Today is the day that it really struck home how utterly pathetic we are at football - Page 4 - Football related - Discussion of non TA football - Tartan Army Message Board Jump to content

Today is the day that it really struck home how utterly pathetic we are at football


Recommended Posts

  • Replies 159
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

9 hours ago, thewolf_1980 said:

What is especially frustrating is that we have better individuals than Norn Iron however they have a team to be proud of and a manager who plays to their strengths whilst taking calculated risks. And they've qualified as a result. On another note, there was a wee section at half time where they interviewed David Healy on the trackside in Windsor Park and it struck me that they are gradually rebuilding an apparently intimidating little ground there, unlike our public park shitehole.

That said, I thought they were murder today.

They lost to Poland, which we didn't.  If they'd have had Poland in their group (or the Republic, or Germany) they wouldn't have qualified   They got a lucky group - we'll get one one day. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Russia are probably the worst team I've seen in the tournament so far. In the first half in particular they were utterly shite, first time in ages I've seen a team give the ball away more easily than we do. Northern Ireland a close second, they'll get found out at this tournament away from an easy group and without any Windsor Park effect. Poland should have had humped them.

Bad as we are, I reckon we are better than both those sides and at least comparable with Slovakia. There are other teams still to play we could compete with too. I found it interesting listening to Bilic talk about Croatia, and how all of their promising young players are playing league football in Croatia from their mid-late teens, so by the time they get to 20-21 they have a lot of experience of competitive football at a decent level. We are always looking to other countries for a 'model' to improve (remember Tommy Burns going to Ajax about 20 years ago?) but think we could do worse than look at Croatia, a smaller country than us with a far from strong domestic league. It also made me wonder as ever about who benefits from bringing in 'big names' from elsewhere into our league.

For a while many of us were happy that clubs were playing (largely due to financial necessity) young Scottish players. But how many of them have actually developed and moved on? There seems now to be a drift away from that (you can bet most OF spending will be outwith Scotland - and I know they can't win, will be criticised if they 'pinch' young Scottish players), and I fear too many other signings will be from the English lower leagues or Ireland, alongside a few overprice haddies from abroad looking for some easy money. It's a shite state of affairs.

 

 

Edited by Pool Q
Link to comment
Share on other sites

31 minutes ago, Pool Q said:

Russia are probably the worst team I've seen in the tournament so far. In the first half in particular they were utterly shite, first time in ages I've seen a team give the ball away more easily than we do. Northern Ireland a close second, they'll get found out at this tournament away from an easy group and without any Windsor Park effect. Poland should have had humped them.

Bad as we are, I reckon we are better than both those sides and at least comparable with Slovakia. There are other teams still to play we could compete with too. I found it interesting listening to Bilic talk about Croatia, and how all of their promising young players are playing league football in Croatia from their mid-late teens, so by the time they get to 20-21 they have a lot of experience of competitive football at a decent level. We are always looking to other countries for a 'model' to improve (remember Tommy Burns going to Ajax about 20 years ago?) but think we could do worse than look at Croatia, a smaller country than us with a far from strong domestic league. It also made me wonder as ever about who benefits from bringing in 'big names' from elsewhere into our league.

For a while many of us were happy that clubs were playing (largely due to financial necessity) young Scottish players. But how many of them have actually developed and moved on? There seems now to be a drift away from that (you can bet most OF spending will be outwith Scotland - and I know they can't win, will be criticised if they 'pinch' young Scottish players), and I fear too many other signings will be from the English lower leagues or Ireland, alongside a few overprice haddies from abroad looking for some easy money. It's a shite state of affairs.

 

 

Whilst Russia and Northern Ireland are poor in possession what they have is a better defence than us.

We lose too many soft goals...they have a better platform to stop goals,  which is why we need to reconsider our team selection and formation.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Northern Ireland have been the worst team in the tournament by a distance so far.

What we could almost guarantee though is if we were as defensive as Northern Ireland against Poland then we would have conceded more goals...barring a wonder display from any of our keepers. 

We are not good enough at the back...and until we find a solution for this we will not qualify for any major tournaments...

Northern Ireland handled Lewandowski brilliantly.

I cannot believe that Strachan did not at least try a different formation or 2 in the 4 friendlies....4 2 3 1 does not work with our defence.

Edited by WeLuvIrnBru
Link to comment
Share on other sites

And another thing...STOP PLAYING MULGREW AT LEFT BACK!

He appears to be the whittaker of the coming campaign!  What I mean by that is that when we play teams that are apparently better than us..or are playing away..he will be the 'solid' option at left back.  He does not have the pace....and we are easily exposed with him in there.  He also gets tucked in out of position in the centre and leaves that area ripe to exploit.

Edited by WeLuvIrnBru
Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, Auld_Reekie said:

Im sure it was noted that Northern Ireland hadnt lost a first half goal in 20 competitive ties. There's a clue to their success.

Our defence? What's the collective term for two or more bombscares?

A Caldwell

Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 hours ago, Auld_Reekie said:

Im sure it was noted that Northern Ireland hadnt lost a first half goal in 20 competitive ties. There's a clue to their success.

Our defence? What's the collective term for two or more bombscares?

A few years ago it was 

article-0-025B16CF000005DC-764_468x377.j

or

Steven-Caldwell-and-brother-Gary-Caldwel

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Northern Ireland can't afford to play like they did on Sunday again, they never attempted to go at them. A complete waste of a qualification entry. They aren't going to qualify every year so they have to at least make an attempt to attack the opposition and have a go. They could look back on this in years to come and think "what if"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/13/2016 at 9:33 AM, Rossy said:

I can't believe that anyone thought Russia were worse than Northern Ireland.

 

 

Personally i thought the North were better as a defensive unit.

 

Whatever about which side is better...that russia team is shockingly poor...especially as 2 of their most important players are missing the tournament.

Edited by Green_Tide_Rising
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/13/2016 at 6:08 PM, Derek said:

Rep of Ireland  just take the lead - a team who failed to beat us

Horrible not making it 

Republic of Ireland a team who beat the world champions at home and drew with them away. A team that got maximum points against georgia both home and away.....Derek my friend, put things into perspective. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, Green_Tide_Rising said:

Republic of Ireland a team who beat the world champions at home and drew with them away. A team that got maximum points against georgia both home and away.....Derek my friend, put things into perspective. 

This is the crux of our failure to qualify. Ireland negated the 4 points we took off them by taking 4 off Germany. They then managed the seemingly impossible task of beating 125th ranked Georgia. It's hard to accept how crucial, and terrible, that result out there was. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 hours ago, Fairbairn said:

This is the crux of our failure to qualify. Ireland negated the 4 points we took off them by taking 4 off Germany. They then managed the seemingly impossible task of beating 125th ranked Georgia. It's hard to accept how crucial, and terrible, that result out there was. 

The result was poor but the gutless performance was worse. For that game alone Strachan should be under far more scrutiny than he is.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/13/2016 at 8:36 AM, Pool Q said:

For a while many of us were happy that clubs were playing (largely due to financial necessity) young Scottish players. But how many of them have actually developed and moved on? There seems now to be a drift away from that (you can bet most OF spending will be outwith Scotland - and I know they can't win, will be criticised if they 'pinch' young Scottish players), and I fear too many other signings will be from the English lower leagues or Ireland, alongside a few overprice haddies from abroad looking for some easy money. It's a shite state of affairs.

This reminds of these stats posted by Gordon Waddell:

Brutal numbers if you ask me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, loons said:

If it hadn't sunk in already then it definitely has now :banghead:

This. Every bloody game it gets worse, it's been a really enjoyable tournament and it's gutting seeing all the fans from the likes of Iceland, Albania, Norn Iron, Wales, Sweden, etc, etc enjoying themselves and wishing we were there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

30 minutes ago, ShedTA said:

It's becoming clearer that our predicament is not purely about quality of available players. For people to keep saying that is clearly wrong.

Correct, our management team are stuck in the past

What do McCall and McGhee offer? Surely someone like Ian Cathro with fresh ideas should be involved. Being somebody's mate or ex-team mate shouldn't be enough to get you a job in international football

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...



×
×
  • Create New...