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McLeish Report


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5 minutes ago, Grim Jim said:

I don't think the McLeish report was about which manager we have, and 10 years on it's not about which managers we had.

It’s gone a bit off topic but it is connected. If the right people were running the SFA ridiculous managerial appointments like Alex McLeish wouldn’t have happened and the O’Neill embarrassment may not have occurred so publicly 

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11 minutes ago, Grim Jim said:

The report was produced before Strachan was appointed, but not much has changed.   SFA still run like a bowling club and clubs still pulling their strings is my impression.

 

Henry McLeish made follow-up comments this week (today?) about the report, and mentioned Strachan’s sacking as being an odd decision.

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2 minutes ago, dohadeer said:

Henry McLeish made follow-up comments this week (today?) about the report, and mentioned Strachan’s sacking as being an odd decision.

It wasn’t an odd decision as he had failed to get us a playoff for a position where we were favourites to get one. He failed. 

Appointing Alex McLeish was the odd decision. 

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27 minutes ago, ErsatzThistle said:

If you can find footage of his final press conference watch it. He was so obviously tired, scunnered 

We would have all looked like that, that day......... You. Me. The lot of us on here.

 

More than most of the others who have held the job in recent times, I don't think Strachan was only a Scotland manager; I think he was a Scotland fan.

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12 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

It wasn’t an odd decision as he had failed to get us a playoff for a position where we were favourites to get one. He failed. 

Appointing Alex McLeish was the odd decision. 

What do you mean ‘a playoff for a position where we were favourites to get one?’

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1 minute ago, dohadeer said:

What do you mean ‘a playoff for a position where we were favourites to get one?’

I meant from a position. It was a typo, it happens. Failing to get to the playoffs for Euro 2016 was a failure. He was given another chance to get us a playoff for the World Cup (a harder task to be fair) and didn’t manage that either. 

The SFA could’ve given him another chance but they decided against it. Hardly an odd decision. 

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21 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

I meant from a position. It was a typo, it happens. Failing to get to the playoffs for Euro 2016 was a failure. He was given another chance to get us a playoff for the World Cup (a harder task to be fair) and didn’t manage that either. 

The SFA could’ve given him another chance but they decided against it. Hardly an odd decision. 

We were seeded fourth for Euro 2016 qualifying, drawn in the toughest group, fared really well against the top 3 seeds, and missed out on a playoff or automatic qualification because of ONE poor result against Georgia. Finished fourth, which was our seeding.

We were then seeded third for the World Cup, and finished third, level on points with the team in second, one goal in our final match away from the playoffs. Again, one poor result against Lithuania was our undoing, which we kind of cancelled out anyway by then winning away to Lithuania later on. At the end of the campaign, we were unbeaten in six competitive matches, our longest unbeaten run for 15 years.

If that constitutes failure, then I’m at a loss as to what you expect from a Scotland manager. That’s clear progress. We have to give people time to do the job, otherwise we run out of feasible options as manager, which is where we found ourselves after dumping Strachan. We can’t sack a manager because of one poor result per campaign.

 

Also, at what point were we favourites to get to a playoff?

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Just now, dohadeer said:

We were seeded fourth for Euro 2016 qualifying, drawn in the toughest group, fared really well against the top 3 seeds, and missed out on a playoff or automatic qualification because of ONE poor result against Georgia. Finished fourth, which was our seeding.

We were then seeded third for the World Cup, and finished third, level on points with the team in second, one goal in our final match away from the playoffs. Again, one poor result against Lithuania was our undoing, which we kind of cancelled out anyway by then winning away to Lithuania later on. At that the end of the campaign, we were unbeaten in six competitive matches, our longest unbeaten run for 15 years.

If that constitutes failure, then I’m at a loss as to what you expect from a Scotland manager. That’s clear progress. We have to give people time to do the job, otherwise we run out of feasible options as manager, which is where we found ourselves after dumping Strachan. We can’t sack a manager because of one poor result per campaign.

With 4 games to go we had gotten ourselves into a position where we would need to make an arse of ourselves to not reach the playoffs, which we duly did. We were favourites for third before the game in Georgia.

In fairness we didn’t expect Ireland to beat Germany but a win in Georgia would still have been enough. 

If you think achieving our expected position in the group is being successful then you are mistaken. That is the bare minimum we should expect. 

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3 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

With 4 games to go we had gotten ourselves into a position where we would need to make an arse of ourselves to not reach the playoffs, which we duly did. We were favourites for third before the game in Georgia.

In fairness we didn’t expect Ireland to beat Germany but a win in Georgia would still have been enough. 

If you think achieving our expected position in the group is being successful then you are mistaken. That is the bare minimum we should expect. 

Without having the data available, I’ll take your word for it, but I would probably agree that we were favourites to reach the playoffs at that stage.

 

Yeah, playing to our seeding isn’t a success, but it’s not a failure either. That’s simply a par performance.

However, given that Strachan had taken us from bottom of the group, to finishing fourth, to fourth seeds and finishing fourth in the toughest group next time, to third seeds and finishing level on points with the second team, ending with a six-game unbeaten run, if that’s not clear and obvious progress, I don’t know what is.

Our fans expect miracles/instant success and also show their lack of intelligence in defining success only along the lines of qualifying/not qualifying. If you’re a fourth or a third seed, particularly if you get a tough draw, which Strachan did both times, then sometimes that isn’t where the success/failure line lies. We can’t reverse 20 years of negative decline overnight. To sack someone who was so clearly moving us back in the right direction was madness. Some of our fans and the SFA should be utterly ashamed of themselves.

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1 minute ago, dohadeer said:

Without having the data available, I’ll take your word for it, but I would probably agree that we were favourites to reach the playoffs at that stage.

 

Yeah, playing to our seeding isn’t a success, but it’s not a failure either. That’s simply a par performance.

However, given that Strachan had taken us from bottom of the group, to finishing fourth, to fourth seeds and finishing fourth in the toughest group next time, to third seeds and finishing level on points with the second team, ending with a six-game unbeaten run, if that’s not clear and obvious progress, I don’t know what is.

Our fans expect miracles/instant success and also show their lack of intelligence in defining success only along the lines of qualifying/not qualifying. If you’re a fourth or a third seed, particularly if you get a tough draw, which Strachan did both times, then sometimes that isn’t where the success/failure line lies. We can’t reverse 20 years of negative decline overnight. To sack someone who was so clearly moving us back in the right direction was madness. Some of our fans and the SFA should be utterly ashamed of themselves.

Strachan’s job was to get us to a major finals, as is Clarke’s. 

Failure to do this will ultimately be classed as failure. Whether that’s fair or correct or not is irrelevant. 

I’m not sure if going to Slovakia and getting pumped 0-3, drawing with Lithuania at Hampden and scraping narrow victories at Hampden against Slovakia and Slovenia was exactly moving in the right direction but if that’s what you’re looking for then fair enough. 

Going in another direction manager-wise  was probably the right thing to do. Most fans wanted a change and obviously so did the SFA. McLeish was the wrong appointment though. 

Do you think Strachan would’ve got us second in our last qualifying group? I highly doubt it. 

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8 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

Strachan’s job was to get us to a major finals, as is Clarke’s. 

Failure to do this will ultimately be classed as failure. Whether that’s fair or correct or not is irrelevant. 

I’m not sure if going to Slovakia and getting pumped 0-3, drawing with Lithuania at Hampden and scraping narrow victories at Hampden against Slovakia and Slovenia was exactly moving in the right direction but if that’s what you’re looking for then fair enough. 

Going in another direction manager-wise  was probably the right thing to do. Most fans wanted a change and obviously so did the SFA. McLeish was the wrong appointment though. 

Do you think Strachan would’ve got us second in our last qualifying group? I highly doubt it. 

Strachan’s job was manager of Scotland. I think that Strachan would have got us to a major finals, do you not?

Come on, you’re more intelligent than that aren’t you? That isn’t where the success/failure line lies for Scotland any more. Making progress surely doesn’t merit being sacked?

Where are you getting ‘most fans’ wanted a change from?

 

We have to be patient. We have to be realistic with our expectations. And, it’s not 1986 any more. Times have changed. We have to make a more intelligent assessment of how well our managers are doing.

If you want a revolving door, where the manager exits every time we don’t qualify, then you’ll get the vicious circle that you deserve. Be careful what you wish for though, as that leads to a long time in the international wilderness.

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1 minute ago, dohadeer said:

Strachan’s job was manager of Scotland. I think that Strachan would have got us to a major finals, do you not?

Come on, you’re more intelligent than that aren’t you? That isn’t where the success/failure line lies for Scotland any more. Making progress surely doesn’t merit being sacked?

Where are you getting ‘most fans’ wanted a change from?

 

We have to be patient. We have to be realistic with our expectations. And, it’s not 1986 any more. Times have changed. We have to make a more intelligent assessment of how well our managers are doing.

If you want a revolving door, where the manager exits every time we don’t qualify, then you’ll get the vicious circle that you deserve. Be careful what you wish for though, as that leads to a long time in the international wilderness.

I doubt we’d have qualified through our last group regardless of who was in charge so I guess the question is whether Strachan would be more likely to get us through the playoffs than Clarke. I’m not convinced he would be and we’ll never know.

Strachan was stubborn and made some seriously bizarre team selections during his tenure. He really didn’t help himself. 

I don’t know about you but I actually go to Scotland games. When you do this you speak to other fans in stadiums, pubs and planes etc. and you get a good idea of the feeling amongst the fans. Most people I spoke with wanted rid of Strachan so that’s what I’m basing it on. Most people on here also stated they wanted a change, at least until McLeish started making an arse of it then there was rumblings of ‘we shouldn’t have sacked Strachan’. 

I’m not sure my intelligence level has anything to do with it. You know (at least I assume you know) what football management is like. Managers are hired to do a job. This could be to win a league, avoid relegation, reach Europe or to get a country to a major finals.

In order to be a success, Strachan would have needed to get us to at least a playoff. This would have been moving in the right direction. Finishing 4th and 3rd in our qualifying group wasn’t really an improvement was it?

If Strachan had kept his job I think we’d be in exactly the same position as we are now. Assuming he’d have won our Nations League group, which he might not have. 

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4 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

I doubt we’d have qualified through our last group regardless of who was in charge so I guess the question is whether Strachan would be more likely to get us through the playoffs than Clarke. I’m not convinced he would be and we’ll never know.

Strachan was stubborn and made some seriously bizarre team selections during his tenure. He really didn’t help himself. 

I don’t know about you but I actually go to Scotland games. When you do this you speak to other fans in stadiums, pubs and planes etc. and you get a good idea of the feeling amongst the fans. Most people I spoke with wanted rid of Strachan so that’s what I’m basing it on. Most people on here also stated they wanted a change, at least until McLeish started making an arse of it then there was rumblings of ‘we shouldn’t have sacked Strachan’. 

I’m not sure my intelligence level has anything to do with it. You know (at least I assume you know) what football management is like. Managers are hired to do a job. This could be to win a league, avoid relegation, reach Europe or to get a country to a major finals.

In order to be a success, Strachan would have needed to get us to at least a playoff. This would have been moving in the right direction. Finishing 4th and 3rd in our qualifying group wasn’t really an improvement was it?

If Strachan had kept his job I think we’d be in exactly the same position as we are now. Assuming he’d have won our Nations League group, which he might not have. 

How long should a Scotland manager be given to reach a major finals then? What about one who takes over with us bottom of our qualifying group, and struggling to hang on to a fourth-seeding for the next tournament?

 

Did you seriously just write ‘finishing 4th and 3rd in our qualifying group wasn’t really an improvement was it?’  ??!

Do you want to read that sentence back to yourself and spot the contradiction?

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4 minutes ago, dohadeer said:

How long should a Scotland manager be given to reach a major finals then? What about one who takes over with us bottom of our qualifying group, and struggling to hang on to a fourth-seeding for the next tournament?

 

Did you seriously just write ‘finishing 4th and 3rd in our qualifying group wasn’t really an improvement was it?’  ??!

Do you want to read that sentence back to yourself and spot the contradiction?

Finishing 4th certainly wasn’t an improvement was it? Whilst finishing 3rd in 2017 was an improvement, in terms of group position, on Strachan’s previous failure of finishing 4th, I would argue that it was an easier group. 

I also wasn’t referring to group position. I was referring to finishing in the qualifying/playoff positions and finishing below them. One is a success and the other is not.

Drawing with Lithuania at Hampden was a disaster. Strachan was in charge for that game. Was that real progress for you? It was shite as far as I remember it. 

The SFA has major problems and lots of changes need to happen for us to be successful in future. We are not in this position because Strachan was sacked. There is far more to it than that. 

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Just now, Texas Pete said:

Finishing 4th certainly wasn’t an improvement was it? Whilst finishing 3rd in 2017 was an improvement, in terms of group position, on Strachan’s previous failure of finishing 4th, I would argue that it was an easier group. 

I also wasn’t referring to group position. I was referring to finishing in the qualifying/playoff positions and finishing below them. One is a success and the other is not.

Drawing with Lithuania at Hampden was a disaster. Strachan was in charge for that game. Was that real progress for you? It was shite as far as I remember it. 

The SFA has major problems and lots of changes need to happen for us to be successful in future. We are not in this position because Strachan was sacked. There is far more to it than that. 

Sorry, we were bottom of our group when Strachan took over. We then finished fourth in the trickiest group, which was an improvement, and then third in the next campaign, which was an improvement again.

Why would you mention a one-off match? We’re not seriously judging players/managers/anyone by hand-picking their worst match are we? That’s not even remotely fair. That’s another massive flaw some of our supporters have, nobody is allowed a reasonable amount of bad performances/results.

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Just now, dohadeer said:

Sorry, we were bottom of our group when Strachan took over. We then finished fourth in the trickiest group, which was an improvement, and then third in the next campaign, which was an improvement again.

Why would you mention a one-off match? We’re not seriously judging players/managers/anyone by hand-picking their worst match are we? That’s not even remotely fair. That’s another massive flaw some of our supporters have, nobody is allowed a reasonable amount of bad performances/results.

We were still bottom of the group after Strachan’s first 2 matches. We finished 4th in that group due to beating Croatia in 2 dead rubbers. Fair play to Strachan for that. He did do some good things in his time in the job. 

He then failed to make the playoffs for Euro 2016 which everyone and their granny managed to do and then finished 3rd in an easier group which got us nothing.

Strachan’s time as Scotland manager wasn’t exactly an unmitigated disaster but he didn’t even get us a playoff. He was always going to get sacked after two full campaigns without even a playoff. That’s par for the course I’m afraid and was not an odd decision. If he had been given another campaign then that wouldn’t have been that odd a decision either but he was given as long as any manager before him, if not longer to get us to a tournament and he didn’t do it.

The odd decision for me was to employ McLeish. That set us back and has made Clarke’s job harder. Employing a better manager than Strachan would have been a good idea.

 

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3 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

We were still bottom of the group after Strachan’s first 2 matches. We finished 4th in that group due to beating Croatia in 2 dead rubbers. Fair play to Strachan for that. He did do some good things in his time in the job. 

He then failed to make the playoffs for Euro 2016 which everyone and their granny managed to do and then finished 3rd in an easier group which got us nothing.

Strachan’s time as Scotland manager wasn’t exactly an unmitigated disaster but he didn’t even get us a playoff. He was always going to get sacked after two full campaigns without even a playoff. That’s par for the course I’m afraid and was not an odd decision. If he had been given another campaign then that wouldn’t have been that odd a decision either but he was given as long as any manager before him, if not longer to get us to a tournament and he didn’t do it.

The odd decision for me was to employ McLeish. That set us back and has made Clarke’s job harder. Employing a better manager than Strachan would have been a good idea.

 

Sacking someone who was moving us in the right direction was criminal, when we had reached a level of finishing level on points with the second-placed team in our group. We got what we deserved for that move, which was to end up right back to where we were before Strachan took over, if not even lower. It’s a long way back from there, when you have to start from scratch again. Those 4 and a half years that Strachan had moved us forward, won’t be easy to come by again.

 

If our fans have this bizarre benchmark that you seem to have of ‘play-off or bust’ then we’re going to end up in the situation that we are in now, of burning through more good managers than there are out there, which leaves us nowhere.

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3 minutes ago, dohadeer said:

Sacking someone who was moving us in the right direction was criminal, when we had reached a level of finishing level on points with the second-placed team in our group. We got what we deserved for that move, which was to end up right back to where we were before Strachan took over, if not even lower. It’s a long way back from there, when you have to start from scratch again. Those 4 and a half years that Strachan had moved us forward, won’t be easy to come by again.

 

If our fans have this bizarre benchmark that you seem to have of ‘play-off or bust’ then we’re going to end up in the situation that we are in now, of burning through more good managers than there are out there, which leaves us nowhere.

As I have stated several times I don’t think we were moving in the right direction. More importantly, his employers did not think this. Strachan was certainly better than Levein but that was hardly difficult. 

Sacking Strachan was certainly not criminal. It was expected. Should he have been given more time? It was a decision the SFA has to make and they went with replacing him. It was hardly a shock. It’s all fine and well to look back in hindsight and say we are no further forward now but if we win our next two matches we will be at a major finals, back door or not.

Strachan would’ve done no better than third in our last campaign so I really don’t get why some people are still bleating on about him as if he would’ve got us to Euro 2020 automatically. 

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18 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

As I have stated several times I don’t think we were moving in the right direction. More importantly, his employers did not think this. Strachan was certainly better than Levein but that was hardly difficult. 

Sacking Strachan was certainly not criminal. It was expected. Should he have been given more time? It was a decision the SFA has to make and they went with replacing him. It was hardly a shock. It’s all fine and well to look back in hindsight and say we are no further forward now but if we win our next two matches we will be at a major finals, back door or not.

Strachan would’ve done no better than third in our last campaign so I really don’t get why some people are still bleating on about him as if he would’ve got us to Euro 2020 automatically. 

I haven’t mentioned him getting us to Euro 2020 automatically. I don’t believe he would have with the draw we were handed, but we’d have had a good chance, with him having been in the job for six years at that point. That’s the kind of continuity that’s needed, not the current revolving door set-up. 

Your ‘play-off or bust’ or ‘qualification or bust’ attitude explains why you are so thrilled that UEFA are now handing out play-off places to lower-ranked teams, us being one of the teams to benefit from that.

How many years of not qualifying do we have to endure before you consider that continuity might be a better policy? I don’t know how old you are, but I’m not sure that you’ll live to see the day we qualify again, if we keep burning through managers at the current rate.

You’re clearly in the ‘there’s a magic solution of a manager out there, keep flying through them, until we find them’ brigade, who expect instant success. As many football fans nowadays are far too guilty of.

Realistically though, it’s going to take patience, lowered expectations, and hard work to get us back to major finals again. If only our fans would take a step back and allow that to happen.

Every successful blueprint out there should set alarm bells ringing that our fans are approaching things incorrectly, in terms of expectations/demands of players and managers.

Edited by dohadeer
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Just now, dohadeer said:

I haven’t mentioned him getting us to Euro 2020 automatically. I don’t believe he would have with the draw we were handed, but we’d have had a good chance, with him having been in the job for six years at that point. That’s the kind of continuity that’s needed, not the current revolving door set-up. 

Your ‘play-off or bust’ or ‘qualification or bust’ attitude explains why you are so thrilled that UEFA are now handing out play-off places to lower-ranked teams, us being one of the teams to benefit from that.

How many years of not qualifying do we have to endure before you consider that continuity might be a better policy? I don’t know how old you are, but I’m not sure that you’ll live to see the day if we keep burning through managers at the current rate.

You’re clearly in the ‘there’s a magic solution of a manager out there, keep flying through them, until we find them’ brigade, who expect instant success. As many football fans nowadays are far too guilty of.

Realistically though, it’s going to take patience, lowered expectations, and hard work to get us back to major finals again. If only our fans would take a step back and allow that to happen.

Every successful blueprint out there should set alarm bells ringing that our fans are approaching things incorrectly, in terms of expectations/demands of players and managers.

I didn’t say you said that.

I believe the manager plays such an important role in international football and I do believe managers should be given time but Strachan was given time. He was given two full campaigns to get us somewhere and he didn’t. Should the SFA just have let him keep the job until such times as he finished 5th in a group in 2034 or something? We also don’t know what went on behind the scenes. Maybe the SFA wanted rid of him for other reasons. 

Strachan was stubborn and some of his decisions were bizarre to say the least. If he had done all the right things and we just narrowly missed out on qualifying then I would have been all for him having another campaign but the guy just wasn’t that good I’m afraid.

I am not thrilled at anything Scotland related at the moment. Please do not tell me how I feel about things as you have no clue whether I am thrilled at the current qualifying rules or not.  Please stick to telling us how you feel (if you must).

If we fail to beat Israel and/or Serbia or Norway then you can bet your bottom dollar there will be some people calling for Clarke’s head. I believe he should be given another campaign at least, depending on what happens in the next one.  Whether he wants the job long term or whether he’ll do enough to keep his job beyond 2022 is another matter. 

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30 minutes ago, Texas Pete said:

I didn’t say you said that.

I believe the manager plays such an important role in international football and I do believe managers should be given time but Strachan was given time. He was given two full campaigns to get us somewhere and he didn’t. Should the SFA just have let him keep the job until such times as he finished 5th in a group in 2034 or something? We also don’t know what went on behind the scenes. Maybe the SFA wanted rid of him for other reasons. 

Strachan was stubborn and some of his decisions were bizarre to say the least. If he had done all the right things and we just narrowly missed out on qualifying then I would have been all for him having another campaign but the guy just wasn’t that good I’m afraid.

I am not thrilled at anything Scotland related at the moment. Please do not tell me how I feel about things as you have no clue whether I am thrilled at the current qualifying rules or not.  Please stick to telling us how you feel (if you must).

If we fail to beat Israel and/or Serbia or Norway then you can bet your bottom dollar there will be some people calling for Clarke’s head. I believe he should be given another campaign at least, depending on what happens in the next one.  Whether he wants the job long term or whether he’ll do enough to keep his job beyond 2022 is another matter. 

I think that your expectations are unrealistic.

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9 hours ago, dohadeer said:

His final press conference would have been days - or even immediately - after just missing out on a playoff towards World Cup qualification. Obviously he would be deflated at that point, but that doesn’t mean that he’d given up.

In the same press conference though, he started going on about Scottish genetics and our players being too small.

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