Steve Clarke - in/out/general discussion

[ScottishZizou]

Just now, 2426255 said:

I don't think achieving something extraordinary should be the minimum. He has been brought in to achieve the goals he has been set and he's done that. We are trying to build up the game in this country and to do that we need to qualify for major tournaments first and foremost. That's why he won't be sacked, because he's achieving what he needs to.

So you think performing less than almost every other country in Europe with any degree of footballing pedigree is enough to keep the job for a very long term?

[Armand 2]

Heard an interview with Ralston on BBC, suggesting they'll look back on this and feel proud. Admire his optimism but I think the only emotion the squad will feel towards this tournament will be utter regret, similar to that which Clarke will surely feel after his bizarre post-match rant.

He can spin this with the denied penalty and the lengthy injury list going into the tournament but the cold hard facts are that we've barely laid a glove on six countries over two tournaments. Clarke is responsible for a large part of that, for sure, but some of our big players simply haven't turned up: McGinn, McTominay, Robertson, the eternally-injured Tierney. Adams has been getting it tight but a) I don't think he's a lone striker and b) we've given him absolutely zero support or service.

When the dust has settled, I would be surprised if Clarke doesn't want one more go at getting to a World Cup. And despite the drudgery that has been inflicted on us in the last 10 days, I think he has enough credit in the bank to avoid being pushed out the door. 

[2426255]

4 minutes ago, ScottishZizou said:

So you think performing less than almost every other country in Europe with any degree of footballing pedigree is enough to keep the job for a very long term?

No. If the terms of his contract are changed after 2026 (when his existing deal is up) that might reflect higher pay and different requirements moving forward. He would need to be paid off to get rid of him presently because he has met his targets. That were reasonable objectives when the contract was signed in 2023.

Fans weren't talking about getting out our Euro-2024 group when we played Cyprus in Mar-2023. So fans are just getting ahead of themselves in my view.

Edited June 24 by 2426255

[Butters Scotch]

1 hour ago, 2426255 said:

You asked my opinion and I gave you my answer and my reasoning behind it, which is robust. 

• 3atb is fundamentally not different to 4atb. Teams play between those shapes and many others in a game depending on the situation in a game.
• The issues in the game last night have been seen with other teams and it's been seen with our team regardless of it being 3atb or 4atb. Gibraltar v Scotland?
• You are trying to link the two, The system and the performance - I don't know why, but you're overlooking correlation ≠ causation. 

I don't see any robust reasoning here, just someone that is being purposely obtuse about what's staring them in the face, someone that doesn't want to admit that they're wrong. 

Its been explained in Lehman's terms by several posters including myself about why playing with three natural CB's in a must win game is conservative and a bad game plan. You're better off dropping one of the midfielders deeper to play as the third CB to keep our shape if required, someone that can defend as well as being progressive on the ball. 

Not gonna go back and forth on this as you've lost all credibility. Toodles. 

[Butters Scotch]

1 hour ago, No_Problemo said:

It isn’t so much about the formation, as the personnel last nights formation lead to. 

When we are chasing a goal and the game is getting stretched do we want three centre halves who can’t move the ball progressively, or an extra creative midfielder or striker that can support us going forward. 

Starting with three centre halves was absolutely fine, he just took far far too long to change it. 

Starting with three CB's in this Scotland team is all that is wrong with us tbh, we are just as shit defensively as we are going forward even with KT in there yet we persist on playing it without him. Game plan was off from the start and we could of done with an extra midfielder in there from the beginning to give Gilmour and McGregor more options to play into. 

[2426255]

2 minutes ago, Butters Scotch said:

I don't see any robust reasoning here, just someone that is being purposely obtuse about what's staring them in the face, someone that doesn't want to admit that they're wrong. 

Its been explained in Lehman's terms by several posters including myself about why playing with three natural CB's in a must win game is conservative and a bad game plan. You're better off dropping one of the midfielders deeper to play as the third CB to keep our shape if required, someone that can defend as well as being progressive on the ball. 

Not gonna go back and forth on this as you've lost all credibility. Toodles. 

Why when we played a back-4 against Northern Ireland and against Gibraltar did we run into similar problems? 

[Bing.McCrosby]

3 minutes ago, 2426255 said:

Why when we played a back-4 against Northern Ireland and against Gibraltar did we run into similar problems? 

lowest shots/goals in the tournament? And still we were bang on the money last night brilliant 

[Butters Scotch]

3 minutes ago, 2426255 said:

Why when we played a back-4 against Northern Ireland and against Gibraltar did we run into similar problems? 

Half strength teams in meaningless friendlies weeks out from one of the biggest tournaments of these players careers? Relying on boys like Forrest and Shankland as our main attackers? Think you're forgetting we had a lot more chances in both games also. Give me strength. 

[RedLichtie86]

End of the day his remit is get Scotland to major championships and to perform at the highest level.

He has got us to 2 of 3 major chamionships. EURO 2020 via play offs. EURO 24 by main qualifiers.

But he has FAILED to have us perform at the highest level.

[Thumper]

Clarke is unsackable and I fully expect him to continue on but his wildly xenophobic outburst in the post-match shows that he's completely out of ideas. The entire team is based around Robertson, Tierney and Dykes and if they're not there (or just aren't being very good) then he's completely scunnered.

He's had a good squad to pick from and overall favourable conditions for qualifying, which should be the bare minimum expected considering. Once he's actually gotten to a tournament he's frozen up hard on all six occasions. Nobody last night had the slightest idea what they're doing which is ridiculous for a squad he's had for five years and two finals.

[ArabFC]

19 minutes ago, Armand 2 said:

Heard an interview with Ralston on BBC, suggesting they'll look back on this and feel proud. Admire his optimism but I think the only emotion the squad will feel towards this tournament will be utter regret, similar to that which Clarke will surely feel after his bizarre post-match rant.

Hardly surprising that Ralston will look back with pride. He probably never imagined being the starting player in a Euros. That will be the peak of his career.

[Self-raising Lazarus]

2 minutes ago, RedLichtie86 said:

End of the day his remit is get Scotland to major championships and to perform at the highest level.

He has got us to 2 of 3 major chamionships. EURO 2020 via play offs. EURO 24 by main qualifiers.

But he has FAILED to have us perform at the highest level.

Pretty much where I am. Was largely positive about Clarke as I thought he'd done well to get us to tournaments and in spells last year we looked a right good team. Sadly that's fallen  apart, and the other side of "he's got us to tournaments" Is we have these spells of getting terrible results, 3-0 in the aviva, no show in the world cup play off, and now two euros. 

[Crùbag]

Need a poll on this.

I think he's done his time. Several top end players have underperformed for the past few months - friendlies and Euros included. He's been loyal to repeat offenders who ship goals and passes. He takes too long to make subs.

He's done well but it has to end here.

Who now? Moyes? McInnes? Not sure, maybe the latter though.

[Mr Heliums]

24 minutes ago, Armand 2 said:

Adams has been getting it tight but a) I don't think he's a lone striker and b) we've given him absolutely zero support or service.

But the reason so frequently given for his selection is that  he's said to be the only one who is suited to playing the lone striker role. I don't see it.

Agree about the service, but away from that I thought Adams verged on counterproductive - he set up two great opportunities for Hungary by giving away daft free-kicks.

[2426255]

1 minute ago, Butters Scotch said:

Half strength teams in meaningless friendlies weeks out from one of the biggest tournaments of these players careers? Relying on boys like Forrest and Shankland as our main attackers? Think you're forgetting we had a lot more chances in both games also. Give me strength. 

You're saying they're half strengths meaningless friendlies now, but before you were saying they were a part of our winless run, bad form etc. So they were important then, but not important now. There are problems to be solved if we want to achieve our longer aim of competing consistently at a higher level - that's not in dispute. I think you're moving the goalposts to be honest.

[HuttonDressedAsLahm]

5 minutes ago, Crùbag said:

Need a poll on this.

I think he's done his time. Several top end players have underperformed for the past few months - friendlies and Euros included. He's been loyal to repeat offenders who ship goals and passes. He takes too long to make subs.

He's done well but it has to end here.

Who now? Moyes? McInnes? Not sure, maybe the latter though.

If McInnes is the answer, I have absolutely no idea what the question is.

[Pens_Dark]

Having had the time to calm down and think about it, I'm still leaning towards Clarke to go. 

He's done brilliant getting us to two tournaments but the performances when they get there just aren't up to scratch. As thankful as we need to be for getting us there in the first place it needs to be reiterated that he has had a really good pool of players to choose from - we should be doing a lot better with that pool. 

I don't massively like the Moyes shout to be honest as I think a lot of people would be disappointed with how he would approach games also..

Don't know who the answer is but it feels like right now is a good time to book-end his Scotland career and freshen it up for the world cup qualifiers.

[TheGoon]

The SFA will not sack Clarke and I really don’t see him walking before 2026, so it’s a bit of a moot point. 

I’ve been a very big defender of him, and he’s been dealt a shit hand with injuries this time around, but I just think the wheels have come off. 

Senior players are consistently underperforming now bar the odd exception, we look like rabbits in the headlights playing anyone half decent. The players themselves deserve criticism for going missing - but we simply dom’t have the pool to replace them. That means looking at the head coach.

It does sound ridiculous to say given where we were pre-Clarke, but it isn’t as much of an achievement reaching the Euros as it once was. Managers should really be judged on how we perform there - we’ve failed miserably.   

[Butters Scotch]

1 minute ago, 2426255 said:

You're saying they're half strengths meaningless friendlies now, but before you were saying they were a part of our winless run, bad form etc. So they were important then, but not important now. There are problems to be solved if we want to achieve our longer aim of competing consistently at a higher level - that's not in dispute. I think you're moving the goalposts to be honest.

Think you're getting me muddled up with someone else and clutching at straws. 

All games are important whether they are friendlies or not, it allows us to try out new players, tactics, systems etc but you are implying we struggled using a back 4 system in friendly games where we didn't play full strength teams and I'm sure the players weren't giving their all weeks out before the tournament. Reaching. 

[Armand 2]

1 minute ago, Mr Heliums said:

But the reason so frequently given for his selection is that  he's said to be the only one who is suited to playing the lone striker role. I don't see it.

Agree about the service, but away from that I thought Adams verged on counterproductive - he set up two great opportunities for Hungary by giving away daft free-kicks.

Yeah, I wouldn't agree with that either. I think he puts in a lot of work that it can be difficult to appreciate unless you're in the stadium but he clearly doesn't give us the same outlet as Dykes does; and that's a big problem in this system when you are relying on the front man holding it up to let players like McGinn and McTominay get up the pitch.