The Greatest Scotland Squad for a Major Tournament

[Caledonian Craig]

I realise this is all subjective but thought I would run a poll on what supporters think is the greatest Scotland squad to be assembled for a major tournament. Which has had the greatest strength in depth, rich in quality and quantity and full of much respected players of that time who have become legends. Of course we all have opinions of our own so what is your favourite/best Scotland squad to represent us at a major tournament.

[Caledonian Craig]

For me I have opted for the 1974 World Cup Finals squad.

Jeez that had quality, legends and strength in depth. Midfield legends such as Billy Bremner, Peter Lorimer, Jimmy Johnstone and attacking greats such as Denis Law, Kenny Dalglish and Joe Jordan. In defence we had steel in Sandy Jardine, Danny McGrain and Jim Holton with a safe pair of hands in David Harvey in goal.

What's your best?

[stocky]

 

[Caledonian Craig]

17 minutes ago, stocky said:

 

To be honest a good case could be made for any of the 74, 78 and 82 squad.

[Whelky75]

1 hour ago, Caledonian Craig said:

To be honest a good case could be made for any of the 74, 78 and 82 squad.

I think you probably shouldn’t have gone as far back as 1954 and 1958, and limited your question to the last 50 years.

How many of us know enough about those two squads to analyse them properly? Also, how would you begin to compare different teams of those eras, when European club competition and international competition were still in their infancy?

I would tend to assume that those squads were even stronger than the 1970s and 1980s squads and that Scottish football has been on a fairly permanent gradual decline for 150 years, as the rest of the world slowly caught up with our early position as one of the world leaders in the game.

The 1970s squads may appear better, due to what those players were achieving in the English league and in European club competitions, however I think that’s more down to circumstances and opportunity and suspect the 1950s squads were probably better teams, in terms of how high up the pecking order they were in the world game.

[daviebee]

1 hour ago, Caledonian Craig said:

To be honest a good case could be made for any of the 74, 78 and 82 squad.

Definitely.  That's a frightening amount of winners in the 82 squad.  In 78 we were leaving out a EC-winning captain and a centre-forward who was Player of the Year down south.  Imagine that nowadays!

I had a wee look at the full squad for 74 just to refresh my memory and was amazed that Pat Stanton wasn't in there although 2 of his teammates were.  We had some talent in 74 when we could leave out a brilliant player like that.  A wee bit light up front though which seems to have been our curse down the decades.  Denis Law was done by that time and Ormond admitted he was there just so he could get the experience of playing in the WC.

74 shades it for me although that might've been different had Danny McGrain made it to Argentina.

[Malcolm]

52 minutes ago, daviebee said:

Definitely.  That's a frightening amount of winners in the 82 squad.  In 78 we were leaving out a EC-winning captain and a centre-forward who was Player of the Year down south.  Imagine that nowadays!

I had a wee look at the full squad for 74 just to refresh my memory and was amazed that Pat Stanton wasn't in there although 2 of his teammates were.  We had some talent in 74 when we could leave out a brilliant player like that.  A wee bit light up front though which seems to have been our curse down the decades.  Denis Law was done by that time and Ormond admitted he was there just so he could get the experience of playing in the WC.

74 shades it for me although that might've been different had Danny McGrain made it to Argentina.

Danny m grain and McQueen would have made a difference in 78.  That team peaked the year before, and McLeod, with hindsight probably picked the wrong midfield.

82 we had a phenomenal number of top players to pick from, to the extent, I’m not sure we knew our best team.

too young to remember 74 but on paper it looks good.  
 

if you could pick the best from 74/78/82 squads and have them all at their peak would be some team. 

 

[ceudmilefailte]

74 for me, the players seemed to be playing top flight for ever afterwards. 

Probably an age thing, time flys by the older you get. 

Pretty sure with all their players at the peak of their game at the same time the 74 team would romp it. 

Dalglish and Law at their peak on the same Saturday afternoon, no one would have a chance. 

[er yir macaroon]

2024

[Orraloon]

The way folk answer this will be as much a reflection of their age than anything else.

[ceudmilefailte]

2 hours ago, Orraloon said:

The way folk answer this will be as much a reflection of their age than anything else.

Pretty close to 100% true. 

[Caledonian Craig]

3 hours ago, Orraloon said:

The way folk answer this will be as much a reflection of their age than anything else.

Not all the time. 1974 was my choice but the first World Cup I really remember is 1978.

[vanderark14]

Went down a rabbit hole looking at the squads. The 82 squad had a ridiculous amount of talent in it. 

On a side note...... Jim Leighton went to 4 World Cups. Did any other scotsman do that? 

A Scotland player playing at 4 World Cups sounds like some sort of dream on modern football 🤣

[Caledonian Craig]

16 minutes ago, vanderark14 said:

Went down a rabbit hole looking at the squads. The 82 squad had a ridiculous amount of talent in it. 

On a side note...... Jim Leighton went to 4 World Cups. Did any other scotsman do that? 

A Scotland player playing at 4 World Cups sounds like some sort of dream on modern football 🤣

Yes he was only Scot to go to four World Cups. Kenny Dalglish almost acheived it but missed out on 1986 with injury.

Edited April 7, 2023 by Caledonian Craig

[ceudmilefailte]

17 minutes ago, vanderark14 said:

Went down a rabbit hole looking at the squads. The 82 squad had a ridiculous amount of talent in it. 

On a side note...... Jim Leighton went to 4 World Cups. Did any other scotsman do that? 

A Scotland player playing at 4 World Cups sounds like some sort of dream on modern football 🤣

A Scotland supporter going to 4 world cups is even less likely now.

[Caledonian Craig]

20 minutes ago, ceudmilefailte said:

A Scotland supporter going to 4 world cups is even less likely now.

No not at all. But they most probably won't be watching Scotland playing in them.

[dan cake]

Not really in the spirit of the thread but we (the fans) have been mugged off for decades, great club players aye but as a national team generations after generation of fucking imposters

[mccaughey85]

Went for 82 but 74 and 78 were exceptionally strong as well. 

82 had 3 or 4 genuine world class players in it who were at their peak. Its full of guys who had won european cups and english league titles. 

Its a disgrace that the 74, 78 and 82 squads never got out the group stages.

I wonder how our squads compared to other nations during those years. We must have been near the top 10 in the world for player/squad strength back then although its hard to judge as most south americans stayed in south america at that time rather than playing for top clubs in europe.

 

 

[bigfingers]

I only remember as far back as Euro 96. That squad was pretty decent with loads of players in their prime. 

[Whelky75]

1 hour ago, dan cake said:

Not really in the spirit of the thread but we (the fans) have been mugged off for decades, great club players aye but as a national team generations after generation of fucking imposters

What do you mean?

[Whelky75]

43 minutes ago, mccaughey85 said:

Went for 82 but 74 and 78 were exceptionally strong as well. 

82 had 3 or 4 genuine world class players in it who were at their peak. Its full of guys who had won european cups and english league titles. 

Its a disgrace that the 74, 78 and 82 squads never got out the group stages.

I wonder how our squads compared to other nations during those years. We must have been near the top 10 in the world for player/squad strength back then although its hard to judge as most south americans stayed in south america at that time rather than playing for top clubs in europe.

 

 

What do you think exceptional means?! 🤔😂

[mccaughey85]

32 minutes ago, Whelky75 said:

What do you think exceptional means?! 🤔😂

Well in comparison to our recent years the 74, 78 and 82 squads could be considered exceptional in terms quality and player strength. 

I would even say that any country of our size(under 7/8 million) to produce a squad of that strength is exceptional or at least relatively uncommon. 

We really had an embarrassment of riches back then compared the last 20 years or even the 90s.

[Whelky75]

38 minutes ago, mccaughey85 said:

Well in comparison to our recent years the 74, 78 and 82 squads could be considered exceptional in terms quality and player strength. 

I would even say that any country of our size(under 7/8 million) to produce a squad of that strength is exceptional or at least relatively uncommon. 

We really had an embarrassment of riches back then compared the last 20 years or even the 90s.

I’m not sure it could be considered exceptional, when you’re saying it happened three times in succession! That kind of goes against the definition of the word.

[mccaughey85]

3 hours ago, Whelky75 said:

I’m not sure it could be considered exceptional, when you’re saying it happened three times in succession! That kind of goes against the definition of the word.

As the saying goes its hard to argue with clever ppl but its impossible to argue with stupid ppl lol.

They were exceptional squads if you compare them to the other squads we took to the other 8 major tournaments. Our other squads have been quite poor/average in comparison.

The 54 and 58 squads are hard to judge imo. European football hadnt started or was in its infancy and its hard to judge how talented the squads were in comparison to other countries at that time. Our performances at those tournaments werent great but then you could say that about all of our tournaments. With the 74 to 82 squads the evidence that they were strong squads were clear to see by how many had european medals.

The 74,78 and 82 squads were also very much interlinked in terms of players. Our squad strength between 74 and 82 could be considered exceptional by our standards and other countries our size.

 

 

 

[Caledonian Craig]

20 hours ago, Whelky75 said:

I think you probably shouldn’t have gone as far back as 1954 and 1958, and limited your question to the last 50 years.

How many of us know enough about those two squads to analyse them properly? Also, how would you begin to compare different teams of those eras, when European club competition and international competition were still in their infancy?

I would tend to assume that those squads were even stronger than the 1970s and 1980s squads and that Scottish football has been on a fairly permanent gradual decline for 150 years, as the rest of the world slowly caught up with our early position as one of the world leaders in the game.

The 1970s squads may appear better, due to what those players were achieving in the English league and in European club competitions, however I think that’s more down to circumstances and opportunity and suspect the 1950s squads were probably better teams, in terms of how high up the pecking order they were in the world game.

You genuinely have no clue do you?

Firstly, the poll is about our best ever squad to go to a major tournament so every squad is up for discussion.

Secondly, the squad of 54 certainly could not be better than available even today due to SFA incompetence. In 1954 they named only a 13-man squad even though other squads were 22-man strong. On top of that the SFA still operated in an archaic manner with a selection committee choosing the squad and selecting the teams. The manager/coach And Beattie had his hands tied in every way. And on top of that due to SFA disagreements with Rangers none of their players were selected and preparation time for the tournament was far more limited compared to other qualifiers as clubs refused to release their players for preparation.

On to 1958 and the SFA still operated in archaic ways though it was being dragged into the new age. Manager Sir Matt Busby was allowed to sit in on selection committees and team selection discussions but the committee had the last word. Handicaps like that were still major disadvantages and the talented youngster Denis Law missed out on the tournament due to a knee injury.

So your comments on 54 and 58 squads are way off the mark. Curious why you chose to comment on a thread which has a poll but you ignore participation and post in only an antagonistic form.