football kit: thigh-high socks. As soon as I have a picture of a SPFL player exhibiting zettai ryouiki I'll post it.

[Morton win 0 - 1. Goal by Forbes.]

UEFA Champions League playoff round, second leg is today: Malmö [2 - 0] Celtic. [Celtic drop down to the Europa League.]

AFC Champions League quarter-final first leg action this week:

Kashiwa Reysol [1 - 3] Guangzhou Evergrande Taobao

Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors [0 - 0] Gamba Osaka

Robinho plays for Guangzhou.

Lichen and Moss

Geneva Convention

On August 22nd in 1864 twelve European countries signed the first treaty in what would come to be known as the Geneva Conventions, titled the Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded in Armies in the Field. And not a moment too soon, considering all the wars going on in 1864. The artist of record, Charles Édouard Armand-Dumaresq, was himself a painter of military subjects.

Richard III

Today marks the 530th anniversary of the death of King Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth Field. The unearthing and reinterment of Richard's bones captured a lot of attention between 2013 and this year, giving some future novelist a unique prism through which to view the England of this decade. While it's still around you should go look at Alexandra Buckle's blog How to Rebury a King, which begins and ends in March 2015 and makes about a half-hour's read. She documents the rediscovery not so much of Richard as of 15th-century practices of reburial.