Ironic Indie Lad Posted June 8, 2022 Share Posted June 8, 2022 3 minutes ago, David said: On point one, we are what we are. We're a nation with a population smaller than that of Finland, and roughly the same as Slovakia and Norway. We'll produce the odd really good player, but for the most part we simply don't have the depth of talent to be a real force. On point two I'd disagree completely. If you find it embarrassing that a fanbase goes abroad and consistently manages to endear itself to both fans and local authorities in the cities they visit, and carry out numerous charitable ventures, including The Tartan Army Children’s Charity, then I don't quite know what you'd consider a fanbase that isn't embarassing. You're right David! I hadn't considered the size of our country against Finland, Norway and Slovakia in my very serious post. I am also against charity work which you have now exposed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Carbomb Posted June 8, 2022 Paid Members Share Posted June 8, 2022 Doesn't Croatia have about a million fewer people than Scotland? I'd have argued it's more about culture and frameworks - Croatia has benefited from the legacy of the old Yugoslav system a fair bit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Posted June 8, 2022 Share Posted June 8, 2022 49 minutes ago, Ironic Indie Lad said: You're right David! Thank you kindly. I aim to help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members PunkStep Posted June 8, 2022 Paid Members Share Posted June 8, 2022 2 hours ago, David said: On point one, we are what we are. We're a nation with a population smaller than that of Finland, and roughly the same as Slovakia and Norway. We'll produce the odd really good player, but for the most part we simply don't have the depth of talent to be a real force. Finland aren't one of the founding fathers of the sport unlike Scotland and are more interested in Ice Hockey and motorsports. The population excuse can only take you so far, look at how shit China and India are at football. Uruguay have a population of 3.5m and have done exceptionally well in the past and pretty well in recent years. Scotland are massive underachievers considering they are a 'footballing nation'. Scotland should have a MUCH richer history on the international stage. Never progressing from the group stages and failing to qualify for 6 consecutive World Cups is appalling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SuperBacon Posted June 8, 2022 Share Posted June 8, 2022 24 minutes ago, PunkStep said: Never progressing from the group stages and failing to qualify for 6 consecutive World Cups is appalling. But ultimately, very funny. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Posted June 8, 2022 Share Posted June 8, 2022 (edited) 30 minutes ago, PunkStep said: Finland aren't one of the founding fathers of the sport unlike Scotland and are more interested in Ice Hockey and motorsports. The population excuse can only take you so far, look at how shit China and India are at football. Uruguay have a population of 3.5m and have done exceptionally well in the past and pretty well in recent years. Scotland are massive underachievers considering they are a 'footballing nation'. Scotland should have a MUCH richer history on the international stage. Never progressing from the group stages and failing to qualify for 6 consecutive World Cups is appalling. No, Scotland aren't "massive underachievers." We're a small nation which tends to fluctuate between being shit to being half decent. Massive underachievers are the likes of England, who, despite having not only the richest and supposed best league in the world, with all of the infrastructure that brings, and have boasted some of the supposed best players in the game, yet have only won a single world cup in over 50 years. We were regular qualifiers for tournaments for a long time, until the qualification process become much harder for teams lower down the scale. I'm not complaining about that, it's how the deck is stacked, which is fine, but let's not pretend that coming second in a qualification group where we were the 3rd pot team, winning seven from ten while losing one, only to fail at the first of what amounted to two one-off knock out games to even get to the tournament is appalling or abject failure. It isn't. You mention failing to qualify for six consecutive world cups. Look at who we were up against and how we fared in those qualifiers: 2022: Finished second to pot 1 side Denmark. We ended that campaign seven points clear of the next best side, and lost only one game in qualifying. Runner up would have to play two single-leg elimination games within a week to qualify for the tournament. 2018: Finished joint second to pot 1 side England, 1 point off the right to go into a further round of seeded elimination games to qualify for the world cup. 2014: Finished 4th in a group behind Belgium, Croatia and Serbia. Would have had to finish second to qualify for the second round of seeded qualifiers. 2010: Finished joint second behind Holland. Wasn't good enough for the next play-off round. 2006: Finished 3rd behind Italy & Norway. I'd say this is possibly the one qualification campaign where we didn't perform at a level we should have. 2002: Lost out to Belgium and Croatia. Finished 3 points from the top of the group, won by Croatia. So, we've pretty much lost out in qualification to Denmark, England, Belgium, Croatia, Serbia, Holland, Italy, and Norway. From that group I'd put Norway and maybe Serbia on a par with us as far as quality of player during that period. Not ideal by any stretch, but it hardly screams appalling underachievers. It's not as if we're finishing below teams well below us in the national rankings. We've lost out narrowly most times, which is the same thing that's happened to other sides of similar standing.  Edited June 8, 2022 by David Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ironic Indie Lad Posted June 8, 2022 Share Posted June 8, 2022 5 minutes ago, SuperBacon said: But ultimately, very funny. But we put on kilts and follow the team around the world and are very, very nice to people. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members bAzTNM#1 Posted June 8, 2022 Paid Members Share Posted June 8, 2022 (edited) When Jock Stein had Scottish superstars at helm, he couldn't even.do it. Serious lack of decent grass pitches up here infuriates me as I have nephews. I also end up doing a hamstring on that plastic pitch stuff. You think Davie Cooper, Tommy Burns, Willie Miller were playing on a plastic pitch? Probably getting hammered in the Juniors (Amateur leagues up here basically. Changed now.) Edited June 8, 2022 by bAzTNM#1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members SpiritOfTheForest Posted August 1, 2022 Paid Members Share Posted August 1, 2022 Well, it's finally back! The Cinch is back and I could not be more excited for all the madness about to ensue. It should be an absolutely terrific season - Celtic have got two of the key players from last season tied down to long-term deals and Rangers have signed annoyingly well. Rabbi Matondo especially looks a player and not one I'm looking forward to lining up against. So predictions - 1) - Celtic 2) - Rangers 3) - Aberdeen 4) - Hearts 5) - Dundee United 6) - Ross County 7) Kilmarrnock 8 ) - Hibernian 9) Livingston 10) Motherwell 11) St Mirren 12) St Johnstone I'm only posting now but these predictions were made before the Sligo Rovers second leg so I expect Motherwell to sign a safe pair of hands like Yogi and finish relatively safely. However this is what my predictions were prior to that game. Random observations: I expect Aberdeen to prove far more competent than last season's calamity. Jim Goodwin knows the league, is a good manager and has had time to shape the team in his own image. They will be decent this year. Ross County will be just fine. Malky MacKay is an excellent manager and last year he crafted a highly exciting County team full of goals performing well above what one might imagine their station to be. I expect that to continue this year and be one of the season's surprise packages. Killie and Dundee Utd will be capable but dull as fuck under very knowledgeable but somewhat dreary management. Hibs surely have to do better than last year but this Lee Johnson character seems absolute shite and I can't imagine he will last long. St Johnstone and St Mirren are fucked and they will be battling it out for bottom spot. Motherwell, if they hadn't sacked Alexander, could well be candidates for going down but they sacked him finally and, while it all depends on who comes in, I reckon they're safe enough now. Nobody could have been worse than that eejit. Livi will do what Livi do....quietly under the radar, using their horrendous pitch to their advantage, surpassing expectations and taking scalps at the Macaroni and survive to fight again. Top of the table and obviously I'm going to go for Celtic. Solid, settled squad, boosted in key areas. However, as alluded to earlier, Van Bronckhorst has signed remarkably well with some genuinely good players coming in. He also seems to have had Ange's plan figured out in the latter OF games of last season so hopefully we can see some tweaks implemented there. However, Rangers certainly looked creaky yesterday against Livingston -one game in be damned - and when Celtic hit top gear we are pretty much unstoppable (in Scottish football terms). Champions League beckons for Celtic which will be great for the money but I do worry somewhat as defensively we remain fragile to put it lightly. Ange's philosophy of all-out attack is excellent viewing and reaps rewards in the SPFL but in the Champions League it will lead to maulings and Joe Hart constantly at the half-way line playing the ball at his feet is never ever good for the blood pressure against St Mirren let alone against Bayern Munich. Finally, and I'm sure I will be mocked for saying this, but I want to post in this thread to talk about Scottish football, my national game, and the game I have had a love for since a boy. I like this forum in general and my reading of it has become a part of my everyday life since 2006. I find the title of this thread to be arrogant at best and downright racist at worst. Yes, yes I realise it is a Blackadder quote and I love that programme but it seems in this situation to be nasty and insulting for the sake of it. I would imagine that the individual who changed the name wouldn't use "The Wogs" as a title for the Cricket thread but then I remembered that on this very forum I was once referred to as a "porridge wog", a term that I cannot believe was allowed to be thrown about as acceptable. It actually still makes me furious even typing it again - a disgusting, classless and downright horrible thing to say. Anyway, I don't want this paragraph to derail from the rest of my post and how excited I am for the new season. Please let's have some predictions, hopes. dreams, worst fears etc in here and, can I respectfully request from the mods that we can just call this the Scottish Football Thread or something? I love my game and I would love to talk about it in its own designated thread without that shite bigotry. Yes, I'm only one man but I feel uncomfortable with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Posted August 1, 2022 Share Posted August 1, 2022 6 hours ago, SpiritOfTheForest said: I'm only posting now but these predictions were made before the Sligo Rovers second leg so I expect Motherwell to sign a safe pair of hands like Yogi and finish relatively safely Yogi? You been sniffing glue? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedRooster Posted August 1, 2022 Share Posted August 1, 2022 45 minutes ago, David said: Yogi? You been sniffing glue? Almost exactly what I was going to say. That would be an insane appointment.  7 hours ago, SpiritOfTheForest said: Well, it's finally back! The Cinch is back and I could not be more excited for all the madness about to ensue. It should be an absolutely terrific season - Celtic have got two of the key players from last season tied down to long-term deals and Rangers have signed annoyingly well. Rabbi Matondo especially looks a player and not one I'm looking forward to lining up against. It definitely looks set to be an interesting season, and I wouldn't want to call it. Despite losing some key players, in many ways Rangers seem to have improved. I'm not convinced by the decision to keep McGregor between the sticks, and I don't think McLaughlin is the answer either. He's perfectly fine, but "back-up" seems the perfect role for him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MungoChutney Posted August 1, 2022 Share Posted August 1, 2022 (edited) Great post @SpiritOfTheForest. I echo the view on the name of the thread, wouldn't necessarily mind a comical name but the way jock and porridge wog has been thrown about on this forum also makes me uncomfortable. I think Celtic will have enough to win the league again. The squad for yesterday's game was strong with good replacements for each position. Not sure Mooy is what is needed and would still like to add a holding midfielder but Ange has bought really well so far and earns the right of patience. Matondo looks a good signing and I'm hoping that despite his pace he'll find similar issues to Kent where, in domestic games, the low block nullifies much of the bursts of pace. Edited August 1, 2022 by MungoChutney Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith Houchen Posted August 1, 2022 Share Posted August 1, 2022 Nobody has started a thread for this seasons English game, so why not start a “Sassenach Soccer Get It Right Up Ye Tea Drinking Flag Shagging Tory Lovers Thread” that’ll learn em. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr_Danger Posted August 1, 2022 Share Posted August 1, 2022 Well done Lionesseseses on finally bringing football home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ironic Indie Lad Posted August 1, 2022 Share Posted August 1, 2022 8 minutes ago, Keith Houchen said: Nobody has started a thread for this seasons English game, so why not start a “Sassenach Soccer Get It Right Up Ye Tea Drinking Flag Shagging Tory Lovers Thread” that’ll learn em. Rangers play in Scotland Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.