Faroe Islands v Scotland

[Guest Bob Mahelp]

1 hour ago, Monkey Tennis said:

Yes, we were majestic in Denmark.

That's a self serving myth.

I suppose there is something in the fact that our best 3 performances in the last year have all been away to Serbia, England and Austria. 

 

[Gordon EF]

5 minutes ago, Bob Mahelp said:

I suppose there is something in the fact that our best 3 performances in the last year have all been away to Serbia, England and Austria. 

 

But those were only better relative to the opposition. If we'd played exactly like we did in the England game against the Faroes yesterday, people would have been spitting teeth about how shite we are.

If we'd gone down to Wembley and battered England with 65% odd possession, and beaten them with a late winner, the place would have erupted.

[Guest Bob Mahelp]

2 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:

But those were only better relative to the opposition. If we'd played exactly like we did in the England game against the Faroes yesterday, people would have been spitting teeth about how shite we are.

If we'd gone down to Wembley and battered England with 65% odd possession, and beaten them with a late winner, the place would have erupted.

I think that's pretty much a given Gordon. A 1-0 win is better than a 0-0 draw. 

But...given the standard of the opposition...I don't think it can be argued that the level of performance last night was better than the level that night at Wembley. 

I'm looking ahead to the play-offs (again, always presuming we don't trip up against Moldova). The 3 games I listed above are at the very least the level we're going to have to reach to get through. Especially defensively. 

 

[No_Problemo]

48 minutes ago, BucksburnDandy said:

Absolutely dreadful last night and won. Same again in Chisinau would do.

Think we had reinforced last night that McGregor has to play alongside Gilmour in the middle of the park. McTominay was pretty poor, Fraser needs game time for his club as he was a long way off his best, Christie was poor also but had little service from behind him.

We've tripped up against 5th seeds so often (Georgia, Lithuania and Kazakhstan spring to mind) so thankfully we got the win.

For months I’ve been quite excited to see a McTominay, Gilmour and McGinn midfield but yeah not again...

McTominay definitely at RCB against weaker sides. Part of me does wonder if against top seeds we could play McTominay alongside Gilmour and McGregor, but at the same time we have looked far better with Adams in behind Dykes. 

[Stellaboz]

Same in Chisinau? Would take it but my heart needs it to be much more comfortable for us.

[Monkey Tennis]

1 hour ago, KingRocketman II said:

but to be seeded we probably need to beat Denmark

Is that the case?

I didn't think it was.

[ArabFC]

14 hours ago, The DA said:

I'd hope Gauld would get a game soon if we need to be more attacking.

I'd hope Gauld would get a game soon too, just cos he's obviously a good fucking player and at least deserves a chance.

[ArabFC]

12 hours ago, Robin.Hood said:

Patterson comes on and within 3 minutes or so gets the assist that gets our win. 

I still think Fraser was the right choice. Whenever he got the ball, he was sticking in good deliveries and made a good couple of inside runs - problem being, for much of the game he wasn't getting the ball as we were playing shite.

Same went with Billy Gilmour having a quiet first half the other night against Israel - it was cos nobody gave him the ball.

Anyway, Fraser is a wing back for using only against teams like the Faroes etc.

The other main 50/50 for me was McTominay or McGregor in which I plumped for McTominay. IMHO, he needs benched for the next game. He's not offering enough at the moment - almost stuck in second gear.

Edited October 13, 2021 by ArabFC

[Ewan8472]

19 minutes ago, Stellaboz said:

Same in Chisinau? Would take it but my heart needs it to be much more comfortable for us.

This !

[Gordon EF]

34 minutes ago, Bob Mahelp said:

I think that's pretty much a given Gordon. A 1-0 win is better than a 0-0 draw. 

But...given the standard of the opposition...I don't think it can be argued that the level of performance last night was better than the level that night at Wembley. 

I'm looking ahead to the play-offs (again, always presuming we don't trip up against Moldova). The 3 games I listed above are at the very least the level we're going to have to reach to get through. Especially defensively. 

 

But you see the point though right? Games against weaker teams who we're expected to beat are a hiding to nothing in that sense. Beat Faroes 4-0, so what? Scrape a one goal win, shite.

[Guest Bob Mahelp]

22 minutes ago, Stellaboz said:

Same in Chisinau? Would take it but my heart needs it to be much more comfortable for us.

Moldova have lost 12 of the 14 games they've played in the last year, and they've only scored 3 goals. They're pretty shite tbh. 

On the negative side, and something I suspect that'll make a nervous night for us, is the fact they've only been hammered in 3 of these games. The other 8 have been relatively tight. They actually drew 0-0 at home to Russia in a friendly a year ago. 

It would be nice if we could light the rocket up or arse from the first whistle against them, rather than keep it for the second half. 

 

[2426255]

33 minutes ago, Monkey Tennis said:

Is that the case?

I didn't think it was.

I think depending on how results go a home draw could do it, with a few head to heads between first and second placed or second and third placed teams as well as fifth and sixth team still to be decided there are too many variables currently to really know what we need just now. I think Groups A, B, C and J are pretty much ruled out if we don't get points at home to Denmark. 

We still have some kind of chance in the other groups certainly if we get a point at home to Denmark.

Edited October 13, 2021 by 2426255

[VictorOnopko]

1 minute ago, Gordon EF said:

But you see the point though right? Games against weaker teams who we're expected to beat are a hiding to nothing in that sense. Beat Faroes 4-0, so what? Scrape a one goal win, shite.

Beat them 4-0 and we increase our changes of a seeded playoff place.  A good performance is also always preferable to a shite one, for confidence reasons.

I'm delighted with 1-0 and the win, don't get me wrong, but there would have been a clear benefit to winning by more, in case we end up in a tie with other 2nd placed teams on 14 points decided on GD.  That said, 15 points is now looking more likely to be the target.

[Theyellowbox]

33 minutes ago, No_Problemo said:

For months I’ve been quite excited to see a McTominay, Gilmour and McGinn midfield but yeah not again...

McTominay definitely at RCB against weaker sides. Part of me does wonder if against top seeds we could play McTominay alongside Gilmour and McGregor, but at the same time we have looked far better with Adams in behind Dykes. 

I was the same. Thought that midfield would be a great set up, but just didn't work.

I actually thought Gilmour was pretty poor last night and if SOD had played like Robertson did, he would be getting absolutely slaughtered today. McTominay I thought was pretty poor by his standards, although the last 5 mins he looked a totally different player.

Can maybe put some of it down to playing a very defensive team on a difficult pitch in difficult surroundings on the back of a draining game, but if we really do want to progress to the next level alongside sides like Croatia and Denmark, we need to find a way to be more comfortable against defensive teams like the Faroes.

If we do get 2nd spot, we will at some point (maybe the next Euro qualifiers) be 2nd seeds and so in theory will be having to go and break more teams down. I think we have the players to do that.

On Moldova, maybe in a way getting a narrow win last night and not playing well could be a good thing. Possibly an element of complacency could have set in if we won by 3-4 and players could have just asked we'd beat Moldova. Clarke can reference lady night as an example of how Moldova may well play and what we will need to do to break them down. 

[GAD]

4 hours ago, Stellaboz said:

How decent were the Faroes in spells last night? Fair fucks to them, they had a plan and looked great going forward a number of times, as well as being solid without the ball. 100% fair fucks to them for that. 

Yeah, I was pretty impressed with them, they weren't some diddy team keeping ten men behind the ball at all, they attacked in numbers, pressed well and were unlucky not to score. I feel they've got a big result in the post, just glad it wasn't against us!

[Cardle is Magic]

Again, I really don’t think there will be much drama next month. Israel to lose in Austria meaning we’ll only be worried about getting seeded.

[coprolite]

7 minutes ago, Theyellowbox said:

I was the same. Thought that midfield would be a great set up, but just didn't work.

I actually thought Gilmour was pretty poor last night and if SOD had played like Robertson did, he would be getting absolutely slaughtered today. McTominay I thought was pretty poor by his standards, although the last 5 mins he looked a totally different player.

Can maybe put some of it down to playing a very defensive team on a difficult pitch in difficult surroundings on the back of a draining game, but if we really do want to progress to the next level alongside sides like Croatia and Denmark, we need to find a way to be more comfortable against defensive teams like the Faroes.

If we do get 2nd spot, we will at some point (maybe the next Euro qualifiers) be 2nd seeds and so in theory will be having to go and break more teams down. I think we have the players to do that.

On Moldova, maybe in a way getting a narrow win last night and not playing well could be a good thing. Possibly an element of complacency could have set in if we won by 3-4 and players could have just asked we'd beat Moldova. Clarke can reference lady night as an example of how Moldova may well play and what we will need to do to break them down. 

Is scoring in the 85th minute really much more comfortable than scoring in the 86th? 

[craigkillie]

2 hours ago, KingRocketman II said:

but to be seeded we probably need to beat Denmark, so we are looking at three successive home wins against likely 3 higher ranked teams. Ooooft. 

A draw against Denmark would make us extremely likely to be seeded.

[Richey Edwards]

Faroe Islands were absolutely robbed last night. They deserved to win.

[Guest Bob Mahelp]

3 minutes ago, craigkillie said:

A draw against Denmark would make us extremely likely to be seeded.

Yeap. There's also a fair chance that the likes of Portugal and Spain (currently 2nd in their groups) will win their groups and Serbia and Sweden will end up in the play-offs. Finland could also overtake Ukraine and get 2nd place. 

Not easy, but preferable to facing the likes of Portugal or Spain.