Next Scotland Manager Mk II

[Rodhull]

I’m certainly no Strachan fan but the idea of getting rid of him and ending up with Gemmell as the replacement should result in at least a couple of the people leading the recruitment losing their positions.

It’s hard to see how that could be spun as an improvement at all.

[The Moonster]

I think this is just some PR work from the SFA.  Everyone is worried we'll appoint McLeish or Malky, so they've leaked Gemmill's name to the press and got the word out he's favourite. Now, when McLeish is inevitably appointed everyone will just be glad it isn't Gemmill.

[KingBeastie]

I'd much rather Gemmill than McLeish.

I actually think Gemmill could prove to be a really good appointment.  I'll probably be proved totally wrong on that. (my crystal ball's not working at the moment so who knows!)

Michael O'Neill had hardly managed at the greatest level when he got an international job.  Any appointment is a risk really but I think Gemmill couldn't possibly do any worse than Levein or Burley and would be considerably more progressive than Strachan.  Southgate's doing alright, he was appointed from a similar position (I am aware they have a much better pool to pick from, I'm just referring to his previous role).

I'm not saying I want him to get the job, just that I don't think it's as big a risk as everyone is making out and it also has a few unique positives to it, compared to other potential candidates.

The last time we gave it to the ex U21's coach was Craig Brown I think, that didn't turn out too badly.

[nsr]

What does the new manager need to do in order to succeed that the last few managers haven't been able and/or willing to do?

[forameus]

6 minutes ago, nsr said:

What does the new manager need to do in order to succeed that the last few managers haven't been able and/or willing to do?

Not really a whole lot, to be honest.  We've been close on a number of occasions, but short of pointing to the key games we lost/drew and saying "just win them", I'm not sure what any new manager could actively do.  Pick the best players we have available, set them out in a manner that maximises our strong areas without making our weaknesses worse.  Once we finally make it to a tournament, things will likely look a lot better.  Things probably looked pretty shit for Northern Ireland and Wales, but now they've qualified I doubt many are looking back and saying "Aye, but member before?"

[Ira Gaines]

I think better performances against sides we should be beating would be a decent start. Losing out to much better sides shouldn't be held against a new manager so long as we go into those games with a bit of belief. Even losing out to sides around our level shouldn't be seen as terrible so long as it isn't a consistent thing and we stay competitive.

[Peppino Impastato]

23 minutes ago, KingBeastie said:

I'd much rather Gemmill than McLeish.

I actually think Gemmill could prove to be a really good appointment.  I'll probably be proved totally wrong on that. (my crystal ball's not working at the moment so who knows!)

Michael O'Neill had hardly managed at the greatest level when he got an international job.  Any appointment is a risk really but I think Gemmill couldn't possibly do any worse than Levein or Burley and would be considerably more progressive than Strachan.  Southgate's doing alright, he was appointed from a similar position (I am aware they have a much better pool to pick from, I'm just referring to his previous role).

I'm not saying I want him to get the job, just that I don't think it's as big a risk as everyone is making out and it also has a few unique positives to it, compared to other potential candidates.

The last time we gave it to the ex U21's coach was Craig Brown I think, that didn't turn out too badly.

Aye, slightly different calibre of player lol.  Brown actually did fairly poorly with what he had to work with and wasn't a very good manager as evidenced by his shit club career.  No idea what makes you think gemmell would be a progressive appointment either.

 

I don't think people are really understanding of how much better our players used to be.  There is a picture of our France 98 team on general nonsense it's incredible how much better they are than anything since, and they were regarded then as not nearly as good as we used to be.

[KingBeastie]

3 minutes ago, Peppino Impastato said:

Aye, slightly different calibre of player lol.  Brown actually did fairly poorly with what he had to work with and wasn't a very good manager as evidenced by his shit club career.  No idea what makes you think gemmell would be a progressive appointment either.

 

I don't think people are really understanding of how much better our players used to be.  There is a picture of our France 98 team on general nonsense it's incredible how much better they are than anything since, and they were regarded then as not nearly as good as we used to be.

Maybe "progressive" is the wrong word, what I am clumsily trying to get at is that we seem to be looking at two options:

1. We appoint a known Scottish manager or someone with connections to managing in Scotland (eg: Lennon), which I don't feel is very good choice, we've tried this again and again, or...

2. We appoint a proven international manager.  If we went down that route I feel O'Neill would have been a good appointment but he doesn't want it, so we have to look elsewhere.

I think Gemmill knows the SFA, now for good or bad that's an advantage - he knows the old duffers and how they operate, he knows who needs appeased, who to ignore, etc.  He's respected by the younger players it seems, his experience is on the international arena (not at senior level I admit), he's also played international football.

Again I am not saying that he is the man for the job, nor would he be my choice, just that I don't think it's as bad a choice as everyone is making out.

 

[Honest_Man#1]

14 minutes ago, Randy Giles said:

I think better performances against sides we should be beating would be a decent start. Losing out to much better sides shouldn't be held against a new manager so long as we go into those games with a bit of belief. Even losing out to sides around our level shouldn't be seen as terrible so long as it isn't a consistent thing and we stay competitive.

I think also not treating games against the top seed of the group as a “free hit” like Strachan and others before have done is a must. Other teams take points from these games whilst we rarely do, and it has been the difference in qualifying or not.

Definitely focusing on winning games against the rotten teams is the main thing though.

[KingBeastie]

38 minutes ago, nsr said:

What does the new manager need to do in order to succeed that the last few managers haven't been able and/or willing to do?

I think picking a decent squad and starting 11 would be a good start.  Strachan lost so much goodwill and patience with his squad selections I feel. 

[nsr]

15 minutes ago, Peppino Impastato said:

I don't think people are really understanding of how much better our players used to be.  There is a picture of our France 98 team on general nonsense it's incredible how much better they are than anything since, and they were regarded then as not nearly as good as we used to be.

Isn't it more a case of us standing still while some other countries have used diet, training, technique etc far more effectively and professionally, leaving us behind?

[KingBeastie]

4 minutes ago, Honest_Man#1 said:

Definitely focusing on winning games against the rotten teams is the main thing though.

We are the "rotten team"!
This is why the other qualify.

[KingBeastie]

1 minute ago, nsr said:

Isn't it more a case of us standing still while some other countries have used diet, training, technique etc far more effectively and professionally, leaving us behind?

[Honest_Man#1]

1 minute ago, KingBeastie said:

We are the "rotten team"!
This is why the other qualify.

We are a better team than Georgia. We are better than Lithuania. We are a mid-level team in terms of qualifying groups, and need to beat the teams below us that everyone else beats.

[Peppino Impastato]

1 minute ago, nsr said:

Isn't it more a case of us standing still while some other countries have used diet, training, technique etc far more effectively and professionally, leaving us behind?

Maybe, that's a different debate, my point is we had a team and squad full of guys playing at a cracking level who had really really good careers.  We don't have that now in comparison.

[The Moonster]

45 minutes ago, nsr said:

What does the new manager need to do in order to succeed that the last few managers haven't been able and/or willing to do?

Mentality would be a good thing to change for me.  A manager who has belief in the players to go out and get the results we expect, rather than shitehawking it and playing defensively hoping to snatch things. A manager who can pass that belief onto the players would make a difference. As much as I agree our players aren't as good as they used to be, they're still good enough to qualify for tournaments IMO, mentality seems to be an issue for us.

[nsr]

Just now, Peppino Impastato said:

Maybe, that's a different debate, my point is we had a team and squad full of guys playing at a cracking level who had really really good careers.  We don't have that now in comparison.

I'm not disagreeing, I'm suggesting the reason is that other countries have got better while we've stood still and our players can't compete at the same level as they used to.

[KingBeastie]

1 minute ago, Honest_Man#1 said:

We are a better team than Georgia. We are better than Lithuania. We are a mid-level team in terms of qualifying groups, and need to beat the teams below us that everyone else beats.

I wasn't serious, poor attempt at humour.  Sorry!

[nsr]

1 minute ago, The Moonster said:

Mentality would be a good thing to change for me.  A manager who has belief in the players to go out and get the results we expect, rather than shitehawking it and playing defensively hoping to snatch things. A manager who can pass that belief onto the players would make a difference. As much as I agree our players aren't as good as they used to be, they're still good enough to qualify for tournaments IMO, mentality seems to be an issue for us.

I'd agree with that. Our mentality can be summed up as "We're Scotland and we're pish".

[velo army]

I honestly don't think he took the Germany games as a free hit. During the game in Berlin he made a tactical change which completely baffled Germany, put them on the back foot and got us a goal (Fletcher coming on and playing a deep-lying centre forward role. The German CB's were utterly at sea for about 15 mins). Naismith hit the post and the German winner came about because of a huge error by McCarthy and the ball just careened off Muller. They were jammy as f**k to win that. It could easily have been 2-1 to us.

Again, I think people are confusing Strachan's pronouncements to the media with his actual approach to the game. He always just fed the media shite. Always. His job with the media was to take the pressure off the players. He appeared to do that and the players loved him for it. He will talk the talk of "we're not expected to get anything from them, so we're just going to go out and play", but in the dressing room you know he's firing them up and focusing on the weaknesses of these big teams.

I know it's all done now, but reckon a lot of the misunderstanding of Strachan is that too many people read too much into what he said to the media. I reckon he made mistakes in team selection and was far too late in calling up Griff and the other Celtic lads, but having gone unbeaten in 2017 it seems insane that he would get sacked now. The SFA are making a huge arse of getting someone better too, on that we can all agree.