World Cup Qualification (Europe) - Group F

[Bluebird Hewitt]

Scotland have taken the lead thanks to Griffiths. 0-1.

[Bluebird Hewitt]

Slovenia equalise courtesy of Bezjak. 1-1.

[Bluebird Hewitt]

Bezjak gets his second. What were the Scottish defence doing?

2-1

[Bluebird Hewitt]

SCOTLAND EQUALISE!!!

2-2 with about 5 minutes left to play overall. 

[Bluebird Hewitt]

Cesar sent off for Slovenia, straight red. Down to ten man for the last couple of minutes.

[Bluebird Hewitt]

Full time - Scotland draw 2-2 and will not be in the play offs.

[Bluebird Hewitt]

In the other games, England's defensive second string win 1-0 against Lithuania thanks to a Kane penalty. Not that it matters as England had already qualified.

Slovakia beat Malta 3-0 to take second.

[The Palace Fan]

Nobody would really be negative about boring, lacklustre performances where we've gone on to win games during qualifiers in previous campaigns because at that point we hadn't lost to Iceland. But the reality is if we go to the World Cup playing like we have done against all the teams in this group at some point we will not make it out the group. We've seen what can happen when teams with less quality than us are playing on tournament momentum and feel good factor so our inability to really kill these teams off is concerning. A big improvement needed Southgate.

[Inverted]

I fucking hate football.

[Honey Honey]

If we can't change the team at least change the commentators. They make it difficult viewing as much as Jordan Henderson's lack of talent does.

[Toony]

It's a complete waste of time going to the World Cup with Southgate in charge, these last two performances have been embarrassing.

A team with any sort of quality whatsoever will pick us apart at ease.

[6666]

An absolutely dour performance. Again. Zero creativity in the side. Jack Wilshere will find himself back in the squad if Southgate actually wanted to change that. Other than him and Lallana, there's not much else.

[Inverted]

Only good that can come of tonight is Strachan going and most of the older players retiring from international football. I cant take any more of Strachan's method: playing lethargic, out-of-form players who barely play for lower-level English teams, getting regularly out-played, conceding soft goals, and holding onto hope by scoring scrappy late goals and Leigh Griffiths being fucking brilliant. 

I want to see us trying something new. There are so many teams with less talent than us that look so much more intense on the ball - they can make things difficult high up the pitch and they can also sit back and stay compact when things get tough. Teams like Albania look better than us out of possession. Iceland are amazingly organised. With Scotland it seems like all we can do is sit back in a kinda deep, passive, sloppy shape. 

The result is that - in a match where Slovenia are playing for nothing and we desperately need a win - they look twice as sharp at getting to the ball. 

Of course it doesn't help that Strachan plays ponderous, lethargic players like Bannan, McArthur, Martin, Philips and Fletcher. Of course energy isn't everything and Bannan and Fletcher actually played brilliantly tonight, but you need balance. We need to be able to be aggressive and get the ball back when times are desperate. It's an organisation issue made even worse by his selection. 

Thats been just one issue for Strachans entire time as manager and he's never changed. Nothing fundamentally has changed. It's been a constant patch-job, of scraping by and barely making up for massive blunders and putting in Herculean efforts just to give ourselves a tiny chance at the tail end of campaigns. We've got a bit better, but that's just thanks to individuals like Griffiths, Tierney, Robertson and Mulgrew getting into great form. That's not Strachan's input.

I want to see us trying something new. I want to see us stop trying to coast by on our few talented players and actually start trying to put out cohesive teams that can play the way that small nations need to to get to tournaments. I want young players in brilliant form like McGinn and MacGregor given chances and for us to try and prepare for the future, rather clinging onto the current generation that even at their peaks never achieved anything for Scotland.

Not everything is Strachan's fault. The fault also lies with the Neanderthals at the SFA who keep clueless dinosaurs like Mark McGhee and Malky McKay in jobs, and also some issues are just unlucky - like Brown and Armstrong getting injured at a crucial time. Or Scotland somehow producing two brilliant LBs as well as a few more decent ones and not having a single passable RB. 

I like him as a person, and he's given us some nice moments.

Not everything would be fixed if Strachan called it quits, but it would be a good start. 

Edit: and yeah,  my sympathies really go out to England for not blowing away Lithuania 10-0 and having to put up with an imperfect record as they are given a clear path into yet another tournament. 

Our last tournament was 1998. I was one year old - I've literally never seen my country play at a World Cup or Euros. For fuck's sake.

[Inverted]

9 minutes ago, Cannabis said:

Didn't see any of the game but heard that England won 1-0 thanks to a Kane penalty which is embarrassing to say the least.  

Scotland once again failing to qualify for a major tournament despite having it their own hands, another summer of obsessing over England for them it seems...

An Evertonian would be the authority on obsession so I guess I can't argue with that. 

But seriously, teams like NI, Albania, Ireland, Wales and Iceland and more, that we are at least as talented as, getting to tournaments thanks to savvy management, and also a bit of luck in the draws, bothers me a lot more than England doing the usual R16/QF effort.

[Inverted]

5 minutes ago, Cannabis said:

Lovely chomp.

.

You can't take any pride on getting a bite when someone's at their lowest.

It's like being one of those American wankers that shoots a drugged-up tiger with a military-grade sniper rifle from half a mile away and then takes a selfie flexing over its body. 

[The Palace Fan]

Whilst I don't agree with what players you've identified as lethargic @Inverted based on there performances for their clubs (quite surprised they don't give it more for their nation) i do think that now is the right time for Scotland to consider a new direction without Strachan. With the extension of teams in the tournament it really gives those sides that regularly finish 3rd or 4th in qualification a real impetus to go for it as seen with Wales, Austria, Iceland, Hungary etc last time out and it's Scotlands best opportunity to break this qualification hoodoo.

Who would you like to see in the charge? Just before Fergie retired there seemed to be an abundance of Scottish Managers in the top two tiers but since then it looks like they've all been sussed out.

[Inverted]

25 minutes ago, Aaroncpfc said:

Whilst I don't agree with what players you've identified as lethargic @Inverted based on there performances for their clubs (quite surprised they don't give it more for their nation) i do think that now is the right time for Scotland to consider a new direction without Strachan. With the extension of teams in the tournament it really gives those sides that regularly finish 3rd or 4th in qualification a real impetus to go for it as seen with Wales, Austria, Iceland, Hungary etc last time out and it's Scotlands best opportunity to break this qualification hoodoo.

Who would you like to see in the charge? Just before Fergie retired there seemed to be an abundance of Scottish Managers in the top two tiers but since then it looks like they've all been sussed out.

I assume you're thinking of McArthur, and actually I rated him for a while. Especially there was a period when I remember him being good for palace and I always thought "it's good we actually have a midfielder regularly performing in the Premier League".

If you watch the players I named for Scotland, it just doesn't look like they can inject urgency in a match when needed. McArthur puts in the effort and can get about the pitch but he's so indecisive on the ball and his control regularly kills attacks for us. 

I think even if he was still in good form for Palace, there must just be a fundamental stylistic difference that makes it hard for him to work with us. Maybe if we adjusted the system we would see his best again. We really need him to start performing for Scotland - Fletcher and Brown won't be there much longer and we need someone to anchor for our players like Armstrong, MacGregor and McGinn.

As for manager there's basically no Scottish manager I'm too keen on. I rate Alex Neill but I don't think he's what we need, even if he would come.

If you look at small nations that got to the Euros, a lot had foreign managers. Albania have an Italian. Iceland had a Swede. Romania and Hungary had Germans, I think. 

If our federation wasn't a typical British old boys' club that seems intent on keeping a select few outdated coaches in work, we could be looking abroad to see if any foreign coaches had a convincing vision of how they could take us to a tounrmanent - there are evidently plenty of basically unknown coaches around Europe capable of getting to tournaments with clearly weaker squads. 

[Lucas]

Can't fault Scotland for their effort but I feel they did well just to push it to the last game and have it in their own hands to be frank. Slovakia are a better side footballing wise.

Would the job be ideal for a younger manager making his name like Derek McInnes?

Been at Aberdeen over four years now and seems to have done a good job since the Craig Brown days. Ok granted, the lack of competition from Rangers should be considered but bar he seems to have done as much as could be possibly asked considering Celtic are far and away in front of everyone else. They pushed them hard season before last in the SPL till there were two games to go and he got Aberdeen to two Cup finals last year.

Maybe this is the right time for him?

[Dan+]

On 10/5/2017 at 9:22 PM, Gunnersauraus said:

Southgate has the charisma of a pork pie. Really don't know why he got the job

Literally that exact reason.

[Dan+]

3 hours ago, Aaroncpfc said:

Nobody would really be negative about boring, lacklustre performances where we've gone on to win games during qualifiers in previous campaigns because at that point we hadn't lost to Iceland. But the reality is if we go to the World Cup playing like we have done against all the teams in this group at some point we will not make it out the group. We've seen what can happen when teams with less quality than us are playing on tournament momentum and feel good factor so our inability to really kill these teams off is concerning. A big improvement needed Southgate.

It's also very hard to get excited over qualifiers when we rarely bodge them up yet know full well we turn up at the tournaments and perform utterly terribly.

I watched more of Scotland's game than ours today. Ours felt like a friendly in every way possible. I think Winks looks like one to watch though. I'm more interested in him than I am Wilshere put it that way.

I'll be genuinely amazed if we get out of our group. Regardless of the draw. We scraped through the easiest group of all time last summer and I'm not convinced we've actually improved at all.

Something tells me Brian's going to have a good laugh at the lot of us as it's Peru's turn to break English hearts.

[Inverted]

2 hours ago, Lucas said:

Can't fault Scotland for their effort but I feel they did well just to push it to the last game and have it in their own hands to be frank. Slovakia are a better side footballing wise.

Would the job be ideal for a younger manager making his name like Derek McInnes?

Been at Aberdeen over four years now and seems to have done a good job since the Craig Brown days. Ok granted, the lack of competition from Rangers should be considered but bar he seems to have done as much as could be possibly asked considering Celtic are far and away in front of everyone else. They pushed them hard season before last in the SPL till there were two games to go and he got Aberdeen to two Cup finals last year.

Maybe this is the right time for him?

I don't watch a lot of Aberdeen it their performance in the cup final last year was really impressive. They have a bit of quality but they're also a solid unit as a team and can make it difficult. They only lost thanks to a moment of individual magic from Rogic.

Maybe he would be up for the job, he's done pretty much all he can at Aberdeen. 

[Honey Honey]

Hopefully Strachan goes and the next manager realises Matt Ritchie is the most talented player Scotland have. Then perhaps he won't feign injury to get out of sitting on the bench 

 

[Dan+]

6 hours ago, Inverted said:

Only good that can come of tonight is Strachan going and most of the older players retiring from international football. I cant take any more of Strachan's method: playing lethargic, out-of-form players who barely play for lower-level English teams, getting regularly out-played, conceding soft goals, and holding onto hope by scoring scrappy late goals and Leigh Griffiths being fucking brilliant. 

I want to see us trying something new. There are so many teams with less talent than us that look so much more intense on the ball - they can make things difficult high up the pitch and they can also sit back and stay compact when things get tough. Teams like Albania look better than us out of possession. Iceland are amazingly organised. With Scotland it seems like all we can do is sit back in a kinda deep, passive, sloppy shape. 

The result is that - in a match where Slovenia are playing for nothing and we desperately need a win - they look twice as sharp at getting to the ball. 

Of course it doesn't help that Strachan plays ponderous, lethargic players like Bannan, McArthur, Martin, Philips and Fletcher. Of course energy isn't everything and Bannan and Fletcher actually played brilliantly tonight, but you need balance. We need to be able to be aggressive and get the ball back when times are desperate. It's an organisation issue made even worse by his selection. 

Thats been just one issue for Strachans entire time as manager and he's never changed. Nothing fundamentally has changed. It's been a constant patch-job, of scraping by and barely making up for massive blunders and putting in Herculean efforts just to give ourselves a tiny chance at the tail end of campaigns. We've got a bit better, but that's just thanks to individuals like Griffiths, Tierney, Robertson and Mulgrew getting into great form. That's not Strachan's input.

I want to see us trying something new. I want to see us stop trying to coast by on our few talented players and actually start trying to put out cohesive teams that can play the way that small nations need to to get to tournaments. I want young players in brilliant form like McGinn and MacGregor given chances and for us to try and prepare for the future, rather clinging onto the current generation that even at their peaks never achieved anything for Scotland.

Not everything is Strachan's fault. The fault also lies with the Neanderthals at the SFA who keep clueless dinosaurs like Mark McGhee and Malky McKay in jobs, and also some issues are just unlucky - like Brown and Armstrong getting injured at a crucial time. Or Scotland somehow producing two brilliant LBs as well as a few more decent ones and not having a single passable RB. 

I like him as a person, and he's given us some nice moments.

Not everything would be fixed if Strachan called it quits, but it would be a good start. 

Edit: and yeah,  my sympathies really go out to England for not blowing away Lithuania 10-0 and having to put up with an imperfect record as they are given a clear path into yet another tournament. 

Our last tournament was 1998. I was one year old - I've literally never seen my country play at a World Cup or Euros. For fuck's sake.

We're damned either way aren't we really? Pretend to be happy at that and we'll just be reminded of how acceptance of such drivel will see us humiliated in Russia, which is true for what it's worth.

[Dan+]

6 hours ago, Inverted said:

An Evertonian would be the authority on obsession so I guess I can't argue with that. 

But seriously, teams like NI, Albania, Ireland, Wales and Iceland and more, that we are at least as talented as, getting to tournaments thanks to savvy management, and also a bit of luck in the draws, bothers me a lot more than England doing the usual R16/QF effort.

I'd be surprised.

[Chaaay AFC]

I will still always maintain Jordan Henderson is a nowhere near top standard and should never have been such a consistent starter for England.

I think him playing for Liverpool has completely masked his poor ability, but also apart from a couple of seasons where Liverpool have done well that's mostly been just about his level (Top 7/8). If Liverpool continue to get better he will get phased out of their midfield.