SCOTTISH FITBA has come a long way in 150 years. We may hold up the 1960s and 1970s, perhaps even include the 1980s, as our Golden Era, when qualification for five successive World Cups was a given and we had the Fab Four of Baxter, Dalglish, Johnstone and Law – plus a conveyor belt of lesser talent to drool over.
The reality, however, is that Scottish Fitba's true Golden Era was much-earlier, in the 1870s and 1880s into the 1890s. Between February 1874 and March 1892, we played over 40 internationals, winning 34, drawing 5 and only tasting defeat 3 times, only once losing at home.
We had, in that time, one run of 22 games, between April, 19879 and March 1888, when we won 20 games and drew 2. Then, as England embraced professionalism and began to import our best players at an industrial rate, we lost our way somewhat.
Back then, we could send one Scotland XI to beat England in London on a Saturday, and a totally-different XI to beat Wales, in Wrexham on the Monday, on their way back up the road. The SFA selectors of the time could even pick a scratch team of uncapped players from some “diddy clubs” confident in their ability to beat Ireland.
Remember, for all England's claim to have invented the Beautiful Game, it took them over 100-years to go ahead of us in head-to-heads between our two nations.
Mind you, running the Scottish team for that first century of international football had its moments, such as the time Hughie Gallacher decided to drink Paris dry, indeed, the litany of embarrassing incidents is a lengthy one:
Naw, we're no gaun tae Brazil if we're no British Champions (1950)
Switzerland in June, that's skiing country – better arrange winter-weight woolen jerseys (temperatures were in the high 70s) (1954)
We only need to take 13 players, and we don't need a back-up goalkeeper (again 1954)
Send Tommy Docherty and Archie Robertson to scout Paraguay, our next opponents – then ignore their report (1958)
Things should have improved once we appointed a Team Manager, but, the SFA has still managed to mess things up on a regular basis even in these modern times:
Andy Roxburgh falling-out with Richard Gough
Barry Boozegate
Copenhagen
Various players spitting the dummy at not getting to start and withdrawing from international contention
So, given our lengthy record of getting things wrong, I have my concerns about this new suggestion, that each Head Coach can take a squad of 26 players to this summer's Euros in Germany. This, for Scotland, is a disaster waiting to happen.
Last time we went to Germany on tournament business was 1974, and while that tournament goes down as the greatest of Scotland's many Fantastic Failures – unbeaten but didn't make the knock-out stages – the legends around that campaign are not good:
Jinky setting sail for Arran during the Home Internationals
Jinky and Wee Bremner having a bevvy in Brussels
Jinky and Wee Bremner reprising their act in Oslo
Heidi the waitress
Given the fact, any gang of young Scotsmen, adrift in Europe either for work or play, are at some point going off to have “a wee swally” and the prospects of lurid headlines are there for all to see.
Mind you, the SFA “blazers” too have had their moments over the years:
“Wullie Hard-on in Argentina (1978)
A well-known journalist getting “A Glesca Kiss” from the SFA over his coverage of the Willie Johnston affair
“The curfew doesn't apply to us – we're the SFA” in Chile 1977 – cue machine gun fire and various “blazers” running for cover in the hotel grounds
The legend that a Highland League official stuck one on Bremner in Copenhagen after the players overturned his bed
I should add, the Scottish Press Corps – those legendary “fans with typewriters” are not immune to the national disease of misbehaviour on football tours. There is the legendary tale of the gentleman from the then Glasgow Herald who, on 19 June, 1954, as the fifth of an eventual seven Uruguayan goals went past poor Fred Martin, rose from his seat in the Sankt Jacob Stadion, Basle, apologised to his fellow Scottish scribes for what he was about to do and delivered a perfect “Glesca Kiss” to a crowing South American scribe.
Or, the gross dereliction of duty by the man from the Evening Times, who body-swerved the first leg of the legendary Celtic v Leeds United “Battle of Britain” European Cup semi-final at Elland Road in 1970, in favour of an evening in the arms of a welcoming Yorkshire lass he had encounteered in Leeds' Dragonora Hotel. Unfortunately for him, his Editor was at the game as a guest of a Celtic director and, his absence being noted, in spite of the sterling efforts of the Daily Record man who covered for him, his “jotters” were waiting on his return to Glasgow.
Mind you, when it comes to pushing the envelope of what is acceptable when covering a Scottish sporting achievement outiwith Scotland, my favourite tale concerns the legend that is the late Ian “Dan” Archer, who, while covering Sandy Lyle's Open win at Royal St Gerorge's, on one of the days, took the cross-channel hovercraft to France and had lunch at a Three Star Michelin restaraunt outside Calais. The paper paid the bill without a qualm – Dan always had class.
So, given this long and proud track record of kicking over the traces, isn't taking a larger than usual party of Scottish players, some of whom will rarely even make it as far as the bench, just asking for another Scottish Soccer Scandal and probably a highly-memorable Sun headline?
SO WEE Brendan got a one-game ban for spitting the dummy over VAR, and will have to sit in the stand. I wonder, is this such a bad thing?
I know that in some sports, the coach's place is on the bench, right beside the action, where he can instantly speak to the players and get his points across.
“The Coach as God” is an American notion, which has spread across the world. The British way was always: “The officials pick the team, it's then up to the Captain to make sure the team works”, although that began to lose traction somewhere around Walter Winterbottom's appointment as England Manager some 80 years ago.
But, while the top American coaches are effectively hands-on beside the action, they have a whole team of assistant coaches, high in the stands, analysing the plays and feeding them additional information.
In World Rugby, the top coaches all sit, high above the action, in the coaching boxes, going between the action unfolding in front of them, and the data they are getting from their lap tops. They then relay instructions for any tactical changes, to an assistant coach on the touchline.
Which is the better approach? Football might be resistant to change, but, you never know, maybe Brendan will get a new perspective from his new seat.
I think the last, indeed perhaps the only Scottish football coach to sit away from the action to get a more-panoramic view of proceedings was wee Jim McLean, at Dundee United.
None who saw the programme can forget the documentary on the club, with Wee Jim seemingly permanently on the telephone to the dug out, imploring them to: “Get Bannan aff, he's havin' a nightmare.”
It must be hard being a Coach. I remember Big Gordon Strachan – the original Rugby-playing one, telling me, when he took over as Coach of Ayr Rugby Club: “I'm not going to be prowling the touchline, shouting at the players; I am going to sit in the stand, analyse what is happening and take it calmly.”
Ten minutes into his first game, he was out of the stand, down on the touchline, screaming at his players. Mind you, Gordon was a good midfielder for Glenafton Athletic, before he decided to concentrate on Rugby, where he went on to play for Scotland; so maybe his early exposure to football stuck.
FINALLY – the ridiculous state of Scottish Football governance in one decision. Muirkirk Juniors, the team from the village where I was born, successor club to the one my grandfather played for and was then President of, got hit by a £50 ban this week – because some daft boy let-off a flare at one of therir home games.
When you consider the pyrotechnics you see going off in sernior football, and narry a fine for clubs, you've got to wonder. OK, you might say, it was only £50, but, £50 means a lot more to a wee club like Muirkirk than it, or even a fine one hundred times that, would to either one of the Bigot Brothers.
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