nek

or we could have beaten germany in either game, poland in either game, ireland away???. we did bare minimum in these games and therefore did not earn ourselves a pass should we up one of the 'winnable' games. thats what pisses me off so much about the mentality that draw in dublin was a great result, Scotland will always drop points in games we shouldnt and need to therefore win some we shouldnt as well

we played and beat poland (you wont get a better like for like than that) before this last group and that didnt help us very much in the end up so dont really think it matters. id rather see some 'b' games with uncapped players given run outs to try and swell the ranks a bit, need to magic couple of players from somewhere

this thread has cheered me up slightly, one less helmet to worry about in malta....

i would probably take being worst 2nd place if it was offered at this point in time....

he has been excellent this season for palace, would be first name on my team sheet for next campaign (assuming he keeps it up), with or without broon in the equation

this no coincidence that every time Forrest plays the FB on his side has a 'bad' game

can i borrow your tin hat sometime?

Ireland suffered the mother of all bad decisions wigh henrys handball and have since dusted themselves off and qualified for stuff, you make your own luck

i think its the oppositte to OTT reaction to be honest, i see this discussion as more looking at longer term solutions to something that has been very long term in the making. the other threads about sacking manager, chasing players into retirment, time to blood young guns early threads (and presumably hope that things instantly improve) are more OTT imho

agree that is decent idea in principle but has become very tricky with non-footballing EU labor laws. could limit non-eu players but not sure that would help much (As they already are, again in non-football means, to an extent with fairly strict permit criteria)

tv dictates this yet again, only games anybody is really interested in paying decent money to cover is old firm, hence 4 of them = more dollars

too true mate, anything beyond songs from west end musicals is hooliganism in some peoples eyes

would also throw in the that fact that we suffer badly that so many of our players play in england, which is, imho, a similar and equally pish brand of football, as their underachieving (relatively) international side is also testament to. partly geography to blame as its nearest big league so obvious landing spot, but we also produce that kind of 'physical' player early, if we did have more 10-15year old playing the way ajax/barca etc wanted they wouldn't hesitate to take them on, but we dont. the idea that guts and grit can win you anything more than occasional international game is long gone

this proportionally, both the world cup and euros have expanded more than the number of competing nations in europe has, so by basic logic it should be easier to qualify if anything

unless Fergie fancies one last hurrah then keep gordie imho

Scotland Euro Qualifying Campaigns 92: Qualified 96: Qualified 2000: 2nd, Lost in playoffs 2004: 2nd, Lost in Playoffs 2008: 3rd in group 2012: 3rd in group 2016: 4th in group don't think you could really get a steadier decline than this. our failings are not a result of anything recent imho, but more as result of persevering with outdated playing mentality and terrible youth/grassroots management through the 90s (hopefully this has improved recently, which may bare fruit 2020 and beyond) no overnight fix to stem such a tide i fear........

exactly, quite honestly if you cant beat poland at home when its all on the line we don't deserve a crack at playoffs, end of story

packers beat colts in SB50 is my (not so) bold prediction

agree with this, was pulling my hair oot watching him that and the fact he turns his back on the runner nearly every time, defensive liability that is pish going forward. wouldnt have him in squad personally never min first XI

this

considering numbers traveling and Guinness supped i think behavior overall was excellent. in part credit to garda to imho, got balance bang on

yep it has, anything but the two looses would have had them above us still. bit of a pity that Gibraltar aren't Fifa members (and so result doesnt count towards ranking) as that would have been a boost for us as well (even tho they are low ranked/pish any competitive win is good news)

by my calculations we will be up to 29th in world and 18th in europe when next lot of rankings come out (up ten places) this has more to do with some poor results (defeats to serbia and wales) dropping in significance than any massive boost from northern ireland win. assuming they go to 9 groups for world cup qualifiers again we would therefore be in pot 2 as it stands. a win vs ireland in june almost certainly keeps us there, a draw would be unlikely but possible (circa 25% chance), a loss would almost certainly have us in pot 3. no chance as far as i can see of dropping into pot 4 now. happy days!

France aye? Would doubt it Masel given they have there friendlies sorted for them now being a "fake" group member in qualifying, they have 3 dates in 3 year to choose who they play , doubt we would be choice 1 or 2! Be a good one if true tho

Wouldn't worry about position now, it's end of group that mattes, good results like both Croatia wins have been demoted in significance so we would have had to beat Germany to keep up, it's us vs us 1,2,3 year ago really