Ryan Gauld

[forameus]

No wonder we never win anything.  One player who looks like he might have a bit of talent and everyone's clamouring for him to be thrown straight in, comparing him to Renato Sanches and Kingsley Coman.  Jesus wept.

[The Moonster]

No wonder we never win anything.  One player who looks like he might have a bit of talent and everyone's clamouring for him to be thrown straight in, comparing him to Renato Sanches and Kingsley Coman.  Jesus wept.

 

He won't ever be as good as Gareth Bale so we may as well just cancel his contract at Sporting and have him play for Glasgow City.  At least there he can't embarrass us any more.

[54_and_counting]

There's a bit of a difference. Sanches is a first team regular for Benfica, and Coman has already won league titles in three different countries and is a first team player for one of the biggest clubs in the world. Gauld is playing in the Portuguese second division.

No one is saying that gauld can play gor France or portugal, what we are saying is that if they are good enough they are old enough, and let's face it the current midfielders arent exactly qualification experts are they, so why not try out our best prospect in that position?

[ExiledSaint]

No wonder we never win anything.  One player who looks like he might have a bit of talent and everyone's clamouring for him to be thrown straight in, comparing him to Renato Sanches and Kingsley Coman.  Jesus wept.

I wasn't comparing Gauld to either of those players, I was only trying to highlight the different mentalities between Scotland, who seem to be fearful of playing young midfleiders, and Portugal or France, who seem to feel if a player is good enough then it doesn't matter the age of them.

 

There is no way that Gauld would do a worse job for our midfield than Craig Bryson, James McArthur or Scott fucking Brown!

[54_and_counting]

No wonder we never win anything. One player who looks like he might have a bit of talent and everyone's clamouring for him to be thrown straight in, comparing him to Renato Sanches and Kingsley Coman. Jesus wept.

No one compared their ability, just their ages and that you dont have to be over 30 to be good enough for your country

[Deeboy]

No one is saying that gauld can play gor France or portugal, what we are saying is that if they are good enough they are old enough.

What makes you think he's good enough?

[woof!]

We'll know by the beginning of September if Scott Brown is past it or not. If with a good pre-season he can reproduce his best form, then he's s big asset. If it's more of the same as last season, then he needs to go.

[bigmacDFC]

McArthur and Fletcher both play for decent premier league teams every week; Gauld plays in the second tier of Portuguese football.

Hopefully Gauld becomes the player we all want him to be, but to suggest he replaces solid premier league players at the moment is just cringeworthy.

Can see the argument for having him in the squad and even trying him out in friendlies. Could be a massive year for him and he may very well play himself into the team.

[kenny131]

Get him playing now we cant do any worse thats for sure

[LinkinFighter]

He can do a lot worse

[kenny131]

He can also do better

[54_and_counting]

What makes you think he's good enough?

 

thats the point, we wont know unless he's given a shot, what we do know is that brown and co ARENT good enough given their repeated failure to qualify for tournaments

 

i could always argue that one of the best teams in portugal for developing talent apparently, thought that gauld was good enough to spunk a few mill on him as a teenager,

[haggisbeastie]

 

He won't ever be as good as Gareth Bale so we may as well just cancel his contract at Sporting and have him play for Glasgow City.  At least there he can't embarrass us any more.

The ironic thing is that Spurs fans used to deride the young Gareth Bale. This was when Rednapp persisted in playing him as a left back for a while ; a period when Bale was slammed by fans for never being part of a winning side for a number of games...

Then everything changed, when he was finally played in a forward position & rest is history.

Point is that even the best players can struggle if not given proper chance in right circumstances.

Scottish players with Gauld's ability are so rare. Frankly, if he can handle going to a foreign country and developing among high-quality peers, he should be in the Scotland squad, at least.

I bet if he was welsh he would have had a number of caps already...

[craigkillie]

9 hours ago, ExiledSaint said:

I wasn't comparing Gauld to either of those players, I was only trying to highlight the different mentalities between Scotland, who seem to be fearful of playing young midfleiders, and Portugal or France, who seem to feel if a player is good enough then it doesn't matter the age of them.

 

There is no way that Gauld would do a worse job for our midfield than Craig Bryson, James McArthur or Scott fucking Brown!

Darren Fletcher got his debut at 19 and captained Scotland at the age of 20.  Scott Brown got his debut at 20, James Forrest was 19, Barry Bannan was 20, Charlie Adam was 21.  Even this year, John McGinn (21), Oliver Burke (18) and Barrie McKay (21) got their debuts in midfield.

The whole "couldn't be worse" thing doesn't make any sense.  We are competitive in qualifying groups, and actually went up a seeding pot as a result of our performance in the last qualifying campaign.  It could be much worse - we could pick a bunch of players who aren't actually poorer than the current crop and end up finishing 5th in the World Cup qualifying group, sending us into a downward spiral seeding-wise.

As an aside, I'm not sure why you keep going on about Craig Bryson, who has played 7 minutes for Scotland in the last two and a half years, and has never appeared for us in a competitive match.

[forameus]

8 hours ago, craigkillie said:

Darren Fletcher got his debut at 19 and captained Scotland at the age of 20.  Scott Brown got his debut at 20, James Forrest was 19, Barry Bannan was 20, Charlie Adam was 21.  Even this year, John McGinn (21), Oliver Burke (18) and Barrie McKay (21) got their debuts in midfield.

The whole "couldn't be worse" thing doesn't make any sense.  We are competitive in qualifying groups, and actually went up a seeding pot as a result of our performance in the last qualifying campaign.  It could be much worse - we could pick a bunch of players who aren't actually poorer than the current crop and end up finishing 5th in the World Cup qualifying group, sending us into a downward spiral seeding-wise.

As an aside, I'm not sure why you keep going on about Craig Bryson, who has played 7 minutes for Scotland in the last two and a half years, and has never appeared for us in a competitive match.

Absolutely this.  I hate this "couldn't be worse" mentality, because it comes from people who would be screaming even louder once it did, in fact, become worse.  I don't follow the U21 team as much, beyond results, but has Gauld even been that impressive for them?  Where is the sense in then promoting a player who is yet to make a first team appearance?  Just saying "it couldn't be worse" is absolute pish, for the reasons that Craig has just said.

The time to judge Scott Brown wasn't last season - if he still looks the same lumbering presence that he was last season in the run-up to our first qualifier, then fair enough, he probably shouldn't be a starter.  But with a good pre-season behind him, and better fitness, I doubt he's going to be anywhere near as bad.

17 hours ago, ExiledSaint said:

I wasn't comparing Gauld to either of those players, I was only trying to highlight the different mentalities between Scotland, who seem to be fearful of playing young midfleiders, and Portugal or France, who seem to feel if a player is good enough then it doesn't matter the age of them.

 

There is no way that Gauld would do a worse job for our midfield than Craig Bryson, James McArthur or Scott fucking Brown!

 

As Craig said, we have had history of giving players debuts at a younger age.  There's little difference in mentality between those countries - if we had a talent like Sanches or Coman, they would be in the squad, absolutely no question.  Gauld is definitely one for the future, and I'd have him in the squad to get him bedded in (if he's not needed for the U21 squad) but he's not good enough to be starting games ahead of players who are playing at a much higher level.

[PrestersKTID]

16 minutes ago, forameus said:

  Where is the sense in then promoting a player who is yet to make a first team appearance?  

I believe he's played for Sportings first team in cup games. I'd have him in the squad at least. If he were still at Dundee united would he be playing first team football? Undoubtedly, so why does that make him any different to a Mcginn say, who's had his full debut?  

[thisGRAEME]

2 minutes ago, PrestersKTID said:

I believe he's played for Sportings first team in cup games. I'd have him in the squad at least. If he were still at Dundee united would he be playing first team football? Undoubtedly, so why does that make him any different to a Mcginn say, who's had his full debut?  

Haven't you just answered your own question, here?

[forameus]

59 minutes ago, PrestersKTID said:

I believe he's played for Sportings first team in cup games. I'd have him in the squad at least. If he were still at Dundee united would he be playing first team football? Undoubtedly, so why does that make him any different to a Mcginn say, who's had his full debut?  

My mistake then, I didn't know he had in cup games.  I'd agree he should be in the squad at least, but I completely disagree with the "we can't do any worse" attitude that could well see him getting scapegoated if it inevitably did get worse.

[54_and_counting]

14 hours ago, craigkillie said:

Darren Fletcher got his debut at 19 and captained Scotland at the age of 20.  Scott Brown got his debut at 20, James Forrest was 19, Barry Bannan was 20, Charlie Adam was 21.  Even this year, John McGinn (21), Oliver Burke (18) and Barrie McKay (21) got their debuts in midfield.

The whole "couldn't be worse" thing doesn't make any sense.  We are competitive in qualifying groups, and actually went up a seeding pot as a result of our performance in the last qualifying campaign.  It could be much worse - we could pick a bunch of players who aren't actually poorer than the current crop and end up finishing 5th in the World Cup qualifying group, sending us into a downward spiral seeding-wise.

As an aside, I'm not sure why you keep going on about Craig Bryson, who has played 7 minutes for Scotland in the last two and a half years, and has never appeared for us in a competitive match.

no one said pick a "bunch of players" we're talking about a scottish player who sporting lisbon deemed good enough as a teenager to spend millions on, when do we take the plunge with guys like Gauld, do we wait until scott brown, darren fletcher etc fail to qualify for their 9th tournament, or 10th, where does it stop

i agree we are competitive now in groups, strachan deserves praise for that, but we need to take that next step and these players that are competitive have yet to make it to a finals, nothing says that they will change that record this coming tournament

[forameus]

33 minutes ago, 53_and_counting said:

no one said pick a "bunch of players" we're talking about a scottish player who sporting lisbon deemed good enough as a teenager to spend millions on, when do we take the plunge with guys like Gauld, do we wait until scott brown, darren fletcher etc fail to qualify for their 9th tournament, or 10th, where does it stop

i agree we are competitive now in groups, strachan deserves praise for that, but we need to take that next step and these players that are competitive have yet to make it to a finals, nothing says that they will change that record this coming tournament

It stops when the manager in charge at the time deems him good enough.  I just don't buy this whole "we never give them chances" attitude.  A while back he went on record as saying he would give young players a spot in squads to get them experience of being in the group, but admittedly I think that died down a little once the matches that really mattered came in.  If these players were good enough to make a significant difference to our fortunes, it doesn't matter if they're 16, 26 or 36, they'd be in there. 

So, assuming that that's the reason why he isn't picked, is that such a bad thing?  I've always said we should save two or three slots in each squad for players like him, but given he's regularly involved with the U21s, is it really such a travesty that he doesn't get dragged across Europe with no chance of playing?

Also, I wouldn't bracket him in with Scott Brown and Darren Fletcher.  From what I remember of Gauld, he's much more likely to slot in as the one behind the striker.  In that case, he's up against some of our better players.  Is he likely to get in in front of Maloney, Ritchie, Snodgrass or Naismith?  Or even Steven Fletcher or similar forward if they decide to go with a similar system to against Denmark?  I dare say that if Gauld was a striker in the Fletcher mould, or a competent central defender, we might have seen more willingness to get him in.