Scotland v Brazil

[Tug]

could someone please to explain to me how Cammy Bell (Of no Club i believe) gets a place on the bench ahead of ryan esson who has been virtually ever present for us and has us in contention for top 6?

[tm4tj]

I thought Scotland were an embarrassment. We have gone backwards at an alarming rate and are nobodies in world football.

The Brazilian that scored the goals looked a top player.

What a load of nonsense.

We've played Brazil a total of 10 times, never beaten them and have only ever scored 3 goals against them (one being a penalty) What did you expect to happen today? From what i seen was exactly how we approach matches against the Old Firm and i don't think ICT are an embarrasing team to watch.

Scotland were ranked 13th in the world back in 2008 and In my opinion haven't played that badly in the big games since then. We did afterall come back from 2 nil down against Spain who are the European and World Champions and although we ended up losing the match for a country the size of ours that is not bad at all.

Which part did you find to be a lot of nonsense?

We were embarrassing to watch, we have gone backwards since the 70's, we are a poor team and the Brazilian guy is an exceptional player.

Apart from that we are still an embarrassment to football. It did remind me of watching ICT at times. Long ball, lack of quality and lack of ideas. We have played better against Brazil before, but today we were lacking anything with a manager who is no better than Vogts. For a country the size of ours..........oh well, that makes it ok for us to play like schoolboys in the park. We may have been ranked 13th, but I doubt we are or were the 13th best team in the world. I could think of fifty teams better than us.

It does not give me any satisfaction to state that, but unfortunately it is fact.

[lukemackay]

we have the players such as charlie adam, darren fletcher, alan hutton, phil bardsley, don cowie.

but when it comes down to it the players dont seem to gel for whatever reason :S

but i can see things being on the up the way leveins handled the players this week has been superb imo, and the result today wasnt the most important thing, as euro 2012 is our aim.

[Renegade]

What I noticed was the contrast in managers. Menezes looked all swave and suited and booted, unlike Levein who looked like he'd spent last night sleeping in a Soho doorway. Where's the inspiration in that?

Edited March 28, 2011 by Renegade

[bdu98196]

Obviously the perception is that we should be winning this game? People need to take a look at what Levien is trying to do - inject youth and build a team for the future - this is a gradual process and overall against Brazil areas are shown to be lacking. Judging the progress of the team against some rose tinted era from the 70's or by how well shaven the magager is - well thats nonsense. Overall with the players coming into the team and the increasing number of (young) players from the EPL there may be a brighter future - I would suggest the depth of talent Scotland has is on a par with Wales & ROI and not far off England once the 'golden era' of failures move on.

Patience is the key and progress can only be assessed at the end of the qualifying campaign and Nations Cup.

[tm4tj]

The perception is we should be playing football and trying to get a kick of the ball every now and then. Brazil are good, there first team will be even better. The result was a foregone conclusion.

It's not just about this one game, it's the whole decline of Scottish football, playing with pride, passion and some skill.

Thirty years ago, every successful English club had top Scottish players in their team. Now we hand pick our squad from the Championship and reserve football. Nobody want's us.

[Yngwie]

Overall with the players coming into the team and the increasing number of (young) players from the EPL there may be a brighter future - I would suggest the depth of talent Scotland has is on a par with Wales & ROI

You make that sound like a good thing. It's not.

Nobody expects us to beat Brazil, but our natural place in football has got to be higher than those small nations who have incredibly weak leagues.

[starchief]

The biggest concern is the front line. We've got Kenny Miller, having his best season IMO, but probably not there for the next World Cup. Steven Fletcher's form has gone way downhill, plus he's not exactly champing at the bit to get back on Levein's good books. All Kris Boyd could do was score but that's the most difficult piece - unfortunately, he can't do that anymore. So, that leaves who? Goodwillie? Let's see if he stays out of jail, plus he's not international quality yet. The only other I can see is McGuire but it's still way too early to say if he's got it.

Not too worried about any other part of the pitch - ok, it's not great when 3 out of the back four are relegation candidates and the other is a Spurs reserve but they're not bad players. Not great, but not bad.

Mind you, we could have concentrated on attack if those two green-tinted turncoats, McGeady and McCarthy, had opted to play for their home country, their parents home country and half of their grandparents (as far as McCarthy's concerned anyway) home country. Let's hope we never see their like again.

[RiG]

Presumably Brazil are the home side and this is an away fixture?

Correct. Brazil can play their home games wherever they want.

Brazil were the "home" team for the game but because of the state of some of the stadia in their country they take their home games "on the road" until infrastructure issues are sorted out back in Brazil.

Neymar is a great player. You'd have to think that one of the big bucks clubs will be looking at him this summer. Shame he has an utterly ridiculous haircut.

[ICTPaisley]

Cammy Bell is only 24 so of course he is going to get a call up instead of Ryan Esson. He still plays for Kilmarnock and has recently come back from injury. He has been linked with Rangers in the summer on a bosman and there is reports he has been dropped because he has refused to sign a new contract. Neither of these keepers however are realistically going to over take Alan McGregor or Craig Gordon for the number 1 spot so including a younger goalie makes sense especially when he has been in excellent form over the past 2 seasons. I would love Ryan getting a call up as much as anyone but i don't see it happening.

I agree with the rose tinted glasses of the 70s,is there really any need for it? Yes we had some famous players but If we were that good we would have qualified for at least one european tournament during those 10 years but this didn't happen, infact we never qualified from 1968 to 1992. Thats six tournaments in a row and we never qualified with this so called better team. So far we are on a run of 3 european tournaments that we haven't qualified for and yes it will be hard to qualify this time around but i still haven't given up. We have beaten the Czechs since Craig Levein took over so i dont see why we can't do it again. As long as results go our way we could well be there come 2012.

We are not an embarrassing footballing nation and as someone said before we have alot of youth coming through that is now starting to play in the English Premier League.

No wonder we don't have Scottish players playing within the big 4 though. Some teams hardly even have English players! Arsenal have Theo Walcott and Jack Wilshire...thats all that comes to mind, Chelsea have Ashley Cole, Frank Lampard and John Terry, three well established players. I can't even think of any young english players they have that have any real chance of making it through to the squad.

Edited March 28, 2011 by ICTPAISLEY

[Yngwie]

Shame he has an utterly ridiculous haircut.

Yeah, looks like he managed to smuggle his cat into the country. Oops, better not upset him, he'll think its racism.

[Libero]

The biggest concern is the front line. We've got Kenny Miller, having his best season IMO, but probably not there for the next World Cup. Steven Fletcher's form has gone way downhill, plus he's not exactly champing at the bit to get back on Levein's good books. All Kris Boyd could do was score but that's the most difficult piece - unfortunately, he can't do that anymore. So, that leaves who? Goodwillie? Let's see if he stays out of jail, plus he's not international quality yet. The only other I can see is McGuire but it's still way too early to say if he's got it.

Not too worried about any other part of the pitch - ok, it's not great when 3 out of the back four are relegation candidates and the other is a Spurs reserve but they're not bad players. Not great, but not bad.

Mind you, we could have concentrated on attack if those two green-tinted turncoats, McGeady and McCarthy, had opted to play for their home country, their parents home country and half of their grandparents (as far as McCarthy's concerned anyway) home country. Let's hope we never see their like again.

I think Levein still has a fair bit of choice in the striking department; McFadden, Snodgrass, McCormack, Riordan, O'Connor, Fletcher and Boyd have all had caps and are potentials for further call ups, they might not be outstanding but Scotland hasnt been blessed with worldclass strikers in recent history.

Strikers who could still make an impact are Mackie, Mackail Smith, Goodwillie and Maguire.

The area that really worries me in actual fact is centre half, we seem to have a real dearth of talent in that department IMO

[bdu98196]

Overall with the players coming into the team and the increasing number of (young) players from the EPL there may be a brighter future - I would suggest the depth of talent Scotland has is on a par with Wales & ROI

You make that sound like a good thing. It's not.

Nobody expects us to beat Brazil, but our natural place in football has got to be higher than those small nations who have incredibly weak leagues.

Of course its not, but then again we have a 'self contained' League system, unlike Wales who somehow have Cardiff & Swansea in the English set-up, perhaps if we had gone down that route our players may be better at the detriment of the National league set-up? As for ROI they have exploited the rules of eligability for the last 15 years, yet we as a nation have always thought we were too 'proud' to do that - maybe we need to wake up and start doing the same as many European teams are doing - France (african players), Germany (polish) etc

Fact is we were well beaten by a far better team, its something we shouldn't be happy about, but then again we have never been world beaters who have fallen from a pedastal - only an average quality national side that got to a few WC finals before places like Africa, Asia and Eastern Eurpoe really started to develop as football nations.

[starchief]

I think Levein still has a fair bit of choice in the striking department; McFadden, Snodgrass, McCormack, Riordan, O'Connor, Fletcher and Boyd have all had caps and are potentials for further call ups, they might not be outstanding but Scotland hasnt been blessed with worldclass strikers in recent history.

Strikers who could still make an impact are Mackie, Mackail Smith, Goodwillie and Maguire.

The area that really worries me in actual fact is centre half, we seem to have a real dearth of talent in that department IMO

None of these actually play as a centre-forward anymore at club level, whilst O'Connor rarely plays. That said, I am a big fan of Riordan and (used to be) McCormack (but he seems to have lost it). I've no doubt Snodgrass and McFadden will be shunted into that position but I was meaning natural strikers. That's why we're having to play converted midfielders/ wingers.

Mackail Smith is 27. I'm pretty sure he's at Peterborough for a reason. Maybe he'll come good but at his age, I doubt he'll progress much more. I forgot about James Mackie - did quite well when he played.

As for centre-backs, I wonder how Webster will fare. When Saturday Comes (strongly recommended) suggested the reasons for Webster being constantly injured at Rangers may have not been the entire truth. All to do with money and contracts being honoured/not honoured. Who knows?

Difficult to know how to play when it's the midfield that's by far the best part of the team (decent full-backs too). You can't leave the defence to take care of itself, nor can you defend deep, knowing that your classy striker will always take his chance. Instead, I guess it's a fairly negative, tactical game, building on the strengths of the passers and fighters in the middle.

Edited March 28, 2011 by starchief