Call me insane but I can see a big change coming

[Worktheshaft]

Oh and the OP is definitely insane. We're fucked. It won't stop me supporting the team and believing but its frightening that some scotland supporters consider us to be anywhere near the quality of Wales or Slovakia. Both teams would have us.

[dogmc]

Councils do have to find the money from somewhere though.

I think the point over starting plans and then not sticking with them is an interesting one.

We're only a few years into the proper 'Club Academy Scotland' system, the performance schools, and so on.

Yet there is all this noise about Brian McClair and Gordon Strachan "ripping it up and starting again" with a so-called 'blueprint'.

Not paying their execs £250k pa would be a start. Falkirk council is spunking money on the costs of an orange walk of all things. Councils have for years seen sports facilities purely as a cash cow which is incredibly short sighted. Kicking kids off pitches is the last thing they should be doing, given the long term benefits of getting more young people involved in sport. The prelude to the Iceland Portugal game gave a great insight into how the Icelandic authorities revolutionised way kids were trained a facilities were provided. I agree we need to stop chopping n changing blueprints but to do that we need to start with one that will work.

[Only one David Marsh]

We are into the CAS system now we are talking about changing it, the best way to develop players is to get them playing. I know someone will be along and disagree with me and say but we've played x amount in our squad that are U23 ofcourse it's a start but I'd love to see young Scottish players have 100 - 200 games under their belt by 22/23 and hopefully we'll see progress with a competent national team manager.

[D.A.F.C]

We don't have the players to compete with even smaller nations than us now.

Changing the manager every few years won't fix it. Chuck the money at youth and academies and change the setup so that all the younger players get exposure rather than rotting in the u20s and the bench.

Talking of reserves maybe it's time we brought that back too. Surely u20s would learn more playing against seniors rather than fellow youngsters only then warming the bench just to make up the required numbers?

You can see that most of the youngsters who made it from Scotland were played at a very young age and played every week.

Snodgrass, McCarthy, Fletcher.

To see Celtic and rangers sign premiership youngsters on loan when they have players like Tierney coming through is mind boggling.

The OF back in the spl will result in less youngsters and back to the same problem eluded to above.

[RandomGuy.]

OP, you're insane.

[woof!]

East Dunbartonshire Council have just put let prices up by 83% for the new season. I can't remember the exact amount, but it's going to cost the team I coach an extra 12k a year across all age groups. We then have to pass that on to the kids, and for some parents that extra £4 per month is too much.

It's rancid from them, and every other council who charges clubs an absolute fortune.

They also replace all green space with houses. Not a scrap of land for miles where I used to live. Kids have nowhere to play.

[forameus]

They do, but an 83% rise on something that will hurt mainly kids is ridiculous. Especially when they've just spent 50k on new signs telling people how many minutes it takes to walk to local landmarks 

 

20% could be coped with, even 40%. It would hurt, but it would be possible, but an 80% rise on anything is horrifically steep*

 

 

 

 

*Unless it's the value of something you own, in which case it's class.

 

You're from Milngavie, yet you resisted the temptation to blame it all on the cycle paths, kudos

 

I think the point over starting plans and then not sticking with them is an interesting one.

 

We're only a few years into the proper 'Club Academy Scotland' system, the performance schools, and so on.

 

Yet there is all this noise about Brian McClair and Gordon Strachan "ripping it up and starting again" with a so-called 'blueprint'.

 

That's what i was getting at really.  That system may mean that in a decades time, we're in rude health and up in pot 1 qualifying regularly.  But I doubt it will, because just three years into it people want to rip up and start again.  I'm sure there were some in Germany who said similar when they did their plan, but the DFB stuck with it.  Can you see the SFA doing the same?  The next manager will come in in 2 years time, it'll be a new dawn, new plans, and then he'll get punted a few years later.  Lather, rinse, repeat.

 

If we've not got the patience as a nation to set out a plan and see it through, then we don't deserve any success, and we'll continue to fall behind other nations.

 

They also replace all green space with houses. Not a scrap of land for miles where I used to live. Kids have nowhere to play.

 

Although it's contributing, I'm just not sure there's the same desire amongst young people to go out and play football.  There was in my day, when it was the cliched going out until it got dark playing football and little else.  Now when I visit my mum and dad, just across the road from the pitch I spent most evenings up at, there's very rarely anyone actually on it.  Last week, when it was glorious sunshine, no-one around.  

 

The kids with talent will get hoovered up by clubs, coached until the fun gets beaten out of them, then most get cast aside for not being good enough.  The ones that aren't talented..well, there's more fun things to do than go and kick a ball around.  Is there an argument that other - previously minority - activities are more attractive?

[TheScarf]

This worries me. Strachan is too old school and shouldn't be allowed to dictate the future development of the youth structure in scotland. Am I right in thinking he refuses to use sports scientists?

 

Quite.  He shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a youth development set up.  He cares not a jot below the full team. Which is criminal.

[Jan Vojáček]

They also replace all green space with houses. Not a scrap of land for miles where I used to live. Kids have nowhere to play.

EDC take the goalposts down at the park in the summer holidays and threaten any club training there with the prospect of every age group being banned from training at any East Dunbartonshire venue.

 

On the 3Gs at schools I was twice told I'd have the Police called on me when I went up to play at my school during the summer and Easter holidays. It's mental. No way me and 5 or 6 mates could pay the £70 to hire the pitch that they asked us too, so it lies empty.

You're from Milngavie, yet you resisted the temptation to blame it all on the cycle paths, kudos

Oh for Christ's sake don't get me started on that monstrosity   Should've just built 5s pitches all along the road, that would've been tremendous.

[woof!]

EDC take the goalposts down at the park in the summer holidays and threaten any club training there with the prospect of every age group being banned from training at any East Dunbartonshire venue.

On the 3Gs at schools I was twice told I'd have the Police called on me when I went up to play at my school during the summer and Easter holidays. It's mental. No way me and 5 or 6 mates could pay the £70 to hire the pitch that they asked us too, so it lies empty.

Oh for Christ's sake don't get me started on that monstrosity Should've just built 5s pitches all along the road, that would've been tremendous.

or the bus garage which is about to be several hundred houses. It's like a billiard table.

[PrestersKTID]

Does the Spfl still have rules for playing at least 3 u21 players? Every team should be doing this to get players first team football. 3 starting players, not just on bench.

 

One of the problems for me is that Celtic and Rangers handpick most of the best youngsters in the country. With the facilities they have they should be producing a new first team player every year. But the majority never make it to the first team. Why? 

Celtic especially has had 4 years of basically no real pressure to win the league so they should've used this time to really bring in their youngsters. But who have we got? Mcgregor, Henderson and Tierney? Out of those only Tierney looks like he can play international football right now. Armstrong might step up but has stalled a bit.

On rangers side they had all the more reason to bring youngsters in, in lowest leagues so would be winning majority of games anyway, it kept wages down and built for future but instead they spunked money on Ian Black, Dean Shiels, Kevin kyle etc.

[Worktheshaft]

Does the Spfl still have rules for playing at least 3 u21 players? Every team should be doing this to get players first team football. 3 starting players, not just on bench.

 

One of the problems for me is that Celtic and Rangers handpick most of the best youngsters in the country. With the facilities they have they should be producing a new first team player every year. But the majority never make it to the first team. Why? 

Celtic especially has had 4 years of basically no real pressure to win the league so they should've used this time to really bring in their youngsters. But who have we got? Mcgregor, Henderson and Tierney? Out of those only Tierney looks like he can play international football right now. Armstrong might step up but has stalled a bit.

On rangers side they had all the more reason to bring youngsters in, in lowest leagues so would be winning majority of games anyway, it kept wages down and built for future but instead they spunked money on Ian Black, Dean Shiels, Kevin kyle etc.

 

Part of the problem is that Celtic & Rangers take the best youth talent from other teams and then leave them to rot on the bench.

Ryan Christie is a perfect example of this, Celtic recalled him from loan at ICT in January and I think he then only got a handful of sub appearances. Had he stayed out on loan he would have been a guaranteed start every week. Its of no benefit to the player and development of our youth players.

[Only one David Marsh]

Any half decent youngsters being swallowed up by academies and left to rot on the bench is nothing new, Scott Allan is another example not saying he's a future international player but went from playing and is now nowhere to be seen. I personally think the proposed draft system could be a good idea if it meant youngsters can get games.

[Dink]

EDC take the goalposts down at the park in the summer holidays and threaten any club training there with the prospect of every age group being banned from training at any East Dunbartonshire venue.

On the 3Gs at schools I was twice told I'd have the Police called on me when I went up to play at my school during the summer and Easter holidays. It's mental. No way me and 5 or 6 mates could pay the £70 to hire the pitch that they asked us too, so it lies empty.

Oh for Christ's sake don't get me started on that monstrosity Should've just built 5s pitches all along the road, that would've been tremendous.

I don't often say nice things about them but Edinburgh Council have a scheme where kids get a wristband each day which allows them to play on the the unbooked 3G pitches whenever they're free. It's a bit of a pain in the arse as it means we end up having to kick kids off our booked pitch every week but at least it gets them playing football rather than allowing the pitches to lie unused.

[yoda]

Bit of a minter that.

 

Point remains though. Slovakia simply aren't that good a team. They have key players in good areas, but we should be able to take something from them. Even that shite Russia team nearly got something from them.

 

That shite Russia team is better than the current Scotland team.

[Alan Stubbs]

If we manage to stop the hand-wringing, accept what our average level is, and then look at how we can regularly achieve above that level, then maybe we might go somewhere.  We regularly fluctuate between expectations that are too high and fury at how shit we are.  There's no middle ground.  The reason du jour on why Strachan is the Great Satan appears to be that he talks us down in press conferences.  But at the same time, anyone who believes we can do something in this qualifying campaign is mental.  So it's terrible that someone is saying we're not so good, and it's terrible that someone thinks we're good.  I doubt any of the "smaller" nations are hand-wringing about how the continually don't qualify.  They're just getting on with it, and in the case of Albania, Northern Ireland, Wales and the like, they qualified this summer.  

 

The only way we're going to really make a marked change is if we go along the route Germany did.  They noticed a problem, they put a plan in place, and then they saw it through to the end in a decade-plus timeline that saw them lift the World Cup.  We'd be lucky if we got two years into the plan before everyone was crying for the manager's head.  Personally I don't think we could even come close to being able to accept the fallow years that come with such plans, so it comes back to what I said first. Accept that right now, we sit amongst the ranks of sides who probably won't qualify, but have a chance to, and then go from there.  

 

EDIT: Oh, and the "Death of Scottish Football"? That's just more evidence of the hand-wringing pish.  There's nothing wrong with Scottish football.  Soon it'll probably be back to the two-horse race at the top, but other leagues around Europe and the World exist in that kind of situation without being "dead".  

 

Pile of absolute shite. Yes, we don't have a divine right to qualify for tournaments but when you fail to do so 9 times in a row, including when they've opened it up to let practically everyone in, that is shite.

 

We sandwich Denmark, Slovakia, Ireland, Croatia etc in a list of European populations, there is absolutely no reason to excuse ourselves for doing f**k all in 20 years.

[DA Baracus]

Has anyone woken up yet? 

[kenny131]

Brian ,Mclair said we 2300 youth players in the current structure and he said this is way too many. I find that statement very alarming as nay be only 10% may make a career out of football that's me being generous so by his thinking a pool in the future of around 200 players is too much. Fucking bonkers

[gavin_3110]

Taking Slovakia for example,

 

Wladimir Weiss, 26 years old, 56 caps.

Miroslaw Stoch, 26 years old, 55 caps.

Marek Hamsik, 28 years old, 89 caps.

 

That's just taking their midfield. All three of them had made their debuts by the age of 19. They have players throughout the whole squad who have amassed a solid number of caps throughout their career.

 

I'd be interested to see the dispersion of caps to Scotland players compared to Slovakia in the last ten years. From the last two Scotland squads we have three players on 50 caps or more. Scott Brown and Alan Hutton both have 50 exactly, Darren Fletcher in the 70's. All three are over 30. Slovakia have nine, and a whole host of players in their 20's who have amassed a decent number to date. They are dispersed across different leagues in Europe and further afield.

 

Scotland's selection policy seems to be have been based entirely on who is having a flash of decent form in the English Championship. There is no consistency or emphasis based on developing players at international level.

 

There are probably even more glaring examples of this than Slovakia and perhaps the odd exception, but if people think that Scotlands English Championship Select team should be beating Slovakia, they're going to be in for a nasty surprise.

[Ira Gaines]

That shite Russia team is better than the current Scotland team.

Not that much better. I'd be hoping for at least 4 points from them.

Have expectations really gotten so low that we can't even expect to beat mediocre teams with f**k all end product?