'To most people it's Trainspotting territory, but to me it's where I grew up'

Gordon Strachan says playing football in Muirhouse made him what he is

Cletic manager and Muirhouse boy, Gordon Strachan. Picture: Phil Wilkinson


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View Gallery"'That's me, streetwise and sarcastic. I make no apologies for that'"GORDON Strachan is unaware that, as he poses for the camera, the navy jumper and tartan scarf he's wearing evoke warm memories of his time as a Scotland international. Back in the area of Edinburgh where he grew up, the Celtic manager is indulging in his own trip down memory lane.
The show reel of matches running through his mind are not those on foreign soil or even key clashes played in front of thousands of buoyant fans, though. "After all the professional games I have played, probably over 1,000 games, I can still remember the games I played around here as a lad," he smiles, "still smell the grass off my jeans. I've still got that. I can remember specific games, remember finishing and sitting down and laughing and joking with my mates and then starting another game. They are absolutely fantastic memories. It sounds strange but even now those are the games I remember fondly."

Nostalgia is a powerful motivating force and that camaraderie and those carefree hours were primary reasons behind his decision to lend support to the Spartans Community Football Academy. Patron of the project since he was approached almost three years ago, he was in Muirhouse this week to see the progress made on the new £3.3m facility. Work is already under way, with a completion date of July 2008 pencilled into next year's diary, but he hopes that will only signal the beginning of the real work. "It's not just about making the kids good players, it's about making them good people."

In an area he stoically concedes is regarded as "Irvine Welsh country – to most people it's Trainspotting territory," he says, "but to me it's where I grew up and played with my mates. I did have a gang but we didn't fight anyone, we just played football all the time. We laughed and joked so I want people to come to the academy and be part of a gang and channel their energy that way."

While ambitious East of Scotland League side Spartans are exploring all avenues in a bid to gain entry to the Scottish Football League and build on their Scottish Cup notoriety, the academy is designed to cater for more than just the elite players in the area. They want to make a difference to young lives. That is where Strachan shares their vision. Once completed, the complex, which includes a mix of synthetic and grass, football and multi-sport pitches, an all-weather basketball court, eight changing rooms, a community club room, learning centre and physiotherapy centre, is expected to attract over 1,500 users per week and, although the football club hopes it will allow them to groom some talented players, for Strachan it is simply about opportunities.

"I love football but I also know that, as well as my parents, it was football that taught me to respect people if they are respectful to me. I have decent manners and I have never been in trouble with the police and neither have my mates so it was football as well as my parents that gave me the chance. Some people are not lucky enough to have those kind of parents and that's where the football suddenly becomes very important.

"Families split up and the mum and dad have problems and kids learn bad habits or they could come from a decent home, but if they mix with the wrong people kids can learn bad habits from them so the idea is to bring them in here and teach them the beauty of teamwork and the importance of discipline for yourself and your team whatever sport you are playing.

"It's primarily football here but it's about respect for everything, property, your team-mates, the opposition and authority. We want youngsters to learn respect for others and for themselves. And if we get a couple of nuggets then great but for me it's about social as well as football skills."

A tanner ba' player who used streets as pitches, pavements as boundaries and good old jumpers for goalposts, Strachan recognises those days are disappearing. Too many cars, less and less open parkland and more obvious social demons waiting to accost youngsters.

"Mums and dads don't really enjoy their kids being out because there are things out there that were never really there when I was a kid. Things like drugs and all the real violence. I heard a statistic that said there is somebody slashed every six hours in Glasgow. I don't know what that statistic is here but we have our own problems so this is an environment which will be safer for the kids.

"I believe everybody has at least one talent. It might not be a sports talent but if you come into a group you will find your talent in something, it doesn't matter who you are."

Growing up on the streets of Muirhouse, Strachan identified his gift early on. He says pretending otherwise would be lying but he adds that. in an area where "you always had to be on the front foot, ready to spot trouble". he never took anything for granted.

In his gang, he knew he was one of the first picks and when up against rivals from other areas, he earned the respect which allowed him safe passage through the neighbouring territories. "Because of the football we all knew each other so I could wander into Drylaw without feeling threatened. You respected each other as footballers and you bumped into each other all the time so there wasn't the ignorance. Football broke down those barriers."

And if there was the odd spot of trouble, sport again helped. The camaraderie and group environment was the ideal forum for honing his one-line ripostes, the training and playing providing the insurance policy of fitness and pace should a quick getaway be necessary.

"There is a lot you can do with an academy like this. Give kids the right role models, teach them values and I believe that every community could benefit. I believe every community should have something like this. Is there enough money out there? I'm sure there's money out there. Look at crime and the social problems we have, well we didn't have the time for that, we were too busy playing football and something like this, giving the kids another way to channel their energy.

"When I grew up in this area, I didn't realise it was different from anywhere else. There's a song (by the band James] that says 'if I hadn't seen such riches I could live with being poor' and it's true but we shouldn't have to. Not when we could have something like this."

Donning a hard hat to survey the building site, it is a switch from the metaphoric protection he normal swathes himself in as an Old Firm manager. It's a highly pressured job and Strachan admits that even a return to his roots, while conjuring up wonderful memories, does not completely alleviate the tension.

The only time he relaxes, he claims, is when in his own house, his wife Lesley beside him and the rest of the world locked outside. "That might sound yucky and a bit sad and I know I shouldn't always feel like that I'm always on the front foot looking for things that are not there, but I have to be ready for it. That's me, streetwise and sarcastic. I make no apologies for that. So long as I'm respectful that's what I learned when I was here."

That and the ability to build friendships, which may not have stood the test of time but which still give him a mental escape from his current career pressures. "I remember my gang. We just used to laugh all the time. That group was magnificent and that's what football, what all team sports give you. The fun and togetherness. Unfortunately we all went our own way but I still remember all the names and all the laughs and joking I did with them.

"I moved about so much so we did lose touch but, even now, after all these years, I still remember some of their birthdays and if you asked me the birthdays of my aunts and uncles and nieces and nephews I wouldn't know but my mates' birthdays and nicknames and where we used to play and in what positions, I know that."

It is what he wants for the youngsters who will pass through the Spartans Community Football Academy. He wants them to learn values and value what they learn.

And he will be on hand as a role model, making guest coaching appearances. "I think I would like to do that and have fun seeing them getting something from this place."

Because in Muirhouse, away from the pressures and as he relives his youth, this is where football is still fun for Strachan.

Recently, we were watching John Waters' 1998 movie Pecker, which starred all kinds of great people like Martha Plimpton and Lily Taylor and Edward Fur

BOZEMAN, Mont. — On a dark highway near Anchorage, Alaska, Specialist Steven Cavanaugh of the Army, who had survived 300 missions in Iraq, was critically injured this month on Dec. 2 when his vehicle hit a moose. Specialist Cavanaugh died four days later.

In the early morning darkness in Lincoln, Mont., in October, a pickup slammed into a 830-pound grizzly bear. The driver survived, but the bear was among seven grizzlies — a record for one year — killed by vehicles this year statewide.

Wildlife-related crashes are a growing problem on rural roads around the country. The accidents increased 50 percent from 1990 to 2004, based on the most recent federal data, according to the Western Transportation Institute at Montana State University here.

The basic problem is that rural roads are being traveled by more and more people, many of them living in far-flung subdivisions. Each year, about 200 people are killed in as many as two million wildlife-related crashes at a cost of more than $8 billion, the institute estimated in a report prepared for the National Academies of Science.

Ninety percent of the accidents occur on rural two-lane roads, and the most common animal involved is a deer.

“I knew it was a big bear, but I didn’t know it was a grizzly,” said Steve Sandru, the driver who hit the bear near Lincoln on the way to his job as a logger. “A grizzly was the last thing I expected to see.”

The human death toll has risen from 111 in 1995 to around 200 in 2005, the most recent year for which figures are available. Officials say better designed highways would help lower the number.

“If you reduce wildlife-vehicle collisions, you would in all likelihood reduce fatalities,” said Rob Ament, research director for the Western Transportation Institute. “The priority would be to treat the hot spots, the areas with the most accidents.”

In addition to the loss of life, the accidents can be expensive. The average cost of a deer collision is $8,000, including repair, towing and cleaning up the carcass, while hitting an elk averages $18,000. If the driver strikes a much larger moose, expenses average about $30,000.

The total cost of the accidents to insurance companies exceeds $1 billion a year, the institute estimates. Pennsylvania has the most vehicle-wildlife crashes. Drivers there struck nearly 97,000 deer in the last half of 2005 and first half of 2006, according to estimates by State Farm, the insurance company.

In the report prepared for the Transportation Research Board of the National Academies of Science, the Montana institute said the number of wildlife crashes was far greater than federal statistics suggested — about 300,000 crashes involving wildlife are reported to the authorities a year — because many of the accidents are reported only to insurance companies.

In recent years, the institute estimates based on insurance industry data, the number of crashes ranged from one million to two million.

Marcel Huijser, a researcher in Missoula, Mont., who prepared the report for the Montana institute, said under-reporting of the accidents hindered efforts to prevent them.

Mr. Huijser added, “If you build a wildlife crossing in the wrong location, they won’t use it or use it to the extent you want them to.”

In a separate report delivered to Congress last month, the institute recommended ways to reduce wildlife-related accidents, including the construction of underpasses and overpasses with fences to keep wildlife off highways and directed toward safer crossings. Other methods include culling animals in places where accidents are numerous and “break the beam” systems, in which animals are fitted with collars that set off flashing lights when they approach a road.

Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada, has been a large laboratory for studying measures to prevent such collisions, which had been frequent on a four-lane highway that runs through the park in the heart of the wildlife-rich Canadian Rockies. Officials there have built 24 underpasses and overpasses, and the changes have reduced collisions by more than 80 percent, park officials said.

Researchers in Montana are conducting similar experiments along a stretch of Interstate 90 near Bozeman. They have built fences and an underpass to allow animals safe passage.

If they could duplicate the results from Banff, said Mr. Ament of the Western Transportation Institute, few animals and people would die and there would be substantial monetary savings as well.

“Wildlife accidents on Bozeman Pass cost the public a million a year” in crash costs, Mr. Ament said. “With an 80 percent reduction, that would be $800,000 in savings a year.”

The accidents can also take a toll on precarious wildlife populations. The report prepared for Congress found that vehicle collisions were a major source of mortality for 21 federally endangered or threatened species, like the red wolf, kit fox, Key deer and Florida panther.

“It’s a new and dubious record,” Chris Servheen, grizzly bear recovery coordinator for the federal Fish and Wildlife Service, said of the seven grizzlies killed this year on Montana roads. “There are more bears and everybody drives faster, and so roads are more of a problem.”

While the accidents are not threatening the bears’ long-term survival, Mr. Servheen said, they do threaten the species’ ability to expand its range.

The animal deaths can also be traumatic for many people.

Last month, a truck driver plowed through a herd of bighorn sheep on Highway 200 near Thompson Falls, Mont. The sheep often congregate there because they eat a salty de-icer the highway department sprays on a treacherous stretch of road. More than 350 wild sheep have been killed here since 1985.

Despite numerous warning signs with flashing lights, witnesses say the truck’s brake lights never came on as it drove through the herd, killing five adult ewes and two lambs. An investigator with the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks is looking into the accident to see if charges are warranted.

“A lot of people in Thompson Falls take pride in these sheep and are pretty upset,” said Bruce Sterling, a wildlife biologist with the state in Thompson Falls.

Schwarzenegger's health plan no humbug

Some of our state's elected officials and others on the Ebenezer Scrooge side of health care reform suggest that Gov. Schwarzenegger's holiday plans to wrap up a health care package with a bow and place it under the tree for all Californians may not be affordable. They urge caution and more delay, but let's not be so quick to forget Tiny Tim in this modern-day "Christmas Carol."

As everyone remembers from Charles Dickens' classic story, Tiny Tim was a disabled and very sick young boy, hovering near death. In the modern-day version, Tim's illness can be cured with affordable health care coverage, but his father, Bob Cratchit, works for Scrooge, a small California employer who cannot afford health care for his employees.

When visited by the Ghost of Christmas Present, we see how sick our current health care system has become - unaffordable or unavailable to millions of Californians. This is the broken system we have a chance to fix. How sad it would be if all that the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come could show us are the results of a "go-slow, incremental" approach that saves Tiny Tim, but leaves millions of others behind. There are many who still say that the door for better health care should be provided solely for children, while the parents of those kids would still be locked out in the cold. Tiny Tim is temporarily saved, but his father is one health care crisis away from economic disaster for him and his family. If that is our fate, it should surely scare the dickens out of all of us.
That is why the Silicon Valley Leadership Group stands with Republican Schwarzenegger and Democratic Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez for this historic opportunity for meaningful, comprehensive health care reform. There are many reasons why this plan has earned our support:

• It has been carefully crafted: This legislation didn't materialize like a ghost overnight. Rather, the governor thoughtfully crisscrossed California for more than a year seeking insights and counsel from thousands of Californians. He considered legislation and legislative language from both sides of the aisle. At the end of the Legislature's normal session, he called lawmakers back into special session to focus attention on this important issue. He published his own specific proposal, based on sound principles, to be debated and discussed for months. The bill that passed the Assembly on Monday, AB1x, is the product of that work.

• It emphasizes shared responsibility: The nightmare of many employers and employees has been that some would pay while others would not. From the beginning, a core principle for sensible reform has been a model of "shared responsibility." We all benefit from comprehensive health care reform. When we all prosper, we must all participate. This proposal spells out the responsibility of employers, hospitals, individuals and insurance companies. It emphasizes responsibility while still offering flexibility, by retaining an employer's ability to purchase employer-sponsored benefits that meet its needs and those of its workers. The state's anticipated $10.1 billion price tag on the legislation, after federal funding of $4.6 billion, is arguably a lower cost over time than the cost of inaction and further delay.

• It covers all Californians: One of every five people we pass on the street has no health care insurance whatsoever. A significant number are underinsured. Equally troubling, many working families are one crisis or emergency room visit from bankruptcy. This plan provides every Californian with the opportunity for coverage. When uninsured families stop using the emergency room as a "first resort" - the most expensive form of health care - then the hidden tax, roughly $1,900 per family, each Californian is paying to cover the uninsured can be eliminated and returned to our wallets.

• It emphasizes wellness rather than illness: This plan promotes diet, nutrition, prevention and exercise. Our current system spends billions treating the sick, rather than investing millions in keeping us healthy. Health insurance companies will be required to offer health rewards and incentive programs for employees as part of what they offer to their employers. This finally provides each of us with incentives to take better care of ourselves by reducing obesity, diabetes and smoking - three killers that are crippling California families and our economy.

If the state Senate acts quickly to pass the governor's package, the Scrooges among us will see the path to reform. And voters will have their chance to weigh in on the financing portion of the plan next November. Then we will all be able to join Tiny Tim as he recites his new closing line: "God bless us, every one. Not just some."