Friendly Next Month

[HibeeJibee]

If we don't play in June our 5 friendlies over 2 years will have been Italy, France, Canada, Netherlands and Argentina: with almost certainly 1 draw off Canada and 4 defeats. Hardly smacks of some "minimal friendlies, winnable friendlies policy". It smacks of swooning for the glamour - and cash - of big name teams and throwing in a spoiler against a lowly-ranked non-European side we didn't then beat.


It's not just about ranking points, anyway, it's also about building-up experience for our regulars - and trying new players and formations.

If there was wide variation in practice it might be arguable, but there isn't. We play fewer matches - for the most part significantly fewer - than almost everyone else; and almost everyone in a similar situation are micro-states or fledgling teams, who have an excuse.

It's not even a British thing either... England played 2 games this window... Wales played 2 games this window... We only played 1 this window, and even then seem to have 'agreed' only to use 3 subs (1 being Charlie Mulgrew)?

[forameus]

2 hours ago, JamesM82 said:

Yes, and the main point of the strategy is to play as few (official) friendlies as possible. The idea is quite simple. FIFA ranking is based on a points average. The number of points you get from winning a friendly, even against a top team, is relatively low. Play fewer friendlies => higher points average.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25134584

Unfortunately for the orange hordes of Dutch fans, that is exactly what their team did in June 2013. If they hadn't played that game they would be one of the top seeds, not Switzerland, who played fewer friendlies than most teams in the final 12 months that counted towards World Cup qualifying ranking points.

"It was on April 26th, I still have the email. I saw the fixtures they [the English FA] announced against Brazil and the Republic of Ireland and I realised that they were making a mistake with regards to the seeding for the World Cup. I wrote to the FA and I told them that they needed to do something about it. I said treat the friendlies very, very seriously or consider breaching one of the rules… basically making more than six substitutions."

I take your points, and I'd slightly misunderstood all the events around Wales/Switzerland/Romania etc, but I still stand by my original points.  HJ puts it much better than I could - it isn't all down to ranking points, and there were certainly better choices of friendlies for the ones we did end up playing.  It's really quite stark when you see the friendlies we've played in 2 years.  Is there a good choice amongst any of those?  Canada wouldn't really benefit us much, and we shat the bed on that one anyway.  The Netherlands is probably the best one out of those, as they're a high-ranking side on the slide.  And we still couldn't beat them, because this time they decided to, after choosing the "right" friendly, they'd just chuck it via squad selection and some weird subs agreement instead.

[Gordopolis]

Out of interest, what has been Northern Ireland's stance re friendlies during Michael O'Neill's tenure?
Looks like he could be our man soon, and id hope he'd tell the SFA to f*ck off and do some work by setting up a proper schedule of friendlies.

[Savage Henry]

Out of interest, what has been Northern Ireland's stance re friendlies during Michael O'Neill's tenure?
Looks like he could be our man soon, and id hope he'd tell the SFA to f*ck off and do some work by setting up a proper schedule of friendlies.

Let’s play Ireland.

[Gordopolis]

Let’s play Ireland.

4-1 ffs - almost 5 as I type

 

But shit that England will be the only 'home nations' interest next summer (until they feck it up).

 

 

 

[skippy2015]

It's really hard to qualify for the World Cup these days for European sides- much easier when auto qualified 2 teams. On a side note Denmark and Ireland really poor 1st leg long ball stuff hard to watch would rather watch Scotland at least we attempt to try and pass the ball - Denmark good tonight wish we had a Christian Erikson

[PB 4.2]

1 hour ago, Savage Henry said:

Let’s play Ireland.

Please stay out of discussions about international football.   You'd have fucking Matt Richtie and Phillips in our team.   This forum has hundreds of active members and absolutely nobody is as clueless about football as you.   

[HibeeJibee]

4 hours ago, Gordopolis said:

Out of interest, what has been Northern Ireland's stance re friendlies during Michael O'Neill's tenure?
Looks like he could be our man soon, and id hope he'd tell the SFA to f*ck off and do some work by setting up a proper schedule of friendlies.

He seems to have grown into it.

Allowing for this year's % being depressed by just skipping just 1 game - he did not play a friendly before their qualifier against Norway in March - he increased every year since his first full season. Put another way - he hasn't passed-up more than 1 date since 2014:

2012 ... played 3 out of possible 5 = 60%
2013 ... played 3 out of possible 6 = 50% ... technically played 2 as match v Russia was postponed due to snow
2014 ... played 3 out of possible 5 = 60%
2015 ... played 3 out of possible 4 = 75%
2016 ... played 5 out of possible 6 = 83%
2017 ... played 1 out of possible 2 = 50%


In effect the big question is for rest of this season anyway i.e. 2x March (Argentina in Morocco?) and 2x June.

We've 3/4 chance of being drawn in 4-team NL group and 1/2 chance of being drawn 6-team Euro 2020 qualifying group, which would mean no further friendlies until Euro 2020 qualification was over.


All this is assuming it's just been successive managers' calls, though, tbf.

[Gordopolis]

He seems to have grown into it.

Allowing for this year's % being depressed by just skipping just 1 game - he did not play a friendly before their qualifier against Norway in March - he increased every year since his first full season. Put another way - he hasn't passed-up more than 1 date since 2014:

2012 ... played 3 out of possible 5 = 60%
2013 ... played 3 out of possible 6 = 50% ... technically played 2 as match v Russia was postponed due to snow
2014 ... played 3 out of possible 5 = 60%
2015 ... played 3 out of possible 4 = 75%
2016 ... played 5 out of possible 6 = 83%
2017 ... played 1 out of possible 2 = 50%


In effect the big question is for rest of this season anyway i.e. 2x March (Argentina in Morocco?) and 2x June.

We've 3/4 chance of being drawn in 4-team NL group and 1/2 chance of being drawn 6-team Euro 2020 qualifying group, which would mean no further friendlies until Euro 2020 qualification was over.


All this is assuming it's just been successive managers' calls, though, tbf.

Cheers for that.
Tbh I don't think it has been successive managers' calls - more a combination of SFA apathy/happiness to hide behind the parapet and managers being happy to go along with that.
O'Neill's friendly record isn't quite as partizan (pro-friendly) as I'd hoped, but I still reckon he'd feel extremely uncomfortable about taking this job - and the wage - without having a chance to strut his stuff and validate his position for the best part of a year, the as-yet unconfirmed Argentina game aside.

[JamesM82]

6 hours ago, HibeeJibee said:

He seems to have grown into it.

Allowing for this year's % being depressed by just skipping just 1 game - he did not play a friendly before their qualifier against Norway in March - he increased every year since his first full season. Put another way - he hasn't passed-up more than 1 date since 2014:

2012 ... played 3 out of possible 5 = 60%
2013 ... played 3 out of possible 6 = 50% ... technically played 2 as match v Russia was postponed due to snow
2014 ... played 3 out of possible 5 = 60%
2015 ... played 3 out of possible 4 = 75%
2016 ... played 5 out of possible 6 = 83%
2017 ... played 1 out of possible 2 = 50%


In effect the big question is for rest of this season anyway i.e. 2x March (Argentina in Morocco?) and 2x June.

We've 3/4 chance of being drawn in 4-team NL group and 1/2 chance of being drawn 6-team Euro 2020 qualifying group, which would mean no further friendlies until Euro 2020 qualification was over.


All this is assuming it's just been successive managers' calls, though, tbf.

They played more friendlies in late 2015 / early 2016 because they needed warm-up fixtures for the Euros.

[Goalie Hamish]

Heard that the trip to Morocco is not happening, they want to play games in Yoorup instead.

[Goalie Hamish]

Peru rumour for the end of the season, a possible game in Lima.

[Gordopolis]

Peru rumour for the end of the season, a possible game in Lima.

A long-haul trouncing? Excellent!

[Goalie Hamish]

2 hours ago, Gordopolis said:

A long-haul trouncing? Excellent!

Just what the doctor ordered.

[paul-r-cfc]

A long-haul trouncing? Excellent!

Florida flashbacks

[Gordopolis]

Herald stating today that we have friendlies with Morocco and Argentina teed up for March? Mentioned in passing during an interview with Craig Brown but the tone was one of certainty.

[HibeeJibee]

Not happening. Morocco have fixed-up Serbia (in London) and Uzbekistan.

In the weekend's paper it suggested the Casablanca triangular had sailed due to the others knowing their WC draw so wanting similar opponents. Said something about playing away v Peru!

It was in an article about Michael O'Neil contrasting the fact the Irish FA had fixed-up games v Costa Rica and Panama.

[Stevieda]

Not happening. Morocco have fixed-up Serbia (in London) and Uzbekistan.

In the weekend's paper it suggested the Casablanca triangular had sailed due to the others knowing their WC draw so wanting similar opponents. Said something about playing away v Peru!

It was in an article about Michael O'Neil contrasting the fact the Irish FA had fixed-up games v Costa Rica and Panama.

Can we not just recruit the Northern Irish FA blazers as well as their manager to replace our lot?

[paul-r-cfc]

Can we not just recruit the Northern Irish FA blazers as well as their manager to replace our lot?

Don't wanna go down that road

[forameus]

The SSC email came out yesterday, and it was very light on specifics on anything.  SSC memberships?  Aye, we're talking about it, stay tuned.  Friendlies?  Aye, same.  Obviously you'll be the first to know, pal.  In the meantime rumoured targets go off and find their own partners, probably leaving us the munter at the side of the hall.  At this rate we're going to be going home with either the dangerous psychopath (France, Italy etc) or the similarly munterish (some other diddy).