Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 vs Switzerland 🇨🇭

[2426255]

5 minutes ago, An Absolute Imposter said:

Thanks for all the positive feedback.

So the general consensus is I am talking shite.

Bit if context would be appreciated. I mostly watch non-league so don't see this highly skilled professionals very often.

You've been found out for the absolute Imposter that you are at this level of the game.

[The Moonster]

8 minutes ago, An Absolute Imposter said:

Thanks for all the positive feedback.

So the general consensus is I am talking shite.

Bit if context would be appreciated. I mostly watch non-league so don't see this highly skilled professionals very often.

I can provide some context to my red dot. Your post was absolute shite from start to finish.

[Chripper]

I watched the entire 90 minutes ago. (I'm cool that way...) 

It's amazing how much different a football match is from watching it with fresh eyes than it is from nervous eyes. 

On first viewing I though the trio at the back were akin to the three stoogies.  On second viewing, they were OK. Not great, but solid enough to give them pass marks. 

On first viewing Gilmour was alright. Not great. Certainly not how he is either Brighton.  On second viewing he was really good. He controlled the tempo and showed his usual composure.  

Scott McTominay played a blinder. It was like there was two of him on the pitch. One who shadowed Xhaka and one who was in the middle of Adams and McGinn. 

There's a reason Ole, Mourinho, Rangnick and ten Hag have given Scott 250+ appearances at Manchester United. You assign him a job and he does it without moaning or being belligerent. You can trust him.

McGinn and Adams are taking unfair criticism. Both worked their socks off and did a lot of unselfish work.

Gunn was back to Qualification Angus Gunn. 

Robertson and McGregor were both excellent.  

My only concern is Anthony Ralston. To his credit he did recover from him mistake, but he had a couple of dodgy moments where he let his man cut inside to shoot. 

All in all it was a really good performance against a side who are far more experienced at tournament football: 

Switzerland: average age - 30.4 - 778 caps - 84 goals

Scotland: average age - 28.4 - 459 caps - 45 goals 

The good thing is that we now know what we need to do. Beat Hungary and that will most probably see us through. 

In Euro 20 every team that ended up with 4 points progressed to the next round.

[LIVIFOREVER]

3 hours ago, Alert Mongoose said:

I guess if you take into consideration the recipient of the pass then you make an argument it was. Players should be aware of who they are passing it to. 

Giving that pass to Gilmour - not a hospital pass

Giving it to Ralston - hospital pass

 

3 hours ago, Lex said:

It's bouncing, it's fast, and he has a player on him. And it's Tony Ralson, that's a hospital pass for me. 

Nah a hospital pass is when your having to commit yourself fully to getting the ball and risking being injured, when you barely have time to get a touch on it and you know you're getting clobbered.

Suicidal passing it to Ralston would be a better description, knowing how shite he is he'd prob give the ball away.

Edited June 20 by LIVIFOREVER

[2426255]

1 minute ago, SlayerX said:

It's amazing how much different a football match is from watching it with fresh eyes than it is from nervous eyes. 

It's a totally different experience, it's more clear headed. Added to that you miss so much watching it only once. There's an incredible amount of things going on concurrently during a football match. Same with a good film, song, book or even a place: The more you revisit it the more depth is revealed. 

[invergowrie arab]

2 hours ago, Lyle Lanley said:

How did anyone feel getting the train before the fan walk last night? 

Felt it was dangerously uncomfortable trying to get onto the train. 

It seemed to be raw luck that nothing bad happened. Absolutely no crowd management.

Other than trains that was an all timer away trip. Every tournament should be in Germany.

For me the main thing about last night was that we looked like we deserved to be there. Could have won it and could have lost it but the optimist in me says we can still move up a gear.

[Merkie84]

A weird one. 
 

Before the game and numerous times in the second half I was very worried we were going to lose and be all but out. 

However , it does feel like a game we could have nicked but they are probably saying the same on fondue and toblerone.com so a draw probably about right. 
 

Decent response  after Friday but not great. But we are still alive and all to play for. 
 

At least the task facing us against Hungary is uncomplicated ( but not necessarily easy). Any win is required. It sometimes confuses matter  when a draw could be enough. 
 

Should  be a very open game as a draw suits neither team. 

[Don Diego De la Vega]

14 hours ago, SlayerX said:

Only one 3rd placed team in Euro 20 qualified to the next round with 3 points.

In total, three 3rd placed teams finished with three points in Euro 20.

It's possible to qualify with 3 points, but I wouldn't bank on it, especially with our goal difference.*

100% of the teams who finished with 4+ points qualified.

We need to win to guarantee a place in the next round.

*D'oh!

 

 

Imagine we qualified with 2 points?

Given Croatia and Albania are on one point each and the dream scenario now would be Georgia/Czechia and Poland/Austria all draw in these fixtures then get best by the big 2 in the groups in round 3 of games then a draw would be enough on Sunday to have us in the pot, pending the pumping of those other 6 teams.

 

easy peasy Steve Clarke knighted 

Edited June 20 by Don Diego De la Vega

[PrestersKTID]

It's no surprise that the mistake leading to the goal involved 2 players with the least amount of game time in the last season.

Hanley overall was solid but some of his passing was poor. His pass to gilmour was brutal but we still should've dealt with it.

Ralston is only in the squad because our first AND second choice fullbacks are out. It was a bad pass but an outrageous finish all the same.

He kept it fairly simple after that. 

[An Absolute Imposter]

 So many experts out there I see.

Why can't our boys play out from the back, through midfield, retain possession rather than punts up the park.

If the boys play well against Hungary, will be straight on to admit I'm an idiot. Happy if I have to.

[oneteaminglasgow]

1 minute ago, An Absolute Imposter said:

Why can't our boys play out from the back, through midfield, retain possession rather than punts up the park.

They can - for example, the goal we scored last night. 

[oneteaminglasgow]

2 minutes ago, PeterRulesOK said:

The goal where mcgregor fell over the ball and was lucky to get it back before giving it to a player who played a tame pass to their goalkeeper?  

You seem intensely dim. 

[Braesoyetts]

Just now, oneteaminglasgow said:

You seem intensely dim. 

I’m going to second that.

if we got rid of Clarke before the last game, we’d be a laughing stock, and rightly so.

Also players fall over the ball all the time -football is hard, in case you’ve never played the game - even the best players.  McGregor did well to recover and play an intelligent pass that led to a goal.  Not McTominay’s best finishing, but proof positive of the fact that if you put a shot on target, it can go in (however it ends up getting in).

[Lex]

1 minute ago, Braesoyetts said:

Not McTominay’s best finishing, but proof positive of the fact that if you put a shot on target, it can go in (however it ends up getting in).

Looking at that goal back Schars error is even worse than Ralstons. It's a tame shot going straight at the keeper that he is going to catch never mind save, and he just sticks his foot out and boots it in the top corner. It's a really bizarre error from such an experienced player, good. 

[No_Problemo]

17 hours ago, S7C said:

It’s better, but celebrating a draw and the commentary team begging for one since half time sums up our mentality.

Even Clarke at the end there telling them to calm down instead of going for the win.

I hope we can do it but we’re the poorest team at the tournament based on the games I’ve watched. Very, very negative and quite limited. We play football from the last century.

Georgia are literally in the tournament, I’m not sure if you remember them being in our qualifying group. 

16 hours ago, Luddite said:

Everything I read the week before the tournament was that Shankland wasn’t good enough for the national squad and Che Adams had to start.

Adams scores a goal every 4 games in the English Championship and a goal every 5 games for Scotland.

I don’t care if it’s an English league, I’d play the in-form striker who’s scored 3 in 12 for Scotland and almost 2 goals every 3 games for Hearts….including 11 against Celtic/Rangers where you’d assume his team didn’t have the bulk of possession.

 

You’ve literally made that up. Adams generally sits at about one goal in four/five in the Premiership, not the championship. 

4 hours ago, Lyle Lanley said:

How did anyone feel getting the train before the fan walk last night? 

Felt it was dangerously uncomfortable trying to get onto the train. 

 

3 hours ago, accies1874 said:

On the songs, the posters above are right. I know I've gone on about on a few different match threads, but it's disgusting and needs to stop. 

Travel into Munich was fine for us as we got on a station early, though plenty on here have said that it was a fiasco and that's the impression I got passing through other stations. Entry into the stadium was a shambles, though, with a swarm of people just getting funnelled into an area with no direction whatsoever. 

Koln Hbf was incredibly dangerous getting to the stadium. More and more Scots started arriving and forcing the crowds towards where line of stewards blocking the stairs, there were random tourists/locals trying to push through the crowds, then some stewards saying that one stairwell was closed by the time we got to the front so tried to redirect us back to the crowd of Scotland fans heading in our direction. Turns out the stewards were talking shite. When we made it onto the platform it was empty and the train had loads of space, so it seemed like they were trying to avoid the overcrowding on the platform and trains but that just resulted in another dangerous situation in the station. I ended up snapping at one point. 

I reckon we'll just end up walking to the game in Stuttgart, as none of us want to experience a repeat of that.

Munich was absolutely horrific, I was at the fan march very early last night so that made things easier - the way back again though was awful. The lack of organisation is utterly wild.

We’ll be walking to Stuttgart  too - trains/trams moving at a snails pace while crushed to f**k for 45 minutes is just too much to bear again. 
 

As a last point - reading back through the thread during the game last night, and the absolutely unhinged seethe is utterly wild - could have thought you were reading about the Germany game. 

[Dons_1988]

35 minutes ago, No_Problemo said:

As a last point - reading back through the thread during the game last night, and the absolutely unhinged seethe is utterly wild - could have thought you were reading about the Germany game. 

At least the chat is football and not the national anthem. Progress. 

[Braesoyetts]

1 hour ago, Lex said:

Looking at that goal back Schars error is even worse than Ralstons. It's a tame shot going straight at the keeper that he is going to catch never mind save, and he just sticks his foot out and boots it in the top corner. It's a really bizarre error from such an experienced player, good. 

Yeah.  It’s one of those tricks of perception where we look at our own players’ shortcomings and magnify them, but watch other countries in the tournament and don’t notice as much how many errors and failings they have.  Like any sport, football is characterised more by failure than anything else, for all but the absolute best players.  It’s how you cope with those failures mentally that defines you.  
 

Just look at the number of own goals in this tournament.  

[An Absolute Imposter]

1 hour ago, oneteaminglasgow said:

They can - for example, the goal we scored last night. 

Watching Scotland is not as easy on the eye as most of the other teams on show. There is a nice flow to a lot of the football whereas Scotland is either rush/rush or too slow with no movement of players. There seems to be a fear factor comes out when playing for Scotland. Our midfield should be quite strong with all 4 Gilmour, McTominay, McGinn and McGregor decent players. Are they too worried about our defence to play their game.

Defensively very shaky, have no confidence in any of them in possession and seem to lose a fair proportion of defensive battles too.

When the midfield did get the ball down and moved it quickly they did put pressure on the Swiss backline.

I still standby that our passing needs to improve, too many times the recipient is having to fight to control a poor pass rather than focusing on developing the move. Too many players seem in a rush to almost get rid of the ball rather than trusting in themselves and teammates.

As was evident in both goals; Gilmours pass to Robertson and then onto McGregor and the final ball to McTom all allowed the move to flow resulting in a decent goal.

Whereas Hanley's abomination to Gilmour gave him no option but to get rid and then Ralston's panic at receiving the ball resulted in him kicking the ball away anywhere.

 

On a sour note poor Ralston is not an international footballer. The gap in quality between him on the right and Robertson on the left is monumental. Definitely not a WB, every time he received the ball you could almost smell the fear.

Change the system if not got a good enough RWB in squad, revert to a flat back four allowing a right sided midfielder to be the outball for that side. The balance of the team is wrong you can't always fit players into the system you want.

Fit the system to the players available. 

[Braesoyetts]

22 minutes ago, An Absolute Imposter said:

Watching Scotland is not as easy on the eye as most of the other teams on show. There is a nice flow to a lot of the football whereas Scotland is either rush/rush or too slow with no movement of players. There seems to be a fear factor comes out when playing for Scotland. Our midfield should be quite strong with all 4 Gilmour, McTominay, McGinn and McGregor decent players. Are they too worried about our defence to play their game.

Defensively very shaky, have no confidence in any of them in possession and seem to lose a fair proportion of defensive battles too.

When the midfield did get the ball down and moved it quickly they did put pressure on the Swiss backline.

I still standby that our passing needs to improve, too many times the recipient is having to fight to control a poor pass rather than focusing on developing the move. Too many players seem in a rush to almost get rid of the ball rather than trusting in themselves and teammates.

As was evident in both goals; Gilmours pass to Robertson and then onto McGregor and the final ball to McTom all allowed the move to flow resulting in a decent goal.

Whereas Hanley's abomination to Gilmour gave him no option but to get rid and then Ralston's panic at receiving the ball resulted in him kicking the ball away anywhere.

 

On a sour note poor Ralston is not an international footballer. The gap in quality between him on the right and Robertson on the left is monumental. Definitely not a WB, every time he received the ball you could almost smell the fear.

Change the system if not got a good enough RWB in squad, revert to a flat back four allowing a right sided midfielder to be the outball for that side. The balance of the team is wrong you can't always fit players into the system you want.

Fit the system to the players available. 

I agree with all this.  
 

With the caveat that despite this they did show pretty good energy, intensity and pressing for most of last night, making a team that is technically better than us look pretty nervous a lot of the time.

I do think we are less than the sum of our parts a lot of the time.  There’s a mental hurdle to overcome before we can push on and play at the level our players should - probably getting past that old barrier of qualification from a group stage.  Once we can do that, I think we’ll see much more belief from a Scotland team.

 

For those of you who know anything about baseball, it’s like the Red Sox winning the World Series.  The longer you go without being able to do it, the more it’s built up in your head as being an impossible task.  Once the Red Sox won the WS, they went on and did it another couple of times.  
You could say the same for Hibs and the Scottish Cup, but we’re still waiting for them to get another one after ‘16!

Edited June 20 by Braesoyetts
Added

[kingjoey]

6 hours ago, Alert Mongoose said:

I guess if you take into consideration the recipient of the pass then you make an argument it was. Players should be aware of who they are passing it to. 

Giving that pass to Gilmour - not a hospital pass

Giving it to Ralston - hospital pass

He had plenty of time to play the ball down the line.