The Whispering Has Started - Cheerio Craig

I AM indebted to my old mate Roddy Forsyth (in today's Daily Telegraph) for the not surprising news that one or two (still unidentified) Hampden "blazers" expressed less than whole-hearted support for the embattled Craig Levein following Tuesday's disappointing draw with Macedonia.

 

We are, I fear, being prepared for oor Craig being oot on his erse if (when) we fail to secure all six points from next month's away double-header against Wales and Belgium. Aside from the long-ago days of George Young, Billy Steel, Lawrie Reilly and Co in the 1950s, we have never had a good record in Cardiff. Our last visit to the Taff capital did for George Burley - and interestingly, isn't wee George's reputation being re-assessed in the face of his successor's current travails? If the Boyos bounce back from their Serbian stuffing, we could be in bother, particularly Levein.

 

Then we come to winning in Belgium. I am old enough to remember the following Scottish team being gubbed 3-0 in a European Championships qualifier in Liege in 1970: Jim Cruickshank; Davie Hay, Tommy Gemmell, Pat Stanton, Ron McKinnon, Bobby Moncur, Archie Gemmill, John Greig, Colin Stein, John O'Hare and Charlie Cooke, with Tony Green and Jim Forrest coming off the bench.

 

In 1979 in another European Championships qualifier in Brussels - Alan Rough; Sandy Jardine, Iain Munro, John Wark, Alan Hansen, Willie Miller, Kenny Dalglish, Graeme Souness, Joe Jordan, Asa Hartford and John Robertson, plus substitutes Frank Gray and Davie Provan lost 2-0 to the Belgians.

 

Three weeks later, Rough; Jardine, Danny McGrain, Wark, Gordon McQueen, Kenny Burns, Dalglish, Roy Aitken, Derek Johnstone, Eamonn Bannon and Robertson, with Provan again coming off the bench, lost 3-1 to the Belgians at Hampden.

 

Three years later, in another European Championships qualifier, we were back in Brussels; Kenny Dalglish scored one brilliant goal and one which was merely a very good one, but we still lost 3-2. That team was: Jim Leighton; Davie Narey, Frankie Gray, Aitken, Alex McLeish, Hansen, Gordon Strachan, Stevie Archibald, Dalglish, Jim Bett and Souness, with Kenny Burns and Paul Sturrock coming off the bench. These 1979 and 1982 teams were managed by Jock Stein lest we forget.

 

OK, Levein is no Stein, but, he doesn't have the quality, or depth of quality of player available to the Big Man. But, I would submit that, unless Belgium - who are still ranked above us, on the FIFA rankings, have gone back faster than a WWII Italian tank, we are still unlikely to reverse form. Lest we forget also, the last time we were in Belgium on competitive business, in September 2001, we lost 2-0.

 

So, the portents are not good, for us, or for Levein. That said, I repeat, who else could do better - we don't have good enough players and until we change the system, we will struggle.

 

 

 

WHICH brings me to my second point. This morning's BBC Breakfast programme made great play of a change to Under-12 football in England, which will see more small-sided games, on smaller pitches, with smaller goals.

 

Of course, the whole shebang doesn't have to be enforced until 2015 and already, the Luddites are making their voices heard to the effect that these changes are unnecessary and will "kill" football.

 

Scotland is ahead of England in bringing-in small-sided games on smaller pitches, but, even up here, it is not yet universal, some ten years down the line. The McLuddites have particularly hard heads - but, in spite of the opposition of the reactionaries, in this field at least, the Hampden "blazers" are forging ahead.

 

However, I refer again to an old friend of mine. I will not name him, but he is a big name in age group football, a major player in age group football in Europe and an SFA councillor, with a seat on one of the influential SFA committees.

 

Every time I meet him he says the same thing: "Up to age 16, Scottish players are as good as any in Europe - and a lot better than many; however, once they get into our professional club system at that age, they start to go backwards and the rest of Europe forges ahead".

 

His message is simple - our clubs pay lip service to and are only playing at proper youth development. We don't put the resources, the time or the determination into youth development at our clubs.

 

I fear, until we waken up to this and do something about it, poor saps like Craig Levein will be asked to battle with players totally unprepared for the modern game at international level; and will pay the price for the failings of others.