Marlow

Although a mistake by him led to one of the New Zealand goals, I do not really blame Evans as I never thought he should have been playing at all. Evans had not ever even been in squads, let alone played, in any of the qualifying games for the 82 World Cup. He was brought into the setup for a friendly and a couple of home internationals in the weeks before the world cup. He had effectively played the equivalent of one game alongside each of the rest of the defenders across three matches before we kicked off against New Zealand. Archibald's time at Barcelona came later by a few years. I do remember us leading the USSR for a long spell until they equalised in the second half. Souness was the guilty man ISTR, though everyone remembers Hansen clattering into Miller later for their second goal.

The 82 squad should have done better. Someone asked if giving away two stupid goals to New Zealand in 82 was Stein's fault (which got us knocked out), and I'd argue it was, actually. He had his favourite and was a wilful man but could also pick people because of media pressure at times. Alan Rough was clearly outclassed by Leighton at the time, but Stein could not acknowledge that yet. Alan Evans should never have been parachuted in to the central defence with effectively zero experience of playing with the rest of the squad, but got a greenlight from Stein and it's maybe also arguable it was also becoming clear that McGrain was not up to the challenges of that heat at that level. There were calls for McLeish and Miller to be the central defenders, even before that World Cup, but Hansen, despite never having been much cop for us in the four years before was always Stein's golden boy at the time. Stein was also not always the best man manager, strangely enough, he did always allow Souness to get away with anything yet also tended to antagonise Dalglish. His favouritism also meant Steve Archibald got to play in every game as lead striker despite not having scored once in the qualifying matches.

Interesting points, and I'd forgotten just how amazing that Dundee United back four was: I have to agree with its being the best ever Scottish defence. Gough and Malpas did achieve a lot with the national team, though, being first choice players for years when we were qualifying for tournaments. Narey played well in two world cups, but I think Hegarty was hindered by having been involved in some defeats early on in his Scotland career and Jock Stein's always wanting to use Hansen in those early years, then the emergence of the McLeish-Miller double act from about 83 or 84. Our defence in 86 was the best we've sent to a world cup and Narey partnered Miller in the second and third games following an injury to McLeish in the first. Hegarty and he, though, were seen a just a shade below McLeish and Miller as a central defensive partnership. Unfortunately, our midfielders and forwards did not get to the same level in the mid 80s.