Plenty of Nothing

Heisei

Emperor Akihito retires today. Here he is in 1990. Source.

Empress Zewditu

Empress Zewditu, who ruled Ethiopia from 1916 to 1930, was born on this day in 1876. Source.

The Man From Fish EP Is Secret

Frank Sidebottom incorporated coded messages into the decorative borders of his cassette sleeves and zines, and these are now partially understood. Story.

To Dunfermline by Tram

Dunfermline High Street. Source.

Morton visit Dunfermline. It's Week 35 and either team can still finish the season 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, or 10th.

In August I speculated that this might be the year a team with 40 points gets relegated. Morton have 40 points now.

Ross County won the division last night, and they did Morton a double favour by denying QoS any points and by rendering Morton's game against Dundee United next week meaningless to the Tangerines.

If Morton win today they are safe from relegation.

Other Championship matches:

Ayr United 0 - 1 Partick (April 23)

Ross County 4 - 0 Queen of the South (yesterday)

Alloa [1 - 2] ICT

Dundee United [2 - 0] Falkirk

Partick [1 - 2] Ayr United

[Morton win 0 - 1 and qualify for the 2019-20 Championship. Goal by Kiltie.]

How have Morton performed against Dunfermline in league play this century?

2018-19        2 draws, 1 loss so far.

2017-18        2 wins, 2 draws; 6 gf, 4 ga; 8 points.

2016-17        1 win, 3 losses; 4 gf, 7 ga; 3 points.

2014-15        4 wins; 10 gf, 2 ga; 12 points.

2012-13        2 wins, 1 draw, 1 loss; 10 gf, 6 ga; 7 points.

2010-11        2 wins, 2 losses; 5 gf, 6 ga; 6 points.

2009-10        4 losses; 3 gf, 11 ga; 0 points.

2008-09        2 wins, 1 draw, 1 loss; 5 gf, 4 ga; 7 points.

2007-08        2 wins, 2 losses; 4 gf, 3 ga, 6 points.

1928-29: Morton visited Queen of the South and beat them 3 - 2. It was Morton's ninth win in a row, and also the last game of the season. Morton finished second in Division Two, with 21 wins, 8 draws and 7 losses, 85 goals for and 49 against, for 50 points. They and first-place Dundee United gained promotion.

Read a slightly outdated piece about former Morton goalkeeper Andy McNeil's coaching career in China. He's now with R&F (HK) FC.

Angus derby: Forfar [1 - 0] Montrose

Pyramid playoffs, first leg: East Kilbride [1 - 2] Cove Rangers

Longest current unbroken string of years by rivals in the same division:

75    Celtic/Aberdeen    (1945-46 on)

35    Celtic/Motherwell    (1985-86 on)

35    Aberdeen/Motherwell    (1985-86 on)

26    Celtic/Kilmarnock    (1993-94 on)

26    Aberdeen/Kilmarnock    (1993-94 on)

26    Motherwell/Kilmarnock    (1993-94 on)

11    Elgin/Annan    (2008-09 on)

11    Elgin/Berwick    (2008-09 on)

11    Berwick/Annan    (2008-09 on)

Which Premiership clubs were relegated to tier II this decade, after how long in the top league, and how long did they then stay out?

                                                 A            B

2018        Ross County            6             1

2018        Partick Thistle          5            1+

2017        Inverness CT           7             2+

2016        Dundee United       20            3+

2015        St Mirren                  9             3

2014        Hearts                     31            1

2014        Hibs                        15             3

2013        Dundee                    1             1

2012        Dunfermline             1             7+

2011        Hamilton                   3             3

2010        Falkirk                      5             9+

A = ended a run of how many years in the top tier; B = began a run of how many years out of the top tier; "+" means "or more"

East of Scotland League championship playoffs:

Penicuik Athletic [3 - 2] Broxburn Athletic

West of Scotland Premiership:

Largs Thistle vs Troon (April 24) [abandoned due to high winds]

Glenafton [1 - 1] Largs Thistle (today)

The Canadian Premier League starts today:

Forge FC [1 - 1] York 9

The commute from York 9's Alumni Field to Forge's ground Tim Horton Field in Hamilton is the shortest in the Canadian Premier League, at 80.6 km or 51 minutes driving time, according to Google Maps.

[York 9's Ryan Telfer scores the first ever CPL goal. He and Morton's Charlie Telfer are the only two people named Telfer I have ever heard of.]

Tomorrow it's Pacific FC [1 - 0] HFX Wanderers.

Pacific FC play at Westhills Stadium in Langford, a suburb of Victoria. Their team colours are a spin on that Nineties favourite, purple and teal. Their badge appears to be a picture of a metronome. It takes 8 1/2 hours to fly from Halifax to Victoria via Air Canada or WestJet.

Pacific FC's name is unfortunate because 1) it could apply to nearly any team in that hemisphere, and 2) it's already taken. There's a Pacific FC in Mazatlán, Sinaloa, in the Mexican third tier. It was founded a year before the Langford one so they have dibs. Somebody in CONCACAF should have noticed.

North American sport scores are usually reported with the home team second. I'm going to make sure to do the CanPL scores the European way, with the home team first.

The Wanderers' new mascot is a dog named Rover. [But not a real dog.]

[If HFX Wanderers' first home game had been today (Saturday, April 17) it would have been rained out.]

Abbreviations: Is it CPL, CanPL or CdnPL?

AFC Champions League group stage, matchday 4:

Group E: Kashima Antlers 0 - 1 Gyeongnam FC

Group F: Daegu FC 0 - 1 Sanfrecce Hiroshima

Group G: Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors 2 - 1 Urawa Red Diamonds

Group H: Kawasaki Frontale 2 - 2 Ulsan Hyundai

24th Fukushima Prefecture Football Championship:

Match No. 16: FC Primeiro [1 - 5] Fukushima University SC

Match No. 17: Bandits Iwaki [2 - 1] FFC Matsushita

Match No. 18: Eastern Japan Int'l University SC [3 - 0] Merry

Iwaki FC play a training match against Sendai University a.k.a. Sendaidai. [Iwaki 1 - 7 Sendaidai. What the?]

J-Village, a sports complex in Fukushima Prefecture, has reopened after serving for most of the decade as a staging area for Fukushima nuclear power plant cleanup operations. Story.

Danish 1st Division: Naestved [1 - 2] Fredericia (April 28)

Swiss Challenge League: Lausanne [4 - 1] Winterthur

Regionalliga Südwest: Mainz 05 II [3 - 1] 1. FC Saarbrücken

Footings for footie at Westhills Stadium in Langford. Source.

Women's Hockey Champions 2019

Peregrine. Source.

Clarkson Cup (CWHL): Calgary Inferno

The CWHL will fold on May 1. Story. Also.

Isobel Cup (NWHL): Minnesota Whitecaps

U Sports: Guelph Gryphons

NCAA: Wisconsin Badgers

Finland: Espoo Blues

France: Remparts de Tours

Germany: Memmingen

Japan: Douru Kenetsu Peregrine

Russia: Agidel Ufa

Sweden: Luleå

Switzerland: HC Ladies Lugano

Italy: Alleghe

EWHL: KMH Budapest

Tourangelles. Source.

Scottish Cup Final 1959

From the 1959 cup final. Source.

 

SCOTTISH CUP TRIUMPH

    FOR ST MIRREN

Large Attendance At Final

    by Cyril Horne

    St Mirren, as had been freely forecast, won the Scottish Cup on Saturday at Hampden Park for the second time, their previous success having been in 1926. If the defeat of Aberdeen was far from unexpected the size of the crowd who attended the match certainly surprised most people. At last year's final (between Clyde and Hibernian) the attendance was 95,123 and in 1957 the gate for the Falkirk-Kilmarnock final was 79,960. On this occasion, however, there were 108,591 paying spectators -- over 2000 more than the number who saw the Celtic-Clyde Saturday final in 1955.

    British Record

    Finals in which Celtic or Rangers have participated have generally attracted the largest crowds in view of those clubs' huge following -- the record attendance at a club game in Britain is the 146,433 at the Celtic-Aberdeen final in 1937 -- but the greatest crowd at a final since the Scottish Cup competition was resumed in season 1946-47 was for a match in which neither Celtic nor Rangers were involved -- 136,274 for Motherwell v. Dundee in 1952.

    Three factors contributed to the unexpectedly large gate on Saturday:--

    (1) The weather was fair for the start of the match, though in the middle of the afternoon there was heavy drizzling rain; (2) there was no first-division opposition, the major league programme having been completed; (3) Aberdeen's important victory over Rangers on the previous Saturday had given the final new appeal.

    Nevertheless, the spectator's appetite for the game at the end of a season which has been far from distinguished is remarkable.

 

INJURY MARKS TURNING POINT

        AT HAMPDEN PARK

        St Mirren 3, Aberdeen 1

    For nearly half an hour at Hampden on Saturday Aberdeen played as if they might repeat their success of the previous week in the role of non-favourites. Brownlee, Clunie, and Glen confidently contained the menace of the St Mirren inside forwards, and the left half and Wishart had St Mirren's veteran, Lapsley, clearly worried as they used the still not inconsiderable speed of Hather.

    The even faster Baker had, it is true, once run clear of Clunie and beaten Martin with a shot which grazed the outside of a post, but St Mirren had an even more narrow escape when Walker made a desperate save of a fast ground shot from Davidson and baulked Ewan as the outside right raced in for the kill.

        Rearranged Team

    But in 28 minutes Caldwell limped from the field suffering from a pulled muscle and though he returned five minutes later it was as an outside left, Hather having been withdrawn from the forward line to take over as right back.

    Thereafter it was St Mirren's match and St Mirren's Cup. Caldwell was willing but severely handicapped -- early in the second half when the score was 1 - 0 a fit player would have scored when Walker misjudged a cross from Ewen -- and Hather, beaten by Miller, as Caldwell not once had been, before the cross which Bryceland headed away from Martin two minutes from half time, was too left-footed and too deficient in positional sense to succeed as a right back. I am sure Aberdeen could have tackled their problem much more intelligently; it certainly was rank bad strategy to permit a full back so lacking in mobility as Lapsley an hour of welcome leisure.

    In any event St Mirren's halfbacks proceeded to exert the influence their opposite numbers had done in the first half-hour and Bryceland and Gemmell revelled in the new-found freedom from close marking. In 65 minutes Miller had merely to side-foot the ball over the line for St Mirren's second goal, and seven minutes later Baker strode away from Clunie, who had slipped as he tried to intercept Bryceland's pass, and coolly directed his shot out of the reach of the advancing Martin. In the final minute Baird scored for Aberdeen, having as a right half in his side's later readjustment of their forces made a much more direct approach than ever he had done as a centre forward.

        Semi-Final Form

    For me at least this, after Caldwell's injury, was no great game. Well as St Mirren -- and Bryceland and Gemmell in particular -- played after Aberdeen's misfortune they rarely touched their form of the semi-final on the same ground. Perhaps there will be general agreement now that Celtic that day were a shockingly poor team.

    Martin, Hogg, all three half-backs, and Wishart made tremendous efforts for Aberdeen. The St Mirren half-backs were throughout equally fine players and latterly one could appreciate the combination of skill and thrust that Bryceland, Baker, and Gemmell have introduced.

    Aberdeen's match-winner of recent weeks, Davidson, had an unhappy day. Injured in the first half and justifiably annoyed about the Leishman tackle which caused him hurt, he set about giving a Roland for an Oliver* and in the end had his name taken by the referee. Two St Mirren players were cautioned, Wilson for a dreadful foul on Ewen and Baker for an angry lunge at Hogg. All of this unseemly behaviour occurred in the second half. There was an unequally unpleasant action of Bryceland in the first half which caused Clunie to have trainer's attention; Mr Mowat could not have detected it so firmly did he deal with the latter offenders. Little men should be extra careful in their attentions to opponents; I have known half-backs who without getting themselves into trouble would have lent a great deal of weight to an argument with such as Bryceland.

    St Mirren's well-deserved success would have been more commendable without those misdemeanours.

    ST MIRREN -- Walker; Lapsley and Wilson; Neilson, McGugan, and Leishman; Rodger and Bryceland; Baker; Gemmell and Miller.

    ABERDEEN -- Martin; Caldwell and Hogg; Brownlee, Clunie, and Glen; Ewen and Davidson; Baird; Wishart and Hather.

    Referee -- J. A. Mowat (Burnside).

Glasgow Herald, April 27, 1959, page 4.

*The Song of Roland.

Levator Scapula

Kriota Willberg illustrates an article on the levator scapula muscle with images of Alison Bechdel exercising, possibly as a poke to get Bechdel to hurry up with her own long-expected book on fitness culture.

LeBreton Flats, 1962

Source.

Mount Etna by Hackert

Mount Etna by Jacob Philipp Hackert. Source.

Chinese Cigarette Brands

Source.