The problem I still have with the Scotland team is as follows

Yes we have promising young players in Scotland particularly the dundee united contingent.

However they have little chance of getting games as we don't tend to blood early 20s players in the national team.

Strachan will still go with the players who have failed in so many campaigns brown, Fletcher's, Morrison, Adam, Hutton etc or players from championship world

This is why scottish players seem to reach mid 20s and are still referred to as young players after the under 21s you seem to dissapear for years.

Russell has and the likes of Armstrong and co will go the same way

That'll be the Dundee United contingent who are part of a team currently sitting 5th in the league and 31 points behind a Celtic team who have been less than stellar this season, have won just over 40% of their league games and who would be, in points terms, closer to the bottom of the league as opposed to the top if Hearts hadn't been deducted points.

Maybe, just maybe, the reality is that they are not currently good enough for international football?

Possibly but we aren't going anywhere with the players I named and it's pretty tragic that we see Darren fletcher as someone who can get us to the euros.

What has he ever done for Scotland even when he was fit.

Just because he is on the books of man united he walks straight back into the team and no doubt captain again as well.

The reality is we need to look to the future but we won't we will hang on to the old guard yet again

Look at the statistics of the results Scotland get and that will tell you why Fletcher gets picked when he is fit.

Scotland win more than they lose when he plays.

Wins = 42%
Draws = 19%
Defeats = 39%


The old guard?

Darren Fletcher is 30, Steven Fletcher is 26, James Morrison is 27, Charlie Adam is 28, Alan Hutton is 29. They are hardly dinosaurs.

Strachan's job is to get Scotland to a major football tournament but it would appear that what you want him to do is to dump players and then bring in players with absolutely no European pedigree whatsoever in the hope that they are able to make the step up. What happens if they can't? Do the entire thing all over again?

Look at the underage squads, when was the last time one of them got the the final stages of a tournament. Have Scotland qualified for one since the U17s got to the European final in 2006 then played in the U18 world cup the following year?

You go on about 'Championship world' but you seen oblivious to the fact that most teams at that level would skelp most SPFL sides.

Yes it's risk but when you add 4 years of these players with probably 2 more failed campaigns we then have the problem again of throwing players in again are 26 or 27 with no experience who we term as young

I am not defending dundee united players it doesn't matter what team but for some reason we just don't blood young players in the team

Who terms these 26 and 27 year olds as young?


It is because they, currently, are not good enough for the full team. It really is as simple as that.

Although it could be argued the current players with many campaign failures under their belts have never been good enough and that's not going to change anytime soon

Levein was bad for terming mid 20 players as young

You are right, they could be classed as not being good enough however what would be the point in introducing new players where the Scottish ranking goes down further and Scotland are put into groups where it is even more difficult for them to qualify? Change for change sake isn't always a good thing.

In the 13 months since Strachan took over Scotland have climbed 35 places up the rankings, they have also climbed 22 places from where they were when Levein was put on gardening leave. Not bad for a team full of terrible players who need to be dumped from international football.


So the only example you are able to give is Levein the abject failure? The way you mentioned "we" earlier I presumed that thousands of Scotland fans and loads of journalists refered to these players as young.

Hold on, 26 isn't "young".

Christ...thanks for depressing me

I just seen Frank Kopel on the BBC news, I had no idea he had ' Dementia '

Wot a sad,sad sight ..........

Dementia is a bastard of an illness.

I lost a gran to it and have a mate going through the same with his dad.

Great to see a club helping one of their own.

I was talking about this with someone last night. What would your ideal Scotland team and formation be for qualifying?

Daily Record will be broadcasting the Poland v Scotland game live online.

What could possibly go wrong with that??

Peter Lawwell has been elected as a member of the European Club Association Executive Board.

The Unseen Fenian Hand becomes more and more seen.

What will it be blamed for next? Nacho Novo being unable to sign for a Scottish side and having to sign with Carlisle?

Aberdeen sell 37,000 cup final tickets with only 3k restricted view seats remaining.

Very unlikely to be a general sale next Monday now.

Annoying as there are likely to be several thousand empty seats due to the SPFL not allowing AFC fans to sit in the tier above Caley fans.

Nothing should ever surprise me whenever Doncaster is involved though.

Apparently ICT have sold less than 6k tickets so far.

Yip, very poor.

By not giving AFC more tickets the SPFL are in effect denying Caley money through gate receipts.

Not surprising given the idiots running our game right enough.

It's madness. Why not just close off the rows (10 or so) in front of and below the entrances. Then there's no risk of things being thrown down.

One thing this does do, however, is vindicate the use of Celtic Park - Ibrox would be starting to look a bit tight for space.

Was it not ICT who wanted the stadium divided up in the manner it is going to be?

Would have been better giving them a bit of the main stand and a few sections of the LL and giving Aberdeen the rest.

That was the plan, it was on the AFC site originally, but caley complained that they didn't want their fans split in two by blocks 119 & 120, so it got changed.

I think so although they should have sold them section by section rather than having fans sitting anywhere they in the Lower LL.

Regardless, I'm sure Caley's ticket office will see a wee surge in ticket sales from people with AB postcodes next week.

I'm sure they thought they would sell more tickets than they have.




You can buy tickets for the ICT section just now on their website without having a buying history with them.