Steve Clarke - in/out/general discussion

[deadasdillinger]

It's mental how little it takes for folk to want rid of our best manager in 25 years or so. A lot of football fans are thick.

[Bing.McCrosby]

2 minutes ago, deadasdillinger said:

It's mental how little it takes for folk to want rid of our best manager in 25 years or so. A lot of football fans are thick.

I find it surprising that people just compare generations as if their all the same and no team improves or gets worse.

It's the best team we've had in that time, with the easiest pathway to getting to the euros. Comparing him to previous managers and saying "he's done the best" is what is thick.

[Chripper]

38 minutes ago, Kadouken_ said:

You keep going on about different formations as if it’s a negative or as if whatever formation we line up in is the most important thing and that managers can’t play different shapes. 
 

It’s the style of play, coaching and player selection that will determine how we play and approach games. 

Of course it is.

It's like people saying that a trio at the back is a negative system. It's not black and white.

As you rightly said, the nuances are the coaching and the instructions, etc.

Another nuanced element is how good the manager is at conveying his instructions and how good the players are at implementing said instructions.

However, if all you have are English Championship/SPL standard centerbacks, you simply cannot play with four at the back at a  major football tournament.

It's asking the centerbacks to play at a level where they don't play at club level.

You can't expect Porteous and Hanley to play as a duo against any of the top 24 nation in Europe.

With a trio at the back  it congests and fills in spaces. It's as simple as that. Friday wasn't a good illustration of this, but it's worked for us over 5+ years.

The people who want to rip up this successful qualification blueprint must be tired of Scotland qualifying for tournament.

Are we getting results whilst we're there? No. But that's another story altogether.

[Kadouken_]

10 minutes ago, SlayerX said:

Of course it is.

It's like people saying that a trio at the back is a negative system. It's not black and white.

As you rightly said, the nuances are the coaching and the instructions, etc.

Another nuanced element is how good the manager is at conveying his instructions and how good the players are at implementing said instructions.

However, if all you have are English Championship/SPL standard centerbacks, you simply cannot play with four at the back at a  major football tournament.

It's asking the centerbacks to play at a level where they don't play at club level.

You can't expect Porteous and Hanley to play as a duo against any of the top 24 nation in Europe.

With a trio at the back  it congests and fills in spaces. It's as simple as that. Friday wasn't a good illustration of this, but it's worked for us over 5+ years.

The people who want to rip up this successful qualification blueprint must be tired of Scotland qualifying for tournament.

Are we getting results whilst we're there? No. But that's another story altogether.

Says who? You keep stating opinions as if they’re facts. 
 

Playing 2 CB’s can be far more tighter defensively with coaching than we’ve been for the last year or so with 3 at the back. It all depends on who’s in charge and what they do.

 

Just saying we need to play 3 CB’s means absolutely nothing without any context  

 

[tree house tam]

I don't think he has the tactical nuance of a top manager but that's just my opinion. Sure he is dealt a fairly shite hand with managing Scotland but I don't think he'd do any better with top, top players. This Wednesday will tell us a lot about Clarke because Switzerland are like a shite Germany, similar tactics and philosophy but with inferior players. Will Clarke have learned? or will he f**k another Euros? Time will tell.

[No_Problemo]

3 hours ago, velo army said:

Robbo isn't a teetotaler and McGinn doesn't strike me as one who follows a Ronaldoesque approach to diet. I remember also the Aberdeen youth team players would often come into TGIs and order the utter shite we had. 

I'm talking about the country as a whole and not just about this team. I appreciate that change is happening and , for instance, you're getting more fit and active 40 year olds now and folk take it more seriously, so there is probably more room for optimism than I'm allowing.

Robertson and McGinn are two players who have got absolutely everything out of their ability, and continuously improved so I’m pretty sure both are very professional!

I think there is so some over aggregation of what utter shite food is, because you occasionally get continental coaches doing bizarre things like outlawing tomato sauce. 

[Chripper]

1 hour ago, Kadouken_ said:

Playing 2 CB’s can be far more tighter defensively with coaching than we’ve been for the last year or so with 3 at the back. It all depends on who’s in charge and what they do.

 

Just saying we need to play 3 CB’s means absolutely nothing without any context  

 

We had 18 years of failure with coaching with two centerbacks by five managers.

Are you saying that all five managers are bad? A manager who won Euro 96 being one of them as well as a Scotland centerback.

SAF, Guardiola and Ancelotti could coach our centerbacks and make then tournament ready.

I gave you context. I simplified things by saying that with 3 players there's going to be less space if there was 2. It's basic physics.

Yes, of course there has to be coaching and practising, etc.

A team with zero coaching isn't going to succeed, regardless of their system.

If a manager coaches a team who play with two centerbacks, and he coaches a team who plays with three centerbacks, the three is going to be tighter, more compact and there's going to be less space for the opposition.

If coached properly.

Steve Clarke's first match was 08/06/19 and he changed formation 04/09/20. It took Steve Clarke 15 months to identify our problem.

It took him to do in 15 months what 5 managers couldn't do in 18 years.

Levein, McLeish and Strachan all flirted with our current system. But they all bottled it when the media and fans were upset that it wasn't bringing wins.

Strachan played our current system when we drew and almost beat them at Hampden.

if you disagree, i'm fine with that. I respect your opinion.

It's not my job to convince you, nor will it slight me if you disagree.  

Edited June 17 by SlayerX

[ogoftheskye]

One problem might simply be that we've been well found out in terms of how we play. Going back to Spain at Hampden, they didn't do their homework on us and we caught them stone cold. There were a lot of eyes on us after that victory, and subsequent to that any top level opposition manager would've made sure they're not caught out in the same way, and that's not difficult to do given we don't look like we can readily adapt to another shape.

[Chripper]

19 minutes ago, ogoftheskye said:

One problem might simply be that we've been well found out in terms of how we play. Going back to Spain at Hampden, they didn't do their homework on us and we caught them stone cold. There were a lot of eyes on us after that victory, and subsequent to that any top level opposition manager would've made sure they're not caught out in the same way, and that's not difficult to do given we don't look like we can readily adapt to another shape.

Could be.

That's why football is always evolving. I would change variables with our current system. I wouldn't make wholesale changes.

The Spain match was a strange one. They make about 6 changes from their previous match. They expected to win with a weakened team.

Edited June 17 by SlayerX

[Pocketman]

1 hour ago, tree house tam said:

I don't think he has the tactical nuance of a top manager but that's just my opinion. Sure he is dealt a fairly shite hand with managing Scotland but I don't think he'd do any better with top, top players. This Wednesday will tell us a lot about Clarke because Switzerland are like a shite Germany, similar tactics and philosophy but with inferior players. Will Clarke have learned? or will he f**k another Euros? Time will tell.

"top top players" and a FIFA top 20 team are a "shite Germany". All about opinions etc etc

[Willie adie]

13 hours ago, BB_Bino said:

As someone who has coached Goalkeepers across a number of academies in Scotland for 17 years and has attended many SFA Goalkeeper Coaching courses and CPD events over that time, I would say that I am qualified enough to tell you that this is nonsense!

I think the whole campaign has been "pretty fkn shite" if i'm being honest. McSauce stepping up in big moments and the win against Spain has simply papered over how bad it's been. Cyprus at Home was an absolute slog and was hugely frustrating until he banged in 2 in the last few minutes (despite leading through McGinn), Norway away was so under par until the last 10 minutes but thankfully we kept ourselves compact and in the game until then and we able to come up with 2 bits of magic, just in time. Georgia was no better, but with the conditions and delays was understandable...we got through it, England, Spain and France.....who cares, they're good teams and we have already qualified......Georgia and Norway, again very poor but we didn't lose and we have qualified so who cares.

Delighted we qualified, of course, and love the main players in the squad along with Clarke, but don't for a minute believe that we are anything other than a small nation with deficiencies that is starting to run out of luck.

I'm interested  then to know  why we see keepers very rarely catch the ball now compared  to when I was growing  up in the 80s, 

[Theroadlesstravelled]

Clarke's win record is worse than Strachan's.

Strachan had some shite to work with. 

[tree house tam]

16 minutes ago, Pocketman said:

"top top players" and a FIFA top 20 team are a "shite Germany". All about opinions etc etc

Scotland have no top top players and Switzerland are a shite Germany.

[ogoftheskye]

13 hours ago, BB_Bino said:

As someone who has coached Goalkeepers across a number of academies in Scotland for 17 years and has attended many SFA Goalkeeper Coaching courses and CPD events over that time, I would say that I am qualified enough to tell you that this is nonsense!

I think the whole campaign has been "pretty fkn shite" if i'm being honest. McSauce stepping up in big moments and the win against Spain has simply papered over how bad it's been. Cyprus at Home was an absolute slog and was hugely frustrating until he banged in 2 in the last few minutes (despite leading through McGinn), Norway away was so under par until the last 10 minutes but thankfully we kept ourselves compact and in the game until then and we able to come up with 2 bits of magic, just in time. Georgia was no better, but with the conditions and delays was understandable...we got through it, England, Spain and France.....who cares, they're good teams and we have already qualified......Georgia and Norway, again very poor but we didn't lose and we have qualified so who cares.

Delighted we qualified, of course, and love the main players in the squad along with Clarke, but don't for a minute believe that we are anything other than a small nation with deficiencies that is starting to run out of luck.

I think that's a pretty rough assessment. If you're less than brilliant there's always going to be an element of exploiting fine margins (Strachan used to talk about something similar, and there was a few almosts in his time). We beat those margins in the latter part of the last WC qualification, and did the same to qualify with a couple of games to spare for this one. Since about September last year we've capitulated so badly we've forgotten we were ever capable of having that edge.

You can fluke the odd victory, but you can't fluke the form that got us here, or to the World Cup play-off. It's horrendous that form disappearing in the run-up to a major finals, but to say we were shite en-route is a bit silly.

[Gordopolis]

9 hours ago, SlayerX said:

Irrespective of who the manager is, when the dust has settled and the Euros are over I would move Hickey to the no 6/anchorman position.

Both Thomas frank and Levein have both said that he'll eventually play there. So why not now. 

A pairing of Hickey and Gilmour has potential.

You fair haver the pish, but this is spot on. He's destined for that role.

[Chripper]

Watching Kante it makes it more apparent that we need an anchorman.

The previous real top ones we had were McCall and Lambert. Not sure I would include Brown, but I can understand why people would.

I just hope in the qualifiers Clarke moves Hickey in the 6 role. The lad is a class act and he's destined for a move to a top club.

Hopefully it's soon as I can see Brentford being relegated when Frank leaves.

 

[2426255]

3 minutes ago, SlayerX said:

Watching Kante it makes it more apparent that we need an anchorman

Ryan Jack is on his way.

[Monkey Tennis]

4 hours ago, deadasdillinger said:

It's mental how little it takes for folk to want rid of our best manager in 25 years or so. 

A case can be made for this, but that's more a reflection of the competition than anything else.

I think it's easy to exaggerate our achievements under Clarke.

 

With almost half of the continent qualifying for the Euros now, getting there is nothing special.  We've still missed out on World Cups which are harder to reach but came close last time after starting poorly.

As noted, we've struggled in most of our crunch games.

We've done fine under Clarke.  I see no particularly urgent need to either stick or twist.  Either approach could be justified.

[AJF]

13 hours ago, deadasdillinger said:

It's mental how little it takes for folk to want rid of our best manager in 25 years or so. A lot of football fans are thick.

Every manager has a shelf life though, and I fear Clarke’s may be nearing an end should we go out the competition with a whimper.

The drastic difference in our performances and results recently when compared to our early/mid qualifying campaign suggests there’s something not quite right. Hopefully he can turn it around though.

[Lex]

8 hours ago, Monkey Tennis said:

A case can be made for this, but that's more a reflection of the competition than anything else.

I think it's easy to exaggerate our achievements under Clarke.

 

With almost half of the continent qualifying for the Euros now, getting there is nothing special.  We've still missed out on World Cups which are harder to reach but came close last time after starting poorly.

As noted, we've struggled in most of our crunch games.

We've done fine under Clarke.  I see no particularly urgent need to either stick or twist.  Either approach could be justified.

Agree with this. Qualifying for every Euros needs to be the absolute minimum expectation of every Scotland manager. I'm not having just making the tournament is some kind of achievement. It was when there only 16 teams in it, it certainly isn't when there's 24 slots available.

UEFA has 55 nations, when you accept that there is at least eight that have never and will never qualify for a thing - San Marino, Gibraltar, Lichtenstein, Luxembourg, The Faroes, Andorra, Moldova, Malta amongst several others - then more than half of the nations that could make the tournament will make the tournament.  Then of the 24 that make it 16 of them get past the group stage. It's became quite a difficult tournament to get knocked out of before the last 16. 

I know that shitehawk Strachan somehow kept his job after finishing 4th in a 6 team group trying to get us to Euro 2016, and that seems to have set some kind of precedent that Clarke is doing a fantastic job just getting us there. He's not. 

What would be him doing a fantastic job is actually making an impact at the tournament - something we've shown no signs of doing thus far - or qualifying for a World Cup. Something he failed at last time around despite having a very kind qualifying group and then a very kind play off route. Denmark, Ukraine and Wales stood in our way FFS.

Personally, I think if we finish bottom of the group here it's time for him to move on. He's had a good run at it, five years in total, two full campaigns. Most international managers don't get anywhere near that. There's been some decent results and performances but there's also been plenty of bad ones and finishing bottom of this group three years after finishing bottom of our last one will show we are flatlining at best. On the other hand, if we somehow get through this group he should keep his job. Let's see how the next two games go.