Edinburgh in August can only mean one thing. Yippee, it's festival time again. I'm a bloke of simple tastes who likes a good laugh so I always head for the comedy shows. You can imagine my delight when I stumbled across one of the funniest performances I have seen in a long time. The one and only Paradise Touring Company and their award winning farce "Whoops Wim, is that your fitba' team?". If the show that I watched at Easter Road on August 3rd is anything to go by then poor old Wim stands more chance of a Perrier award for most promising newcomer on the comedy circuit than he does of seeing the Tims lifting a trophy.

What were Celtic like? For a team who now claim to be playing a modern system of possession, passing and patient build-up they gave a fairly convincing display of the old headless chicken scenario. Macnamara seemed to be a more potent attacking force than Tommy Johnson was yet he is supposed to be holding back in mid-field and not committing himself to the typical Celtic charge forward that usually ends up with them leaking goals. Celtic introduced Henrik Larsson to the fray in the second half and took us all by surprise as he bears an uncanny resemblance to Scary Spice. There is a new ruling that stipulates if players wear thermal shorts under their team shorts then they have to be the same colour as the team shorts. I wonder if the same ruling applies to the girlie headband that Larsson wears when playing? As much as I am a fan of skillfull soccer I must admit that I had a wee smile to myself when Larsson was clattered unceromoniously by Willie Miller almost as soon as he went near the ball. Welcome to the gritty reality of Scottish football mate.

It made me proud to watch Hibs playing Celtic off the park that day, every member of the team contributed to a memorable victory. Without a doubt it was Chic Charnley's finest game in a Hibs strip (his finest moment came a week later with 'that' goal against Alloa). Chic ran the game from mid-field and exuded confidence to his team-mates. The new Hibees, 'Jimmy' Bocu and Olafur Unpronouncable, were superb, especially Bocu whose uncompromising style of defending made him an instant hit with the fans. As for Olafur, no-one round me was sure whether he was left or right footed as he was just as reliable on either side. If he is as good a shot stopper as Leighton was then he will be the complete article and a fantastic piece of business for Jim Duffy.

We Hibs fans can only wonder what the rest of the season will bring and hope we can reproduce the spirit shown against Celtic on a regular basis. The cup win over Alloa was fine and, realistically, no more than could be expected. The league cannot lie so that is where our efforts must be concentrated with the target being to win the home games and not lose the away games. Oh, and I nearly forgot, four wins out of four against the Jambos, now surely that's not too much to ask is it?

Yours from behind the goals. H.I.Bees
Leither column, August 97'