Latest news with #Edinburgh
The South African
31 minutes ago
- Sport
- The South African
URC quarter-final: Bulls v Edinburgh
The Bulls – URC runners up in 2022 and 2024 – will secure themselves a home semi-final if they emerge victorious against Edinburgh, which will fuel their motivation immensely as they cast an eye further ahead by attempting to repeat the double by advancing to the Grand Final for the second season in a row. Kick off for their quarter-final on Saturday is at 13:30. Teams: Bulls: 15 Willie le Roux, 14 Canan Moodie, 13 David Kriel, 12 Harold Vorster, 11 Sebastian De Klerk, 10 Keagan Johannes, 9 Embrose Papier, 8 Cameron Hanekom, 7 Ruan Nortje (c), 6 Marcell Coetzee, 5 JF van Heerden, 4 Cobus Wiese, 3 Wilco Louw, 2 Johan Grobbelaar, 1 Jan-Hendrik Wessels Replacements: 16 Akker van der Merwe, 17 Simphiwe Matanzima, 18 Mornay Smith, 19 Jannes Kirsten, 20 Marco van Staden, 21 Zak Burger, 22 Stedman Gans, 23 Devon Williams Edinburgh: 15 Wes Goosen, 14 Darcy Graham, 13 Matt Currie, 12 James Lang, 11 Harry Paterson, 10 Ross Thompson, 9 Ali Price, 8 Magnus Bradbury (c), 7 Hamish Watson, 6 Jamie Ritchie, 5 Sam Skinner, 4 Marshall Sykes, 3 D'arcy Rae, 2 Ewan Ashman, 1 Pierre Schoeman Replacements: 16 Paddy Harrison, 17 Boan Venter, 18 Javan Sebastian, 19 Liam McConnell, 20 Ben Muncaster, 21 Conor McAlpine, 22 Ben Healy, 23 Mark Bennett The match-up between the Bulls and Edinburgh is expected to be an entertaining affair, given the close contest between the sides early in the season, where the Pretoria outfit emerged 22-16 victors at home in the second round, before the Scots turned the tables with a 34-28 win in the EPCR Challenge Cup quarter-final. With seven straight URC victories to their name and the team having suffered only four defeats this season, the Bulls will enter the clash as favourites. However, they will be wary of underestimating Edinburgh, who – over-and-above from knocking them out of the EPCR Challenge Cup – have had a fair run of form of late, losing only one of their last five matches, while one ended in a draw. In fact, their only defeat in this series of events was against the Sharks in Durban by one point, but that said, they will have to enter the match strong-willed to break their disappointing away-win record, which shows six defeats in nine outings. In stark contrast, the Bulls have suffered only one home defeat in the competition this season, and adding to this, they have won six more matches than the Scots in the pool stages, and have a better record on attack and defence. This, however, will undoubtedly fire up Edinburgh. Bulls v Edinburgh Date: Saturday, 31 MayVenue: Loftus Versfeld, PretoriaSA Time: 13h30Referee: Adam Jones TV: SuperSport
The Citizen
2 hours ago
- Sport
- The Citizen
Jake White: Bulls' previous loss to Edinburgh was a ‘blessing'
The Bulls coach said he was grateful his side had no space to feel overconfident as they take on Edinburgh in a URC quarter-final. The Bulls will have no room to feel overconfident after their defeat to Edinburgh during their last encounter, at Hive Stadium. Picture:Bulls director of rugby Jake White said he was thankful his team lost their last match against Edinburgh – the Challenge Cup quarter-final played in Scotland last month. The lessons from that 34–28 defeat at Hive Stadium provide more insight than a victory would have, as the Bulls prepare to face Edinburgh again in their United Rugby Championship quarter-final at Loftus this Saturday (kick-off 1.30pm). The teams clash for the third time this season after the Bulls emerged victorious at Loftus in September (final score 22–16). Head-to-head, Edinburgh have won three of the five games between the sides, though both teams have won every match played at home. Bulls might have been overconfident 'I think what is a blessing for us is we lost to them a couple of weeks ago. I think had we had beaten them there and maybe won easily then maybe there would be a feeling of 'gee, we whacked them or we beat them away',' White said. Had the Bulls done, so they would have made history as the first South African team to beat Edinburgh in Scotland. As it happened, the Sharks took that honour with an 18–17 win thanks to a last-minute try in the URC the next weekend. 'The blessing for us is that we lost to them [Edinburgh], and we gave them a good start. They were 24–7 up at half-time [and then 31–7 after 42 minutes]. So those lessons surely must be as clear as day. We cannot give them a 24–7 start and we can't just believe that we will beat them because they beat us the last time that we played.' When it comes to fast starts, however, the Bulls have led the way with 29 tries in the first 20 minutes this competition. But when asked about it, White said there is no magic formula and largely out of his hands. Edinburgh have top internationals who 'don't go away' White said Edinburgh were perhaps not a side that drew attention from world media but they probably have mroe international players than the Bulls do. 'I don't ever want you to ever underestimate the value an international cap does for a player. You look at how our players have grown. When you look at a guy like Ruan Nortje, when he got here compared to now. 'When you've played the All Blacks twice and beaten the All Blacks as a Springbok you must become a better provincial rugby player. It just happens like that.' White made mention of the extensive budget Edinburgh possess, making it one of the wealthiest clubs in the world. 'They have lots of British & Irish Lions players in that squad as well. There is no doubt that a person who plays for the British & Irish Lions or Scottish rugby… must be a better player than you sometimes give them credit for.' 'The most important thing that they can do is they just don't go away. It's not just against us, it's any games that they have played – they stay in the fight. This is a 'very different' play-off for Jake White White also drew attention to the growth of his players since their first URC campaign in 2021/22. They reached the final of that tournament, losing to the Stormers in Cape Town. They followed that up with a quarter-final exit in 2023 before reaching the final again last year, and losing to Glasgow at Loftus. 'I've done this many times, and I'm not saying this in an arrogant way, I've been lucky enough to experience these feelings of playing knockout games in different competitions. 'It's very different, this one. Because this group of players has exceeded expectations early on.' He said they played in their first final when the average age was about 23. 'I get the feeling we are maturing as a group.' He said while Willie le Roux joined the side to add experience, players such as Johan Grobbelaar, Ruan Nortje and Simphiwe Matanzima had clearly matured and developed their games. 'I feel the vibe is different. I feel the lessons they learnt are a lot more meaningful now because they've played together a lot more.'
New York Times
4 hours ago
- Business
- New York Times
Why have U.S. owners become so commonplace in Scottish football?
Viewers of TV drama Succession will be familiar with the lengths Logan Roy's children would go to in their attempts to win his affection. In season two, his youngest son, Roman, has a think and decides to buy the football club from the Scottish city of Edinburgh he believes his father supports — Hearts. Advertisement Naturally, it turns out his dad is actually a fan of their bitter city rivals, Hibernian, leading to Logan giving this response to the gift: 'You know, maybe you're right. How would I know what team I supported my whole f***ing life? I mean, maybe I support Kilmarnock. Or F***lechester Rangers? I mean, how can I possibly f***ing know?'. While a piece of the English football cake has become the ultimate soft-power toy for the world's billionaires over the past two decades, Scottish clubs are still being bought up in the real world — and by mere millionaires; ones who do a lot more research than Roman Roy did. This month, Livingston were purchased by Calvin Ford, the great-great-grandson of car-industry pioneer Henry Ford. They were promoted back to Scotland's top division on Monday, after a 5-3 comeback win in a play-off against Ross County. Now a U.S.-based group led by healthcare businessman Andrew Cavenagh and 49ers Enterprises — the investment arm of the NFL's San Francisco 49ers, which already owns Leeds United of the Premier League — is expected to complete a takeover of Rangers, one half of Glasgow's famed Old Firm rivalry, which would see Leeds' chairman Paraag Marathe also become vice-chair of the 55-time Scottish champions. It means that next season, seven of Scotland's clubs will be American-owned, including five of the 12-team Premiership. 'Passion, on steroids,' is the explanation offered by Mark Ogren, who acquired Dundee United in 2018 following their relegation to the second division. Suddenly, this son of Minnesota, previously in charge of his father's oil distribution empire, which had lasted half a century, was responsible for reviving that famous club from the east coast of Scotland. Ogren tells The Athletic: 'At a fan forum after we bought the club, we're sitting among all these fans and they're just asking me tons of questions. Finally, a guy stood up and said, 'I'm sorry, Mr Ogren, if it sounds like we're asking you a lot of personal questions, but you need to know this. This isn't our local petrol station that goes out of business. If that happens, we'll find another one. It's not our local grocery store. If they go out of business, we'll find another one. It's not even our local pub. If that goes out of business, we'll find another one. This is our football club, this is our life'.' Advertisement The first Scottish club to be bought by Americans were Dundee, back in 2013, when Texan duo Tim Keyes and John Nelms invested £650,000 to assume majority control. Dundee's city neighbours, United, whose Tannadice stadium is just 200 yards away from their Dens Park, were next. The following year, Hibernian were bought by Washington, D.C.-based Ron Gordon and his family. The past 12 months have seen a further flurry of investment from across the Pond. Why Scotland, then? The Athletic spoke to the owners of Dundee United, Hibernian, Dunfermline and St Johnstone to try to find out. Dundee United owner Ogren used to find football a little boring and coached his kids to play it without knowing all the rules but, as he took in more and more games from leagues in Europe, his love for the sport grew. In September 2018, he decided to sell the family business and invest in football. He did not have the financial muscle to buy in the top two divisions of the English game, so started looking for mid-tier leagues in Europe which had rich histories and favourable routes into the continental UEFA competitions; a search which led him to Scotland. 'Celtic and Rangers are in a different financial class than all of us, quite frankly, but there's still three European spots in most years that are available,' says Ogren. 'The ramifications of getting into Europe can be really big.' United have indeed qualified to play in Europe next season, clinching fourth place in the Premiership and its UEFA Conference League spot. This marks significant progress from when Ogren arrived almost seven years ago. United were in need of direction but there was some trepidation over this American stranger's intentions. That is no longer the case. Ogren says, 'When we bought the club, it was in a really tough financial position. And to this day, I consistently get thanked by our fans. It's been quite a roller-coaster ride.' Advertisement There was nearly a promotion in his first six months but United lost the play-off final in 2019, having finished as runners-up in the second tier. The pandemic then forced him to fund major losses as matches were behind closed doors due to government restrictions on crowds, designed to limit the spread of Covid-19. They did go up in 2020, as champions of that coronavirus-curtailed season, and in their second year back in the top division, finished fourth to qualify for Europe. They were then relegated again 12 months later. 'As we ended up in fourth place (in 2021-22) and got Europe, we said, 'Hey, let's spend some more money'. On paper, we had one of the best teams that we've ever had, but for whatever reason, it just didn't work out,' Ogren says. 'It was a very difficult time and it forced us to hit reset because the revenue dropped off significantly, but we're one of the bigger clubs in Scotland. We didn't want to cut everything to the bone. When we got relegated, there was some anger, but I'd rather have that, because that's telling me that there's the passion is still there.' United duly came straight back up last season, and Ogren's decision to stick with manager Jim Goodwin has paid off as he has taken them to fourth again this time, while the club boast record season-ticket sales of 7,000 and average crowds of 11,000 at home matches. 'Our fans couldn't celebrate the first promotion, due to Covid,' Ogren says. 'And so when it happened again, although nobody wanted to have to go through that again, our fans were able to experience that. ' Ogren has put in over £13million ($17.5m), having recorded a loss of £2.4m in the club's most recent accounts. He did not expect to reach such a number, but says he has no regrets. Now a relatively experienced owner in Scottish football, he believes the country can capitalise on American investment and improve the profile and revenues of its league. He says, 'I'm hoping the 49ers being involved is going to increase the exposure, but there is definitely scope to increase the revenue. The TV deal is a big thing, but also the culture. The alcohol situation continues to bother me.' Advertisement There is a ban on any alcoholic drinks being served inside Scotland's football stadiums, a government policy that has been in place since rioting at an Old Firm game in the national stadium, Glasgow's Hampden Park, in 1980. Clubs in England can serve alcohol on their stadiums' concourses. 'It's absurd,' says Ogren. 'It's a touchy subject, but it is part of the entertainment value for people who come to matches, and they should be able to buy a beer.' 'It was always the plan for my dad and me to do this together,' says Ian Gordon. The Hibernian executive director is talking about his father, Ron, who bought the Edinburgh club in July 2019 then died from cancer in February 2023, aged 68. 'Towards the end, me and my brother watched the games on the bed with my dad,' Gordon tells The Athletic. 'We kind of knew that was it, that he only had a couple of days left. But he loved that day, sitting there talking about Hibs and everything. 'I wake up every morning with even more pride and fire to drive forward now and make sure we get it to the place that we talked about.' Ron had been born in the South American nation of Peru, where he learned the game, had a period living in Australia and then settled in Washington D.C. From there, he treated his two sons to a childhood filled with football-watching trips across the globe. He also built a communications business, which he sold to NBC Universal for around $200million in 2018. The goal after that was to buy a football club — and one place on the map kept calling. 'We did a very special family trip to Scotland to learn about our ancestry, go up to the Highlands, play a little golf, and have a little whisky,' says Gordon. Hibs have a 20,000-seater stadium and a modern training ground in Scotland's capital city, making them an attractive proposition. Their lack of silverware, relative to their size, excited their American buyers, too. 'We love this club. It's really taken over what our lives are. This is home for our family now,' Gordon says. Advertisement This season, the Hibernian men's team finished third in the Premiership to earn a place in the Europa League's qualifying rounds, the women's side won the Premier League title to secure Champions League football and the under-18 boys also topped their league and will play in the UEFA Youth League (the age-group version of the Champions League) next season. It has made all the trials and tribulations of the past six years worthwhile, but there were plenty of mistakes and lessons along the way. After his father's takeover, Ian was made head of recruitment, despite having limited experience in the sport. It was widely seen as nepotism. 'I wasn't picking the players, it was from a structure standpoint,' he says now. 'The club needed revamping in terms of how it operated. Looking back, we needed more experience, and we needed to bring a certain level of knowledge in.' The Gordons took bold action, ditching manager Paul Heckingbottom within four months. Then, in December 2021, came a controversial move. Despite Heckingbottom's replacement, Jack Ross, taking Hibs to their first third-place finish in 16 years and making it to at least the semi-final stage of four consecutive domestic cup competitions, they sacked him too, a week before the team faced Celtic in the League Cup final. Gordon says, 'We felt we needed to make a change, but I don't think we had the long-term or what's next figured out yet. Looking back, I don't think we would have made that change now. Everything's been a learning lesson.' His father took the public blame for the decision, but the churn continued across three more managers. Gordon never contemplated a sale, even after his dad passed away. In February last year, a potential game-changer occurred when billionaire Bill Foley, a fellow American, bought 25 per cent of the club for £6million. Advertisement Foley's Black Knight Football Club empire already contained Bournemouth, Lorient in France and New Zealand's Auckland FC, with the former having become the poster boys for forward-thinking Premier League clubs. Hibs are now part of the multi-club stable and employ similar coaching, playing styles and profile of players to other teams in the group, which they hope will be their competitive advantage. Foley, who also owns top-flight ice hockey's Vegas Golden Knights back in the States, and Ohio-born Tim Bezbatchenko, who is now the general manager across the four clubs, both have seats on the Hibs board. The new partnership did not result in an overnight transformation. Having filled in as caretaker manager after the previous three sackings, former club captain David Gray, who scored the late winner as Hibs beat Rangers in the 2016 Scottish Cup final, was given the job permanently when Nick Montgomery got fired last May. A dreadful start to this season brought just one win in the first 14 league games, and Foley laid bare the tensions behind the scenes. 'If the other ownership group at Hibernian listens to us, they will do better,' he said. 'There was a disagreement about the coach, but since then, Tim has come in and he's now hired multiple people under him,' says Gordon. 'Black Knight is now really starting to put their network together, and since then the collaboration is daily. The biggest benefit we see now is the exchange of best-practice behind the scenes. We're doing so many things in the background to get the structure that we now have in place, so we can just be a well-oiled machine. 'Ultimately, I decided that Dave was the right guy, and luckily that paid off quite well this season.' Hibs lost just three of their remaining 24 league games after that dismal beginning, picking up 49 points — four more than Rangers over that period and only three fewer than eventual champions Celtic. The appointments of Gray and sporting director Malky Mackay marked a reset in strategy, investing in Scottish experience to provide context to data. Advertisement 'I think Scottish football is unique. It's not like any other league in the world,' says Gordon. In February, Gordon vowed that his family would absorb the accounts' £7.2million worth of losses for the 2023-24 season. With the club expected to lose money again in next year's books, it surely isn't sustainable? 'We know we can't be writing off £7.2million every year,' he says. 'Moving forward, it should be a much better position, but if you want to be ambitious and drive for European football, you know you have to push the budget. With Black Knight, this is our clear plan.' In February, club anthem Sunshine On Leith went viral on social media after the Hibs fans serenaded their team following a derby win over rivals Hearts. They had a pub lock-in to celebrate, too. Gordon also highlights a trip to face Swiss side Luzern in the Conference League's qualifying rounds two years ago, which saw the staff mingle with 3,000 travelling supporters in a local bar from 10am. 'Just being in that and around that and feeling what the European trips do to the fans, what they did to me, it was such a great experience,' he says. Could Hibs, four-time champions of Scotland but not since 1952, one day challenge Celtic and Rangers for the title? 'Step one needs to be consistent years where we're qualifying for Europe, and then you're able to build from there,' Gordon says. 'Then (the goal is) to see this club competing year in, year out in Europe and winning multiple cups — not just one, multiple cups. This club has won just one Scottish Cup in almost 130 years. It deserves more.' When attempting to bring modern methods to football and upend its established order, who better to count among your former bosses than Brighton & Hove Albion's owner Tony Bloom and his Brentford counterpart Matthew Benham? James Bord is a former poker player who built a career in AI and data analytics. Born near London but now dividing his time between the UK and the States, he is leveraging that expertise, alongside his American business partner Evan Sofer, with Dunfermline Athletic in Scotland's second-tier Championship. Bord worked with Bloom — who is trying to buy a stake in Hearts — at data analytics company Starlizard after completing a degree in banking and international finance. He then spent a couple of years under Benham at sports betting firm Smartodds. 'They're both very inspirational guys in their own way, but I was too young and stupid to learn much from them at the time,' Bord says with a wry smile. 'I'd love my Dunfermline to play against Tony's Hearts one day.' Bord discovered he was a talented poker player at a local club. He went broke on his first trip to Las Vegas in 2002 but returned six years later. 'I walked into the biggest game in Vegas and just got really lucky,' he says. 'I had $2,000 when I got off the plane, and at the end of the month, I had $750,000. I bought a house and told my boss I was quitting.' Advertisement Poker is not his career, though. He joined a machine-learning company in the very early days of that technology before setting up his own firm, Short Circuit Science, in 2016. It now employs around 350 people, with around 75 per cent of its business being in sports analytics. The experience of working with elite football clubs exposed Bord to inefficiencies, and the absence of sophisticated algorithms that his company designs. Through an existing relationship with investment fund Infinity Capital, he was able to buy a 37 per cent stake in Spanish second-division club Cordoba last year. Soon after, he added 25 per cent of Bulgarian top-flight side Septemvri Sofia. Both deals are structured for him to assume majority control over the coming years, but Dunfermline already represent that following January's takeover. Bord says of the club based just across the famous Forth Bridge from Edinburgh: 'I bought Dunfermline because I love the underdog. The ambition is to bring back some of their history, but also to change the atmosphere at the club. Optimism. They are a very passionate fanbase that has suffered enough pain, and we'd like to bring them some joy.' He and Sofer had considered clubs in Croatia and Belgium, leagues with a strong track record in youth development, before buying Dunfermline. 'We were looking for an outlet to develop young players,' he says. 'We have three clubs and we don't want to bite off more than we can chew. A step-by-step approach is much healthier, as creating stress hurts performance. We are focusing on Dunfermline.' The golden era for Dunfermline came in the 1960s, when they won the Scottish Cup twice and got to the semi-finals of Europe's since-scrapped Cup Winners' Cup, losing 2-1 on aggregate to a Slovan Bratislava side who then beat Barcelona in the final. They experienced a resurgence in the 2000s, making three more domestic finals and returning to Europe, but ended up entering administration in 2013 before their supporters saved them. Bord vows that he will never take on a debt, but Dunfermline have already broken the mould for Scottish clubs outside the Premiership by paying transfer fees and signing players on multi-year contracts. He has installed three people to work behind the scenes, but the aim is for him and Sofer to leverage what they have built at their company to influence the club's football department, particularly in terms of recruitment. Advertisement 'I think the traditional sporting department, when we look back in 10 years' time, will seem pretty historic,' Bord says. 'You can fail, but myself and Evan feel that we can bring modern methods to the game, which aren't adapted everywhere, and participate in a community team.' Bord pulled off a coup in March by hiring five-time title-winning former Celtic and Hibs manager Neil Lennon, who was in turn able to lure ex-Celtic and Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Victor Wanyama back to Scotland to play for him again. 'I wouldn't say it was soulless, but it was lost as a club,' Bord says. 'A big personality can steer the ship back in the right direction. Neil's presence at the club makes everyone's day around the place. Neil's front-foot playing style suits my philosophy, and hopefully we have him now for another two years.' Lennon was able to get Dunfermline to a seventh-place finish in the 10-team division, avoiding relegation, but what are the ambitions for the new regime's first full season in charge? 'In terms of spending, there's a calculation: how long you stay in the Championship and what you lose in cash-burn, against promotion?' Bord says. 'We have concluded that we're happy to spend a little bit more money to give ourselves a better chance of going up as quickly as possible. 'We'd hope to be in the Premiership within two years, but as long as I can see development in the playing style and in the playing squad, I think that comes naturally. With a bit of luck, of course.' Qualifying for Europe every three to five years is the eventual goal, but for now Bord is just enjoying being able to watch his team compete. 'Sometimes, you have to kick yourself, as it is such a fun experience,' he says. 'I might watch 50 games on a Saturday, so I will be watching four games at the same time. But all I will really be watching is Dunfermline. 'I'm not going to be an absentee owner. But I also back my staff, as intervention in the wrong place is bad. You need to give them the confidence that you believe in them, and I believe in these guys.' 'If we get relegated, I view it as a reset,' said St Johnstone's owner Adam Webb, speaking when his Perthshire club were five points from safety with just six games of this season left to save their Premiership status. 'We have done everything we can do and gave our coach the resources in January to get the players he wanted. We improved and have been a top-six club in terms of form since January, but will it be enough?' Advertisement Alas for them, it was not. St Johnstone were relegated for the first time since 2002, just four years on from them winning a Scottish Cup/League Cup double in the greatest season of their 141-year history — indeed, perhaps the best pound-for-pound season football in Scotland has ever seen. Webb, who bought the club from local businessman Geoff Brown last summer after three tough seasons that saw them finish 11th, ninth and 10th in the 12-team Premiership, says he has no qualms about his commitment now they've finally succumbed to the drop. He tells The Athletic: 'It's not that we are going to lose interest, it is that (the fans) are going to be disappointed in us. Are people going to blame us that, in our first year, we got relegated? 'We are fighting our perception as unwise owners to come in and have this happen, but I think people who have been studying it can see that we have been giving the resources to the football people. We are in a pretty good place to succeed and get back up, to reinvigorate the club. 'It is not a positive, obviously, but it is a chance to take the steps that need to be taken to make the future bright. It is an inflexion point. We will be in a league (next season) where we will be expected to do well. Let's use it as a springboard.' Webb grew up in Columbus, Georgia, where he played football in high school before studying law at Harvard University. He then started his own firm in Atlanta. St Johnstone are not his first involvement in British football — he owns 10 per cent of Cambridge United, who have just been relegated to League Two, England's fourth tier. Webb bought the club based in Perth, a short drive west of Dundee, with a group of fellow investors in early July, but just two weeks later received the news he had cancer in his neck. Months of debilitating chemotherapy and radiation treatment, which he is still feeling the effects of, could have been taken as a sign to focus on his recovery and perhaps pass the club on to someone else. Advertisement 'After something like that, you feel high on life,' Webb argues. 'And when you get to my age, mid-fifties, your kids are leaving the roost and you think, 'What are going to be some of my hobbies, goals, aspirations with this phase of my life?' For me, football and St Johnstone are it.' Webb says he's experienced 'universal embrace' and was part of the Scottish equivalent of a 'pep rally' at a local pub before the first game of the season. He now has a home beside the nearby River Tay and plans to spend the bulk of his summer there. 'I could have bought a beach house (instead) and had some very nice vacations,' Webb laughs. The full drama of St Johnstone's season has been filmed as part of a fly-on-the-wall documentary that hopes to project what makes Scottish football so intoxicating. 'It might not have the money, but it's still got the soul,' says Webb. 'We can certainly be the people's club, because we have a lot going for us. A beautiful community in the heart of Scotland, 140 years of tradition and a place that people could come to love and appreciate as they have Sunderland or Wrexham (after those clubs featured in recent documentary series over recent years). 'We don't have a Ryan Reynolds on board. If you know a Ryan Reynolds type — let me know.' The club are working with experts to improve the matchday experience for families to try to get attendances back up to what they used to be. Webb is also planning a club museum and shop in Perth's city centre, next to the building that houses the Stone of Destiny — a block of red sandstone used in the coronation of Scottish and British monarchs for centuries. He has partnered with a U.S. analytics company, is investing in the academy infrastructure and seeking to build St Johnstone's football budget every year, but says he will not be pumping in millions. 'We have to find an edge to compete, because we're a smaller club in a smaller city, and we're going to run a sustainable club,' he says. 'Owners always get tired after a few years of putting in money. I don't know if I would, but I think I would if I were five, 10 years into this and every year I'm putting in a million or more dollars. I might get sick of it. Advertisement 'By then, you've built up a residual cost, staff and systems that are going to sink the club. So it's just better, even if you want to put money in, to shoot to break even.' Webb will be planning St Johnstone's boomerang back into the top division during his stay in Perth this summer, and he may head home to the States with a few local phrases in his increasingly mixed vocabulary. 'The exoticness of a Scot still exists when you hear the accent,' he laughs. ''You cannae score if you dinnae shoot!' (You can't score if you don't shoot) is one I love. Just as well we have subtitles on the documentary!' (Top photos: Ogren, left, and Marathe: Getty Images)
Yahoo
5 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Dept. Q,' ‘Mountainhead,' Alfred Hitchcock on Netflix, and the best to stream this weekend
Welcome to , your VIP guide to the best of pop culture for the weekend ahead, curated by the Gold Derby team of experts. (May 30-June 1) From a genre perspective, Scott Frank's latest project for Netflix has little in common with his previous two shows for the streaming service, the Emmy-winning limited series The Queen's Gambit and Godless. But like them, Dept. Q is must-see TV. More from GoldDerby Patti Lupone goes scorched-earth, inside the troubled Michael Jackson biopic, and what to read this weekend: May 30, 2025 Loretta Swit holds this Emmy record that may never be broken Directors open up about identity, risk and emotional storytelling at Disney's FYC fest Adapted from the best-selling Department Q crime novels by Danish author Jussi Adler-Olsen, the nine-episode series (now streaming) stars Matthew Goode as DCI Carl Morck, an acerbic detective returning to work months after a routine welfare check leaves a young cop dead, his best friend and partner paralyzed from the waist down, and him with a bullet wound to the neck and mandated therapy. When his embattled Edinburgh police station needs a PR win, Morck is assigned to a newly created department of one, charged with investigating cold cases, starting with the four-year-old disappearance of a one-time prominent civil servant (Chloe Pirrie). What no one expects is that Morck, a lost cause with his own little band of rejects à la Slow Horses, might actually be successful in his endeavor. Dept. Q is the awards contender to watch this weekend. However, there is a lot going on this week as the TV season comes to a close ahead of the first phase of Emmy voting in June. Other contenders include: Hacks: Recently renewed for a fifth season, Max's Emmy-winning comedy closes out its excellent fourth season with a coda that finds Deborah (Jean Smart) and Ava (Hannah Einbinder) taking a trip to decompress after the life-changing events of the penultimate episode… and the news that Deborah can't perform stand-up for 18 months due to the contract she'd signed for Late Night. It's a fascinating, if somewhat unexpected end to a season about creating art and comedy with the confines of traditional media. The finale is now streaming on Max. Adults: It's a truth universally acknowledged that adults don't actually know what they're doing. FX's newest comedy puts Gen Z at the forefront of the latest version of this all too familiar story, as a group of five messy twentysomethings fumble their way through the early days of adulthood in New York City. Across eight episodes, the show tackles the fears and anxieties of being in charge of one's life and having no idea what to do about it. In an unconventional rollout, the series airs new episodes Wednesdays on FX, but the entire first season is already streaming on Hulu. The Better Sister: Based on the 2019 book by Alafair Burke and directed by Craig Gillespie, Amazon's newest limited series follows Chloe (Jessica Biel) and Nicky (Elizabeth Banks), two estranged sisters who could not be more different. While Chloe lives an idyllic life with her husband and son, Nicky is a recovering addict who struggles to make ends meet. But when Chloe's husband is brutally murdered, the two siblings reunite, uncovering a complicated family history as they attempt to find out what happened. All eight episodes are now streaming on Prime Video. Streaming services emphasize the new over the classic, and Netflix does this most of all. It's estimated that only about 2 percent of Netflix's movie library consists of films made before 1980. This is very bad for cinema history, as viewers are not exposed to classic films on the dominant streaming platform. So it's important to watch classic movies when they pop up on Netflix. Which means our top movie pick this weekend isn't a new release, but a bunch of old ones from the Master of Suspense that are coming to Netflix for the first time. On June 1, Netflix is adding a collection of six Alfred Hitchcock films: Rear Window (1954), The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Vertigo (1958), The Birds (1963), and the final two of his career, Frenzy (1972) and Family Plot (1976). Also joining the collection are the 2012 biopic Hitchcock starring Anthony Hopkins and two horror films that bear a heavy Hitchcock influence, 2019's Us and 2022's Barbarian. The films' addition coincides with a six-week Hitchcock retrospective at Netflix's Paris Theater in New York. More Hitchcock films are expected to be added throughout the month. Psycho, Hitchcock's most famous film (though not his best; that's generally considered to be Vertigo, which topped the Sight & Sound poll in 2012), is already available on Netflix. It's a great opportunity to reconnect with the work of arguably the most influential filmmaker of all time. If you're looking for something new, here are some other recommendations: : For his first post-Succession project, creator Jesse Armstrong returns to HBO — and the world of billionaires — for the satire film Mountainhead. Steve Carell, Ramy Youssef, Jason Schwartzman, and Cory Michael Smith star as tech billionaires gathered for a ski trip at a mountain retreat when a financial meltdown occurs, and it's mostly their fault. The made-for-TV movie was shot in March, and made an astonishingly tight turnaround to premiere on May 31 at 8 p.m. on HBO and Max, just under the wire for Emmys eligibility. : This animated kids' comedy from DreamWorks is a spinoff of Captain Underpants that takes the form of a very silly story-within-a-story. It's about a police officer and his K-9 who get fused together to become Dog Man: half man, half dog, all cop. Dog Man goes up against Petey, 'the world's most evilest cat,' to save Ohkay City from the orange kitty's (voiced by Pete Davidson) reign of terror. It topped the box office for a few weeks earlier this year, with kids (and parents) enjoying its energetic humor. It's now streaming on Peacock. : U2 singer Bono gives an unusual take on the musician memoir in this filmed version of his stage show, which features the man born Paul Hewson telling stories from his life interspersed with new versions of some of his iconic songs, like 'Beautiful Day' and 'Where the Streets Have No Name.' It's an immersive show — literally so, if you have an Apple Vision Pro headset, which Stories of Surrender is the first film specifically made for — shot in striking black-and-white by Academy Award-winning Mank cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt and directed by Andrew Dominik (Blonde). If for some reason you don't have an Apple Vision Pro, don't worry; you can watch the film in 2D on Apple TV+. : This Christian cartoon is an interesting take on the Charles Dickens' children's story The Life of Our Lord, a version of the story of Jesus Christ that Dickens wrote for his own children. Kenneth Branagh voices Dickens, who narrates the frame story while his son Walter (Roman Griffin Davis) gets transported into it, and experiences the life of Jesus (Oscar Isaac) from a disciple's point of view. The film comes from leading faith-based studio Angel Studios, and features a star-studded voice cast that includes Uma Thurman, Mark Hamill, Pierce Brosnan, Forest Whitaker, and Ben Kingsley. It's now available on-demand on Apple TV and Fandango at Home. Speaking of Bono's Stories of Surrender, the U2 frontman released a three-song EP to accompany the streaming special featuring new live solo versions of the band's classics "Sunday Bloody Sunday" and "Desire," along with lesser-known track "The Showman." Give a listen below. Finally, with the sad news of the passing of composer Alf Clausen, whose Emmy-winning music helped define the best years of The Simpsons, we offer the playlist from Songs in the Key of Springfield. The compilation album, released in 1997, features such Clausen classics as "The Monorail Song," "Flaming Moe's," "Oh, Streetcar," and "We Do (The Stonecutters' Song)." After Clausen was unceremoniously fired in 2017, the show was never the same. Best of GoldDerby 'I cried a lot': Rob Delaney on the heart and humor in FX's 'Dying for Sex' — and Neighbor Guy's kick in the 'zone' TV directors roundtable: 'American Primeval,' 'The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power,' 'Paradise' 'Paradise' directors John Requa and Glenn Ficarra on the 'chaos' of crafting 'the world coming to an end' Click here to read the full article.
BBC News
9 hours ago
- Business
- BBC News
I saw what Gordon Ramsay had and thought 'I want that'
Stuart Ralston was destined for a culinary dad was a chef, his mum was a chef and his brothers went into the business was necessity that took him into his first kitchen at 13 "so he could afford his own trainers".But it was hard work that led him to his first Michelin star, bagged in February at the age of with four renowned restaurants in Edinburgh, the Glenrothes-born chef who cut his teeth in New York under Gordon Ramsay has come a long way. Ralston's housing estate upbringing couldn't be further away from the upmarket fine dining establishments he finds himself in told the BBC Scotland's Scotcast: "If you come from a background where potentially you didn't have much and you wanted to get more, it gives you a certain chip on your shoulder or a resilience that you can really battle through a lot of hard times.""The business is a hard business to be in and it takes people who are really determined not to fail and I think that's the common thing that I always see with a lot people in our industry."Ralston was the victim of two knife assaults in his youth."In primary I was slashed with a pair of scissors from my ear to the bottom of my mouth after an argument with someone."And in high school I got slashed on my leg with a box cutter with someone just walking through the hallways."So, you know, I didn't grow up in the most affluent of areas, it was a dog-eat-dog world. But I think getting out of that just made me determined to not be part of that culture. Ralston worked his way through the ranks in his late teens and early 20s and then chanced his arm by asking celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay for job at his New York restaurant."I'd done a trial in London for him that I thought I'd messed up really badly, but I still got offered the job because I had an attitude. I really cared about my career and trying to be something and I think they saw that."I got an opportunity that not many people did. There was maybe only eight British guys taken out to America. "I was 23 years old and I didn't know anybody."He doesn't recognise the angry, potty-mouthed Gordon Ramsay that made his mark on TV shows. But he did soak up the work ethic and skills on display around him."I didn't really see what people see on TV as much. It was definitely tough, and he was definitely passionate about what we were doing."I worked more so with the head chefs that had been with him for a long time."After two years, scraping chewing gum off tables, prepping vegetables and setting up the staff canteen led to kitchen training and running every section of Ramsay's restaurant at the London spent five years in New York, rising to head chef status and then spent a stint back in the UK before a time at the Sandy Lane Hotel in Barbados. Fast forward to 2025 and he is halfway through his most successful year. He has four Edinburgh restaurants - Aizle, Noto, Tipo and Lyla, for which he was awarded his first Michelin star in says his kitchens run differently to those days in the early 2000s and that the culture has changed."It was rough, really rough," he admitted."When I was started out, you're working all the hours. The conditions were tough. "I've seen fights, I've see people getting burned, I have seen things being thrown at people. I have seen people being kicked out of kitchens for mistakes. "But mostly, I would say, I don't think there's many kitchens that would run like that nowadays." For someone who dreamed of owning his own restaurant from a young age, Stuart Ralston has realised his says he grew into who he is and changed his perspective when he saw what was possible, learning from the best people around him. He said: "Take Gordon for example, look what he's done in his life. I saw him and I wanted a bit of that."
