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best-hohenzollern-ruler · 2 years ago

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Friedrich der Große (r. 1740 - 1786)

'Old Fritz'

Friedrich's relationship with his father, Friedrich Wilhelm I, is an oft-discussed topic. It was marked by public and private abuses and emotional and physical in nature. While the King's beheading of the then-crown prince's friend was the culmination of this treatment, it was consistent over Fritz's adolescence. Denigrated for his effeminacy, physically assaulted, and denied all earthy respite; it is little wonder that Fritz attempted to flee his father's persecution the first chance he had.

In 1740, Friedrich led Prussia against its first bout against Austrian tyranny. Did we have any claim to Silesia? Not a one. Did we agree to the Pragmatic Sanction? Technically, yes. Did that matter to Old Fritz? It did not, and for that he brought Prussia out of the scrapheap and into history! Because of him Prussia will live on for centuries! ...What the hell is a Kaliningrad?

Many rumors abounded about Friedrich's paramours and proclivities. It's the burden of every great man to endure these sorts of challenges, you see. Some say his testicles were malformed or, even, nonexistent. Some say everything was in fine working order and he sired bastard children with a Madame von Wreech. Some - and this is most absurd, you will agree - even posit that he was a homosexual. I understand hating your wife all too well, but that does not mean 'fortune is a woman and I am not that way inclined' suggests anything improper! ...Voltaire wrote what (Note: I am concerned for your health -L)

Friedrich III (r. March 1888 - June 1888)

The 99-Day King

Surprisingly for a Hohenzollern, Friedrich took a relatively liberal stance to politics. Even more shocking was his pacifist streak that led him to oppose our wars against Denmark, Austria, and France. Do not let his heart fool you; even a Prussian pacifist is nothing to sneer at. In all three conflicts, he commanded his troops capably and treated his opponents with the utmost dignity.

There were many hopes pinned to Friedrich's reign, put there both by himself and his supporters. Alas, he ascended to the throne when he was already terminally il with laryngeal cancer. Push and push as liked, what reforms could a dying emperor make? The most significant aspect of his reign is what it may have been - and what it could have avoided.

We have received a letter, whose author only identified herself as an 'American woman.' It reads: 'I know Fritz is going to beat Fritz, but please look at him. Isn't he the most dreamy Hohenzollern you've ever seen? Those piercing eyes, that strong nose, that beard you could lose your hand in. So what if he didn't like his son? That a crime now in this family? Fritz, your wife is gone, but I know one English maiden who's still seeking a good man. HEY-O!' (Note: Burn this debauchery -L)

#frederick the great #friedrich ii #friedrich iii #hohenzollern bracket #staffer theodor #round one

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skleznev · 2 years ago

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Alexander Millar (b.1960)

Scrapheap Challenge

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nautiscarader · 1 year ago

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okay so I have returned to watching Steven Universe earlier seasons( I was late to the party, joined regularily in S4)

And I am mid-season 2.

And Peridot walks onto stage properly.

And...

I am fully convinced that writers have been possessed by spirits of Marx brothers because the entire bathroom imprisonment-and-interrogation scene made me laugh for hours.

with the crowning jewel,or gem of this:

And then there is the barn, and the COCKING SCRAPHEAP-CHALLENGE MECHA BATTLEso they can decide who will build the drill to julesverne into the center of earth

And the last episode with Peridot watching a show and getting overcomplicated shipping chart and trying to explain this to poor Steven.

I mean, this IS tumblr in one GIF! I didn't know it was possible to compress the entire culture of overfixated nerds into one GIF,but lo and behold!

But it's not just slapstick... because in-between those mishaps,. Peridot grows... and learns. Becomes more understanding,more compassionate, stronger and independent.

And in the final moment, by calling Yellow Diamond a clod, she becomes a Crystal Gem, after thousand of years.

What I'm trying to ask is...

IS IT TOO LATE FOR ME TO JOIN THE "Peridot is the best space gremlin" CLUB?

And do I have to pay late membership fees - because I am willing to!

#steven universe #peridot

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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 1 year ago

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By: Andrew Doyle

Published: Feb 13, 2024

In his novel Shalimar the Clown, Salman Rushdie traces the deterioration of Kashmir from a place where Muslims and Hindus could live together in peace and co-operation to a country ravaged by conflict. This descent is signalled early in the novel with the arrival of a character called the Iron Mullah, a blood-and-thunder preacher with “skin the colour of rusting metal”. We think his name is metaphorical, but the Iron Mullah had risen from the scrapheaps of the Indian army, the junkyards of weaponry and tanks that have been left to decay. When he arrives, he removes his turban and raps his knuckles against his own head so that the locals can hear the metallic clang. It’s Rushdie’s way of portraying the idea that it was the actions of the Indian army that gave rise to the appeal of Islamic extremism in Kashmir.

Soon after the appearance of the Iron Mullah, a local Muslim man challenges him.

“Be off with you. We don’t want any trouble, and you, standing here in the middle of our little town and yelling your head off about the punishments of hell – you look like trouble to me.” “There are big infidels,” replied the stranger calmly, “who deny God and his Prophet; and then there are little infidels like you, in whose belly the heat of faith has long since cooled, who mistake tolerance for virtue and harmony for peace.”

For the likes of the Iron Mullah, moderate peaceful Islam is just another form of heresy. He soon has a mosque built in which he preaches from a pulpit made of scrap metal, old bits of radiator and “bent fenders spearing upwards like horns”. He is a frightening and ridiculous figure, but everyone is too intimidated to laugh.

Religious intolerance is something that Rushdie has had to live with for most of his life. Whereas extremists cannot reason and therefore resort to violence, Rushdie’s power has always been in his words. He is one of the handful of living authors whose work I genuinely adore, and Shalimar the Clown is undoubtedly my favourite. His depiction of Kashmir’s degeneration from an ecumenical paradise to a sectarian warzone is heartrending. It was published in 2006, seventeen years after the fatwa issued by the Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran following the publication of Rushdie’s novel The Satanic Verses, and surely the Iron Mullah was inspired by these experiences.

That evil spectre of the Iron Mullah was resurrected in August 2022, when an Islamist fanatic attempted to murder Rushdie at an event in New York, leaving him struggling for his life in hospital with multiple stab wounds. And although there was widespread condemnation, the silence from the Royal Society of Literature was curious to say the least. This week, fellows of the RSL have come forward to criticise the charity’s leadership for not being forthcoming on condemning this atrocity. The RSL’s former president, Dame Marina Warner, has said its leadership refused to issue a statement in support of Rushdie’s right to free expression because to do so “might give offence”. Do knife-wielding maniacs really deserve all that much consideration?

The RSL’s current thinking on the subject was outlined in a piece for the Guardian by its president, Bernardine Evaristo:

“Finally, to the matter of “freedom of speech”. There’s no question that the current leadership believe in this. However, the society has a remit to be a voice for literature, not to present itself as “the voice” of its 700 fellows, surely a dangerous and untenable concept. It cannot take sides in writers’ controversies and issues, but must remain impartial.”

The best response came from Rushdie himself. “Just wondering if the Royal Society of Literature is ‘impartial’ about attempted murder? (Asking for a friend.)”

Apparently, remaining “impartial” means not issuing statements of support for authors when there are attempts to cancel them both figuratively and literally. When activists hounded the poet Kate Clanchy with spurious allegations of racism and ableism in her award-winning book Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me, the RSL were mute. “They would not make a stand about the attacks on Clanchy,” said Warner, or any kind of defence “for all writers facing these social media attacks”.

In recent years, we have seen attempts by activists of many stripes to conflate language and violence, to claim that offensive words can cause the equivalent of physical harm. By this kind of twisted logic, bloody repercussions against authors and artists can be deemed a form of self-defence. A survey of American students in 2017 found that 30 per cent of respondents agreed with the statement: “If someone is using hate speech or making racially charged comments, physical violence can be justified to prevent this person from espousing their hateful views”. In this regard, today’s identity-obsessed self-proclaimed “social justice activists” have something in common with the mullahs of Tiran.

[ Protesters gather outside of the Batley Grammar School in West Yorkshire ]

Consider what happened to the schoolteacher at the Batley Grammar School in West Yorkshire who, in March 2021, was suspended for displaying a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad during a lesson on free speech. The protesters that gathered outside of the school couched their objections in terms of “safety and well-being”. One read aloud a statement in which the school authorities were accused of failing in their “duty of safeguarding”, and the teacher himself was charged with “threatening and provocative” behaviour. Here we saw a sinister alliance of religious fundamentalism and “safetyism” (a term coined by journalist Pamela Paresky to denote the elevation of emotional “safety” to a sacred value). The teacher from Batley Grammar is still in hiding to this day; I would suggest that his safety ought to take priority.

When activists say “this person makes me feel unsafe”, they are effectively saying “I don’t agree with this person and I want them to be censored”. Depressingly, this tactic generally works. Event organisers, school authorities, and employers feel obliged to act because they are gulled into believing that this is an issue relating to their legal duty of care. But disagreement and causing offence are not a threat to anyone’s safety, and we need to stop pandering to anyone who claims otherwise.

Of course, the RSL is not responsible for violence against authors, but they could at least offer their vocal support to the principle of artistic freedom. Let’s not forget that there have been many commentators over the years who have tacitly blamed Rushdie for writing his book in the first place. I recall one of teachers at school making the case that Rushdie “should have known better”. How exactly? The Satanic Verses is a brilliant and thoughtful work of fiction, and I daresay my teacher hadn’t even read it.

At the time of the fatwa, there seemed to be endless debates in the media over whether or not Rushdie deserved our sympathy and police protection. A case in point is the singer Yusuf Islam, otherwise known as Cat Stevens, who appeared on the Australian television show Hypotheticals soon after the fatwa was declared. When asked what he would do were he to encounter Rushdie in public, Stevens said that he would inform the Iranian authorities of the author’s whereabouts. As a grim final flourish, he went on to imply that he would rather enjoy the prospect of watching him being burned alive.

In a civilised and free society, it shouldn’t be all that difficult to reach a consensus that violence is not an appropriate form of literary criticism. Or that one of the most important novelists of our time should be entitled to write and say whatever he pleases, just as all of us should be entitled to write and say whatever we please.

I can’t help but think that we, as a society, failed the test of upholding artistic freedom at the time of the fatwa in 1989. We failed again after the massacre at the Charlie Hebdo offices in January 2015. At first, there were widespread declarations of “je suis Charlie”, until the inevitable victim-blaming began. PEN America initially showed much-needed support with a freedom of expression award for the satirical magazine. But then thirty-five writers signed a letter protesting against the decision on the grounds that Charlie Hebdo had mocked a “section of the French population that is already marginalized, embattled and victimized”. This is to misidentify the target. The cartoonists weren’t “punching down” at the Muslim minority. The target was God, and you can’t punch much higher than that.

And if you haven’t read The Satanic Verses, I suggest that you do – not because of the controversy, but because it’s one of Rushdie’s best. It was only a subplot of the book that caused the offence, those sequences based on the founding stories of Islam. The novel is really about the immigrant experience of living in London, but with the author’s characteristic touch of magical realism. It has one of the most audacious openings of a novel I’ve ever read, with the two principal characters – Gibreel and Saladin – falling from the sky from an exploded jumbo jet, dancing and singing deliriously as they tumble towards London. The novel is exhilarating, moving, and frequently funny; I can’t help but notice how many of Rushdie’s critics seem to lack that all-important sense of humour.

Of course, this wasn’t really about people reading a book and being offended by its contents. This was about philistines who hadn’t read the book and who were offended anyway because some Iron Mullah had told them to be. And when it comes to freedom of expression, we all need to be a little braver. We need to remind those who complain about works of fiction that their offence is their own business. They don’t get to decide what other people should or should not read, which cartoons should or should not be drawn, which ideas should or should not be ridiculed or critiqued.

In his memoir Joseph Anton (the pseudonym that Rushdie adopted during his time under police protection), Rushdie includes this letter to a reader:

“Thank you for your kind words about my work. May I make the elementary point that the freedom to write is closely related to the freedom to read, and not have your reading selected, vetted and censored for you by any priesthood or Outraged Community? Since when was a work of art defined by the people who didn’t like it? The value of art lies in the love it engenders, not the hatred. It’s love that makes books last. Please keep reading.”

And that’s exactly what we should do. We need to keep reading, in spite of those Iron Mullahs of the world who would compel us to stop.

#Salman Rushdie #Andrew Doyle #freedom of speech #free speech #freedom to offend #offended #blasphemy #safetyism #blasphemy laws #censorship #islam #this is islam #islamic violence #Cat Stevens #Yusuf Islam #Charlie Hebdo #religion is a mental illness

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heavymetalrobotics · 27 days ago

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ARC Scrapbots Event Report Part 1

It's time to get started on our event report from ARC Scrapbots Challenge! This was a very unique event unlike anything else in robot combat so this report is going to be a little different than usual. In this part I'll explain the event format a little bit and go through the first stage, and then in subsequent parts I will go through each of the fights in detail.

In most robot combat events, competitors arrive with their custom made fighting machines that they've spent hundreds or thousands of hours designing, building, testing, and engineering to be at peak performance in the fighting arena. Scrapbots Challenge is quite literally the opposite. Every single robot that competes must be built at the event, in 3 hours (roughly). Competitors are provided with a common, basic electronics kit consisting of motors, electronic speed controllers, and a battery. They are then tasked with constructing their robot using nothing more than what can be found in a large pile of household junk. The format is based on the old TV show Scrapheap Challenge (called Junkyard Wars in the US). That was once one of my absolute favorite shows, and I have long talked about wanting to try a similar thing in combat robotics. When the opportunity came up for me to participate in ARC's version I jumped at it immediately. Silly combat robots are my favorite kind and here was an event consisting entirely of silly robots!

The event took place at a makerspace, so there were plenty of tools freely available for use to build our robots with. Upon arriving, each competitor was instructed to add their own household junk to the pile on the table, and then given a small numbered token. The pile was quite small when I arrived but had nearly doubled in size by the time the event began. All manner of random objects could be found in the pile: disposable cutlery, plastic food containers, VHS boxes, old cell phones, computer speakers, broken children's toys, bits of rubber, old 3D prints, lego pieces, aluminium drink cans, and much, much more. Anyone could pick what they wanted from the pile, so there was no guarantee that something I could see early on would still be there when it came time for me to pick the scrap for my robot.

The numbered tokens were an important part of balancing the difficulty curve of the event. People who were new to combat robotics were drawn into groups 1 & 2, while those with experience were placed in groups 3 & 4. When it was finally time to begin, the groups were each called one at a time in numerical order and given 3 minutes to pick 5 items from the pile to use for their robot. This ensured that the less experienced competitors had the best selection of pieces to choose from, and more time to work on their robots while the later groups were still picking through the pile. I ended up in group 3.

Rather than waste precious time sitting around while the first two groups were picking their parts, I had a look over the electronics kit and began to lay them out so I could begin planning my robot. After all, there was no sense in picking out pieces that would be too small to hold everything. In addition to the electronics, there were also 3 different sizes of 3D printed hubs to make it simpler to attach things to the motors. I had one of the "spinner" kits (the other kind was a "lifter" kit) which meant I would need to also plan for a spinning weapon for my robot.

When my group was called to the scrap pile, I had a difficult time finding suitable parts. Many of the good pieces had already been taken by groups one and two, and I quickly ran out of time before finding what I wanted. Once every group had their chance to pick through the pile for their initial parts, it was opened up for anyone to go in and get more pieces whenever they wanted. I ended up spending a LOT of time going back and forth looking for more parts, something I definitely need to improve on the next time I try an event like this again.

What I ended up picking the first time around were two bottle caps with holes in their centers, a clear plastic bowl, a giant googly eye, and a sheet of thin green plastic that was very flexible, similar to the material that file folders are made from. I was hoping to use the bottle caps as wheels, the plastic sheet as a base plate, and the bowl as a shell for the robot. But everything else the robot needed I had no idea for and had to figure out as I went.

I didn't have much of a chance to take photos during the building process because of the limited amount of time available. Pictured above is what I constructed for the base of my robot. I cut a square out of the green plastic as a base plate, then cut small rectangular recesses in the sides to mount the drive motors in. I spent probably far too long cutting up an aluminium drink can (from an energy drink I think) to fold into motor mounts. While I knew I could simply hot glue the motors into place, I was anxious about the risk of the glue getting into the exposed gears and locking them up for good. Further, glue doesn't help much to resist torque, so I wanted a direct mechanical connection to take that load. I ended up folding the aluminium into a roughly omega shape (Ω) so I could fold the "wings" under the base plate and glue them in place. Some creative slots cut in the aluminium also meant I could slide them into the recesses in the base plate, further adding to the mechanical strength of the connection. This was honestly my favorite part of the whole build. It's been a VERY long time since I have tried to work with joinery techniques, and also quite a while since my brain has gotten a good creative workout like this.

Knowing that traction would be a problem with bare metal wheels, I found a small strip of foam rubber, cut it up, and glued it to the outside of the bottle caps as a wheel tread. I then used the smallest of the 3d printed hubs provided (which I cut down further) to mount the bottle caps to the drive motors. Several times the glue holding the hubs to the caps came loose, probably because of how smooth the metal was, so I ended up scratching up the inside of the caps to add texture for the glue to adhere to better.

By this point I had decided to build a robot type called a Shell Spinner. So to mount the weapon motor vertically, and keep it stable so it wouldn't come loose, I hot glued a Lego Technic piece down the center of the base plate and press fit two wooden dowels into it. Then I duct taped and hot glued the weapon motor between them. Keeping this as close to vertical as possible at all times was super important because the clearances between the chassis and spinning shell would be quite small.

(Forgive the post event photo, I didn't get a good picture of the finished chassis at the event.)

For the rest of the chassis, I found a metal bracket that just happened to be the exact shape of one side of my robot, so that got duct taped as the front wall. Not able to find any other scrap that was particularly suitable I dug out some foam board from the pile, cut it up, and used it for the back and sides of the chassis. At this point I was running out of time. I think I only had 45 minutes left when I started working on the chassis walls, and I didn't even get around to the shell yet! To cover over everything I picked out a plastic lattice that had once been part of a model kit and had all the pieces removed from it. I thought that it would be pretty cool and unique to have a sort of "cage" over the top of the robot rather than a solid opaque lid so that the electronics could be seen through it.

With the chassis mostly finished it was time to work on the spinning shell weapon. At first I thought about securing the "teeth" to the sides of the bowl by running them through it, but the first attempt at puncturing it resulted in the bowl cracking. Not having enough time to sort out alternate solutions, I simply hot glued the pieces directly to the outside surface. This was very tricky as I needed to hold everything at an angle to a curved surface while the glue set and cured. Somehow I managed to get them attached the way I wanted, with one piece supporting the other so they wouldn't just break off the first time they hit anything. I ended up using the handles of disposable razors because they were orange. At the time I was thinking about theming the robot based on one of my old designs from video games (which was orange) but ultimately I decided against it, and by this point it was too late to change things.

You may be wondering why I used the handles of razors instead of the sharp blades themselves for the weapon teeth. The answer is simple. If I included anything as sharp as an actual razor blade I would also need to make a safety cover for them so that nobody would get injured while handling the robot outside the arena. Time was rapidly running out (I think I had maybe 10 minutes left at this point) so that wasn't an option.

With the remaining few minutes I glued the cut-off parts of the wheel hubs from earlier to the bottom of the robot to keep it from tilting forward and back too much. Then it was decoration time! Shell spinners are not a particularly appealing shape (they are round almost by definition) so I felt I needed to do something to make it look nicer. A few small googly eyes around the top of the shell and a plastic egg in the center did the trick. I had initially thought about the big googly eye going on top but it was larger around than the shell and blocked the view of the chassis inside. I'm pretty sure one of the other builders at my table ended up using it in the end. Lastly, I happened to find blue, pink, and white straws in the pile, so those got glued to both sides of the shell to add some more color while it spins around.

I don't have any photos of this next part so have one of the makerspace as it was set up for Scrapbots.

Not long after I finished the decorations, time was called. At this point it was mid-day, and the event had a 1 hour break for lunch. However, we were all permitted to spend our lunch break however we saw fit. Those who had finished their robots went out to get food, while many kept working through the extra hour to get their robots finished. I was one of those who kept working.

First up was testing to be sure the controls worked properly and the shell would actually spin. To my surprise, I had mistakenly calibrated the fail-safe in the radio system incorrectly. I had assumed that a single direction spinner would use the throttle stick on the transmitter from zero percent at the bottom to 100 percent at the top. However, the electronic speed controllers provided were bi-directional which meant that they treated the middle point as zero, and the bottom as -100 percent throttle (full speed reverse). So when I tested the fail-safe by shutting off the transmitter, the weapon turned on at full speed in reverse. Oops. I eventually solved this by moving the weapon control from channel 3 to channel 4 on the radio, which meant that it was controlled by moving the throttle stick from side to side. This not only was already set to fail-safe correctly, but it made it easy for me to control the weapon. I could simply let go of the stick and the spring would push it back to the center zero position to shut the weapon off.

The bigger issue though, was that the weapon didn't actually spin! The clearances between the chassis corners and the inside of the shell were too small, and at some points in the rotation they would rub against each other. Essentially the chassis was acting as a brake. I spent most of my lunch hour cutting and grinding away at the corners of the chassis to try to free up the weapon. In the end I made it work, but there was still some slight rubbing which would occasionally stall the weapon out during fights.

Finally, before fights were to begin, we had to weigh our robots. Normally ARC runs robots in the 150 gram weight class, but for Scrapbots the weight limit is increased to 250 grams. Part of the reason I chose to make a shell spinner is because of how challenging it can be to keep those designs within the allowed weight. The shells are usually really heavy, and so the chassis needs to be small and compact to account for that. Well, it turns out I did too good of a job on that front. My finished robot only weighed 157 grams! Without the decorations it would be completely legal to run in the normal 150g antweight class. Next time I try a competition like this I plan to make a larger robot that uses the full weight limit.

That brings us to the end of the building portion of Scrapbots! Up next will be the fight reports from each time my little robot was put into the arena. Everyone got 3 fights to qualify for a knockout bracket, so there was plenty of robot fighting action to be had. Tune in then!

#ARC scrapbots #battlebots #robot wars #robot combat #HMRevents #teamHMR #scrapbots challenge #makerspace

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dongtopus · 6 months ago

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scrapheap challenge

you have one hor remaining

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countzeroor · 8 months ago

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Where I Play Xenoblade Chronicles: Part 54 - Scrapheap Challenge

We go hunting for the replacement Piezoelectric Unit. Continue reading Where I Play Xenoblade Chronicles: Part 54 – Scrapheap Challenge

#JRPGs #Let&039;s Play #Xenoblade Chronicles

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bgtopics · 1 year ago

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I reckon the A Team would have been good on Scrapheap Challenge

This topic was set at 2024-07-15 00:54:07

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thedreadvampy · 2 years ago

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unfortunate thing is the more scrapheap challenge I watch the more the misogyny seeps into my pores

it makes me sad like it's still such a good and fun show but god the lads lads lads dadly ewwww girls heheheh breasts boy's club energy truly leaks out.

#red said

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kokonoko84 · 1 year ago

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Champion of the arena, Ronar will send any challenger to the scrapheap.

#hero forge #Ronar #warrior #sword #scifi #fantasy #robot #gladiator #arena #shield

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ultrafox1963 · 1 year ago

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Five football managers in danger of the axe during 2024

1. Mikkel Arteta (Arsenal)

The Spaniard was given lavish funding during the summer to propel another push for the gunners' first Premier League title in two decades.

However, neither Kai Havertz nor Declan Rice have looked entirely convincing during their time at the Emirates, and three league defeats during December have brought rumblings of discontent within a notoriously twitchy fanbase.

Should Arteta again fall short - and a run in the Champions League may push his squad's workload beyond breaking point - such unease could spread to the Emirates boardroom, especially if the club is looking upwards at neighbours Tottenham in the final league standings.

2. Eddie Howe (Newcastle)

As the first manager since Sir Bobby Robson to guide the magpies into the Champions League, Howe fuelled hopes that he would be the man to restore the club's status as a northern powerhouse.

But his reputation has suffered a setback in recent weeks with a tame group-stage exit from that competition, together with indifferent domestic form.

Unless Howe can stop the slide back towards mid-table mediocrity, the patience of his club's Saudi owners may come under increasing strain.

3. Mauricio Pochettino (Chelsea)

Despite overseeing an extensive investment in players, the Argentine has yet to provide the results for which his owners would have hoped.

Although injuries to key players have disrupted the squad, other clubs have faced similar issues during the season and found ways to overcome them.

Pochettino may have to look to the cup competitions for salvation, to avoid becoming the latest addition to the Stamford Bridge scrapheap.

4. Brendan Rodgers (Celtic)

Following his ignominious exit from Leicester, the former Liverpool boss eagerly accepted the chance to recapture former glories in Scotland.

But his progress at Parkhead second time around has been far from smooth, overshadowed by both off-field disputes and European embarassments.

Although a recent victory over Rangers brought short-term respite, his rivals' resurgence, together with international call-ups causing serious damage to his squad, may well present Rodgers with challenges that prove beyond him.

5. Erik Ten Hag (Manchester United)

As with other managers in the post-Ferguson era, the Dutchman has found the Old Trafford hot seat a little too warm for comfort.

The progress made during his first season has been completely reversed by his inability to secure consistent performances from either senior players or the series of expensively-acquired duds recruited on his watch.

Unless his side produces a drastic improvement in form in the coming months, a summer exit appears inevitable.

#PremierLeague #SPFL #Arsenal #Newcastle #Chelsea #Celtic #Manchester United

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