Belgium Match Thread (07/09/2018) - Page 13 - TA specific - Tartan Army Message Board Jump to content

Belgium Match Thread (07/09/2018)


Clyde1998

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3 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

Sadly, nae other bastard wanted the job. 

Nobody that was better than McLeish anyway. 

At the time of appointment there didn't appear to be a lot of rumours of anybody wanting the job apart from the usual suspects. Too much focus on Michael O'Neil.  McLeish seemed to be the easy option. Lazy attitude from the suits at the SFA.

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19 minutes ago, TDYER63 said:

Reminds me why I dont bet. 13/1 for a fluke seems a pretty shit return to me. 

I do agree that  Monday will be better right enough. 

I certainly wouldn’t have bet on us last night. 

I have a feeling that Monday will be similar to Slovakia and Slovenia at Hampden last year. It will be nervy but we’ll do just enough to win.  

Either 2-1 or 1-0. Something like that. 

Hopefully we’ll blooter them 3-0 but we never seem to do things the easy way. 

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18 minutes ago, Lairdyfaeinverclyde said:

At the time of appointment there didn't appear to be a lot of rumours of anybody wanting the job apart from the usual suspects. Too much focus on Michael O'Neil.  McLeish seemed to be the easy option. Lazy attitude from the suits at the SFA.

Exactly. It’s a poisoned chalice. 

The only people that wanted it were guys that no decent club will touch. 

It’s a very difficult job and the only way to be a success at it is to take us to a major tournament. 

McLeish was an easy appointment for the SFA to make but I honestly believe he was the best person that applied. They could obviously have tried harder to woo a big name but they would have had to have spent a fortune. 

I think the O’Neill debacle scunnered them and they took the easy option. 

Christ knows what they’ll do if McLeish makes a colossal arse of it and is sacked half way through the campaign. 

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8 minutes ago, Third Lanark said:

Feel a wee bit better now England have been done similar to us except they didn't  gift them goals. They too mistakenly thought they could go toe to toe...

They hardly got pumped 0-4 though.

Should have had an equaliser as well but the ref wrongly disallowed it by the look of it. 

I didn’t see much of the match though. We’re Spain all over them?

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9 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

Exactly. It’s a poisoned chalice. 

The only people that wanted it were guys that no decent club will touch. 

It’s a very difficult job and the only way to be a success at it is to take us to a major tournament. 

McLeish was an easy appointment for the SFA to make but I honestly believe he was the best person that applied. They could obviously have tried harder to woo a big name but they would have had to have spent a fortune. 

I think the O’Neill debacle scunnered them and they took the easy option. 

Christ knows what they’ll do if McLeish makes a colossal arse of it and is sacked half way through the campaign. 

Don't think a big name was important. A manager who had potential, knew how to develop a young squad and new ideas. I think the supporters would of shown a bit more patience, i know i would.

Edited by Lairdyfaeinverclyde
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25 minutes ago, Third Lanark said:

Feel a wee bit better now England have been done similar to us except they didn't  gift them goals. They too mistakenly thought they could go toe to toe...

That's England favorites for relegation now. We could get them next time round in league B.

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2 minutes ago, Lairdyfaeinverclyde said:

Don't think a big name was important. A manager who had potential, knew how to develop a young squad and new ideas. I think the supporters would of shown a bit more patience, i know i would.

McLeish is trying to develop a young squad though isn’t he? 

His post match interviews have been interesting. He’s been saying he’s trying to get away from the big lump up the park and to try and change things for the better by not parking the bus. 

OK so it didn’t work out last night but I like what he’s trying to do. I actually thought we looked pretty good until Belgium’s first goal. 

We could have sat back and played for a 0-0 but what good is that in a friendly?

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26 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

McLeish is trying to develop a young squad though isn’t he? 

His post match interviews have been interesting. He’s been saying he’s trying to get away from the big lump up the park and to try and change things for the better by not parking the bus. 

OK so it didn’t work out last night but I like what he’s trying to do. I actually thought we looked pretty good until Belgium’s first goal. 

We could have sat back and played for a 0-0 but what good is that in a friendly?

Maybe i'm wanting something and someone new. Hopefully i will choke on my opinion and i will be the first to admit i was wrong.

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57 minutes ago, Third Lanark said:

Feel a wee bit better now England have been done similar to us except they didn't  gift them goals. They too mistakenly thought they could go toe to toe...

They played defensively with the 5 and low block until they went behind, didn’t open up and go “toe to toe” until they were losing late in the game. 

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Just now, Lairdyfaeinverclyde said:

Maybe i'm wanting something and someone new. Hopefully i will choke on my opinion and i will be the first to admit i was wrong.

I would have loved McInnes or Steve Clarke to take the job but those guys aren’t interested in the job at this stage if their careers. 

As has been said before on here countless times, the Scotland job is not rocket science. Pick the best players and use sensible tactics and we should beat the teams we’re better than and hopefully compete well with teams who are better than us.  

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2 hours ago, Texas Pete said:

McLeish is trying to develop a young squad though isn’t he? 

His post match interviews have been interesting. He’s been saying he’s trying to get away from the big lump up the park and to try and change things for the better by not parking the bus. 

OK so it didn’t work out last night but I like what he’s trying to do. I actually thought we looked pretty good until Belgium’s first goal. 

We could have sat back and played for a 0-0 but what good is that in a friendly?

I'm fine with getting rid of the big lump up the park (we didn't do that under Strachan either though). However, I'd take a long ball every day of the week ahead of our approach yesterday.

We didn't lose yesterday because of our shape or purely because of making mistakes. We lost because we decided that the best way to build an attack was to pass the ball to players under pressure in the middle of the pitch in front of the box.

We can make our mistakes all day long but lose the ball in that area against a decent team and it's all over. Yesterday we did it 3 times, and that's totally inexcusable for an international team. It's not even schoolboy stuff, even the youngest teams are taught to take it out wide before bringing it back to the middle again.

I think if we learn that lesson from this game and remove it from our play immediately then this game will have been useful.

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10 hours ago, Texas Pete said:

Eh?

Griffiths and McBurnie can hold the ball up pretty well.

Much as I like Griffiths but you're completely wrong. 

Why was he third choice at Celtic last season? It's because he can't hold the ball up anywhere near as well as the other strikers. 

And for Scotland he'd be poor at that role. 

McBurnie, I've not seen a lot of, but from what I've seen he's not goi g to be the answer at this level. Hopefully he continues to develop and proves me wrong but he's not good enough just now. 

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On 9/7/2018 at 9:27 PM, Stu101 said:

did we not lose by 4 to the USA?

Was it not 5??

On 9/7/2018 at 10:09 PM, Malcolm said:

 

Pretty accurate assessment.  Brown is a big miss. Robertson is our best left back and I feel we are trying things to accommodate Tierney.   I’m coming to the conclusion we either have to bench Tierney or find a position where he is better playing out of position than the equivalent in their natural position.  I’m also wanting 4 at the back....  we were destroyed down the left tonight.

I'd try a back 4 with Tierney at lb and Robertson further up the wing in midfield. Fuck knows if it would work but they could both go forward and both cover each other

On 9/7/2018 at 10:36 PM, Malcolm said:

You have proof that he is an alcoholic?  Possibly libellous.

Weesht

On 9/7/2018 at 10:41 PM, Jute said:

Yes was to do with some wanting to sit and some wanting to stand.

There were 30000 spare seats ffs they could have moved if they were that upset

On 9/7/2018 at 11:31 PM, giblet said:

Hats off to those that went tonight.  I’ve decided to take a back seat for a while after regularly going to the home games for the last 20 odd years.

just totally scunnered with shite inept displays time and time again with no real improvement.

Yeah im past the days of home friendlys especially at those prices. Will maybe go to the other two games but not 100%

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I’m still a member of the travel club... but every time it comes around I question the value.  They were wise reducing the price and ditching the tat tshirt.  Fifa have devalued international football fitting it around the clubs.  I don’t do friendlies as they are rotten, or midweek games against minnows.  Please more Saturday games....

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After some reflection, I think it is premature to abandon the back 3 idea. A back 4 would have changed very little, especially since 3 of our goals were lost through the middle, not from the wing. Experimenting against world class opposition was not the right time to try out a new formation, as we learn very little.

Honestly, I'd stick with the same formation against Albania, and only change 1 or 2 players (McDonald out for certain)

Edited by Tartan blood
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2 hours ago, RenfrewBlue said:

Much as I like Griffiths but you're completely wrong. 

Why was he third choice at Celtic last season? It's because he can't hold the ball up anywhere near as well as the other strikers. 

And for Scotland he'd be poor at that role. 

McBurnie, I've not seen a lot of, but from what I've seen he's not goi g to be the answer at this level. Hopefully he continues to develop and proves me wrong but he's not good enough just now. 

I think you might be doing Griffiths a bit of a disservice here. He fell down the order at Celtic because Dembele and Edouard are probably better players. That doesn’t mean he can’t hold the ball up. 

It certainly isn’t his strength. He’s better at running the channels while someone else holds the ball up and feeds him although playing two strikers in international football these days is pretty rare. 

In fairness, I haven’t seen that much of Griffiths outside of Scotland games but he held the ball up pretty well when he came on against Rangers last week and I’ve seen him do similar in the past. He might not be as good at it as Dembele or Edouard but neither of those guys are Scottish so he’ll have to do. 

Like yourelf, I haven’t seen much of McBurnie either but I assume he plays up front on his own for Swansea? He can’t be that bad at holding the ball up if he does. 

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1 hour ago, Tartan blood said:

After some reflection, I think it is premature to abandon the back 3 idea. A back 4 would have changed very little, especially since 3 of our goals were lost through the middle, not from the wing. Experimenting against world class opposition was not the right time to try out a new formation, as we learn very little.

Honestly, I'd stick with the same formation against Albania, and only change 1 or 2 players (McDonald out for certain)

It was the only chance McLeish had to experiment so he didn’t have much of a choice in fairness.

I’m not sure what match some people on here were watching but the formation used on Friday worked pretty well. For most of the match, anyway. Belgium hardly ran us ragged or steam rollered us. 

Having said that, I think a back 4 should be considered against Albania but it’s a difficult choice for McLeish to make. 

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1 hour ago, Malcolm said:

I’m still a member of the travel club... but every time it comes around I question the value.  They were wise reducing the price and ditching the tat tshirt.  Fifa have devalued international football fitting it around the clubs.  I don’t do friendlies as they are rotten, or midweek games against minnows.  Please more Saturday games....

I haven't been to a Scotland game for about 4 years pretty much all to do with shifting fixtures away from Saturday. I wonder whether attendances have gone down throughout Europe as a result of these changes.  I doubt that UEFA or FIFA care though.

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1 hour ago, Tartan blood said:

After some reflection, I think it is premature to abandon the back 3 idea. A back 4 would have changed very little, especially since 3 of our goals were lost through the middle, not from the wing. Experimenting against world class opposition was not the right time to try out a new formation, as we learn very little.

Honestly, I'd stick with the same formation against Albania, and only change 1 or 2 players (McDonald out for certain)

McTominey will come in for McDonald im sure. If only to cap him but he has always looked decent when playing for us. 

As for the back 3, i think it needs to go back to 4-2-3-1 and Tierney at RB. I dont think Robertson looks happy at wing back.

We also wasted ryan fraser on Friday... i think we switched to 4 at the end and fraser was our best attacker.

I think back to slovenia and home, lithuania away, slovakia at home and even holland at home. We played good stuff, 10x better than now. 

At the moment we have 2 great left back and non of them playing left back!

As for world class opposition, costa rica, hungary, Peru i dont think are "world class"

 

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11 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

It was the only chance McLeish had to experiment so he didn’t have much of a choice in fairness.

I’m not sure what match some people on here were watching but the formation used on Friday worked pretty well. For most of the match, anyway. Belgium hardly ran us ragged or steam rollered us. 

Having said that, I think a back 4 should be considered against Albania but it’s a difficult choice for McLeish to make. 

It's the first time Tierney and Robertson have both been available, so fair enough. I think if we'd went with a back 4 and lost 4-0 everyone on here would have been screaming for a back 3.

 

I do think blaming McLeish for the loss is a tad short-sighted. As i mentioned earlier, there is maybe only 1 player I'd have changed from what McLeish chose. You have to take into account the fact that Belgium are about 5 years ahead of us in their football renaissance. 2-3 years from now will be a better time to judge this team (I hope). Though doing that under McLeish is probably not ideal

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11 minutes ago, jamboman said:

McTominey will come in for McDonald im sure. If only to cap him but he has always looked decent when playing for us. 

As for the back 3, i think it needs to go back to 4-2-3-1 and Tierney at RB. I dont think Robertson looks happy at wing back.

We also wasted ryan fraser on Friday... i think we switched to 4 at the end and fraser was our best attacker.

I think back to slovenia and home, lithuania away, slovakia at home and even holland at home. We played good stuff, 10x better than now. 

At the moment we have 2 great left back and non of them playing left back!

As for world class opposition, costa rica, hungary, Peru i dont think are "world class"

 

They weren't world class opposition, but I seem to remember we were missing over half our first team squad. This was McLeish's real first test. (Albeit, his second stint in charge)

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