6 year rebuilding plan like Berti Vogts suggestion

[AMMjag]

We already had our supposed long-term plan in place with the appointment of Mark Wotte, and for reasons unknown he was punted in favour of a beetroot-faced jakey. Whether Wotte's more fundamental objectives would have been achieved is something we'll never know, but you'd like to think - when needed - he'd have at least been well-placed to sell the national job to established foreign coaches like, for instance, Martin Jol.

There's not a single person left in the entire national setup who could command the respect of someone like that though. Yesterday's 5 hour jolly in the boardroom underlines how much of a closed shop we are, and how we would rather buy into fanciful notions of suddenly winning our next 6 games rather than pursuing a more ambitious and imaginative agenda that holds people's positions to account. A shower of lazy b*****ds who couldn't give a toss.

[Dunning1874]

There's a lot of criticism here of short-term thinking, but the 'rip it all up and start again' approach is short-term thinking itself. We can't rip up the entire youth set-up as a reaction to every humiliation of the senior team.

Although Wotte's gone, the performance schools are still in place - we have to give them time to see if they improve the standard of player coming through. A youth set-up like that isn't going to start delivering players after only four years and ripping the whole thing up and starting again before we have any judge of how successful it's been, then doing the same again with the next widely hailed youth system, then the same again with the next after that, only ensures that we'll never actually improve. We simply have to give a youth system time to succeed before binning it, which means giving it at least a decade.

[Dunning1874]

As for Vogts, the idea that he was a success on the basis that he got us to a playoff is, as others have covered, ridiculous. He scraped into second place, one point above Iceland & four above Lithuania, having drawn in the Faroes and lost in Lithuania. Levein had us in a group with Lithuania, finished six points above them and didn't lose to them - though dropping points to them at all was disgraceful enough. Burley had us in a group with Iceland and finished five points above them.

In any draw of normal difficulty, dropping five points v Lithuania and the Faroes would end the campaign. It'd be akin to losing to Lithuania and drawing with Malta in this group, before taking into account results v Slovenia & Slovakia. Vogts got us into a playoff because it was by a considerable distance the easiest qualifying group we've ever had. We will never have a group that easy again. I'm a firm believer that Craig Levein is the worst manager in Scotland's history, but I have no doubt that he would have taken us to the playoff in that group - to fail, he would have had to drop points against all three of Iceland, Lithuania & the Faroes, who at the time were all complete minnows.

[ayrmad]

5 hours ago, Dunning1874 said:

There's a lot of criticism here of short-term thinking, but the 'rip it all up and start again' approach is short-term thinking itself. We can't rip up the entire youth set-up as a reaction to every humiliation of the senior team.

We can and should when it doesn't do what it's supposed to do, it's certainly not done what it's supposed to do in recent times, those involved should be embarrassed at the standard of players being produced.

Quote

Although Wotte's gone, the performance schools are still in place - we have to give them time to see if they improve the standard of player coming through. A youth set-up like that isn't going to start delivering players after only four years and ripping the whole thing up and starting again before we have any judge of how successful it's been, then doing the same again with the next widely hailed youth system, then the same again with the next after that, only ensures that we'll never actually improve. We simply have to give a youth system time to succeed before binning it, which means giving it at least a decade.

Surely after 5 and a half years we should have a fairly good idea how it's going with the progression of 14 to 16 year olds.

If we genuinely think those 14 to 16 year olds are going to be better than what has went previously then my 1st answer is negated, if .they don't think that's the case then they need to search for a coach(probably not Scottish at the moment) that really knows their stuff and give them a free hand to restructure everything to enable us to produce players that know how to play football properly not the shite brand we've become accustomed to in recent decades, passing, movement and control would be a start.

We're producing players that wouldn't be impeded if they were made to wear tackety bits.

[Dunning1874]

18 minutes ago, ayrmad said:

We can and should when it doesn't do what it's supposed to do, it's certainly not done what it's supposed to do in recent times, those involved should be embarrassed at the standard of players being produced.

Surely after 5 and a half years we should have a fairly good idea how it's going with the progression of 14 to 16 year olds.

If we genuinely think those 14 to 16 year olds are going to be better than what has went previously then my 1st answer is negated, if .they don't think that's the case then they need to search for a coach(probably not Scottish at the moment) that really knows their stuff and give them a free hand to restructure everything to enable us to produce players that know how to play football properly not the shite brand we've become accustomed to in recent decades, passing, movement and control would be a start.

We're producing players that wouldn't be impeded if they were made to wear tackety bits.

You don't judge the success of a youth system on how good players are at 14-16. You judge it on how good they are when they're in their 20s and playing first team football. No player who has been in a performance school from the start has reached first team football yet, so we don't know if it's doing what it's supposed to do. Five and a half years is not enough time to judge the success of a national youth strategy.

[Gordopolis]

Well, in answer to that, in Berti's four best games (Iceland away, Germany x 2, and Holland at home), this did not seem to be an issue. The team actually functioned rather well, although still nowhere near enough, of course. When the shit hit the fan, though.....

 

Both Burley and Levein had moments like this. Burleys first qualifier involved passing the ball about in the fucking baking heat, while telling his players they didnt need to go chasing until they were too knackered to run around. Likewise CL in Prague, where his 4-6-0 was deemed surplus the minute the Czechs scored....and employing two strikers 'in midfield'!! Then substituting them, to go with Miller alone instead!! 

 

I'll never sleep tonight now, thanks a fucking lot!!

Pedant alert: in Prague, Levein brought on Miller and Iwelumo as a 2

[Gordopolis]

You don't judge the success of a youth system on how good players are at 14-16. You judge it on how good they are when they're in their 20s and playing first team football. No player who has been in a performance school from the start has reached first team football yet, so we don't know if it's doing what it's supposed to do. Five and a half years is not enough time to judge the success of a national youth strategy.

Spot on.

Despite the sfa being a bunch of f*cking spineless morons, the main team being all over the place and the manager acting the w*nk, the youth side of things set up by Wotte remains to be judged but only when those output from it reach an age where you'd normally judge professional footballers.

[Officer Barbrady]

9 minutes ago, Gordopolis said:

Pedant alert: in Prague, Levein brought on Miller and Iwelumo as a 2

How do we know this? Remember Peter Houston suggested that we only knew about being 'strikerless' that night, because 'they' told us. Either way, Levein was as much a tool as Vogts. 

[Gordopolis]

How do we know this? Remember Peter Houston suggested that we only knew about being 'strikerless' that night, because 'they' told us. Either way, Levein was as much a tool as Vogts. 

Indeed. Some said we had a manager in the dugout that night but I never saw one...

[capt_oats]

So that's the Record reporting an exclusive on the Performance Director shortlist http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/malky-mackay-leading-race-become-9296338

For those who don't want to give them the clicks the shortlist is apparently:

Austin MacPhee

Alan Irvine

John Collins

John Park

Malky Mackay

Tommy Wilson

[Dunning1874]

Malky fucking McKay indeed.

Are we sure they don't want to consider Oleh Blokhin, Arrigo Sacchi or KKKenny Dalglish while they're at it?

[kenny131]

Malcky fucking mackay,  the cheapest option available is there remit everytime,  they really are mind boggling unfit to run our game.

[HibeeJibee]

Various outlets carried that 'short-list' last weekend, but without Tommy Wilson.

[Sherrif John Bunnell]

Malky Mackay, bloody hell.

No wonder that Dembele kid has chosen to play for England.

[Staggie_93]

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/sfa-spark-civil-war-stewart-9291119

I'd be interested to see what this new 'blueprint' is.. Maybe something like this?

[7-2]

Looks like paying a fortune to that top London headhunting agency for their worldwide search will be worth every penny. 

[HibeeJibee]

So the blueprint's title is "Project Brave"... jings !!

Some of the aspects appear fairly uncontroversial.

However, limiting the top academy level to 8 clubs and replacing the Development League with an SPFL Trophy requiring a minimum number of over-agers are clearly controversial.

Many advocate slashing the number of players being developed but that must have risks, too.


Notably, in those respects it is basically "ripping it up and starting again" though, btw. Again. Again.


EDIT: Article linked from that claims Rangers, Celtic, Hearts, Hibs and Aberdeen are definitely in the "Elite 8", plus Hamilton will get the nod having been on the working group alongside Falkirk-Forth Valley as it's supported by SFA. Leaves all other clubs fighting for the last place.

[kenny131]

8 minutes ago, HibeeJibee said:

So the blueprint's title is "Project Brave"... jings !!

Some of the aspects appear fairly uncontroversial.

However, limiting the top academy level to 8 clubs and replacing the Development League with an SPFL Trophy requiring a minimum number of over-agers are clearly controversial.

Many advocate slashing the number of players being developed but that must have risks, too.


Notably, in those respects it is basically "ripping it up and starting again" though, btw. Again. Again.

It is a crazy and wrong perception they have at the sfa,  yet again the cheap option for them is to gamble on giving less youth players more training and continuing to dilute the player pool we can choose from.

I spoke with ano old fella who was in the sfa doing in his words scouting youth players. I met him when attending a course and his view was pretty much what they are planning less kids to train the better coaching they will get. Absolute madness in my view we need more playing not less.

[Rabinho]

So that's the Record reporting an exclusive on the Performance Director shortlist http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/malky-mackay-leading-race-become-9296338

For those who don't want to give them the clicks the shortlist is apparently:

Austin MacPhee

Alan Irvine

John Collins

John Park

Malky Mackay

Tommy Wilson

Jesus, anyone bar Mackay would be a good appointment.
Particularly Wilson or MacPhee.

[Gordopolis]

Maybe a noddy question, but what does being part of the 'elite 8' with academy status actually mean? Money grants? First pick on youth talent? Something else?

I take it these 8 academy-status clubs replace the performance schools (or the performance schools are gradually transitioned over to the academy clubs)?

Just struck me that everyone seems ready for a fight about it when it's not really been properly explained yet.

 

ETA: apart from the cheesy title, there's quite a lot of decent stuff in what has been revealed. The summer football for youths along with winter futsal is a great move IMO.