This site came about as a place to consolidate posts that were written on the Overthebridge and Pie & Bovril message boards. At the time, I never thought that I would complete a full season’s analyses of home matches, let alone attempt to continue into further seasons.
The articles are inspired by a number of sources. I have always had an interest in football tactics since falling in love with the game while watching World Cup 1994 and more prominently Euro ’96. The two recent sources of inspiration are writings from:
- Zonalmarking.net
- Jonathan Wilson, author of ‘Inverting the Pyramid‘.
There are various blogs like this that cover top-level i.e. English Premier League and top-flight football around the world. At the time that I created this, I never saw anything similar covering Scottish football, let alone any football in the Scottish Football League.
Anyone can leave a comment on a message-board and claim to be an expert on what and what doesn’t happen in a SFL match. The lack of substantial and regular television coverage only encourages this. I thought: why not do something different and follow up observations with illustrated pictures.
Why do I illustrate my points with Subbuteo? You might find earlier posts in the archives that had illustrated photographs. I am told that publishing photographs (with all of its intellectual property implications) is bad. Using a Subbuteo set to re-create some of the situations in the football match discussed is a fun and original alternative. I would like to have taken credit for it, but I have to thank my girlfriend and a couple of followers for suggesting it at different times, until the idea stuck.
Since creation, the site has been commended by the Scotsman, the Guardian and also Jonathan Wilson on Twitter (a personal highlight).
