Hooray and up she rises, as another morning of ‘Kicking Off’ comes round like the boisterous daily activity on the vessel that sparked that aforementioned sea shanty in the first instance. It’s funny isn’t it? You know you are getting up early in the morning so what do you do? That’s right. You spend most of the night wide awake, fidgeting, tossing and turning in a boggled eyed fever because you’re so freaked out by the fear of not waking up at the time that you’d planned to wake up and when you do wake up, it tends to be after you’ve finally dozed off and are scunnered by the prospect of actually waking up. Oh well, here’s the daily sports briefing to get you up and at it. Come on. WAKE UP!
Today's top tales
- Nicky Clark's late show downs Kilmarnock
- Jason Cummings breaks Hearts as Hibs's treble tilt stays on course
- Motherwell clatter another nail into Dundee United's coffin
- Alan Stubbs insists Scotland's top flight needs Hibs and Rangers
- Hard bargaining brings Kristoffer Ajer to Celtic
- Aberdeen nearing last chance saloon after Caley cropper
- Ross Draper: "If McInnes thinks I'm a cheat he should say so"
- Boyata believes fit-again Brown and Mulgrew can win title race
- Scottish clubs could be excluded from European second division
- Ali Price believes more rugby should be played on plastic
Radio Blah Blah: The word on the wireless
06.05 Radio Scotland sports headlines
Hibernian and Rangers through to last eight of Scottish Cup ... Dundee United are 13 points adrift at the bottom of the Scottish Premiership with just 13 games to play after Motherwell defeat ... Chelsea lost 2-1 to PSG in the Champions League ... defending champion John Higgins is through to the third round of the Welsh Open snooker.
06.35 Radio Five Live sports headlines
Guus Hiddink plays down Chelsea's 2-1 defeat in the first leg of the Champions League encounter with PSG ... Hull City's draw with Brighton has given them a two point lead at the top of the Championship ... Hibs win a fiesty Edinburgh derby as Rangers also progress ... Wales Rugby Union kicking coach Neil Jenkins believes Dan Biggar is tough enough to deal with any pressure France put on him in the Six Nations match next week ... Ronnie O'Sullivan said he was "just having a bit of fun" when he turned down the chance of a 147 break in the Welsh Open ... British tennis No 2 Aljaz Bedene was knocked out of the Rio Open in the first round.
The late show
Nicky Clark stuns Kilmarnock in Scottish Cup replay
Cometh the hour, Cummings the man
Jason Cummings is the match winner in boisterous Edinburgh derby
All's Well that ends well
Motherwell put Dundee United to the sword and ease relegation fears
Can't live without you?
Alan Stubbs believes Scotland's top flight needs Hibs and Rangers
Checking in
Some hard-bargaining brings Norwegian youngster Ajer to Celtic
Last chance saloon?
Aberdeen can't afford anymore slip ups in title race
What did you call me?
Ross Draper wants Derek McInnes to come clean over "cheat" claims
Saluting his team-mates
Boyata welcomes the return of Brown and Mulgrew in time for title run-in
3G or not 3G?
Ali Price reckons there should be more rugby played on plastic pitches
Out in the cold?
Scotland's clubs could be European outcasts if new proposals are approved
Read all about it: Today's back pages
The Herald leads with Rangers's last gasp win over Kilmarnock while Alan Stubbs insists that both Hibs and Rangers would be welcomed back into Scotland's top flight with open arms. Ross Draper looks for clarity amid the bickering with Derek McInnes and says the Aberdeen boss should come out and call him a cheat ... if that's what he thinks.
The Evening Times has Rangers splashed all over the back while The National gives the arrival to Celtic of Norwegian youngster Kristoffer Ajer a decent hit.
Grandstanding: Today's sports comment
Wednesday is Stuart Bathgate day, and in his weekly ponderings on all things rugby related, The Herald man suggests that Scotland's rugby team needs a stronger bench ... and by that he means stronger players not sturdier seating arrangements.
In The National, meanwhile, it's rugby refs who are getting it in the neck.
Sporting Twitteratti
Dundee United fans look away now. Well, you should be used to doing that given the eye-watering stuff on show this season. It's a fickle old game. The Tannadice team's former manager, Jackie McNamara, left them in the doldrums and moved to another club, York City, which was so low he must have thought his first fixture was against Atlantis Athletic. Seven defeats in a row to start his reign was hardly ideal but having dragged the Minstermen out of the League Two relegation zone last night, it seems wee Jackie is now as popular an attraction in York as the Jorvik Centre.
Chants of Jackie Mc's Barmy Army can once again be heard loud and clear from The David Longhurst Stand.
— York City FC (@yorkcityfc) February 16, 2016
That's all for now folks. Thanks for reading and join us tomorrow morning for another rummage around the sporting news and views.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here