6 year rebuilding plan like Berti Vogts suggestion

[Desp]

34 minutes ago, forameus said:

I'd also probably disagree we're "plummeting".  We're not really.  We're just stagnating while other "lesser" nations are catching up and overtaking.

I understand your point re Euro 2020, however, even with all the qualification spots available, why should we be confident?  Euro 2016 was also the "biggest chance we had of qualifying".  We still made an arse of it. 

Also, while we're stagnating quality wise, if we are not getting the results and other teams are then overtaking us, we'll be plummeting down the rankings.  That fucks us for future qualifying campaigns.

 

30 minutes ago, SpoonTon said:

The point with Wales and Iceland is that we're talking about very good young players that were brought in, but in many ways they aren't doing anything significantly different to us at first team level. What we need are players who are good enough to make the step up. Grant Hanley was brought in at a young age, he got his first cap and 19 and now has 27 caps. You could argue that's looking to the future - Strachan placed faith in his younger defender who could play in the next 2 or 3 cycles. The important thing is having good enough players coming through - if you don't have that then what can you really do?

Agree on the players, and of course that's a huge factor.  However, there's teams out there who don't have the superstars that others have.  Northern Ireland for one, Republic another to an extent. Their manager gets them set-up properly, hard to beat, drilled well.  We can't magic up four or five brilliant players, but we can get a management team in place who can get a team set-up to be difficult to beat and working to a plan.  Not blindly throwing players into a 4-2-3-1 because that's what everyone else does.  

[SpoonTon]

Just now, Desp said:

I understand your point re Euro 2020, however, even with all the qualification spots available, why should we be confident?  Euro 2016 was also the "biggest chance we had of qualifying".  We still made an arse of it. 

Also, while we're stagnating quality wise, if we are not getting the results and other teams are then overtaking us, we'll be plummeting down the rankings.  That fucks us for future qualifying campaigns.

 

Agree on the players, and of course that's a huge factor.  However, there's teams out there who don't have the superstars that others have.  Northern Ireland for one, Republic another to an extent. Their manager gets them set-up properly, hard to beat, drilled well.  We can't magic up four or five brilliant players, but we can get a management team in place who can get a team set-up to be difficult to beat and working to a plan.  Not blindly throwing players into a 4-2-3-1 because that's what everyone else does.  

I agree completely.  

[54_and_counting]

38 minutes ago, SpoonTon said:

Quite simply, the results were more successful. There's no question about that. 

ETA: I'll also point out that there were no play-offs for Euro 2008. Finishing third was essentially the same thing as losing a play-off for Euro 2004. It would have been like having a team like Holland in the group with us for that round of qualifying. 

Vogts' record in qualifying was 4 wins, 4 draws, 3 defeats (1.45 points per game). Smith/McLeish record was 11-2-7 (1.75 points per game). You can also make direct comparisons with records against Lithuania and the Faroe Islands. 

 

id argue that the no playoffs thing wasnt anymore difficult for teams like scotland, while having a holland in the group would obviously give us two tougher games, it still isnt a straight shootout over said two games, holland could very well have beat us twice and we could still finish above them (think of ireland last campaign doing that to us after only getting one point from 6 against us)

whereas vogts was unlucky in that it came down to a scotland vs holland double header, nothing else could affect that

their records were indeed better, but given that vogts had to overhaul the whole squad in a short space of time he deserves credit for giving scotland some hope, when was the last time we had that

[54_and_counting]

49 minutes ago, forameus said:

and have the right mix of the best players we have available and any youngsters who would be useful.

 

unfortunately the supposed "best players" we have available are consistent failures who are gradually delivering worse and worse results, hell Brown is supposedly the best we have available and he got the run around at wembley, why not at least let a future player get the same run around, they might actually learn something from it as its clear Brown hasnt and wont given his age and the fact he's done this for years

oh and you could replace Brown with Fletcher in the statement above, or pretty much any of the guys that have failed for the past 3 tournaments at least

[forameus]

13 minutes ago, Desp said:

I understand your point re Euro 2020, however, even with all the qualification spots available, why should we be confident?  Euro 2016 was also the "biggest chance we had of qualifying".  We still made an arse of it. 

Also, while we're stagnating quality wise, if we are not getting the results and other teams are then overtaking us, we'll be plummeting down the rankings.  That fucks us for future qualifying campaigns.

Haven't you heard?  Barbrady thinks it doesn't matter where we're ranked 

I'm not saying we should be confident exactly, but there's a middle ground between that and not focusing on it at all.  2020 is an even better chance than 2016 (well, kind of equal, although in theory the playoff you face is "easier").  The rage moment for me will be if we treat the Nations League with disdain.  It's very likely we'll be in the third tier of that (although if this campaign keeps going as it is, maybe it'll be the bottom one), and taking three other teams from around that level, we absolutely should be able to win that group.  Should, mind, not will.  If we do that, we're guaranteed another shot at qualifying should we f**k it up, which would hopefully take a little bit of pressure off.  A playoff in that situation would then be against two of three more sides in that tier.  Again, winnable.

We can't really afford to sack off 2020.  If we're really going to sack off, then it should be every World Cup campaign, because that's only going to get harder (no more playoffs as of 2022 campaign) with only 3 second placed positions going through.  We stand little chance of qualifying for them without significant improvement.  Euros is a different story.

[kenny131]

Some very interesting posts and lots of great points. Biggest problem we have is the sfa is now more inteseted in money making, as long as fans keep paying the prices and they keep getting 50 odd million every 4 yrs from sky they won't give a flying f**k as long as the money keeps rolling in. 

They have had 20 years to do there job by improving our game and moving forward keeping our grassroots football thriving and performance schools producing.  There ineffectiveness is blindingly obvious to us fans yet they sit with their fat asses behind a desk getting paid a kings ransom and have overseen the demise of our game without recrimination.

[Guest DAVIDB69]

One of the real problems is a lot of fans see us pushing the second group of seeds in tournaments .

The reality is we are heading towards the fifth band and we are only able to beat the absolute diddies in pot 6

[SpoonTon]

3 hours ago, 54_and_counting said:

id argue that the no playoffs thing wasnt anymore difficult for teams like scotland, while having a holland in the group would obviously give us two tougher games, it still isnt a straight shootout over said two games, holland could very well have beat us twice and we could still finish above them (think of ireland last campaign doing that to us after only getting one point from 6 against us)

whereas vogts was unlucky in that it came down to a scotland vs holland double header, nothing else could affect that

their records were indeed better, but given that vogts had to overhaul the whole squad in a short space of time he deserves credit for giving scotland some hope, when was the last time we had that

All I was really meaning was that people often cite the fact that Berti got us to the play-offs. I'd say that in our only decent campaign since Brown left, there wasn't a play-off to get to! To be honest, I'd rather take my chances in a tie over two legs. We also had Ukraine in that group, it was very difficult. But either way the point was just that there wasn't a play-off.

I'm not saying that they were a massive success, they both left before they could be really deemed that. If Strachan had left at a similar point to McLeish or Smith (say, after the Ireland win), we might have thought favourably about him as well. 

I'm not sure that Vogts had to perform the overhaul that he did. Indeed, he didn't really do all that much in the competitive matches - it was more not using friendlies to our advantage and being a tactical buffoon (he once started Christian Dailly at left mid, enough said). There were changes needed, certainly, but Smith and McLeish both made changes of their own. We needed a steadying of the ship while young players had a chance to settle in. We had players like Lambert, Ferguson, McNamara, Naysmith, Weir, Cameron, Dickov, Miller, Alexander, Dailly, Hutchison, McCann, and Douglas. No exactly world beaters, but not too that bad either. It also didn't take long for Fletcher and Ferguson to emerge. I'd have taken McNamara, Naysmith, and Weir in our back four on Friday night. Is there really much difference between Lambert, Ferguson, and Cameron of then and Fletcher, Brown, and Morrison of now? We had Kenny Miller and James McFadden breaking through then. I don't think it was actually as bad as was made out. All that was required was a bit of patience in bringing in a select number of younger players. Berti's overhaul, which occurred mostly in friendlies, was totally unnecessary. 

[Malcolm Malcolm]

10 hours ago, Gordopolis said:

It'd be brave and the media would never buy into it (three defeats into it and they'd be printing plane tickets for the new manager to go home), but it's probably the way to go.

I particularly agree with the idea of playing at every opportunity - quite depressing that we're silently absent from tonight's friendly fixtures.

Also, following the French model of having different age groups train/play at the same place seems sound: could give the various grades a sense of unity and cohesiveness in atmosphere and approach - maybe a more progressive version of Strachan's 'club mentality' thing?

And while we're at it, I reckon we should bite the hand off of the likes of Barry Hearn or Ken Schofield:

http://www.heraldscotland.com/sport/14904911.EXCLUSIVE__Former_golf_supremo_Schofield_prepared_to_help_halt_the_decline_in_Scottish_football/

'I would try and help any sport, but, in particular, anything connected with Scotland. But if people have closed minds it makes it much more difficult.'

I did not know that. Ken Schofield would surely have a lot of worthwhile insights.

[Malcolm Malcolm]

11 minutes ago, SpoonTon said:

All I was really meaning was that people often cite the fact that Berti got us to the play-offs. I'd say that in our only decent campaign since Brown left, there wasn't a play-off to get to! To be honest, I'd rather take my chances in a tie over two legs. We also had Ukraine in that group, it was very difficult. But either way the point was just that there wasn't a play-off.

I'm not saying that they were a massive success, they both left before they could be really deemed that. If Strachan had left at a similar point to McLeish or Smith (say, after the Ireland win), we might have thought favourably about him as well. 

I'm not sure that Vogts had to perform the overhaul that he did. Indeed, he didn't really do all that much in the competitive matches - it was more not using friendlies to our advantage and being a tactical buffoon (he once started Christian Dailly at left mid, enough said). There were changes needed, certainly, but Smith and McLeish both made changes of their own. We needed a steadying of the ship while young players had a chance to settle in. We had players like Lambert, Ferguson, McNamara, Naysmith, Weir, Cameron, Dickov, Miller, Alexander, Dailly, Hutchison, McCann, and Douglas. No exactly world beaters, but not too that bad either. It also didn't take long for Fletcher and Ferguson to emerge. I'd have taken McNamara, Naysmith, and Weir in our back four on Friday night. Is there really much difference between Lambert, Ferguson, and Cameron of then and Fletcher, Brown, and Morrison of now? We had Kenny Miller and James McFadden breaking through then. I don't think it was actually as bad as was made out. All that was required was a bit of patience in bringing in a select number of younger players. Berti's overhaul, which occurred mostly in friendlies, was totally unnecessary. 

We all dream of a team of Christian Daillys.

[Officer Barbrady]

3 hours ago, forameus said:

Haven't you heard?  Barbrady thinks it doesn't matter where we're ranked 

I'm not saying we should be confident exactly, but there's a middle ground between that and not focusing on it at all.  2020 is an even better chance than 2016 (well, kind of equal, although in theory the playoff you face is "easier").  The rage moment for me will be if we treat the Nations League with disdain.  It's very likely we'll be in the third tier of that (although if this campaign keeps going as it is, maybe it'll be the bottom one), and taking three other teams from around that level, we absolutely should be able to win that group.  Should, mind, not will.  If we do that, we're guaranteed another shot at qualifying should we f**k it up, which would hopefully take a little bit of pressure off.  A playoff in that situation would then be against two of three more sides in that tier.  Again, winnable.

We can't really afford to sack off 2020.  If we're really going to sack off, then it should be every World Cup campaign, because that's only going to get harder (no more playoffs as of 2022 campaign) with only 3 second placed positions going through.  We stand little chance of qualifying for them without significant improvement.  Euros is a different story.

It matters less than how our results are being currently, ahem, achieved. Bungling along in 3 or 4, is one thing.....but it would bother me a lot less, if we dropped one, with the correct focus, attitude, application and desire were shown. We will eventually find our level, but it will be through incompetence and heads-in-sand rather than an evolution of us finding a way to scrap for wins like NI or other severely limited teams do. Listen to players, management and officials for evidence that none of the above are in existence whatsoever.

 

The results during Vogts' reign, whilst hardly great, were probably what we were due by that stage.....the likes of Macedonia, Albania, Cyprus etc were getting decent scores off the South and England iirc, certainly not the 5/6 goal rapings of the 80s.....the game was changing, as were we. He also wasn't exactly a PR guru either, often making a c**t of himself on and off telly and radio, but still a lot less than this fucking buffoon in charge just now. Clinging on to a 4th pot spot is excruciatingly sad, if its being done in the hope that we continue on the current path we are going down, and just happen to strike lucky. 

[Diamonds are Forever]

Is Vogts really getting credit for 'unearthing' Fletcher, McFadden and Gordon? One of whom was playing in the Premier League for Man Utd at the age of 19, the other 2 who were always hyped up, virtually from their club debuts (I still remember watching Gordon in what I think was his debut away to Bordeaux with Hearts and playing a blinder). Any other manager would have picked them because they immediately made our team better, it wasn't like he persevered for a few years until they developed. Craig Brown gets a bit of a hard time for apparently allowing the squad to age, there was nothing come through at the time apart from Barry Ferguson though. He had to resort to calling up crap like Mark Burchill and Paul Ritchie in an attempt to bring the age of the squad down, can anyone name any young players who deserved a chance that he left out?

People look far, far too much into the role of the national team, and setup, at developing players. Which is why Brown stupidly gets the blame for there not being much when Vogts arrived. Players spend about 90% of the season with their club side, the idea that 3-4 international games a year is going to significantly impact on whether a player makes it or not as crazy. Which is why the idea of just throwing in loads of youngsters is stupid, firstly it will make virtually no difference to their development so you are going to affect your results short term for no real benefit long term. Secondly, there's no way of knowing who will be good in a few years time. 3 years ago we were being told Stevie May was the future, before that John Fleck etc etc. What if, as is almost certain, we pick the wrong players to give the opportunity to, get terrible results while we wait for them to get better but it never happens?

Look at our side that lost 2-1 to Spain in the Under 19 2006 European Championship final. The only ones that ever played for Scotland were Lee Wallace, S Fletcher, Dorrans and Gary Kenneth. Kenneth should never have been near the team so effectively only 3 of them became viable international players, and only Fletcher has ever been more than a bit part player. And that was our best generation of youngsters in the last 20 years. However, only an idiot would say the reason that Ryan Conroy, Scott Cuthbert, Andrew McNeil etc didn't make it to the senior squad was due to not being given senior team experience, it was because they didn't develop at their clubs and were never going to be good enough. However if we were having this debate 10 years people would be saying to throw guys like this into the senior squad to give theme experience. If there are no talented youngsters you can't force them to be good by chucking them in at a level that they aren't good enough for, it doesn't work like that.

The national team is at the mercy of our clubs producing players. Once they are at the stage where they can add something to the team you include them, and you employ a manager who can get the best out of whatever players he has available to him at the time, no matter what age they are. It really is that simple. Of course there are things we can fix further down the age groups to try and get more players coming through, but it's not the role of the senior national team to try and fix systemic problems.

[mcfadden78]

4 minutes ago, Diamonds are Forever said:

Is Vogts really getting credit for 'unearthing' Fletcher, McFadden and Gordon? One of whom was playing in the Premier League for Man Utd at the age of 19, the other 2 who were always hyped up, virtually from their club debuts (I still remember watching Gordon in what I think was his debut away to Bordeaux with Hearts and playing a blinder). Any other manager would have picked them because they immediately made our team better, it wasn't like he persevered for a few years until they developed. Craig Brown gets a bit of a hard time for apparently allowing the squad to age, there was nothing come through at the time apart from Barry Ferguson though. He had to resort to calling up crap like Mark Burchill and Paul Ritchie in an attempt to bring the age of the squad down, can anyone name any young players who deserved a chance that he left out?

Jamie Fullarton and Scott Marshall in 1996. Admittedly both their careers didn't pan out quite how they wanted (Fullarton got a broken leg and Marshall played in the Old Firm decider for Celtic on the losing side). Both were part of the Scotland Under 21 side in 1996 that reached the Semi-final of the European Championships. Fullarton played for a team in France (Bastia?) and Marshall was part of the Arsenal squad though not a first pick. In 1996 we had a strong defence but lots in their 30's. Stephen Glass and Charlie Miller were both talented players that maybe could have got more of a look in particular as they added flair.

 

[mcfadden78]

16 minutes ago, Diamonds are Forever said:

Is Vogts really getting credit for 'unearthing' Fletcher, McFadden and Gordon? One of whom was playing in the Premier League for Man Utd at the age of 19, the other 2 who were always hyped up, virtually from their club debuts (I still remember watching Gordon in what I think was his debut away to Bordeaux with Hearts and playing a blinder). Any other manager would have picked them because they immediately made our team better, it wasn't like he persevered for a few years until they developed. Craig Brown gets a bit of a hard time for apparently allowing the squad to age, there was nothing come through at the time apart from Barry Ferguson though. He had to resort to calling up crap like Mark Burchill and Paul Ritchie in an attempt to bring the age of the squad down, can anyone name any young players who deserved a chance that he left out?

 

Ferguson was the most talented Scot coming out of a period inbetween a few years when yes there was a lack of talent. John Collins and Paul Lambert were perhaps the most talented Scots produced and were 18 years old in roughly 1987 1988. This meant a 14 year gap before our next 'great' Scots Craig Gordon and Darren Fletcher in around 2002 2003, although both would argue against this, Fletcher has had a decorated career and Gordon before injury was considered the best keeper since Leighton. Therefore a 14 year gap between talented players means we are still catching up. Looking at the figures it is clear that the late 1980's early - mid 1990's were the death knell for producing players.

[Gordopolis]

We all dream of a team of Christian Daillys.

As do our wives

[Diamonds are Forever]

7 minutes ago, mcfadden78 said:

Jamie Fullarton and Scott Marshall in 1996. Admittedly both their careers didn't pan out quite how they wanted (Fullarton got a broken leg and Marshall played in the Old Firm decider for Celtic on the losing side). Both were part of the Scotland Under 21 side in 1996 that reached the Semi-final of the European Championships. Fullarton played for a team in France (Bastia?) and Marshall was part of the Arsenal squad though not a first pick. In 1996 we had a strong defence but lots in their 30's. Stephen Glass and Charlie Miller were both talented players that maybe could have got more of a look in particular as they added flair.

 

 

Pretty much as I said then, there was no-one. Even the ones who did play a few games like Burchill and Ritchie went downhill from there. You also have to remember the context, which is that we qualified for Euro 96, qualified for 98, lost narrowly in the play-offs in 00, lost out narrowly in the 02 qualifiers (if Ferguson hadn't missed that sitter to go 3-0 up against Belgium I'm sure we'd have qualified). Given we were qualifying/getting very close to qualifying in every campaign, and given the lack of youngsters making any kind of claim to be starting it's no wonder Brown picked who he picked. There's no way you'd leave out experienced guys who'd been there and done it to bring in guys like Scott Marshall, Jamie Fullarton or Charlie Miller.

It kind of goes back to my point up the thread, if good youngsters don't exist then they don't exist, just throwing them in at a level which they aren't good enough for yet is not going to get us anywhere.

[54_and_counting]

23 minutes ago, Diamonds are Forever said:

Is Vogts really getting credit for 'unearthing' Fletcher, McFadden and Gordon? One of whom was playing in the Premier League for Man Utd at the age of 19, the other 2 who were always hyped up, virtually from their club debuts (I still remember watching Gordon in what I think was his debut away to Bordeaux with Hearts and playing a blinder). Any other manager would have picked them because they immediately made our team better,

except they dont, and havent done, if vogts was scottish he'd have kept they 3 waiting till they were 26 before throwing them in at the deep end expecting the best from them

we almost seem scared of trying out our young guys at an early age for some reason, citing the lack of experience etc, had we not had a complete lack of left backs id say robertson would still be waiting on his shot, and even then when we do introduce youngsters we still fucking molly cuddle them, while other countries make their young ones learn the hard way

[pandarilla]

There's a fair bit of 'post hoc ergo propter hoc' (or however you spell it) here.

Vogts didn't really have a clue. A few things worked out well but an awful lot didn't.

The idea that the Smith success came from that is wildly off.

[54_and_counting]

4 minutes ago, Diamonds are Forever said:

 

 

It kind of goes back to my point up the thread, if good youngsters don't exist then they don't exist, just throwing them in at a level which they aren't good enough for yet is not going to get us anywhere.

and how do you know the youngsters arent good enough for this level, take barry ferguson for example, walter smith tried to sell him early 1998, he rejected the move, next season advocaat places him centre mid and in amongst a massive spending spree ferguson shows he had the ability to stay in that position

 

[mcfadden78]

22 minutes ago, Diamonds are Forever said:

 

Pretty much as I said then, there was no-one. Even the ones who did play a few games like Burchill and Ritchie went downhill from there. You also have to remember the context, which is that we qualified for Euro 96, qualified for 98, lost narrowly in the play-offs in 00, lost out narrowly in the 02 qualifiers (if Ferguson hadn't missed that sitter to go 3-0 up against Belgium I'm sure we'd have qualified). Given we were qualifying/getting very close to qualifying in every campaign, and given the lack of youngsters making any kind of claim to be starting it's no wonder Brown picked who he picked. There's no way you'd leave out experienced guys who'd been there and done it to bring in guys like Scott Marshall, Jamie Fullarton or Charlie Miller.

It kind of goes back to my point up the thread, if good youngsters don't exist then they don't exist, just throwing them in at a level which they aren't good enough for yet is not going to get us anywhere.

I agree with this. In the context of things cannot argue I guess it is mainly what happened late 1980's early 1990's that led to the staggering halt in producing players.