MEDIA management - don't you just love it? Somebody at the SFA - 'Boyneband Broadfoot?' decides that a specific player will be put-up for media duties and the donkeys of the Scottish Football Writers Association dutifully troop down to the SFA's team camp, throw a series of easy questions at that day's patsy, then return to Glasgow to write-up their masterpieces - yawn.
Yesterday it was Russell Martin of Norwich City, or Russell Who? as he is known to the Tartan Army. Nae harm to the boay, he seems a nice guy, but, he and his type are the problem with Scottish internaitonal football today.
I would never decry the boy's ability. He is an English Premiership regular with his club, so, he has to be worth a shot. He is English-born, to a Scottish father and therefore qualifies through the Caledonian diaspora feeder stream. This is to his credit and an advantage, we suspect he might be able to trap a falling bag of cement, a feat which is beyond most home-grown SPL players. I also suspect, having had an English football education rather than a Scottish one, he just might be able to find a team-mate standing further than five yards away with a pass to feet, and might also have a professional attitude to his craft.
But, he came onto the SFA's radar as his club climbed through the ranks in the English League. His experience of European football at a meaningful level is almost non-existent and he missed-out on the international grounding of Under-21 honours.
This is my main beef with the Hampden blazers; they will squabble like feral cats for a place on the glamour trips - how many "blazers" have wangled their way onto this week's sun-kissed jolly to Croatia I wonder? But, when it comes to implementing a development plan for Scottish international football - "not my department Jimmy".
I look at the first Scotland "development" teams. The first Scotland B team, which drew 0-0 with France in Toulouse in 1952 was: Ledgerwood (Partick Thistle), Parker (Hearts), Cunningham, Docherty (both Preston North End), Davidson (Partick Thistle), Kelly (Blackpool), Buchanan (Clyde), Moir (Bolton Wanderers), Gardiner (East Fife), Gemmell (St Mirren), Ormond (Hibernian). The Doc, Hughie Kelly and Willie Moir had already been capped, Willie Cunningham, Jimmy Davidson, Ian Gardiner, Tommy Gemmell and Willie Ormond would all go on to win caps, indeed, Cunningham captained Scotland during the 1954 World Cup Finals.
The first Under-23 team, might have been hammered 6-0 by a Duncan Edwards-inspired England at Shawfield in 1955 but: Duff (Hearts), Parker (Falkirk), Caldow (Rangers), Mackay (Hearts), Baillie (Airdrie), Holmes (St Mirren), Leggat (Aberdeen), Walsh (Celtic), Hill (Clyde), Wishart (Aberdeen) and McParland (Partick Thistle) was an XI which included in Parker, Caldow, Mackay and Leggat four future Scotland players, two of whom, Eric Caldow and Dave Mackay captained the country and attained "legend" status - while Doug Baillie became a press box legend and the uncapped Bobby Wishart won Scottish League titles with two provincial sides, Aberdeen and Dundee.
The first Under-21 team, which drew 0-0 with Czechoslovakia in Pilson in 1976 read: Clark (Aberdeen), Burley (Ipswich), Albiston (Manchester United), Aitken (Celtic), Stanton (Hibernian), Burns (Celtic), Cooper (Clydebank), Wark (Ipswich), McNiven (Leeds United)/subProvan (Kilmarnock), Narey (Dundee United)/sub Muir (Hibernian) and Sturrock (Dundee United). Clark and Stanton were "over-age" players, in there to provide experience, but nine of the rest went on to achieve full international status; all nine had careers ranging from the very good to the legendary.
We used to develop internationalists through a Scotland system. Perhaps we could have done it better, but we did it. Today's Scotland team-building seems to consist of looking at a middling English club having a good run, finding-out if any of their players has a Scottish parent or grand-parent, then capping them. It's the internaitonal equivalent of what the clubs are doing, shopping in the football equivalent of Iceland or Farm Foods.
There doesn't appear to be a long-term plan. My God, the Murrayfield Mandarins, the sporting by-words for stick-in-the-mud, old-fashioned, we-don't-care-we-will-do-it-our-way, stick-in-the-mud traditionalism, are more-ready to encourage young players, be organised and progressive than their SFA cousins.
Would it not be better for us to pick an Under-23, B or Futures squad and send them off to play in the likes of South Africa, Australia, New Zealand or North America, places where the Caledonian Diaspora is well-established, to gain experience and bond, before coming back and being fed into the national team?
I realise the former colonial outposts in the southern hemisphere and the New World have come on a bit, while we've regressed, since the SFA sent a touring party unbeaten round the world in 1967. That touring squad was: Andy Anderson (Hearts), Willie Callaghan (Dunfermline Athletic), Eddie Colquhoun (West Brom), Jim Cruickshank (Hearts), Alec Ferguson (Dunfermline Athletic), Doug Fraser (West Brom), Joe Harper (Huddersfield Town), Harry Hood (Clyde), Bobby Hope (West Brom), Jim McCalliog (Sheffield Wednesday), Jackie McGrory and Tommy McLean (both Kilmarnock), Willie Morgan (Burnley), Andy Penman (Rangers), Harry Thomson (Burnley), Hugh Tinney (Bury), Jim Townsend (Hearts), Ian Ure and Jonathan Woodward (both Arsenal).
Cruickshank, McCalliog, Penman, (one cap each), McGrory (three caps) and Ure (ten caps) were the capped players on that tour; Callaghan, Colquhoun, Fraser, Harper, Hope, McLean and Morgan were subsequently capped, Harry Hood ought to have been while Ferguson has done not bad in the intervening years.
Berti Vogts, having seen the German FA successfully use B, or as they dubbed them "Futures" internationals as a means of bridging the gap between Under-21 and Full internationals, introduced such a stepping-stone when he was Scotland boss. But, gradually since Berti's departure, enthusiasm for such games have declined and Scotland has been the poorer for it.
Better to find-out if a player has got what it takes in a B international than in the cauldron of a World Cup qualifier - even one which means nothing to us, since we're out anyway.
AM I the only one who thinks a British FA, with the Celtic fringes throwing-in their lot with The Common Enemy, as has been suggested this week, would be a bad thing for Scottish football?
Thanks for that support - this has to be a non-starter.
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