gtbahfm
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Posts posted by gtbahfm
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I do think it's interesting that in recent years most of the eye catching talent has tended to be smaller, very technically gifted winger / attacking midfield type players – perhaps influenced by more technical coaching, or being inspired by the likes of Messi and Silva on the TV / FIFA games. However, a couple of encouraging things are first, Andrew Robertson's meteoric rise to the top. We suddenly have a skillful, physical, pacey left back who's playing (and getting lots of positive comments) in England's top league. The fact he was playing amateur football just a couple of years ago suggests there may be more defenders out there who can develop quickly with the benefit of first team football.
The second positive (and back on topic) is that Harper is over 6ft and looks physically strong for his age. It would be good to have a forward with good strength and pace to match up with strong technical skills. Fingers crossed he keeps developing and either makes it at Madrid, or moves to another high level team in Spain / Europe.
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Haah, me too!
ETA: what a run and finish! How long before he opts for England
Have to say I was impressed with it - very direct! Sadly, there's every chance these guys may opt for England at some stage, but all Wotte and his team can do is keep finding potential gems, giving them youth caps, getting them involved in squads and training camps etc and hope that most of them stick with Scotland.
One thing in our favour is that quite a few young players are stepping up several levels, so the likes of Soutar and Gauld at U21 level despite being 18, Robertson getting into the full team etc. It should hopefully give the likes of Cardwell hope that if he progresses well at club and youth international level he might be a full international by the time he's 20. The same would be a lot harder at England, especially playing up front!
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Why he is a smashing young talent with a crazy buy out fee on his skull.why should he not be involved early?
Don't get me wrong – I think it's great news, but given he's not involved in the first team at domestic level yet, I wasn't expecting him to be included in their CL squad until next season.
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Gauld has been included in Sporting's CL squad, which is a bit of a surprise. Hopefully might mean he gets the odd game off the bench if he continues to do well with the B team.
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I noticed this lad scored two for the U19s last night and hadn't heard of him before (although I live near Reading), so had a quick search and see he's quite highly rated – Reading nicked him from the Hull Youth Academy for £75,000, which Hull were not happy about.
Anyway, I haven't seen any highlights of his goals last night, but found this one from the FA Youth Cup last season against Liverpool, which is a 'bit special':
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L-JY_oLXfY
Fingers crossed he continues developing well and isn't nabbed by England.
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Good interview with Mark Wotte in RBS's business mag:
http://www.rbs-businessagenda.co.uk/mark-wotte-11.html
Some interesting comments about the work he is doing with performance schools etc, although anyone who reads his blog regularly will probably know most of it already... Still worth a read though.
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Strikers coming through
in Tartan Army Ramblings
Posted · Edited by gtbahfm
Edited to say Swansea instead of Leeds!
Spot on assessment of Scotland fans / media!
I do think that there's a strong tendency (and I've been guilty of it myself with players from Rhodes, to Kris Boyd and way back to Scott Booth) of equating early success with blindly thinking/hoping a striker will be our goal scoring machine for years to come. The reality, is that despite good initial goal scoring returns, these players are usually not of a high enough standard to do it regularly, and/or don't offer enough to the overall team given the limitations of the squad as whole.
Similarly, if a striker doesn't score in their first 5-6 caps, we tend to write them off as not good enough, regardless of how they actually played. I was guilty of this with Griffiths who had some pretty mediocre performances in his first few caps, but with the confidence of the goals against England looked so much better having bedded into international football.
With McBurnie, it could be a similar situation. He's not scored for the NT yet, and looks a bit rough around the edges, but he's only 22, has good physical assets to be a number 9. In addition, he's wracked up a decent number of minutes at EPL level, before scoring a good number of goals in the Championship for Barnsley and now Swansea, so he certainly looks like a player we should persist with and give enough chances to prove if he can cut it at international level.