Daz1982

‘we got our arses handed to us that day’ fairly standard downtrodden Scottish perspective right there! It was an even game that could have went either way. England dominated first 10 mins or so of the second half (when they opened the scoring), but we had our spells too, remember David Seaman pulling off a world class save from a Gordon Durie header. Can’t remember Andy Goram having much to do during the game. To suggest we were somehow outclassed our outplayed that day is ridiculous.

New Zealand do it which proves that it is actually possible.

I would say we take sport just as seriously as any other of the home nations for example, we just have a general acceptance of failure imo. I won the 100 metre race at my school sports day when I was 5 years old!

Can’t think of any notable achievement on the world stage from any of our national sides.

Everybody’s favourite nation to play against! We are guaranteed to fold or make the wrong decision at the crucial moment every single time! For me, we just had to play a bit more clever when their tails were up in the first half, take the ball in hand and suffocate the game a bit! Instead every time we got possession we kicked it back to Japan and invited more pressure! Nation of losers in every walk of life!

Like the look of that team. Only thing I would change, is play a more recognised defensive type player for Fraser, maybe Jack. And drop Forrest for Fraser.

Will try that, thanks 👍

Has anyone tried an alternative to listening to this mans commentary, apart from turning the tv volume down. Thinking of watching on tv whilst listening to radio commentary, but it will probably be out of sync. We all know the predicament that we’re in, just don’t want it rammed down my throat for the entire 90 mins as per usual!

Aye, the players of yesteryear also failed miserably when it came to the crunch! The first World Cup which Ireland qualified for was Italia 90, they went on to reach the quarter finals. Think USA 94 might have actually been the last 16 'only' (but again through the groups). Since then (off the top of my head), they got through the 2002 WC group and certainly the last Euros. You can pretty much go through every country in Europe, and at some point they have reached the latter stages of a major tournament. It truly is utterly depressing.

Agree 100%

Unionists have an acceptance of being second best, and have no real desire or belief that we’ll ever be anything more. How pathetic is that!?

For me the next appointment has to be a significant one which raises the spirit of a whole nation. I do not think Steve Clarke, despite being a very good manager, is the man to do this. The majority of Scottish managers seem to be of the opinion that we are not good enough, too small, to wee etc etc etc. This type of mentality has got to be knocked on the head once and for all. Jurgen Klinsmann would be my choice, he is a proven international manager. Maybe Darren Fletcher or Paul Lambert as his no. 2.

Jurgen Klinsmann

During Italia 90 there was already a lot of unrest regarding the upcoming war, some players were left at home and I'm sure the manager at the time received death threats. All things considered they done remarkably well to reach the quarter finals. In addition to this they had a man sent off after 30 mins against Argentina. Went on to comfortably qualify for Euro 92 before being withdrawn from the tournament, the rest is history. However, back to the topic. Yes, if Croatia can reach the latter stages of a major tournament there is absolutely no reason why we can't. The mind-set in this country will have to change first, the aim at the very least should be to WIN a tournament, otherwise we are simply wasting our time. Whether we ever WIN a tournament is another matter, but it should at the very least be our ambition to do so.

Completely agree with this, I think we would become less ‘interested’ in the fortunes of England if we had our own broadcasts, although they would remain a rival who we could still never ‘support.’ However, things will not change until we are an independent nation with our own identity. Post independence I genuinely believe that the self confidence of our entire country will improve drastically within a generation. In turn we will be more focussed on the fortunes of our own national team and it’s success.

The population argument does not wash we with, it's a typical Scottish (we're too wee) excuse for failure imo. Football is our national sport and therefore we should be aiming to compete at the very highest level. Croatia for example have a population of just over 4 million, they enter tournaments with an expectation not just to 'compete' but to challenge and progress to the latter stages. The only difference between ourselves and England (for example) should be that at any given time they might have 10 quality forwards to pick from whereas as we would maybe have 2 or 3. Granted, the population argument is more relevant when considering age brackets. However there it is no excuse for the senior team. There is no doubt that is more difficult for a smaller nation to succeed but it is not impossible, New Zealand prove this in Rugby Union.

Exactly, why are we accepting second best yet again!? The renovation of Wembley cost nearly 1 Billion pounds!!!! Surely Hampden can be kept as is or upgraded for a fraction of that cost. Absolute disgrace if we lose our national stadium because of a lack of funds!

Ticket now sold

Hi there My brother can no longer make game, therefore I have a ticket for North Stand, D4 available. £40 (face value).

My point is that if you do not aim to be the very best then what is the point? Aim for 2nd, 3rd, 4th best and that's what you'll get. Go through every nation in Europe and consider their best ever run in a tournament, think we are undoubtedly the biggest underachievers. All the home nations have progressed further and here's some more....... Bulgaria, Semis WC 94 Sweden, Semis EC 92 and WC 94 Iceland, QF EC 2016 Turkey, SF WC 2002 .........and yet we think that it's somehow impossible! Why?

I agree with this, it's deep-rooted in our psyche. The minute the group was drawn, we were aiming for second place, pathetic stuff really. Our recent match against England was a fairly even contest in my opinion yet our national manager comes out after the game and says, 'it was like watching a faitherweight box a heavyweight.' Anybody who did not see the game would think we were absolutely battered from start to finish. Our population is over 5 milion, our national sport is football, therefore our ambition should be to win either the Euros or World Cup, why not?

Yes that was him, not surprising that he's a downtrodden no voter. Scotland were mentally weak yesterday, beaten before the game even started.

Not a bad way to think about it! That's me booked up for it, training starts next week!!

Haha, I totally agree, but would like to do it once too!

Hi there It has been on my to-do list for a few years now, so thinking of running a marathon this year before I get too old to run a decent time. Been looking at the Perthshire and Fort William runs later this year. Thing that puts me off the Perthshire one is that it's a half marathon course that you run round twice, think I'd struggle with that psychologically. Fort William run mentions various terrain, don't want to be running through forests and mud tracks. Think I will have to pick one of them though as this will fit into a 16 week training plan which I aim to complete prior to the race. Any advice / tips would be greatly appreciated.