Hickey and Hepburn to Bayern

[Carnoustie Young Guvnor]

And he's like Tierney he's a natural defender, thinks like a defender, you can never have too many of them. Offensive minded players are ten a penny, smart players like Hickey are invaluable. I think he may well end up a defensive midfielder, Levein said that about him recently I think it will suit him.

[Theroadlesstravelled]

You know you're shite at football when people are excited about a 17 year old left back possibly signing for the Chelsea youth team.

[greenockraver]

On 06/08/2020 at 22:07, Junior Pub League said:

Cool story bro.

Will read again.

whats the point of this shite?

 

It is pretty exciting to see the fruits of the changes at youth level starting to become apparent. We ditched the kick and rush when we had Wotte come in and he always s said it would take a while for the real class to start coming through

[Ro Sham Bo]

On 11/08/2020 at 19:35, Gunz said:

Something like the recent Croatia team would be a realistic dream IMO (not suggesting we will get to a World Cup final) especially if more players keep moving abroad. Just say in the next 5 years or so you had Tierney at Arsenal, Gilmour at Chelsea, Hickey and Hepburn at Bayern. Then perhaps a core of players playing at random clubs such as Everton, Hoffenheim, Fiorentina etc. Always felt sticking to the UK is something that has held the home nations back.

More than likely we'll just keep churning out quality left backs while the rest of the squad is made up of bang average filler. 

[Carnoustie Young Guvnor]

10 hours ago, Theroadlesstravelled said:

You know you're shite at football when people are excited about a 17 year old left back possibly signing for the Chelsea youth team.

Actually the team that want him just beat Chelsea 7-1.  You're just a walloper, its entirely natural for people to be excited about talented young player, that's not the problem, the problem is just that you're a fanny.

[Genuine Hibs Fan]

16 hours ago, Carnoustie Young Guvnor said:

he strolls it every week.  

He really doesn't. He's a good young player, and he's obviously got a lot of potential, but there's no point making stuff up. He regularly looked lost at sea at times last year.

On the general point, it's nice to have some technically promising youngsters. I'd be surprised if half of these teenagers go on to the levels you're talking about though. Big teams are stockpiling youngsters on an industrial level, so signing these guys is no guarantee they will get anywhere near the first team. 

[Savage Henry]

7 hours ago, greenockraver said:

whats the point of this shite?

 

It is pretty exciting to see the fruits of the changes at youth level starting to become apparent. We ditched the kick and rush when we had Wotte come in and he always s said it would take a while for the real class to start coming through

Have you seen Scot Gemmill’s under 21s?  They went for smashing the ball long to giving the ball to Billy Gilmour to smash the ball long.   6 ft 1 players get dropped for being too short and not running about enough.   I do agree there’s a tendency to downplay Scottish successes in favour of “none but us” exceptional pessimism, but while MacKay and Gemmill are involved, our development teams will continue to be a shambles.

[Bing.McCrosby]

1 hour ago, Genuine Hibs Fan said:

On the general point, it's nice to have some technically promising youngsters. I'd be surprised if half of these teenagers go on to the levels you're talking about though. Big teams are stockpiling youngsters on an industrial level, so signing these guys is no guarantee they will get anywhere near the first team. 

This is true, but it still bodes well for the future that massive teams like bayern are interested in and signing our young players in numbers we've never seen before. Maybe one makes it as a first team player there, its one more than we had before.

58 minutes ago, Savage Henry said:

Have you seen Scot Gemmill’s under 21s?  They went for smashing the ball long to giving the ball to Billy Gilmour to smash the ball long.   6 ft 1 players get dropped for being too short and not running about enough.   I do agree there’s a tendency to downplay Scottish successes in favour of “none but us” exceptional pessimism, but while MacKay and Gemmill are involved, our development teams will continue to be a shambles.

This is also true, Scott Gemmill needs to be getting sacked if we're going to make big progress.

Everytime I've watched his u21 teams they play absolutely honking football. Its not the players, its him. Kick and rush is the game plan and its hopeless. I honestly couldn't believe people were touting him for the main job.

He won't get sacked tho, performances don't matter to the sfa. Its obvious his face fits. 

Edited August 14, 2020 by BingMcCrosby

[Sergeant Wilson]

21 hours ago, The Moonster said:

Edinburgh Live reporting that Hickey wants assurances from Bologna "in writing" that he'll get first team football, according to some Italian news agency.

That has to be journalistic licence. Would any player, never mind a young I e, ask for that? Has there ever been a manager that would agree to it?

[Carnoustie Young Guvnor]

3 hours ago, Genuine Hibs Fan said:

He really doesn't. He's a good young player, and he's obviously got a lot of potential, but there's no point making stuff up. He regularly looked lost at sea at times last year.

On the general point, it's nice to have some technically promising youngsters. I'd be surprised if half of these teenagers go on to the levels you're talking about though. Big teams are stockpiling youngsters on an industrial level, so signing these guys is no guarantee they will get anywhere near the first team. 

He does, you just can't see it.  He has struggled a few times defensively and physically, that's entirely to be expected as a literal kid playing against men, with twelve first team games under your belt against guys with four hundred.

He absolutely strolls it every game in almost all aspects, the things he struggles with will come with time and experience. He just needs to be a little older when he will be physically stronger that's all. 

Of course it isn't a guarantee, nobody is suggesting it is. There is a natural attrition rate for all sorts of reasons, but what it means is right now, for their age, they're absolutely top drawer.

That's why the big clubs are after them, Hickey last year was hands down one of the best 17 year olds in world football. Whether he becomes one of the best 25 year olds is yet to be seen but for his age he's almost as good as it gets, that's why the top clubs in the game want to sign him.

The only thing he is a bit off in is physically, there will be 17 year olds out there miles ahead of him physically, but there's not much he can do about that and as he gets older he'll naturally catch up a lot anyway.

Technically he is of a level he could stroll into the equivalent age group team at Real Madrid or Juventus right now and probably be give or take their best player.  That's very exciting and bodes well for our future, as its likely a lot of these guys will go on to be good players. 

Whether they make it at clubs like that doesn't really matter for Scotland, they can go on to play for slightly lesser clubs and be great for us, the indications at this stage of their careers are very good, much better than what we have had to work with for the last 25 years, so in all likelihood they'll go on to be better than most of what we've had as senior players over that time period too.

I mean name me the last time a 16 year old Scottish CB went to Bayern Munich?  I've kept a close eye on these things all my days and there's been precious few for fuckin decades lol, just a handful here and there, now its a stream of them. We could realistically have a 16, 17 and 18 year old at Bayern Munich this time next week. That's fuckin awesome, Norway or Denmark would be delighted with that.

Look at Billy Gilmour he's basically Xavi with acne why would people not be excited about this?  No joke if I was given a magic wand and limitless money to rebuild Barcelona for the next 10-12 years the midfield gets built around a 19 year old kid from Ayrshire who says his dream is to play at a World Cup for Scotland, he's fuckin brilliant and would genuinely get a game for Barcelona tonight.  We've not had players like that for a long long time, he just turned 19 FFS, imagine what he could be like at 24 if he was the best midfielder in the world you wouldn't be in the slightest bit surprised.

[Genuine Hibs Fan]

Have you had a drink mate? That's some deranged rambling you're doing there. 

[Barry Ferguson's Hat]

43 minutes ago, Carnoustie Young Guvnor said:

 

You are the liquor.

[Bing.McCrosby]

I think I'm one of the biggest optimists on here when it comes to Scotland (someone has to try balance out the self hatred)

But even I think that's overly optimistic.

Very close to being utter crap.

[Carnoustie Young Guvnor]

6 minutes ago, BingMcCrosby said:

I think I'm one of the biggest optimists on here when it comes to Scotland (someone has to try balance out the self hatred)

But even I think that's overly optimistic.

Very close to being utter crap.

I've been proved right about literally everything so far.  Its slightly hyperbolic, but, as always, I'm correct.  If you disagree you just can't see it, and will agree when they tell you it on MOTD in five year's time.

[Bing.McCrosby]

I'm afraid you will never get this satisfaction. As match of the day wouldn't be covering bayern or Barce games.

Or going into a rant about Scottish players coming thru and moving to to big clubs 5 years after the event.

FYI  Match of the day do highlights of the English premiership games

[Genuine Hibs Fan]

Is it any surprise folk think this part of the forum is full of oddballs when you have this level of pish getting spouted.

"I am hyperbolic, but I am also correct".  In this case, the two are mutually exclusive 

[John Lambies Doos]

Look I think the answer is somewhere in the middle. Yes Fuzzy is going a bit too far here and is in dreamland to an extent, but he is right in saying we are producing much better players than we have in decades, this bodes very well indeed.

[Toma_BullyWee]

Uch he's just excited leave him alone. 

No very often there's anything to get excited about when it come to the national team.

[DiegoDiego]

Uch he's just excited leave him alone. 
No very often there's anything to get excited about when it come to the national team.

There's excited then there's "I have been right about literally everything." egotistical nonsense which deserves to be put in its place.

[Carnoustie Young Guvnor]

Just now, DiegoDiego said:

16 hours ago, Toma_BullyWee said:

Uch he's just excited leave him alone. 
No very often there's anything to get excited about when it come to the national team.

There's excited then there's "I have been right about literally everything." egotistical nonsense which deserves to be put in its place.

I never said that.  Fake news.