Ra Peepul Are Happy, But, Should They And We Be?

DOWN HERE, in God's Orange County of Ayrshire, where (allegedly) they still give you a picture of King Billy, on his white horse at the Boyne, to hang above the fireplace in your new cooncil hoose, life is good this morning.

 In East Ayrshire, you allegedly got one of these with the keys to your council house

The sun is shining, the bretheren, brown brogues polished to a mirror finish, are stepping-out briskly to worship at their local watering-hole. And if what the leiges term: “The Natural Order” has not quite been re-established, the "tattie-munchers" were humbled yesterday. They might still lead the SPFL table, but, only on goal difference and the upstanding hordes of Ra Peepul are smiling again. The dark days are behind them, and number 55 can be imagined, just over the horizon.

But, if I was them, or a member of the Celtic Family, I would be very worried as 2018 prepares to cede the stage to 2019. Because, for all their financial muscle and advantage, for all those questionable refereeing divisions, which we are told: “level out over time,” the Bigot Brothers are not running away from the field; season 2018-19 is not yet the usual one or two-horse race.

Kilmarnock, now in the hands of a proper football club manager/coach are but one point off the pace, Aberdeen, for all their inconsistencies, are tucked-in a further two points behind Killie, with the even more-wildly inconsistent Hearts not that far behind.

I have of late become a fan of the American web site fivethirty-eight. Now 538 takes a close statistical look at various sports and political events around the globe. One of their best features is their Global Soccer Club Rankings, a statistics-based system which ranks over 600 clubs in leagues from the SPFL to the Australian, from the Chinese to the Brazilian. It makes sobering reading for the Scottish game.

The data they use goes right back to the birth of league football in the 1880s, it is updated after every game, using their SPI (Soccer Power Index). Right now, for instance, they rank Liverpool as the number one club in the world, with an SPI of 92.9.

The Top Ten in the Global Club Rankings are:

1. Liverpool – 92.9
2. Bayern Munich – 92.3
3. Manchester City – 91.8
4. Barcelona – 91.6
5. PSG – 89.9
6. Juventus – 89.5
7. Ajax – 88.0
8. Real Madrid – 87.6
9. Chelsea – 85.6
10. Atletico Madrid – 85.3

Where you ask are our leading Scottish clubs? Ah! Not such happy reading. The rankings of the 12 SPFL Premiership clubs, of the 628 world clubs ranked are:

82. Celtic – 65.0

185. Rangers - 52.2

292. Aberdeen – 42.8

358. Kilmarnock – 38.8

401. Hibernian – 36.0

445. Livingston – 32.6

455. St Johnstone – 31.3

497. Hearts – 26.8

559. Motherwell – 21.6

600. St Mirren – 14.8

609. Dundee – 12.1

614. Hamilton Academical – 10.7.

These are 538's figures, if we look at the UEFA Club Rankings, which take into account European form, the story is not quite as-dismal. The UEFA Club Rankings and Co-Efficients take into account each club's performances in Europe over the past five seasons. At the moment their top ten reads:

1. Real Madrid – 144.0
2. Bayern Munich – 127.0
3. Barcelona - 127.0
4. Atletico Madrid – 125.0
5. Juventus – 120.0
6. PSG – 101.0
7. Manchester City – 99.0
8. Seville – 99.0
9. FC Porto – 90.0
10. Arsenal – 86.0

The UEFA rankings list no fewer than 450 clubs from the leagues in all 54 UEFA member associations, and the Scottish clubs' rankings are:

  44. Celtic – 31.0

185. Aberdeen – 5.5

205. Rangers – 5.25

221. Hibernian – 4.425

222. St Johnstone – 4.425

223. Hearts – 4.425

224. Inverness CT – 4.425

225. Motherwell – 4.425

These are the only Scottish clubs mentioned in the rankings, since they are the only ones to have tasted European competition in the past five seasons.

What can we learn from these figures? Not a lot to be honest, other than – regardless of whether you try to assess Scottish football in global or merely in European terms – we are shite. This may not be news to the average punter in the stands, but, this information has yet to breach the force field which exists around the sixth-floor corridor of power inside Hampden, where they still have not realised how poor we are, far less sought some new way of changing things to bring about improvement.

Once upon a time, when I was a young man – we actually fancied our chances against the top European clubs. We could go toe-to-toe with them and win. Today, while we are not yet at the stage of being a guaranteed win against such clubs, where once, Scotland expected against them, now: furrit tho' we cannae see, we guess and fear.

Back then, our determination to win could offset our failings in the technical department. The fact the average Scottish defender could not trap a falling bag of cement was not such a handicap. He could offset this by putting the fear of God into these mamby-pamby sand-dancing furriners.

Today, the continental player is every bit as tough as the home-bred Scots while, since the Souness Revolution, we have tended to import third-rate foreign players, rather than trusting our fate to second-rate Scots.

I live in hope, that, perhaps beginning in 2019, we will change tack, start once again favouring ball skills and technical prowess over the ability to run all day, trusting in home-grown youngsters, and, maybe, just maybe – in world football terms, the lion rampant will roar again.

And, if we can clean up our spectating act, from some of the rubbish we saw and heard yesterday at our two big city derby games – so-much the better.

Hae a Guid Ne'erday, when it comes. See you across in 2019.

It Looks As If The Real Manchester United Are Back For Christmas

CONFESSION TIME – I have, as 2018 has unfolded before us in all its awfulness, rather fallen out of love with fitba. Maybe it has been a hangover from Brexit; how can you get involved in football when, out in the real world, there is a genuine crisis going on.

 If yesterday is any guide, he will not be missed

Any way, just in time for Christmas, I saw possible salvation. This came when I watched the Manchester United v Cardiff City game last night. It fairly restored my faith in the beautiful game, to watch United take Cardiff apart. OK, it was only Cardiff, but, over those 90 minutes, the United squad rediscovered the swagger which had been squeezed out of their game by the Chosen One, over his three-year reign of terror.

I never saw Mourinho and United as a good fit. He has never encouraged or espoused the vibrant attacking football which is demanded of the repertory company inside the Theatre of Dreams. The Portuguese's mantra has always seemed to me to be: “We win 1-0,” whereas the United dictum has been: “OK, you score three, we will score four.”

That said, it cannot be easy being a United player. Even Paul Pogba, for all it cost United £89.3 million to bring him back from Juventus; will never be considered the best player to wear the number 6 United shirt – so long as there is someone alive who saw Duncan Edwards play.

 Paul Pogba

He's a good player, but, I still reckon this guy would be most people's first pick for the number 6 shirt in any Manchester United dream team.

 Duncan Edwards

 

Alexis Sanchez isn't a bad player, but, he just happens to have inherited the number 7 shirt once worn by George Best, (who also of course wore 11), Eric Cantona and Cristiano Ronaldo, to name but three. David De Gea is touted as possibly the best goalkeeper in the world – but, so too were Harry Gregg and Peter Schmeichel before him.

Some day, they might erect a statue of Marcus Rashford, Anthony Martial and Romelu Lukaku – but, will they ever match the legend of the original golden trio of Best, Charlton and Law?

They are standing on the shoulders of giants, yes, but, today's United players still have an awful lot of history – from the 1948 cup-winning team of Carey, Delaney and Co, via the Busby Babes, to the side with the “Holy Trinity” on-board, and on to the “Boys of '92” - bearing down on them.

And yes, it was: “only Cardiff,” but, to those of us who have a soft spot for watching an attacking Manchester United team going full pelt for goals – yesterday was a welcome ray of sunshine in what has been a mainly dark season.

HUGHIE McILVANNEY once reckoned Ali v Frasier, both in wheel-chairs, in an old people's home, would still be one hell of a fight. There would not be the athleticism of the Fight of the Century, or the Thrilla in Manila, but, there sheer competitiveness would still have made it interesting.

Hugh McIlvanney

So, bearing that in mind – the Scottish Premiership, quality-wise, might currently be shite, but, by God, this season is the most-interesting in a long time. I know the Lap Top Loyal and the Celtic-Minded sects within the Scottish Football Writers Association are duty-bound to try to con us into believing the quality of the Bigot Brothers' squads, but, the reality is, as is shown by the league table, they are no better than the “Diddy Teams” they are forced to play against.

I have long felt, if a provincial club manager in Scotland is ever able to persuade his players: “It doesn't matter how we get on against the Old Firm – but, if we can beat everyone else, the chances are, we will win the league;” then that manager could well succeed.

In accumulating seven straight league titles, Celtic's average accrual of available points has averaged 79.8% of those available. In 2016-17, they won 106 points out of an available 114 (38x3). That has been their best show of the seven, their worst was season 2012-13, when they took the title, with 79 points – 69.3% of those available.

The eight games against the Old Firm account for 21.05% of the available points; so, had any of the other ten clubs concentrated on beating every team, other than the Old Firm, and succeeded, then they would have won the league in three of the last seven seasons. The percentage of points available in games not involving the Old Firm, almost exactly equates to the average number of league-winning points accrued by Celtic during their current run of seven in a row.

It could also be argued that a team used to beating everyone else, would surely be capable of taking points, at least at home, against the Old Firm. Something there for managers to perhaps try to get their heads round.

Of course, so used are we to the big two winning, I sometimes think they are already 1-0 up when they kick-off against provincial opponents. A similar degree of expectation comes into play with the other sides. They might approach a game against one or other of the Old Firm with hope rather than expectation of victory, whereas, against any other of the provincial sides, it is expectation rather than hope which is uppermost in the players' minds.

I feel things are levelling-off in the Premiership this season. It is certainly the most-competitive it has been in years, with, almost at the half-way stage, four points separating first and fourth. I sense, Aberdeen and Kilmarnock can maintain the pressure on the OF up until and hopefully after the split. That would be marvellous.

We now have a three tier top flight, with the top four split by those four points. Tier two also contains four teams: Hearts, Hibs, Livingston and St Johnstone – split by just two points, while at the bottom Motherwell, Hamilton, St Mirren and Dundee are involved in a dog fight for survival.

The football might not be top drawer, but, the excitement and uncertainty surely is, and long may it continue like this.

We Could Do With Someone To Cut Through The Bullshit And Tell It Like It Really Is

WHEN the European Nations League was first suggested, I had a notion it would be good for Scotland. This was based on the little-known or appreciated fact, at least in Scotland, we always do better in competitive games.

One of the best of the many pro-independence websites is one entitled: “Talking Up Scotland,” it is run by Professor John Robertson, a former senior teacher at the University of the West of Scotland. The good professor has been waging, ever since he was “retired early” - apparently for not singing of the British Establishment hymn book – a one-man campaign to counter-act the many lies, items of misinformation and downright shite published by our rabid right-wing mainstream media.

Professor John Robertson - we coud do with someone in Scottish Football doing his job

Maybe, given the way the Lap Top Loyal, the Celtic-Minded and the Hingers-Oan of our football media have been anti every Scotland manager since Craig Brown, we need a Prof. Robertson type, to cut through the bullshit and tell it like it is.

The caveat is, as always – there are three ways of doing anything in sport: the easy way, the hard way and the Scottish way. We are the absolute masters of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. No victory is ever greater than a Scottish one, and no defeat is ever as ignoble as a Scottish loss.

But, given the lack of cash in our game, the lack of administrative talent, the lack of foresight and forward planning our game, you know, we are not in as bad a place as we perhaps believe ourselves to be.

Of course we have this long, long history weighing us down. After all, while you can credit England with codifying and organising the game, it was the Scots who adapted the basic English method and made it work – we invented the passing game, every early advance had a Scot or two. Then we allowed the SFA blazers to have too-big a say, we allowed a couple of clubs founded on sectarianism and bigotry to become too-powerful, and we stagnated.

Today, we see ourselves as too wee, too poor and too stupid to get back to where we think we ought to be, well, I concede, there isn't a lot of cash slopping around in the Scottish game, but, if we make the best of what we have got – we can surely live with the wealthy and have as good a quality of football.

We have been playing international football for almost 150 years, we are in our 15^th decade as an international-playing country. Here is our record over these 15 decades:

1870s – played 12 – won 8 – 66.7% wins

1880s – played 26 – won 22 – 84.6% wins

1890s – played 30 – won 19 – 63.3% wins

1900s – played 30 – won 15 – 50.0% wins

1910s – played 15 – won 7 – 46.7% wins

1920s – played 33 – won 23 – 69.7% wins

1930s – played 42 – won 22 – 52.4% wins

1940s – played 17 – won 7 – 41.2% wins

1950s – played 67 – won 32 – 47.8% wins

1960s – played 63 – won 29 – 46.0% wins

1970s – played 88 – won 37 – 42.1% wins

1980s – played 88 – won 35 – 39.8% wins

1990s – played 89 – won 37 – 41.6% wins

2000s – played 85 – won 33 – 38.8% wins

2010s – played 80 – won 34 – 42.5% wins

These figures give us an overall record since 1872 of having played 766 games, of which we have won 362, or 47.3%. Of these games, 226 have been friendlies, while the other 540 have been competitive – in the sense there were league points or a trophy at stake. If we separate the two types of games we find:

Friendlies – played 226 – won 100 – 44.6% wins

Competitive – played 540 – won 262 – 48.5% wins.

We tend to disparage today's players, as being not as good as the ones we once had. We long for a new Dalglish or Law, we wonder if we will ever see another Johnstone, or Baxter, Souness or McGrain. Just have a look at these figures above, our present bunch of no-hopers are actually doing better than our star-studded sides of blessed memory.

The current crop of players and managers are actually doing better than the giants of the past. For instance, our Teams of the Decades for those “great years” of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, when Scotland were near ever-presents at the World Cup finals are:

Team of the 1970s: Rough; Jardine, McGrain; Bremner, McQueen, Buchan; Dalglish, Gemmill, Jordan, Hartford, Morgan.

Team of the 1980s: Leighton; Gough, Malpas, Souness, McLeish, Miller; Dalglish, McStay, Archibald, M Johnston, Strachan.

Team of the 1990s: Leighton; McKimmie, Boyd, McCall, Hendry, Calderwood; Gallacher, McStay, McCoist, McAllister, Collins.

Even with these two in the side, we didn't do as-well as the current squad

There are some sterling names in there, but, their under-rated modern-day successors are actually a marginally more-successful outfit. We may not be featuring on the big stage, as we were back then, but, we are winning more games.

Of course, it is always difficult to compare eras, perhaps it is a case of while we have made marginal gains, other countries have simply got better, had better coaching and player development strategies in place, made better use of the available talent.

Maybe we should try to be a wee bit less Scottish. The wind is not always in our faces; perhaps good things are for the likes of us. He might not, for now, be getting credit fot it, but, I would like to hope, by delivering those last two results, perhaps Big Eck has started us of on the upward staircase again.

We might never get back to where we were in the 19^th century, but, perhaps, in the remainder of the 21^st, we can get closer to where we want to be – and, the last two wins were a good place to start from.

Sorry Ladies, But, I Don't Think You're Quite Ready

MEDIA manipulation is now so ingrained in society in this AD 2018, I sometimes think we don't notice we are being manipulated. The mainstream media does not help – it was the social media platforms who spotted the White House's cack-handed and ridiculous efforts to doctor video tape, to try to make CNN look bad, for instance.

We are not immune to media manipulation here in Scotland – even without going into the tsnumai of “SNP Bad” stories which have caused the news and comment pages of The Herald and The Scotsman to become comic pages, unworthy of these organs' great history, while the way the Scottish “sports” pages have virtually become advertising for the Old Firm is another shaming indictment of the poor management in the msm today.

The great Hugh Dan will hopefully be back for the BBC Alba coverage of women's rugby

Yesterday, we saw further evidence of media manipulation, with the news that BBC Alba is going to start showing Women's Rugby. Now I loved Alba's coverage of the PRO14, although I could follow little of what the excellent Hugh Dan McLelland ever said. But, it got Edinburgh and Glasgow covered, and they were covered well.

But, Women's Rugby, shakes head sorrowfully.

I have nothing against women playing rugby, I would not stop them, but, I am old school, it just doesn't seem right. Nothing against women playing football either, in fact, I have fewer objections to women playing with a round ball than an oval one. This may come down to the lesser potential for injury, and, having played in a couple of mixed hockey matches, I know fine well, old Rudyard Kipling knew what he was talking about when he wrote: “the female of the species is more-deadly than the male.”

I simply feel, Women's Rugby in Scotland is not yet ready for regular TV exposure. I know the girls, plus big Shade Munro and his coaching team work bloody hard. I appreciate they need encouragement, but, they simply are not yet good enough to be showcased regularly on TV – even on a “fringe” station such as BBC Alba, and it could back-fire, badly.

For me, the standard is not high enough, the depth of talent too-shallow. Women's rugby in Scotland's time is not, for me, here yet.

There is a suggestion, only a whisper as yet, that the Alba deal for the women might be the forerunner of a similar deal for Super-6. Let's hope so, the standard will certainly be higher, but, at the end of the day, I feel showcasing women's rugby is nothing more than a spot of box-ticking by someone inside Pacific Quay.

Now, the Scottish rugby community is perceived as being politically “conservative.” In fact, a large percentage, given their upbringing – the right type of Edinburgh school, followed by one of the older universities, will certainly be “Conservative and Unionist,” they might want to start thinking Independently.

Because, once Scotland is again Independent, and it is coming – the clammy, dead hand of BBC Scotland, the last outpost of the imperial broadcasting service - will be removed. We can hope, indeed, we must demand, that the post-independence Scottish Broadcasting Corporation will be encouraged to positively support Scottish sport, with better coverage of our national teams and our top exponents in more sports. And they ought to be telt, in no uncertain terms: in Scotland, we have more than one sport played, and more than two teams playing.

Have any of you noticed, by the way, what happens on Premier Sports, when they cover a Cheetahs or Kings game? Just before the match starts, up on the screens will flash the names of the commentators – you have an Afrikaans commentary, an English one and a Xhosa one. Why cannot we have this choice on BBC Scotland? Scott Hastings or John Beattie could do the English one, Hugh Dan the Gaelic one, it would be up to the viewer which commentary he or she listened to. I know, we occasionally had a choice of English language commentary on BBC Alba last season – this is worth expanding with the new coverage.

I AM told, as part of their preparations for the Fiji game, tomorrow, the Scotland management team had one of the young, up and coming club coaches do his homework on the Pacific Islanders.

And Hoggy's back too - hooray!

His research brought-up the amazing statistic – the Fijians score over 60% of their tries off breakdown ball. Apparently, this is a very high figure. So, the Scottish game plan is  to stifle them at source.

I might have thought, Hamish Watson, one of our very best breakdown “jackals” should have played as an antidote to this, but, maybe Toony, who has a far-better tactical brain than I, has something up his sleeve.

They are all big men up front, so maybe the bulked-up Scotland pack is designed to tie the Fijians down – as much as you can tie-down a free spirit like big Leone – to deny them turnover opportunities.

I suspect we might see Greig and Finn kicking more often than normal, to try to turn them. I am however, quietly confident the side Toony has picked can avoid what is definitely a potential and too-obvious banana skin game.

With four internationals in as many weeks, squad rotation will be key, hence the one or two unexpected selections for tomorrow, in a squad which reads (in 1-23 order):

Allan Dell, Fraser Brown, Willem Ne, Sam Skinner, Grant Gilchrist, Ryan Wilson, Jamie Ritchie, Matt Personage; Greig Laid law (captain), Finn Russell; Sean Mainland, Peter Horne, Alex Dunbar, Tommy Seymour. Replacements: Stuart McNally, Alex Allan, Simon Bergman, Jonny Gray, Josh Strauss; George Horne, Adam Hastings, Chris Harris.

Hogg coming back so quickly was something of a surprise, but, we need to have our few X-factor guys playing as much as possible. He will be ready.

Eck Has Chosen, Let's Get Behind Him And His Squad

YESTERDAY, to a somewhat muted fanfare, Big Eck announced his Scotland squad for the upcoming two crucial European Nations League games. The details are:

UEFA Nations League: Albania v Scotland, Saturday, 17 November, kick-off 7.45pm
Loro Borici Stadium, Shkoder

UEFA Nations League: Scotland v Israel, Tuesday, 20 November, kick-off 7.45pm
Hampden Park, Glasgow

Goalkeepers: Craig Gordon (Celtic), Allan McGregor (Rangers), Jon McLaughlin (Sunderland).

Defenders: Michael Devlin, Scott McKenna (both Aberdeen), Charlie Mulgrew, (Blackburn Rovers), Stephen O’Donnell (Kilmarnock), Andrew Robertson (Liverpool), Graeme Shinnie (Aberdeen), Kieran Tierney (Celtic).

Midfielders: Stuart Armstrong (Southampton), Ryan Christie, James Forrest (both Celtic), Ryan Fraser (Bournemouth), Gary Mackay-Steven, (Aberdeen), Kevin McDonald (Fulham), John McGinn (Aston Villa), Callum McGregor (Celtic), Callum Paterson (Cardiff City).

Forwards: Steven Fletcher (Sheffield Wednesday), Oliver McBurnie (Swansea City), Matt Phillips (West Bromwich Albion), Johnny Russell (Sporting Kansas City).

These are crucial games for Eck. He may not have “lost the dressing room,” but, he, has perhaps lost most, if not all of the press box. The Lap Top Loyal and the Celtic-Minded are not enamoured of his selections, tactics or results to date, and, if you lose them, then your jaiket is immediately on a shoogly nail.

To be fair to Eck, he has been fairly consistent in his selections; 13 of the 23 men he has named have appeared in at least 4 of the 8 squads he has picked. You could also add Kieran Tierney to that list, since he was voluntarily excluded from the squad which travelled to Peru and Mexico.

No player has been an ever-present during Eck's second term in the “impossible” Scotland job, but, he is at least doing the basics of team-building, in establish a core “spine” to the side: either Allan McGregor or Craig Gordon in goal, Scott McKenna (five starts in eight games and Charlie Mulgrew (6/8) in central defence, John McGinn (6/8), Calum McGregor (5/8 + 1 sub) and Kevin McDonald (4/8 + 1 sub) in the centre of midfield; and if he has yet to find two strikers to operate together, Ollie McBurnie (2/8 + 3 sub) and Jonny Russell (3/8 + 1 sub) have been consistent picks.

Stephen O'Donnell has also come in and pretty-much established himself as first-choice at right back, which gives McLeish a “first-choice” starting XI (in 4-4-2 formation) of:

A. McGregor; O'Donnell, McKenna, Mulgrew, Robertson; McGregor, McDonald, McGinn, Armstrong; McBurnie and Russell.

Immediately you look at that side, McLeish's media problems become obvious – where's Kieran Tierney? Well, KT, great player though he is, is victim to an age-old Scotland problem. Right from the early days, we have had a history of maybe being short of class in one position, while having an embarrassment of riches in another.

Jimmy McGrory for instance, scored goals for fun for Celtic, while at the same time Hughie Gallacher was doing the same for Newcastle, Chelsea and about four other English clubs – and we could only ever play one of them, with Gallacher, for all his discipline problems, usually getting the nod. (And you think Leigh Griffiths was the first “problem” player around a Scotland squad).

Then there was the Reilly or Bauld debate, the Smith or Waddell one, Henderson/Johnstone, Ure or McNeill, Forsyth or Buchan, Leighton or Goram, the list goes on. You have the likes of wee Alex Troup, an absolute star in providing so-many of the crosses from which Everton's Dixie Dean scored his plethora of goals, but, unfortunate to be a contemporary of Alan Morton. Or what about Ralph Brand, a member of the elite goal-a-game at international level club, but, only ever a stand-in for the absent Denis Law.

 Ralph Brand - eight caps, eight goals, but only ever a stand-in for Denis Law

(thanks to Andy the Photo Doctor for this colourised image)

In the old days of the selection committee, the lights would burn into the night while such debates were concluded, usually via an element of horse-trading; today, it's Eck's call, and, even if we disagree with him, we have to back him.

It's not as if he has the power Gregor Townsend, his contemporary across at Murrayfield has. The SRU is run on the basis that, the national side is the one that makes the money and drives the interest, therefore, the National Coach gets everything he wants within reason. He can ask Glasgow or Edinburgh to maybe try-out a Scotland squad member in a new position, or to rest a player who is maybe looking jaded. He can suggest these clubs play in a certain way, to aid the national side.

Scotland Rugby Coach Gregor Townsend, has a power to influence things Eck can only dream of

Eck does not have that control. In fact, it often seems as if some clubs – two in particular - view the Scotland team as a nuisance and a hindrance to their club objectives. Eck is being asked to operate with one hand tied behind his back. His job truly is a poisoned chalice.

Some are already seeing Eck's second spell as Scotland boss as a disaster. However, we have won 9 of the 18 games in which he has led the country. And, this time round, he has a 50% winning record in the competitive games we have played.

But, we cannot overlook the monkey on every Scotland boss's back: this age-old history of “Scotland expects.” We haven't been “World Class” for over 40 years. (I am taking “World Class” to be in the top ten in the World), we haven't reached the finals of a major tournament for 20 years, mediocrity is our normal.

We expect Eck to preside over a win in our European Nations League group; nay we DEMAND he leads us to glory – while at the same time, placing every obstacle we can in his way to getting us there.

But, hey, what's new – that's the Scottish way of working. And I do not see it changing any time soon.