Andy’s Sting In The Tale (28/06/24) “Where Does the Blame Lie?” – Scottish Football Supporters Association – SFSA

Date: 28th June 2024

(Photo:@Homesoffootball)

AKA Who Let Steve, and the Nation Down?

Last Sunday may have turned on a no-penalty decision and more ‘Ifs’ than in the top 10 Roger Whittaker song.
If the Argentinian ref had blown, if we had scored, if we had then held on, and if nothing else had changed, the Tartan Party across Germany would still be in full swing and we’d be all over Frankfurt on Monday night seeing if we could give Ronaldo an even bigger greetin-face than the Georgians did on Wednesday. Good luck to them against Spain.

Like Roger, ‘I don’t believe in if anymore’.

Immediately, after the game, talk about the manager’s performance and his future status into the Nations League and World Cup broke out.
And fair enough too.
We didn’t ever expect to come home with silver but we wanted to exit with our heads held high and I’m not sure we did.
Sadly Scotland’s Euros statistics will never look good even if we use the best tartan polish.
Out of 24 nations Scotland’s scores are:
Fifa Ranking 18^th
Population 21^st
Shots taken 23^rd
Goals conceded 24^th
Shots on target 24^th

Not great reading but ask any bookie and none of it was unexpected.

What hurts most is we were dull, totally outplayed by Germany and it just never happened on the parks.
Serial underperformers Scotland.

So where do we go from here?

I don’t think our SFA have the answers.
They’ve certainly had enough time over the years to future proof a conveyor belt of good kids.

Truth is we were lucky to hire Steve and he has over-delivered for us.
That said maybe it is or maybe it isn’t his time.
It should be his decision when he’s had time to think it over.
I hope he stays.

What is a positive is that at long last there is growing realisation that Scottish football just doesn’t produce enough players of the right calibre.
Ergo we have just delivered what we deep down deserved.

Across Scotland even the Red Tops are starting to see that the solution to this is not about bringing in a new manager.

I was talking about Scotland’s tournament with some old Spartans team mates while losing golf balls on Tuesday when Sunday’s  outcome was still raw.
Most of the guys were disappointed by the tactics but like me still supportive of Steve and his management team and pretty sanguine and united about the principal reason why we have failed again.
Yes our tactics were defensive and we maybe didn’t change what we were doing fast enough.
And Steve is low key in media interviews.

But the real issues are deeper than that.

Our system is simply and inexorably incapable of delivering the right players to our national side.

We’re just not good enough when compared to other nations.

Why?

There are lots of interlinked and complex and complicated reasons but the biggest one was agreed unanimously and also being echoed all over our media.
We are not investing enough thought, resource and commitment into grass roots and because of that are constantly managing a decline.

Why?

A complex series or reasons: historic, current, systemic, organisational, visionary, and all exacerbated by inherent difficulties with SFA integrated commitment.
Fundamentally the blame lies on 6 men’s doorsteps.

Who are they Andy?

The last 6 Hamden supremos who could have done something about it:
Ernie Walker 1977 – ‘90
Jim Farry ’77 – ‘99
David Taylor ’99 – ‘07
Gordon Smith ’07 – ‘10
Stewart Regan ’10 – ‘18
Ian Maxwell ’19 – present.

It would be great (if impossible) to get these guys with all their experience round a table.
But the good news is Ian Maxwell can start the ball rolling.

Since Ernie Walker,  the Scottish system, whatever it is, hasn’t worked.
Why?
That’s easy.

It was always ,and still is hopelessly conflicted by club self-interest, by internal power games, by financial pressures and overwhelming short-termism.
People outside Scotland can even see it.

On Monday I got an email from a Dutch Football mainstream Journalist who was following the Tartan Army in Germany, somehow read last week’s, ‘Sting in the Tale’, and got in touch.
This is what he wrote and said, verbatim.

“Very interesting Andy, you hit the nail on the head.
To bring about a turnaround in the presentations of the Scottish Team, a master plan is needed which is supported by everyone, (commercial, sporting, but also from politics).
I also think your Scottish football culture at the top has to change. In the Netherlands, we love Scottish Football. Because of the passion and fighting spirit. But it is still a lot of kick and rush and little technique.
For me Scottish football is also the football of technically brilliant footballers like Dennis Law, Jimmy Johnstone and Kenny Dalglish. So it can be done but it needs long term planning not just good wishes and naïve optimism, and it has to become the core part of what your football is. Not just a box being ticked for a year or two. That is where you are. You need a leader to lead you there.
Other countries like Netherlands, Belgium, Iceland and Croatia have shown you how to do it but you seem content to stay the hole you have been digging”.

Gordon Strachan this week also supported the call for a full root and branch overhaul as part of his Euros Sun features when he said.
“I was dreading this analysis column on where it all went wrong. People can talk all they like about stuff like the manager, the tactics, the system, the referee, about how Steve should have made changes to his line-up.
But that’s not the real argument.
I’d point to the imaginary players we don’t have in our squad and why they’re not there.
The players with a genuine turn of pace. The ones who can eliminate people with a wonderful piece of skill. The ones with real imagination who see passes nobody else can see.
But the reason we don’t have them in our squad is because they don’t exist in Scotland and they haven’t existed for a very long time now.
We’ve stopped making them.
When Steve looked round at his bench with 20 minutes, we don’t have a Modric, a Lewandowski, Bale or Ibrahimovic.
We need to get back to basics, properly and get better at it”.

Andy’s Sting in the Tale

1. Our Wonderful Tartan Army
2. How Much Money Did the Last Two Euros Deliver?
3. An Amazing Find in a Spanish Airbnb Cupboard in 2012

1. Scottish Football Doesn’t Deserve the Tartan Army

Real football fans who are true ambassadors for the country and the game.
Dig down beyond the pastiche and the beers and you’ll find an inclusive, good-natured bunch where everyone is welcome as long as your behaviour is decent.
Always optimistic, always no trouble, and always let down by our game’s inability to think long term about the talent we need to stay at the top table.

Thanks Jim, Rod & Sheila for sending some great photos.

2. And What is Happening to the Unbudgeted Revenue?

If I was chairman of the SFA instead of the SFSA I’d like to know what the unbudgeted revenues from both the recent Covid Euros and the current German tournament will be.
Then I’d like to know what the SFA plan for the money is.

I think,
It should be treated as seed corn for the future rather than a wee treat.
It should be about infrastructure and policy.
It should be in the public domain too.
Why is it not in the public domain?

3. The Late Cruyff’s Flowery Wallpaper

Last week I shared insight from an article by a football journalist ,Jacob Whitehead, whose summary before we were sent home said, “This tournament needs to serve as a spark for reinvestment for Scotland rather than the end of this generation of players”.
This week he wrote another incredible piece, ‘Johan Cruyff and the incredible drawings that explain modern football’.
It was once again in ‘The Athletic’ and is well worth the read.

Johan Cruyff and the incredible wallpaper drawings that explain modern football – The Athletic (nytimes.com)

Anyway the story is that the most famous number 14 ever was in Spain on a winter break with an Ajax coach called Ruben Jongkind talking about the best future for Ajax, and Ruben, not having any paper, wrote down a Cruyff stream of consciousness on the back of some flowery wallpaper. The ‘document’ then somehow lay in some cupboard in the apartment till it was re-found years later.

The plan was how Cruyff planned to revolutionise Ajax but it’s much bigger than that.
It’s changed football.

It started with situational ‘analysis’.
Where are we now?
Collaboration? Finances? First team football? Business model? Youth training? and What is Our Mission?

It then highlighted three core development areas: –  to have the best young first team, the best training staff for talent development and to balance the club’s budgets.
It advocated significant increases in young player investment to 7.5% of the club’s budget and to look to co-fund the club from future academy sales.

Next came an interesting insight.
Cruyff believed,
“Talent is everywhere, talent can be developed, Environment affects development”.

So Cruyff said the environment had to be changed and it happened.

Cruyff wanted attractive, simple football at the club based on just 8 principles.

Compact the pitch when defending.
Counterpress (Win the ball back immediately)
Deep before wide, (the first pass should always go forward)
Create an extra man in the midfield
Third man runs (Create opportunities for players who cannot be found with a direct pass)
Create one v ones
Positional interplay (players should be capable of fulfilling multiple roles
Forward defending

It’s the same 8 principles on view every week in Guardiola’s Man City and elsewhere,

Not a bad starting point for our SFA in creating a conveyor belt of good enough kids.

That’s it from me again this week.

If you are not an SFSA please join and help us make the future brighter.

Join over 80,000 Scottish football fans and let’s #reclaimthegame – Scottish Football Supporters Association – SFSA (scottishfsa.org)

Andy’s Album of the week

Notes and Rhymes, The Proclaimers

This was the brothers 8^th album and the BBC called it at the time ‘An elegant combination of country pop, bluegrass and soapbox pontificating with not a lazy lyric in sight’.

‘Love can move mountains’ and ‘On Causewayside ‘ are standouts but the whole album is like feeling the sun on your neck after a long and cold winter.
I know Flower of Scotland does a job and can be stirring but if we ever need a real national anthem that is more than fighting the English I’d commission Craig and Charlie to do the business.

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