Davie Provan knows the score, Wallace Disney

Opinions are like bottoms, everyone has one and the advance of the internet allows a lot more bottoms to have their say.

I did think quite a bit over whether this issue was worthy of comment, or wasting my time, but since it's from a 'quality' newspaper which likes to look down at 'tacky tabs' it is worth commenting on.

Thankfully the match with Rapid Vienna is over with and there's some action, or inaction, to comment on rather than half-baked half-truths from 25 years ago.

In media terms the Celtic-Rapid match was a godsend allowing all sorts of nonsense and theories to surface, the fact that some allegedly quality newspapers, or to be much more accurate websites, decided to slag off the re-reporting of 25 years earlier makes them fair game.

READABLE

The Guardian is generally a very readable website for the football fan, some original news and comments from journalists who can think outside the box and generally have a depth and knowledge about what they are writing about.

Rather than rehash press conference quotes or attempt to find controversy where it doesn't exist the Guardian can usually be relied on to provide some comment and content worth thinking over. Usually that is.

There are always exceptions however and one blog piece caught my attention, initially for the number of factual errors through it, interestingly the original article has since been corrected, probably prompted by the readers comments.

Despite commenting that This article has been amended since its initial publication some key errors remained including incredibly missing Rudi Wienhofer as the victim of the bottle throwing, or unidentified flying object as Uefa finally described it.

Within the not so thinly disguised criticism of all things Celtic the author gets carried away into a spot of character assassination on Davie Provan.

That will be the successful former Celtic player, whose career was ended by illness and who then reinvented himself into one of the most in-demand pundits and commentators thanks to his hard-hitting honest assessments rather than churning out predictable party lines.

IMPRESSIVE

Standing up for himself Provan is highly rated and valued by Sky Sports, News International and Radio Clyde which is a pretty impressive cv by any standards.

Comically the author of the piece decides to dredge up an incident between Provan and Willie Johnston of Hearts from 1983 when the former Rangers winger collected one of the many red cards that littered his career.

According to the author Wallace Mercer, was prompted into threatening comments regarding lawyers and court cases by the incident.

Wow. Shockerooni. Whoopidododo.

The great Waldo in self publicity shocker! If trophies were created for self promotion they might have needed a trophy room during Mercer's reign at Hearts.

ALBERT KIDD

Mercer had the league trophy as good as won before the club travelled to Dundee on the final day of the 1985/86 season.

Mercer announced to the world the merger of Hearts and Hibs in 1990 to become a real force in football.

Mercer managed Hearts to zero trophies whilst Hibs, St Mirren and Motherwell celebrated silverware as Mercer filled pages with hot air from Tynecastle.

No harm to Mercer, who died from cancer in 2006, but he'd probably now be embarrassed by the attempt to blacken Provan's name and reputation by attempting to give credibility to an incident from 26 years ago that wasn't captured by television cameras.

Coin throwing and worse was a regular and regrettable feature of football in the early and mid-eighties with Edinburgh fans amongst the worst offenders.

Off the top of my head, without the benefit of extensive research I can remember John Brown of Dundee and Paul McStay being struck by coins at Aberdeen and Gordon Strachan being hit by a coin at Easter Road. Every club had their coin throwers.

MISSILES

Provan, Frank McGarvey and McStay were regularly assaulted with coins and other missiles at Tynecastle from the junction of where the Wheatfield and School End stands are now situated. It happened.

The internet happily allows all shades of opinion to be aired, otherwise this piece would still be bouncing around in my head.

Blogs provide a fantastic opportunity for almost anyone to promote their thoughts and views, doing so with accuracy and responsibility is desirable.

In times gone by it was almost impossible to get an opinion into the mainstream with the publishing and broadcasting giants enjoying their monopoly status.

Those days are gone and even 'viewers in Scotland' can now enjoy the writing and podcasts of the Guardian giving a breadth and depth of coverage previously out of reach.

It won't bother Davie Provan in the slightest the sad ramblings of an online 'expert' as he enjoys the rewards from his successful career and the memories of a great playing career spent alongside great Celtic team-mates like Tommy Burns, McStay, Murdo MacLeod, Charlie Nicholas and McGarvey.

He'll probably smile that someone has decided to revisit the Johnston incident.

Good Guardian

Dodgy Guardian

Thanks for bearing with me through this mini rant, feel free to add your comments below.