Scotland vs Slovenia

[jagfox]

Strachan has attempted to foster a 'club spirit' in the National Side. Initially this bore some fruit and we won some improbable ties and did okay halfway into the Euro Qualifiers. Unfortunately that's when results and performances began to mirror those of his club sides. We're left with a shambles of a defence, ageing midfielders in Brown and Darren Fletcher and the sight of Chris Martin in a Scotland top. We're going backwards and Strachan is doing nothing to arrest this steep decline.

The question is becoming when he goes? Defeat tonight could hasten that but a win and he may see out the campaign. That might be tolerable if he were given a remit from the SFA to steady the ship apart from the ship is stranded in the mid Atlantic without a compass.

If he's jettisoned we should go for an interim manager or even selection by committee. We couldn't get much worse.

[G-MAN]

1-1 draw

Strachan to go

McLeish to come in for rest of campaign

Michael O'Neill to be in place for Euro 2020 campaign.

[rainbowrising]

The draw was made in July 2015, at a time we'd been playing well and were as it stood the favourites for second place and automatic qualification from our Euro 2016 group. On that basis it was reasonable to have some confidence of competing well with Slovenia & Slovakia for second here. Of course, in our next game after the draw was made we lost to Georgia and it's been downhill since, without a single good performance or result. Any confidence at the start of the campaign was misplaced, but confidence at the time the draw was made was understandable.

yep, Georgia was a serious loss not just for the actual defeat. We seemed to have no game plan to win that match and as a squad have been on a slide ever since. The Canada friendly was a dreadful example of a team with no real purpose in how it was supposed to play.

[ScottishZizou]

I would find it odd that Michael O'Neill would want to be our national team manager, I would have thought his logical next move after Northern Ireland would be another crack at club management but at a higher level than he was previously at.

As for what we are dealing with right now, I am as p****d off with Strachan's management as anyone else. Some utterly bizarre and irrational decisions. However, the way I view it is, we have 6 games left of this campaign: Slovenia home and away, Malta home, Slovakia home, Lithuania away and England home. Unsure of order. A quick estimation would think we would need to win 5 of these 6 games to secure second place. Would be useful if England would win every game against other opposite. The odds of us coming second due to form and ability are incredibly slim, if we played it out 50 times we'd probably only get through 1 or 2. But I dont plan on giving up just yet. If and massive if we were to win tonight, the furthest we would be off 2nd is 2 points with 5 games left, slovakia still to play at home. 

When we inevitably don't win tonight is when I will give up the small hope I should have given up months ago.

[accies1874]

It's a shambles if he drops Cairney, by the way. Also, it'll be Forrest on the left, Snoddy on the right and Armstrong through the middle, I reckon.

[jagfox]

Slovenia seem to be a bang average side with Oblak being arguably their only star player. It wouldn't be a total shock if we won but it wouldn't change a whole lot in the grand scale of things.

[Malcolm Malcolm]

2 hours ago, BallochSonsFan said:

This is a must win game for Strachan, although in the grand scheme of things Scotland were never going to be strong candidates to get out of this group.

Losing tonight might get rid of Strachan. What it won't do is kickstart the kind of change thats needed in our game. We can come up with all the completely nonsense programmes like Project Brave that we can dream up. Won't do one iota of good unless there is massive and long term change in our game.

You can tell that Project Brave is shit because the name has a nod to Braveheart and it was therefore knocked together by lazy thickos.

[ICTJohnboy]

1 hour ago, Pearbuyerbell said:

The group was actually winnable.   All we're hoping for is a manager to organise the defence and to select the correct personnel.   

We've been lucky with this draw - all the other teams are baws.   

 

Not so sure about that - as usual we didn't do our homework and totally under-estimated the opposition.

[Grangemouth Bairn]

Griffiths might start and he is way out of his depth at International level.

[F_T_Y]

I find it unlikely we will finish second and even if we do think this will be the group where the 2nd place doesn't get a play off spot.

The Lithuania game was a shocker and the performance in Slovakia was dire, you would expect to get beat by England and i thought we actually played quite well in that game.

Just really hope we win tonight so the england game in june isn't a dead rubber. Slovenia will be coming to finish us off. 

1-0 Scotland Leigh Griffiths.

Come onnnnnnn. 

[MarkoRaj]

"Poaching" surely?

Well yes but it was pronounced porching for some reason. No idea why

I think Chris Martin is going to start tonight. And I am pretty much resigned to a 2 - 1 defeat

[Guest]

Does Josip Illicic not play for Slovenia ?

He's a damn sight better than anything we have in the final third. Having watched their last few games I'd say they are technically very good and will prove a very stern test for us tonight. We also shouldn't forget that we were outclassed by Lithuania at Hampden and I'd say Slovenia are a step up from them. 

The bottom line is that we need to play positively tonight and try to create chances, if we persist with this tippy tappy nonsense then we'll just inevitably be picked off as our Central defence has no pace and no positional sense. I fear it could be a long night...........

[Guest DAVIDB69]

Slovenia seem to be a bang average side with Oblak being arguably their only star player. It wouldn't be a total shock if we won but it wouldn't change a whole lot in the grand scale of things.

Maybe but we are a well below average side

[accies1874]

Does Josip Illicic not play for Slovenia ?
He's a damn sight better than anything we have in the final third. Having watched their last few games I'd say they are technically very good and will prove a very stern test for us tonight. We also shouldn't forget that we were outclassed by Lithuania at Hampden and I'd say Slovenia are a step up from them. 
The bottom line is that we need to play positively tonight and try to create chances, if we persist with this tippy tappy nonsense then we'll just inevitably be picked off as our Central defence has no pace and no positional sense. I fear it could be a long night...........

Spot-on with everything said. I'm very worried for tonight.

[Guest]

45 minutes ago, jagfox99 said:

Slovenia seem to be a bang average side with Oblak being arguably their only star player. It wouldn't be a total shock if we won but it wouldn't change a whole lot in the grand scale of things.

Looking through their squad they actually have quite a few well known players plying their trade in Italy and Germany.

Josip illicic  (Fiorentina), Valter Birsa (Chievo), Kevin Kampl (Bayer Leverkusen), Bostan Cesar (Chievo), Robert Beric (Saint Etienne) plus many others playing at a good level.

[Paco]

It's easy to complain about a Scotland starting XI, and assuming the Twitter talk is right, people will focus on Griffiths for example but he's certainly a better player than Martin. No question of it. Tierney is a bold move if he's at RB but it's not a ridiculous shout, we have two excellent left-backs so it makes sense to try and get them both in the side. 

James Forrest, however, is absolutely laughable. Burke, Fraser and Ritchie in the squad and we're starting Forrest. 

[Guest DAVIDB69]

I would find it odd that Michael O'Neill would want to be our national team manager, I would have thought his logical next move after Northern Ireland would be another crack at club management but at a higher level than he was previously at.
As for what we are dealing with right now, I am as p****d off with Strachan's management as anyone else. Some utterly bizarre and irrational decisions. However, the way I view it is, we have 6 games left of this campaign: Slovenia home and away, Malta home, Slovakia home, Lithuania away and England home. Unsure of order. A quick estimation would think we would need to win 5 of these 6 games to secure second place. Would be useful if England would win every game against other opposite. The odds of us coming second due to form and ability are incredibly slim, if we played it out 50 times we'd probably only get through 1 or 2. But I dont plan on giving up just yet. If and massive if we were to win tonight, the furthest we would be off 2nd is 2 points with 5 games left, slovakia still to play at home. 
When we inevitably don't win tonight is when I will give up the small hope I should have given up months ago.

Yes we have to be realistic why would he move from Northern Ireland to Scotland he would

[kenny131]

I can't think of any game in last 3 years we have played well under his charge. I,m not sure what WGS has over the SFA but anyone else would have walked or been punted.

[ICTChris]

Going out for a Mothers Day dinner tonight rather than watch this rubbish. Hopefully it's a heavy defeat, leading to Strachan and co being sacked.

[JakeSAFC]

If Chris Martin and Wallace are in the team then I hope we get fucking hammered.