Ideas on how to improve the Scottish game

[DetroitHibs]

Just reading on the Molde thread about Scottish talent not par with other countries. I think a good idea would be to expand reserve football. I know it's started back up this year, but it's very few games. I'd like to see the bigger Scottish clubs that could afford it organize games against English reserve teams. Get these young lads excited about rubbing shoulders against there counterparts and superstars that are coming back from injuries. I think it would benefit our game and give the young lads a real test.

[Phil MaGlass]

Scottish talent not on a par, if we were playing them 18 games into our season with a settled team I think it would have been a different outcome, we would most definitely have beaten them at ER plus they dont even play on grass and have double the investment from TV. Lets talk about level playing fields if they want to start that nonsense.

[Benny Brazil]

Start with improving youth football- better facilities better coaches more kids playing football get them off their ganes consoles and out kicking a ball about - so many issues at youth level that need addreased.

[Ryan69]

Getting rid of the dinosaurs that run the game and cant seem to market it at all....would be a good start.

[BH Hibs]

Stop running the game for the benefit of two clubs. Previous poster beat me to getting rid of the cliques and blazers

[mjhibby]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

Start with improving youth football- better facilities better coaches more kids playing football get them off their ganes consoles and out kicking a ball about - so many issues at youth level that need addreased.

Facilities don't make good players though it helps. It's a combination of not enough kids like sjm with the burning ambition to succeed and terrible coaching like we see with Harry Potter at the pbs. Cathro did try to get them to play football but it was alien to them so we saw what happened. It's also a cultural thing where fans get agitated when the ball is not fired forward. At all levels the emphasis is on fitness and speed. A young Scott Allan would be booted off the park nowadays. Also the refs need to stop rotational fouling so players can play. Watching calm Pattersons poor ball control in Cardiff game just shows where we are it. It needs a complete overhaul of the coaching system and forget about bloody medals. No point in winning everything through the youth ranks if players then disappear as they weren't coached correctly and they can't cope once they try to step up to first team level. Also of course to do with money and the TV deals. Can't see any changes or improvements in my lifetime. We keep failing in Europe and the national team and everybody just shrugs their shoulders and accepts it. It is what it is I'm afraid.

[MacGruber]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

Stop running the game for the benefit of two clubs. Previous poster beat me to getting rid of the cliques and blazers

It is genetics.

Our Aussie/Swiss strikeforce, Hungarian keeper, Nigerian defender, English, American, Lithuanian, Irish, Ghanian midfield and Scottish contingent all have poor genes😅

[Smartie]

Stop beating ourselves up about the state of the Scottish game every time we have a bad result.

We lost to a decent side - a decent side that I'm confident we'd beat in January/ February when they're getting a side ready for the new season and we're halfway through ours.

Even the national team looked much better in the second half of the last qualifying campaign.

We're nowhere near as bad as we seem to want ourselves to be.

[J-C]

Far too restrictive for kids playing football nowadays, everything has to be organised and you see very few kids actually kicking a ball about the park these days. Also times have changed and less kids are into football as much as they used to be, with the world of gaming and more people worried about allowing their kids outside on their own due to whatever dangers are out there, kids are less likely to pick up a ball and go out to the park with their mates, hence why organised football has taken over. Now the problem with the organised football is no matter how enthusiastic the parents that run these teams, they are not always the best coaches, no disrespect to the hard working guys and gals who run the local kids teams. Football in Scotland has been on a downward slope for a good few years now.

[Elephant Stone]

Start the season earlier. It feels like almost every team that beats us in Europe have already started their season, can't even imagine how much of an advantage that is. It makes a lot of sense: better weather, better pitches, less competition for viewing figures on TV and let's our teams compete in Europe at no disadvantage compared with the earlier season country teams. For a small country like ours which is struggling to make progress in Europe we should try and do everything we can to make it easier for the teams competing, earlier seasons would be surely at least some sort of advantage.

[Joe6-2]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

Getting rid of the dinosaurs that run the game and cant seem to market it at all....would be a good start.

Stop running the game for the benefit of two clubs. Previous poster beat me to getting rid of the cliques and blazers

Both these posts are spot on!

[horseflesh]

Ban Sky from showing English premiership matches in Scotland. If 20% (that’s a complete guess)of sky sports subscribers are north of the border then we should be looking for a bigger slice of that English cash. I k ow the cash they get is not all from subscriptions but even a couple of percent of the obscene amounts down there would incredible

[cleanyman]

Its not bad at this moment in time.

The supposed golden generation from the 70s and 80s were the biggest failure of them all. For a pool with such talent they achieved nothing at international level.

We have some good players coming through and we have seen a revamp with the reserve league as well as league cup group games which is giving more first team game time to younger players.

We'll reap the rewards in a couple of years time. Not saying it will be brilliant but definitely better than the last 15 years.

[scuttle]

Bigger leagues, too much pressure on clubs to survive so youth not getting a chance and ban plastic pitches at the top level. Move the bigot brothers to England and let the rest of us get on with it

[ColintonHibs]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

Far too restrictive for kids playing football nowadays, everything has to be organised and you see very few kids actually kicking a ball about the park these days. Also times have changed and less kids are into football as much as they used to be, with the world of gaming and more people worried about allowing their kids outside on their own due to whatever dangers are out there, kids are less likely to pick up a ball and go out to the park with their mates, hence why organised football has taken over. Now the problem with the organised football is no matter how enthusiastic the parents that run these teams, they are not always the best coaches, no disrespect to the hard working guys and gals who run the local kids teams. Football in Scotland has been on a downward slope for a good few years now.

Shocked to read this. What dangers are there going to the park to play football in Edinburgh? Pathetic parenting if true IMHO.

[Deansy]

Until the GFA and all associated with it are completely removed from our game, then imho, there'll be no improvement.

[Phil MaGlass]

Replace SFA,

[Kato]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

Until the GFA and all associated with it are completely removed from our game, then imho, there'll be no improvement.

[J-C]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

Shocked to read this. What dangers are there going to the park to play football in Edinburgh? Pathetic parenting if true IMHO.

It wasn't meant to be shocking, I think parents nowadays are less likely to let their kids go out for hours at a time like they did back in the day, the world today has many dangers and you hear and read a lot of nasty stuff, this makes parents less happy to allow their kids to disappear for 6 hours down the park like they used to do, hence why organised football has taken over from a kick about with your mates. It's just a sign of the times unfortunately, we used to go out after breakfast and get home as it was getting dark and no one batted an eyelid as long as you were home in time, this doesn't happen now, don't come straight home from school and the police are phoned.

[cleanyman]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

It wasn't meant to be shocking, I think parents nowadays are less likely to let their kids go out for hours at a time like they did back in the day, the world today has many dangers and you hear and read a lot of nasty stuff, this makes parents less happy to allow their kids to disappear for 6 hours down the park like they used to do, hence why organised football has taken over from a kick about with your mates. It's just a sign of the times unfortunately, we used to go out after breakfast and get home as it was getting dark and no one batted an eyelid as long as you were home in time, this doesn't happen now, don't come straight home from school and the police are phoned.

There was arguably more back in your day.

At least we have CCTV now....

[Joe6-2]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

There was arguably more back in your day.

At least we have CCTV now....

Bit late after the fact

[Nutmegged]

It's all about timing and finances, if we played Molde last April/May we'd have battered them, we were in full flow and all our best players were familiar with each other, thats the timing issue, now about the finances, due to how unrealistic the game has become down south it makes it near on impossible to hold onto a player who shows any sign of promise and it makes it just as hard to sign anyone from there unless its a loan deal.

Its all short-termism and that means we're conatantly rebuilding, the rebuild usually comes in the Summer which unfortunately for teams like ours (and every Scottish team, even Celtic) that means we head into these qualifiers with a squad still trying to get to know each other, still learning what works and what doesn't, when we face a Molde they've had four months to deal with all that, they know each others game and they're familiar with their tactics.

Add to that the English transfer window closing three weeks early this year and we find ourselves minus our best and most influential player, in the past Villa wouldn't have bothered with someone like McGinn until late August, after the qualifiers but now it's created even more problems for the Scottish game.

[ScottB]

Ultimately, it's not a mystery, all the Western European countries that have produced generations of talent in the last couple decades; France, Spain, Germany, Belgium, even Iceland, all did much the same thing, invest heavily in high quality coaches for youth football.

In Scotland we have the added problem of Celtic and Rangers. To me, if you can perform, even win stuff, with Hibs, Hearts, Aberdeen etc. that is, surely, more challenging than playing for the Old Firm, outside of their couple European games a year. This could well lead to talented players stagnating; they don't really need to get much better than they were, as they go from playing for smaller sides with less quality, to being in a 'better' team against weaker sides every week. In part, that's why I'm delighted McGinn went south. He'll play against a better standard of player, meaning he'll have to keep working hard and improving. Not that I'm saying he would, but had he gone to Celtic, he likely could have coasted by, and been able to enjoy the cliched drinking / smoking / crap food diet that likely also effects Scottish players up here.

The other option is countries like Croatia, who despite no decent facilities churn out quality players, who seem driven to escape poverty as much as anything, so that could be an upside to the coming Brexit mess, maybe we'll get some decent players after all the rationing

[JackHibs]

I don't know how much facilities make a difference, a lot of it lies with the kids actually wanting to go out and play football not stay in on xbox.

Where I stay there have been new 3G 5 aside and 7 aside pitches in the last 2 year and a brand new 11 aside this year. Me and a couple mates have been up a few times for a kickabout while the weather was nice and there was not a kid in sight, and that was during the summer holidays.. Sad to see

[Benny Brazil]

This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote

I don't know how much facilities make a difference, a lot of it lies with the kids actually wanting to go out and play football not stay in on xbox.

Where I stay there have been new 3G 5 aside and 7 aside pitches in the last 2 year and a brand new 11 aside this year. Me and a couple mates have been up a few times for a kickabout while the weather was nice and there was not a kid in sight, and that was during the summer holidays.. Sad to see

The cost of the kids using these facilities can be restrictive for some families even just going for a kick about with their pals. We have new pitches where I stay and each kid has to pay to play on them. I understand that the places that own/run these pitches need to pay for the upkeep etc but there is so few open spaces where kids can play now

[Ozyhibby]

High quality coaches are far more important than good facilities. SFA charge far too much for coaching courses compared with nations who are doing a lot better than us.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Viva_Palmeiras]

Has anyone actually read Henry McLeish’s report and recommendations? Or the summary?

is it available online?

why did De Wotte leave?

[Stewboy]

I coach at a 2010's squad in Edinburgh with some of the other parents, and their are loads of kids playing in both Edinburgh & other areas in the same age bracket. Some real talent even at that age.

As somebody pointed out earlier about coaching badges, by next year I need to be at 1.3 which will have meant a spend of about £200 to get to that - The club pays that back to us, but ultimately somebody is having to pay for it. We are lucky we get that back, however that may put some off doing it if the don't.

Football is certainly better for 7 & 8 year olds than it was 30 years ago when I was a lad, they start at 4 a side, then 5 a side (both non competitive) before moving onto 7s, then 11s when they are about 12. At this stage it is all about as many touches of the ball as you can get, all the training is with a ball at your feet.

Who knows where all these kids at this age will end up football wise, but it is certainly encouraging just now

[Chic Murray]

Is there another league in the world where the teams meet each other four times in a season?

[HoboHarry]

Hire all the guys from the Icelandic FA who created the blueprint for improving their game, and fire everyone with the same responsibilities in Scotland.