🔵🟡Scotland v Poland 🔴⚪

[ahemps]

When I heard the lineup last night I felt so deflated as there was nothing new when we are crying out for some change. However the performance was actually very good and the players on the park clearly still want to be there and are trying.

3 individual errors from players who probably should be squad players now (McLean generally always has been) and Clarke continuing to play the same personnel and getting the same results is very frustrating.

The saying 'doing the same thing and expecting different results' applies to our manager just now. 

[troopio]

Knew as soon as I saw the line up we would lose. I predicted the 11 correctly, Clarke and his shoddy Loyalty Picks of Fat Hanley, Usless McLean, Bombscare Ralston and Dick Van Dykes.

John overrated McGinn also anonymous again but because of who he is gets off with Murder too.

Ralston, Fat Hanley and McLean should be instantly jettisoned but we ALL KNOW Clarke looks at Loyalty first and all 3 will start on Sunday. If any of them are dropped it will be another Bombscare in Porteous coming in with Gauld maybe getting a full Debut.

I do not care if team played well, I would rather play awful and win. When points are at stake you do what you have to do to win, no one remembers teams who played well and lost. All that matters is the end result.

Clarke picked this team, Clarke showed loyalty to certain players and it backfired, he either gets a backbone and drops these players who have cost us dearly or he pays the price with his job because his record this past 18 months would get most people sacked.

 

[Insert Amusing Pseudonym]

24 minutes ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

So be it then.  Did, you, I or anyone other than Steve Clarke have them in our thoughts four months ago ?

Did anyone ever think about Ryan Gauld for Scotland?  

No, you're right enough,  can't ever remember people wanting him involved

[shivute]

With regards the Gilmour substitution. He looked to have been struggling for about 10 mins before he actually came off. Feeling his leg, limping off the ball.

I wasn't surprised he went off and I would suspect he may be a doubt for Portugal.

[Dunning1874]

While it was always going to be the biggest stick to beat Clarke if we didn't win, I could see the logic in picking McLean.

The alternatives to play beside Gilmour and open up a space to freshen things up further forward were McTominay who's wasted as an attacking threat when he plays deeper, McGinn who lacks the positional discipline to be trusted defensively there, Christie who has never played there for Scotland and ultimately had a good game as a winger, or Barron who is worse than McLean.

I'd prefer Christie there personally but there was a credible argument that starting McLean beside Gilmour to allow Christie to play further forward and provide some attacking width is better than either not having as much width or starting one of the natural wingers in Morgan (in the same never going to be quite good enough to start for Scotland regularly category as McLean having played at a lower level for most of his career) or Doak (has started four games in his career) to get it.

Of course, whether fairly or unfairly it does play into a perception of conservatism and unwillingness to change things, the fact you then see McLean make a f**k up in the build up to the first goal only makes things worse (albeit that mistake is forgotten about if we have a competent goalkeeper to make that simple save) and we're at the point where the logic behind decisions being sound before a defeat doesn't really matter: Clarke needs to get results and once again didn't.

[kennie makevin]

54 minutes ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

By that interesting logic a nation like Croatia could lay claim to being the best-performing in international football.  Population size is a facile argument.

In terms of context, whilst last night WAS a close game and a narrow defeat, it continued a depressing sequence of results, with yet more costly errors which simply can't be ignored. 

Uruguay , twice World Cup winners and no idea how many South American championships has a smaller population than Scotland. They are by some distance the best performing nation by population size in football history. 

[FK1Bairn]

Don't have too much to add to what's already been said but that defence last night was abysmal. Three of the five (Gunn, Ralston and Hanley) simply shouldn't be getting games at this level and neither should McLean. 

We obviously have been impacted by long term injuries to Hickey, Patterson, Tierney and to a lesser extent Lewis Ferguson but if their replacements are such a massive drop in quality then we're always going to struggle. Doesn't mean we should accept mediocrity or stupidity in decision making.

For what it's worth I did enjoy the game last night. Somebody else has already said that you get a great view in the South Stand Upper and I'd absolutely agree with that. We had no width other than Robertson and Christie in the first half. Loads of us could see the first penalty coming before Poland even got into the box.

The goalkick routine does my head in, especially the long ball out right to McGinn in the second half. I don't think he won a single ball, even the Poland fans beside me agreed with my rant about that at the time!! 

I haven't seen it mentioned yet but I thought the Polish fans were brilliant last night

[eez-eh]

8 hours ago, Forza Alba said:

In amidst all the hand wringing, we have narrowly lost to a nation with 7x more people than us, who we at least matched throughout, due to two poor defensive mistakes leading to penalties and a long range effort from them.

We will be fine. No need to over analyse.

Good fight to get back into it. We are still weak at right back, no news there. Maybe if we have 30m more people to select from we would have a better right back, it is what it is.

Yes let’s look purely at their population and ignore that they aren’t actually very good.

When we lose to Croatia will that be a bitter disappointment because they have fewer people than us?

[TheScarf]

Croatia and Uruguay are better than Scotland because they, like nearly every nation in the top 75 of the world rankings, will have better youth coaches, who teach youngsters how to actually be footballers.  

The population of a country is completely irrelevant.

[Aufc]

It’s quite amusing that we can’t seem to product a decent striker but can produce various right and left backs. 
 

Thought we played well. The four at the back worked well. However, you cannot commit those daft fouls and expect to win games at any level, even more so at international level. Glad to see gauld and doak get a shot. Hopefully they stay in the squad. Add in Lewis Ferguson and got some decent options. Thought mctominay was superb last night. 

[Aufc]

1 minute ago, TheScarf said:

Croatia and Uruguay are better than Scotland because they, like nearly every nation in the top 75 of the world rankings, will have better youth coaches, who teach youngsters how to actually be footballers.  

The population of a country is completely irrelevant.

To be fair, it is not completely irrelevant. It’s clearly a contributing factor to what makes a successful international real. It is not the only reason as you mentioned above

[Scary Bear]

9 minutes ago, eez-eh said:

Yes let’s look purely at their population and ignore that they aren’t actually very good.

When we lose to Croatia will that be a bitter disappointment because they have fewer people than us?

Have we ever beaten Poland in a competitive game?

Their forward plays for Barcelona, ours plays for Birmingham City. Not looked at who the rest of their squad plays for but I’d assume the players are with decent clubs around Europe. Despite that we should have got our usual 2-2 draw with them.

Edited September 6 by Scary Bear

[FK1Bairn]

I've just seen the second penalty on TV! Wtf is Hanley thinking??

[Groundhopping Adventures]

8 hours ago, Forza Alba said:

In amidst all the hand wringing, we have narrowly lost to a nation with 7x more people than us, who we at least matched throughout, due to two poor defensive mistakes leading to penalties and a long range effort from them.

We will be fine. No need to over analyse.

Good fight to get back into it. We are still weak at right back, no news there. Maybe if we have 30m more people to select from we would have a better right back, it is what it is.

I'd be raging if we lost to India, China, Pakistan or Indonesia but I know what you mean

[Binos]

29 minutes ago, Dunning1874 said:

While it was always going to be the biggest stick to beat Clarke if we didn't win, I could see the logic in picking McLean.

The alternatives to play beside Gilmour and open up a space to freshen things up further forward were McTominay who's wasted as an attacking threat when he plays deeper, McGinn who lacks the positional discipline to be trusted defensively there, Christie who has never played there for Scotland and ultimately had a good game as a winger, or Barron who is worse than McLean.

I'd prefer Christie there personally but there was a credible argument that starting McLean beside Gilmour to allow Christie to play further forward and provide some attacking width is better than either not having as much width or starting one of the natural wingers in Morgan (in the same never going to be quite good enough to start for Scotland regularly category as McLean having played at a lower level for most of his career) or Doak (has started four games in his career) to get it.

Of course, whether fairly or unfairly it does play into a perception of conservatism and unwillingness to change things, the fact you then see McLean make a f**k up in the build up to the first goal only makes things worse (albeit that mistake is forgotten about if we have a competent goalkeeper to make that simple save) and we're at the point where the logic behind decisions being sound before a defeat doesn't really matter: Clarke needs to get results and once again didn't.

Would love to see the bbc team picker for percentage of line ups that contained McLean 

My guess 2%

[Bacchus]

Scotland and their defensive woes continue. Other than Roberson and the ever injured Tierney we do not have any international class defenders. Last night McKenna a free agent no English Championship or Div 1 team wanted him. Hanely only played 61 min of football this season nowhere near match fit gives away a penalty. Ralson Celtics reserve right back came off the bench 3 times for Celtic played 27’, 9’ and 15’ a total of 51 min game time another not match fit. He too gives away a penalty. 
Defenders from the EURO Finals: Cooper without a club, Hendry (Celtic reject) now playing in Arabia. Porteous cannot get a game for Watford.
Scotland’s problem no young defenders on the horizon. 
The team is scoring goals but until we get better defenders, we will struggle to score more goals than we concede. 
 

[Binos]

1 minute ago, Bacchus said:

Scotland and their defensive woes continue. Other than Roberson and the ever injured Tierney we do not have any international class defenders. Last night McKenna a free agent no English Championship or Div 1 team wanted him. Hanely only played 61 min of football this season nowhere near match fit gives away a penalty. Ralson Celtics reserve right back came off the bench 3 times for Celtic played 27’, 9’ and 15’ a total of 51 min game time another not match fit. He too gives away a penalty. 
Defenders from the EURO Finals: Cooper without a club, Hendry (Celtic reject) now playing in Arabia. Porteous cannot get a game for Watford.
Scotland’s problem no young defenders on the horizon. 
The team is scoring goals but until we get better defenders, we will struggle to score more goals than we concede. 
 

Scott McTominay is scoring goals 

[eez-eh]

5 minutes ago, Scary Bear said:

Have we ever beaten Poland in a competitive game?

Their forward plays for Barcelona, ours plays for Birmingham City. Not looked at who the rest of their squad plays for but I’d assume the players are with decent clubs around Europe. Despite that we should have got our usual 2-2 draw with them.

Dunno.

Their players seem to play for slightly better teams overall but they aren’t a brilliant team. They failed to qualify outright from a much easier qualifying group as ours and had to scrape past Wales on penalties in the play-offs.

[Scary Bear]

2 minutes ago, Bacchus said:

Scotland and their defensive woes continue. Other than Roberson and the ever injured Tierney we do not have any international class defenders. Last night McKenna a free agent no English Championship or Div 1 team wanted him. Hanely only played 61 min of football this season nowhere near match fit gives away a penalty. Ralson Celtics reserve right back came off the bench 3 times for Celtic played 27’, 9’ and 15’ a total of 51 min game time another not match fit. He too gives away a penalty. 
Defenders from the EURO Finals: Cooper without a club, Hendry (Celtic reject) now playing in Arabia. Porteous cannot get a game for Watford.
Scotland’s problem no young defenders on the horizon. 
The team is scoring goals but until we get better defenders, we will struggle to score more goals than we concede. 
 

Agreed. 

Clarke’s ethos of making the international side into a club side only works when most of the players are fit and getting a game for their club side. When that isn’t happening we have him playing players who are out of form and aren’t getting a game for their club sides. That’s not a recipe for success.

[craigkillie]

8 minutes ago, Bacchus said:

Scotland and their defensive woes continue. Other than Roberson and the ever injured Tierney we do not have any international class defenders. Last night McKenna a free agent no English Championship or Div 1 team wanted him.

McKenna plays for Las Palmas in La Liga.