Learning Gaelic Through The Medium Of Greenock Morton And Ross County

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Well before we go into Gaelic let's start with this evening's FA cup victory of Newport over Leicester City. You know when Leicester equalised you thought you were about to see the sort of game where the plucky underdog got steamrollered by the top league opponent. But Newport bit back. They deserved the victory.

Just hope they're not drawn against West Ham in the next round.

Anyway earlier this morning I'd decided to start learning Gaelic by watching a football match on the BBC Iplayer. As I've mentioned before when starting to learn Welsh I would concentrate on two types of programmes, preschool and sports, for the simple reason that I'd have some idea what was going on.

Preschool programmes would teach me more on the vocabulary. Sports would be more to hear Gaelic being spoken even though I'd understand little. The point of listening at this time is just getting an ear to the language and tuning yourself in.

The match was a Scottish Championship (ie second tier) game between Greenock Morton and Ross County. Which was shown live last Friday on the BBC Gaelic channel BBC Alba. Ross County were leading the division and were the favourites for the night.

Now I must be honest the first half for the neutral was a dull affair. I know this through how much my attention was distracted by peripheral things.

Such as:

Ross County's shirt sponsors are a company called McEwen Fraser (who I learnt later are estate agents). Probably the most Scottish sounding sponsors you could get.

Greenock Morton seem a very local club judged by their advertising hoardings. For in the midst of national bookmakers you could also see hoardings for butchers, wedding and funeral services. All human life is there (and let's not forget the one for International fine Art Auctioneers).

The Greenock Morton shirt are blue hoops over a white background QPR style. Thing is as symbolism goes the fact the hoops dissolve as they go across the chest is not a good look.

Yes the match was that dull. The first half finished nil-nil. Which was consequently the first Gaelic word I learnt (Neonini).

The second half was almost as dull. But Greenock Morton scored. A poacher's goal but no matter. A goal is a goal. One - nil then. One being aon in Gaelic. Closest way I can describe the pronunciation is Un in French.

The only other bit of interest was the confrontation between a Greenock Morton player and the Ross County manager. Trust me when I say I haven't learnt the Gaelic for handbags at dawn.

So it ended One-nil. Later through Twitter later I've also learnt the word for weather "Aimsir".

The crawl in learning a language begins.

Until the next time.

Why Yesterday Could Be An Important Day For Welsh National Rugby....Because Of Cardiff City Football Club

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

When big institutions are in danger. It's never because of some big almighty swipe that sends them reeling. No what happens are slow seemingly inconsequential actions that gradually weaken it so that when openly attacked it's too venerable to respond.

Yesterday in the first of the Autumn rugby internationals Wales beat Scotland 21-10 in the Principality (should go back to being called Millennium) stadium in Cardiff.

Meanwhile at roughly the same time Cardiff City football club lost to Leicester one nil in  the Cardiff City Stadium.

And the key words in the previous paragraph are "roughly the same time"

When I chat about rugby in this blog I almost acknowledge the fact that there are people more knowledgeable on the subject than I am. But I honestly can't recall this happening. I've chatted about the problems facing the clubs previously but potentially this is the first time where the status of the national side has (however quietly) need to be discussed.

South Walian football teams would normally avoid playing home fixtures when the national rugby team was playing. They knew that on an international level the pull of the team was great. The cliché, even when I moved to Wales in 1997 of Welsh people coming together to watch these games at home with friends or in the pub is true (and let me stress probably true for this game as well given that it was on free to air TV).

But for Cardiff City to have played a match at roughly the same time as the Wales rugby team, and if the pictures I saw on Match Of The Day are any guide did not appear to have hurt the Bluebirds in any way in terms of attendance suggests a change of mindset. The seeming deference to the national rugby side has, perhaps subconsciously, gone.

Why this change of mindset? I can only speculate. I've mentioned before that football not rugby is the nation's sport at a club level and perhaps it's permeated into the national side as well. But I really don't know.

Now I'm not saying that people didn't watch the Wales-Scotland game and for all I know Cardiff will be playing away for the rest of the autumn internationals and next year's six nations. However as I said at the top of the post powerful organisations need to careful with actions that chip away at it's authority. The Welsh Rugby Union would need to understand this or else in the future this weakening might continue until it's too late.

Until the next time.