Why were we so shite for so long?

[YassinMoutaouakil]

Like most folk my age who are too young to remember 98, this is the first genuinely good Scotland team I've ever experienced, apart from brief and fleeting moments under McLeish and Strachan.  Aside from that, for the two decades I've been aware of the Scottish national football team, they've generally been shite.

How did this happen? How did we manage to completely drop off a cliff from 1998 onwards from being perennial qualifiers before? Was it just a regression to the mean after a few decades of overachievment? Did we just stop producing good players randomly? Were we gradually getting worse but nobody noticed until it was too late? I've read a few Soccernomics-y explanations about the fall of Communism introducing about a dozen more countries that we had to compete with for qualification spaces,  which makes at least partial sense to me, but you'd think there must be more to it than that.

[LauriestonBairn]

Signing foreign players became more fashionable with the rise of the English Premier League. Scottish clubs followed suit to the detriment of home gown players. We cant compete with finances down south so I think a lot of teams have put a bit more focus into youth development. 

[dundeefc1783]

All of factors involved in this also not helped by the break up of the Soviet Union, and Yugoslavia etc as many competitive nations came off the back of that eg Croatia, Ukraine, Serbia etc.

[Cptn Hooch]

7 hours ago, LauriestonBairn said:

Signing foreign players became more fashionable with the rise of the English Premier League. Scottish clubs followed suit to the detriment of home gown players. We cant compete with finances down south so I think a lot of teams have put a bit more focus into youth development. 

 

7 minutes ago, dundeefc1783 said:

All of factors involved in this also not helped by the break up of the Soviet Union, and Yugoslavia etc as many competitive nations came off the back of that eg Croatia, Ukraine, Serbia etc.

Hard to disagree with both of these. Look how successful Croatia have been recently. The focus on youth in Scotland has been a huge factor in turning our fortunes around. For too long we relied on ageing players who had failed at every attempt to qualify for a tournament like Scott Brown, Allan McGregor, Barry Ferguson, Charlie Mulgrew, Matt Phillips, Steven Fletcher, Darren Fletcher. With clubs in England looking to Scottish talent more often it's giving our youngsters a better level of coaching and experience. When was the last time we had as many players playing in some of the top leagues in Europe. Patterson, Gilmour, Tierney, Robertson, Adams, McTominay, Hanley, McGinn, Armstrong, McLean, Cooper, Fraser all play in the EPL and Hickey is playing regularly in Serie A. Previously we were relying on a squad full of EFL jobbers and we were chopping and changing so often. Nowadays it feels like the majority of the squad can be predicted before the selection as we have a solid core of players.

[The Moonster]

I'd say looking back it's clear the "Pro-Youth" road we went down was absolutely useless. For a couple of years the local side I played with came up against more than a few of these sides and they were almost always teams full of wee guys and coaches thinking they were in the big time with no actual concentration on technical ability or tactics. It was all physical and using intimidation to win the game. 

I haven't been involved at any level of football for years now but there seems to be a much bigger focus on making players technically good first and foremost and you can see it with the first few boys coming through the performance schools. I'm still not completely convinced the performance schools and "elite" academys are the best we can do but they certainly appear to improve ability in our players. 

[Donathan]

The 1986 World Cup qualifiers had 32 teams competing for 12 slots plus 1 intercontinental playoff (which we ended up in and won, beating Australia 2-0 on aggregate)

 

 

Now there’s 55 countries competing for the same 13 places.

 

 

 

 

[Binos]

7 minutes ago, The Moonster said:

I'd say looking back it's clear the "Pro-Youth" road we went down was absolutely useless. For a couple of years the local side I played with came up against more than a few of these sides and they were almost always teams full of wee guys and coaches thinking they were in the big time with no actual concentration on technical ability or tactics. It was all physical and using intimidation to win the game. 

I haven't been involved at any level of football for years now but there seems to be a much bigger focus on making players technically good first and foremost and you can see it with the first few boys coming through the performance schools. I'm still not completely convinced the performance schools and "elite" academys are the best we can do but they certainly appear to improve ability in our players. 

I blame ricky sbragia 

[afca32]

I think having an astute manager is certainly one of the key reasons for our recent good form. I don't think all the previous incumbents were useless, but Clarke seems to be getting more out of the players than most have. I think, for the most part, we've generally had a reasonable group of players but the current squad is certainly one of the strongest this century.

I do think the performance schools are working at least to some extent, but IMO we need to see more Scottish players given a chance in our top flight. At the moment it seems like there are some really good technical players coming through, but outside them not that many are being given a real shot with a lot of more experienced but really mediocre imports blocking their path a bit.

[craigkillie]

For too long we relied on ageing players who had failed at every attempt to qualify for a tournament like Scott Brown, Allan McGregor, Barry Ferguson, Charlie Mulgrew, Matt Phillips, Steven Fletcher, Darren Fletcher.

You think that picking good players like Barry Ferguson, Allan McGregor, Scott Brown and Darren Fletcher was the issue, rather than the useless ones who were alongside them?

If you were ruling out players that had previously failed to qualify then unfortunately that means no Marshall, Gordon, Robertson, Tierney, Hanley, Armstrong, Fraser, Forrest any more. Do you think we'd be a better team without those guys?

[HuttonDressedAsLahm]

It’s a culmination of so many issues. Teams are cyclical. Even the very best nations on Earth have down periods as they ‘re-build’. The best countries see it coming and adjust ahead of time. Those less prepared, or with less strength in depth (see Ireland recently; Netherlands of mid/late 2010s; Italy in same period; Scotland at end of Strachan’s reign) will suffer during the transition.

The next one to watch how they cope is Belgium. Their last chance may have passed in ‘18, and ‘21. Their last friendlies showed their pivot to playing new faces.

We do seem to be creating better players. At least, the very best 4-5 players in our XI are as good as anything we’ve created since the 90s. Tierney, Robertson, McGinn, Gilmour, and McGregor would walk into the starting Xi in the last 20-25 years. Even the next tier, Adams, McTominay, Patterson etc would have started in most teams. 

Even our peripheral/non-guaranteed players (Armstrong, Christie, Hendry, Cooper, Fraser etc) would have played for most squads.

We do seem to be entering a ‘Golden Generation’ period (relatively speaking for us). The only way for it to mean anything is for us both to qualify for tournaments, and ensure the conveyor belt keeps going (I.e. find another young goalkeeper, striker, centre half in the next few years).

Our team is young enough that there’s no urgency at all in finding depth (beyond GK and ST), and we just be able to enjoy this side for the next couple of qualifications.

Edited April 2, 2022 by HuttonDressedAsLahm

[Clown Job]

3 hours ago, Donathan said:

The 1986 World Cup qualifiers had 32 teams competing for 12 slots plus 1 intercontinental playoff (which we ended up in and won, beating Australia 2-0 on aggregate)

 

 

Now there’s 55 countries competing for the same 13 places.

 

 

 

 

Aye but 4 years later we managed to qualify for Euro 92

It was an 8 team tournament at the time. 

[craigkillie]

To do so we finished ahead of Switzerland, Romania, Bulgaria and San Marino. Some good teams in there certainly, but no world beaters.

[Donathan]

4 hours ago, HuttonDressedAsLahm said:

It’s a culmination of so many issues. Teams are cyclical. Even the very best nations on Earth have down periods as they ‘re-build’. The best countries see it coming and adjust ahead of time. Those less prepared, or with less strength in depth (see Ireland recently; Netherlands of mid/late 2010s; Italy in same period; Scotland at end of Strachan’s reign) will suffer during the transition.

The next one to watch how they cope is Belgium. Their last chance may have passed in ‘18, and ‘21. Their last friendlies showed their pivot to playing new faces.

We do seem to be creating better players. At least, the very best 4-5 players in our XI are as good as anything we’ve created since the 90s. Tierney, Robertson, McGinn, Gilmour, and McGregor would walk into the starting Xi in the last 20-25 years. Even the next tier, Adams, McTominay, Patterson etc would have started in most teams. 

Even our peripheral/non-guaranteed players (Armstrong, Christie, Hendry, Cooper, Fraser etc) would have played for most squads.

We do seem to be entering a ‘Golden Generation’ period (relatively speaking for us). The only way for it to mean anything is for us both to qualify for tournaments, and ensure the conveyor belt keeps going (I.e. find another young goalkeeper, striker, centre half in the next few years).

Our team is young enough that there’s no urgency at all in finding depth (beyond GK and ST), and we just be able to enjoy this side for the next couple of qualifications.

You can add Germany of the last few years to that list.

IIRC from the 2006 World Cup to Euro 2016 inclusive, they reached the semi finals of every single major tournament. That’s got to be unprecedented 6 in a row for a European side. They won the 2014 World Cup and reached the final of euro 2016. It was the nucleus of the side that was built for their home World Cup and then supplemented with some players that emerged in 2010 like Muller and Ozil.

 

Since then, they were papped out of Russia 2018 in the groups and then comfortably beaten by England in the first knockout round of the Euros.

 

I think they’re on the verge of getting back to competing in the latter stages. 

 

[oneteaminglasgow]

8 hours ago, Donathan said:

The 1986 World Cup qualifiers had 32 teams competing for 12 slots plus 1 intercontinental playoff (which we ended up in and won, beating Australia 2-0 on aggregate)

 

 

Now there’s 55 countries competing for the same 13 places.

Aye, but a lot of those additional 23 teams are almost always absolutely shite. Taking Russia, Czechia and Serbia as successor nations to previous uefa members, then it’s probably only 3 or 4 of the new countries who’re consistently any good.

Obviously 3 or 4 new decent countries does make it more difficult for us, but, imo, the reality is that us being pretty poor for a long time has more to do with us having a lack of quality. 

[sparky88]

17 hours ago, YassinMoutaouakil said:

 I've read a few Soccernomics-y explanations about the fall of Communism introducing about a dozen more countries that we had to compete with for qualification spaces

Came to post something to this effect. As a result, I would suggest the current Scotland is better than the 1998 one but difficult to compare. 

Also PlayStations and no summer football.

[Donathan]

26 minutes ago, oneteaminglasgow said:

Aye, but a lot of those additional 23 teams are almost always absolutely shite. Taking Russia, Czechia and Serbia as successor nations to previous uefa members, then it’s probably only 3 or 4 of the new countries who’re consistently any good.

Obviously 3 or 4 new decent countries does make it more difficult for us, but, imo, the reality is that us being pretty poor for a long time has more to do with us having a lack of quality. 

The only ones to have actually taken tournament slots are Croatia, Bosnia-Herz, Latvia, North Macedonia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Ukraine.

 

Several more of the new members have, however, actively prevented us from qualifying for tournaments by taking results off us while out direct rivals beat them. Faroe Islands, Lithuania, Georgia and Belarus all spring to mind. Could argue Kazakhstan too although technically we ended up qualifying for the tournament in which they’d beaten us in qualifying. 

[oneteaminglasgow]

36 minutes ago, Donathan said:

The only ones to have actually taken tournament slots are Croatia, Bosnia-Herz, Latvia, North Macedonia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Ukraine.

 

Several more of the new members have, however, actively prevented us from qualifying for tournaments by taking results off us while out direct rivals beat them. Faroe Islands, Lithuania, Georgia and Belarus all spring to mind. Could argue Kazakhstan too although technically we ended up qualifying for the tournament in which they’d beaten us in qualifying. 

Again, I’d argue that that’s been down to our lack of quality rather than anything else. It’s only really Croatia who’ve qualified on a very regular basis of the new countries.

Edit: Switzerland also sorting their act out and becoming perennial qualifiers after almost 30 years without qualifying for anything hasn’t helped either, but again I’d say that’s a side issue.

Edited April 2, 2022 by oneteaminglasgow

[lubo_blaha]

I think attitude and professionalism amongst Scottish players has definitely improved. There are fewer players who act like they’ve made it after their first pro contract and drinking is less of a feature than 10+ years ago. I couldn’t imagine a boozegate scandal with the current crop of players.

[Gordopolis]

32 minutes ago, lubo_blaha said:

I think attitude and professionalism amongst Scottish players has definitely improved. There are fewer players who act like they’ve made it after their first pro contract and drinking is less of a feature than 10+ years ago. I couldn’t imagine a boozegate scandal with the current crop of players.

Good point. Obviously there was the utterly sozzled conga after Belgrade, but I think we can forgive them that one!

[lubo_blaha]

Good point. Obviously there was the utterly sozzled conga after Belgrade, but I think we can forgive them that one!

They’re not all teetotal (although some are) but I don’t think as many players are going out drinking every week like some were 15/20 years ago. Having a blow out after a big win is understandable, even if you have important Nations League games a few days later.