albagubrath

Exactly. I can’t understand why anyone can claim with a straight face that these kids would be playing first team for them, the evidence strongly points to anything but that situation. There have been literally dozens of occasions this year (and every year) where either half of the OF (and indeed non OF teams) were multiple goals up with 10-15mins left and put on aging 30+ pros over the young players on their bench. It’s up there with the narrative that Doak was a first team player at Celtic where he had about 20 minutes total across 3 games to try and get him not to leave. If he had signed a contract he would have been papped straight back to the youth team. Scottish teams are horrendous at youth development and there is no evidence whatsoever to suggest it’s anything to do with ‘the best’ kids all going to England at young ages; if anything that is a result of how poor our clubs are at development and how long they have been so poor. If I was an agent with Scottish clients I would get them out as soon as possible.

No, it’s Adire, Dire (pronounced dee-ray) for short.

The reality is we did absolutely nothing in terms of real structural player development as a nation until around 2010-2012, largely relying on luck to lead to developing both a baseload of talent as well as generational talents. That is to take nothing away from individuals all across the game in this country who have done wonderful things, this is about the lack of concerted and organised structural effort from the governing body to assist those hard-working people. That all changed, as I say around 2010-2012, following off the back of the McLeish report. Whilst the SFA ignored much of the suggestions in that report, they did completely rebuild the youth football landscape off the back of it. That project was always supposed to have a long gestation with a true impact forecast for 2020 and beyond. That has proved accurate with the first players from the Performance Schools for instance breaking into the national team at that point. We have yet to see much in the way of forward players breaking through, but I expect we will over the next few years with the likes of Wilson and Doak (not a PS player tbf) at the Vanguard of that movement. It is exceptionally difficult to be patient, but I think if we are and we trust in the processes that have been put in place, we will start to see consistent development of the standard of player we want/need rather than the odd lucky outlier like Ireland seem to have stumbled on with Evan Ferguson.

What makes you say that? I would say he is better defensively and certainly better positionally than Tierney, who is much better going forward and a much better 'athlete'. I would say he is also better technically and is taller than Tierney, but he is currently certainly not as strong. At only 20 that will come. I think Hickey could play at CB for sure and be good at it. I didn't think he could play rightback tbh but he is now a starting EPL quality rightback at 20, there is little to suggest he couldn't play CB to a very high standard IMO.

I think you have to try and get them all in the side. Something like: Gunn Hickey xx* Tierney Robertson McGregor Gilmour McTominay McGinn Armstrong/Christie Adams I'm not sure I like the idea of forcing McGinn a bit wider but him, Adams and the LWF could rotate as they more or less do already. The big problem will be if Ferguson keeps progressing as he has over the last year - we might really struggle to get our best players all on the pitch at that point. * I have no idea who our best CB partnership is right now but I'm convinced Tierney is one of them.

This thread is wild. A genuine debate about whether Gilmour should drop out of our squad - before the last double header I probably would have had him starting in the first 11 ahead of McTominay! Gilmour should remain in the squad, if we had someone better or at least comparable dropping him would be understandable but we don't so we shouldn't.

Exhausting isn't it.

Quite a weird take then is it not? Those are the only two clubs of note in Wales. They are going to struggle to compete at any semblance of international level if the highest level the majority of their squad are playing at is Barry Town in the Welsh Premier League. Obviously any player of any real talent is picked up by English teams - it's the same for the Irish or indeed any nation without a half-decent league of its own. We're increasingly seeing it ourselves despite our actually quite good league with our best boys going off to EPL teams - I (and I would think most others in Scotland) still consider them to be developed by our system regardless. Gilmour, Doak, Wilson, Patterson, Hickey etc. are products of our system, but were all playing abroad whilst still eligible for U21 football.

Depends. Are you counting players that come through Cardiff and Swansea as developed in the English system?

Somehow forgot their last match, probably because it was a dull goalless draw. Only kidding of course, it was a 7-0 win vs Switzerland and part of a double header where the other game finished 4-4

Not a great performance from them, missing Wilson badly, but they were undone by some freak goals. Two goalie mistakes, maybe 3 if you are being harsh. When they got the ball down in the second half and played they were much better. This team seems to be a bit feast of famine though. Their last 10 games are: 4-2 loss to Wales, 5-1 loss to Czechs, 3-0 win to Northern Ireland, 6-0 win to Malta, 1-0 loss to Sweden, 3-1 loss to Denmark, 5-1 loss to Portugal, 6-1 win to Georgia, 4-0 loss to Germany, 2-2 draw with Czechs. Just the 45 goals across 10 matches

There have been a few days of rumours of exactly that. Probably newspapers using the exact same logic (who has loads of money and no left back) rather than any actual truth in it but interesting all the same.

I have the game on in the background on my second screen while I work and I have missed literally all 7 goals

Live here if you are interested:

The U-17s are currently playing Switzerland U-17. They are 4-0 up after 20 minutes. Yes, Scotland are FOUR up after 20 minutes

Or just switch them around. And if that doesn’t work, switch them back. And if that doesn’t work…

He's another full back.

Don’t play this game, it’s English football fanboy shite. There are plenty good players in the SPFL as evidenced by the fact many of them go on to have excellent careers in the Championship or EPL. I am sure Nisbet and Shankland would do just fine down there, there given Ross Stewart is one of their top scorers and he could only manage 1 in 4 for Ross County.

The main reason Satoshi that those on this specific thread are concerned is because clearly he will be unlikely to play for Scotland if he is not playing league football. I agree that he will go on to have a great career, but it is frustrating for most that we finally have a potentially world class midfielder but we are not going to be able to play him because he is not match fit. Will he be a mainstay of our team for many years? Probably, yes. Is he able to contribute to the team right now? Probably not. Football is hugely skewed to the here and now and the here and now is that Gilmour is an EPL reserve. Edit: multi quote didn’t pick up Satoshi’s post, I never can seem to get it to work on my phone.

I didn’t mean to directly ask you specifically but I can see from my post I did, it was meant to be a general question to the board!

If we are talking about prospects, what about the two Hogarth boys. Jay (19, Rangers on loan at Alloa) or Nicky (21, Nottingham Forest on loan at Falkirk). Both have had lots of minutes this year in league 1. If Transfermarkt can be trusted both have had well over 1000 minutes this year which is decent for a 21 yo keeper and pretty good for a 19 yo. I haven’t seen either myself, are they any good?

Lol, fair point

Did anyone see that Wayne Rooney interview a few weeks ago when he talks about joining Everton first team training for the first time. At first he said he was super excited to be there and loving it but he realised pretty quickly that the rest of them were shite (comparatively). “I remember thinking ‘I’m better than all these players’. That’s not disrespect to them players but some of them just weren’t good enough and should never have played for Everton,” he added. “I remember thinking the step up would be harder.” https://fanbanter.co.uk/wayne-rooney-labels-old-everton-team-mates-crap-in-hilarious-yet-brutal-interview/ I think Doak has turned up at first team training and seen Nunez and been somewhat surprised

Watching the Everton game to see Patterson but also watching Anthony Gordon (Scottish qualified). Can’t say I’ve been hugely impressed tbh, but as an EPL level forward he probably would be in and around our first team. Not good enough for England at this point I would say so worth a punt to see if he’s interested in Scotland.

Ah, apologies my mistake. Good to see a 16yo on the bench though, still promising.