The writing is on the wall for McGhee already

Mark McGhee was given a bye-ball for defeat at Celtic last weekend in what was a spirited Dundee performance that ended with a result that might have yielded a point or better on another day. Saturday's 4-0 humiliation at home to Livingston was another matter entirely.

Prior to kick-off McGhee had said: “I’m under no illusions, when you go to any club, you have to win the loyalty of the fans,” said McGhee. “I’m aware of that. All I’m asking is that they give us the benefit of the doubt.”

Shipping three goals in the first 21 minutes will not have been part of the plan for McGhee and certainly, those plaintive pleas were given a decisive answer as the Dens Park regulars upped from their seats and headed for the exits. It later emerged that McGhee had been engaged in an angry confrontation with one.

McGhee himself observed that the Celtic performance could not be relied upon to measure his early impact because it was a big occasion.

He said: “This game will be a bigger indicator of how the players have responded to us than last Sunday’s game at Celtic.”

If their limp defeat at Dens on Saturday was the players' answer to their new training methods and manager it was a damning one. This week they host a Hibs team that has suddenly found a bit of life under Shaun Maloney. McGhee must dearly hope for the same. Defeat will not be terminal, of course, but it will only intensify the belief that McGhee was the wrong man for the job.

Yes, he has a CV that boasts promotions with Reading, Millwall and Brighton and yes, his work at Motherwell went under the radar but that feels like an awfully long time ago now.

Red Star's Russian links

More eagle-eyed observers of European football might have spotted the significance of Rangers' drawing Red Star Belgrade with a wider view on what has been happening in Ukraine over the past week.

The Serbian club were saved by Gazprom from financial oblivion in 2010 – a relationship that allowed them to maintain their dominance of domestic football and to return to the Champions League twice in recent seasons having been banned from it in 2014-15 because of their financial problems.

German side Schalke 04 renounced their sponsorship of Gazprom – the gas provider owned by the Russian state – last week, removing the company's logo from club shirts but UEFA which accepts £66m per year had dragged its heels on similar action but is now taking legal advice. Don't expect to see Red Star taking similar action, however.

Caixinha's star continues to fall

Pedro Caixinha gave a presentation that blew the Rangers board away before he became manager of the Ibrox club in 2017. In it he documented the four trophies he had won in Mexico with Santos Laguna and his reputation as a Portuguese coach of some renown. He lasted just 27 games in the hot seat before his bizarre proclamations, team selections and an appearance in a hedge in Luxembourg, brought his time in charge to an end. Sometimes when a manager fails in Scottish football there are mitigating circumstances and it becomes obvious that it was just the wrong fit at the wrong time. But Caixinha's misery has continued since departing these shores. He lasted until the eighth game of his second season at Mexican side Cruz Azul before resigning after two wins to start the campaign. His next spell at Saudi side Al Shabab ended in the sack after seven months while last week, he was dismissed again after 14 months in charge, this time by Santos Laguna, the club he had once been the darling of.

Trash talking does Taylor no good

Josh Taylor made it known before Saturday's light-welterweight world title fight against Jack Catterall that – among other insults – his opponent was “in for a long, painful, methodical beat down”.

It didn't quite work out that way for the Prestonpans fighter who can consider himself lucky to have woken up yesterday morning with all four belts still sitting by his bedside. Few inside the OVO Hydro believed Taylor had won a fight in which Catterall put him on the canvas for the first time in his professional career.

Trash talking has always been a factor in boxing that has confused me – it's part of the spectacle, of course, an attempt to create drama and a frisson of tension for the paying punter but also to help psyche up the boxers.

Too often, though, the pantomime act can backfire. Taylor constantly referred to putting himself under too much pressure in his post-fight press conference but he was adamant that he had won. Few from the world of boxing agreed with him putting in context the folly of his brashness.

Damage was already done to Scotland before France defeat

And so, Scotland's Six Nations title ambitions have floundered once again. There is no shame in the admission but it raises a question about when – or even if – this assemblage of players, among the best Scotland has had in a generation, will ever be equipped.

The Scots entered the tournament as World Cup winning coach Sir Clive Woodward's dark horses yet two defeats in, with a trip to Dublin yet to come, it appears another mid-table finish is a virtual guarantee.

Once again, it is mindset – that hoary old chestnut – that comes into question, not so much in Saturday's skelping at the hands of an imperious French side that is unlikely to be stopped this year but more so in that harrowing defeat – Scotland's 11th in 20 years in the Principality – against a Wales side that was seen off by the England outfit that Gregor Townsend's men had already beaten on the opening weekend of the Six Nations.

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Bruce Anderson took his tally for the season into double figures with a brace for Livingston at Dens Park on Saturday. The former Aberdeen striker is finally fulfilling the kind of potential that once made him a prolific striker in the Pittodrie reserve ranks.