Opinions on John Collins comments?

Aye but we'll still win the league by 20 odd points.

Love a bit of karma, me.

 

Collins will be vindicated come May, or even October when we are steam rolling the * out of teams and already 15 points clear.

Sod's law though...

 

I'm just saying that when you start chattin' a bit it comes back to haunt you.

What exactly is achieved by saying our domestic competition are effectively a bunch of bums?

 

His comments were taken out of context and blown way out of proportion.

 

The main problem that the other clubs in Scotland face is that, like most football clubs in the world, they draw their support based on geography.

I mean, I doubt we'll see bus loads of football fans travelling from Coatbridge or Airdrie to see Hearts, Aberdeen or Dundee United playing, will we?

Usually the support each club gets is drawn from its local area. Sides like Aberdeen are bigger than some of the others because you're talking about the third biggest city in Scotland outside of Edinburgh and Glasgow. They also have the added advantage of being a one-club city.

Both Edinburgh clubs draw their support from the 2nd biggest city in Scotland, whilst both ourselves and Sevco are based in the biggest city in Scotland.

Where we shoot into the distance (along with Sevco to a lesser degree) is that we don't just rely on geographical location for our support. We draw wider support from the Irish Catholic community from within Scotland and beyond, with Sevco doing the same from the Unionist Protestant demographic.

More support means more money, which means more media coverage, which means more interest from supporters. It's a constant cycle that the other clubs in Scotland simply don't have a chance of breaking.

It's for that reason that it's really quite unfair for us to say that other clubs should simply improve, as if it's more a choice than anything else.

It's akin to sides like Chelsea, Barcelona, Real Madrid and suchlike looking at our Champions League exploits and saying that we should simply "work harder" to match them.

Our supporters would be very quick to point out the huge gulf in resources that exist between ourselves and clubs like that. We simply cannot afford the players, the wages, the transfer fees, the managers and so on to compete with them.

It's the exact same for the lesser sides in Scottish football.

You can have all the fitness experts in the world, but it makes no difference if the playing personnel aren't all that physically gifted, which is the case more often than not with players who ply their trade in Scotland.

 

couldn't agree more ,but what did j.c achieve ,only to * off some people ,we all know celtic are the best team in scotland at the moment ,let hope it continues

 

The people * off at us are always * off at us.

Infact, they are always * off. How can they not be when their team is rank * rotten?

 

I'm not arguing with that mate, it's all absolutely true; and yet I do think these clubs can and should do much better than they do in terms of fitness and coaching. Let's not compare them with us; let's compare them with similar-sized clubs on the continent and you can see they underperform. You can excuse the odd result against bigger clubs, such as Aberdeen losing to Real Sociedad last year, but that apart the record of Scottish sides in Europe is shocking.

You know, when it came to the crunch, we dismantled the second best team in Scotland last year with a contemptuous ease you never see when we play European qualifiers (apart obviously from when we play part timers). Many of these clubs are not bigger (neither in terms of fan base not in terms of budget ) than Aberdeen, Hearts, Hibs, yet they are much tougher to beat.

 

I think it's different when it's a one-off game or a two-legged tie though. Look at our recent success (and failures) in the domestic cup competitions. We usually dismantle teams easily in the league, but teams have a different mentality in a cup tie, don't they? That mentality is what we face in the Champions League qualifiers.

 

Possible, mate, but it really is such a long standing pattern now that you have to question it and when you add the record of Scottish clubs in Europe against smaller European sides in "qualifying" matches, I think you have to say they are underperforming. The name "qualifying match" is a complete misnomer for any Scottish team but (occasionally) us.

 

Again, an issue we suffer from in Scotland is the infamous summer start.

For example, Aberdeen were beaten by FC Kairat of Kazakhstan, who play in a league that runs from March to November. They're essentially mid-way through their season, whilst Aberdeen are just getting started.

Inverness lost to Astra Giurgiu of Romania, who's league season begins at the start of July and ends in May.

I'm not saying this is the only reason that Scottish teams lose, but when you're playing teams who are already relatively fit (or in some cases in mid-season and in great shape) it certainly doesn't help.

Not to mention that we scraped past Qarabağ of the Azerbaijan Premier League, which isn't exactly one of Europe's hotbeds.

I do think that because we're such a huge club we tend to look at Scottish football in a way that we really shouldn't be. If you took us and Sevco out of the equation scotland really is a footballing backwater, and it should be considering the fact we're a nation of 5 million people living in a country that doesn't really have a climate that's conducive to quality football or footballers.

 

I think Neilson made the point about coaching in his comments. I agree with this
and I agree with RR points regarding coaching and fitness. I would add in mentality of players and managers into that equation. All of which can be addressed,as Neilson points out through coaching.

The mentality of managers is one which I find frustrating. I know this example is open to debated in terms of being comparable. Take the approach of Unai Emery the other night. 4-1 down and he still encouraged his players to go forward.His subs and tactical changes also followed that positive approach. Here it's the "lets not lose anymore" approach.Our managers aren't brave to take make such decisions. Why not??

The Sheep last week had gave themselves an opportunity with a handy 1st leg showing against Kairat. A full house turned up and they struggled to create much to cause the opposition problems. Managers setup teams negatively. All our best results at club and International level,come from being defensive. We struggle badly when it's roles reversed against lesser or equal opponents.

The best and most pleasing performance I've seen with Scotland was Spain at Hampden (got beat 2-3), under Levein of all people. 2-0 down and then all of a sudden we just went for it. Had them on the back foot, played without fear and allowed our players to express their strengths in our play. It was about the last time as well.

The last point about the players. Why do managers in Scotland not utilise players to their strengths?? Why make them do things that play on a weakness?? We have talented and skillful players being asked to sit back and carry out defensive duties?? Some go one further and leave these players out. Why don't they find a solution to include them??

If teams play negatively or don't feel they can compete with other sides, Why?? Is it fitness or technique?? Is it just a problem with Scottish players?? If so, what is the solution?? Early intervention with youth players. Give them the foundations to build the technical ability to the levels of top players in other countries

Say they have the basics. Why doesn't the ability of these players progress?? Is it down to the individual or coaching??

I could go but I'm beginning to bore myself. While the financial gap makes things difficult. It doesn't mean we should use it as a mill stone around our necks; or give up finding other ways of improving.

 

I am not a Collins fan and maybe if anyone else said it then wouldn't have been such a story of course its true no harm to the other clubs not their faults

 

The main issue for me is the quality of the coaching on offer. Guys who are thorough and professional in their approach aren't going to hang around the backwater of Scottish football for any longer than they have to.

Like any other industry the top performers will be headhunted and rewarded with more money from bigger employers, such as what happened to Alex Neil.

As soon as he started making some progress with Hamilton he was immediately snatched up by an employer with more money.

What happened then? Hamilton reverted to type because they had to bring in a replacement that fit within their financial framework.

Well, Sevilla had the benefit of being able to look to their bench and bring on a player that Liverpool had bid in the region of £16 million for previously, and an on-loan striker who cost his parent club over £15 million.

When you have that kind of ability sitting on the bench, not to mention the fact that you have the €20 million Ever Banega in your ranks I'm going to guess that you can go for the brave decisions because you know you have the players to make it happen.

I'd also like to point out that the Scottish clubs do make these kinds of brave decisions when they play each other. It's not as if Dundee play a conservative game against Dundee United, as you saw the other night.

Even though I don't really think that the other sides in Scottish football have the managerial talent to compete with the best in the world, I do believe that they still know more about the game than the regular Joe, so i'm going to assume that even the likes of Robbie Neilson and Derek McInnes know more than you do. I like to think that if some nobody on an internet forum can spot these issues then so can they, and that there's reasons why it doesn't happen.

Why couldn't we cope with Barcelona or Milan a few years back in the Champions League? Why did Milan cuff us 3-0 at home? Why did Barca beat us 6-1 in Spain? Why did Maribor beat us at home?

Why were Inverness able to get a draw away to Astra Giurgiu, a side that we could only draw with away last season as well?

Why were we beaten 3-1 at home by Salzburg?

Is it fitness or technique?? Is it just a problem with our players?? If so, what is the solution??

Do they? Aberdeen don't even own a place for the players to train! They have to constantly switch up where they hold their training sessions depending on who can accommodate them, be it local Universities or suchlike, whilst Dundee United train at a University sports centre.

Aberdeen begun plans to build a new training centre in June of this year, but these things take time, and Scottish clubs for the most part aren't in a financial position to make the kind of investment in facilities afforded to us.

I guess the near £10 million we spent isn't quite within their budget.

I've seen nothing to suggest that any of the Scottish clubs are "giving up", but the economic facts are still facts. They do their best with what they have, but when you look at what we have in comparison we can't really expect them to be able to compete with us.

 

OK, we can't stop the best players and managers going to England for the money, so what do we do? I tell you what I think we should do, Dáibhí: we move the whole thing up a level.

Let's stop blowing hard about how great Largs is and start genuinely producing a glut of great coaches. That way the very, very best of them will get the big money down south, but there'll still be plenty of great coaches left to work up here. There are literally thousands of ex-footballers in Scotland and the majority of them are capable of being great coaches and youth coaches with the right training.

This would, after some years, filter down to better players and teams.

But it would require us to admit that our training for football coaches is not as good as we like to pretend and that out training for youth coaches must be utter * given the results and overhaul the whole thing from top to bottom.

It's the lack of humility that's holding us back.

 

Again, you're telling me what we should be doing, but not exactly how you would go about it.

It's easy to say that we need to move the whole thing up a level, and that we need to revamp how we produce coaches and so on, but this isn't easily done without proper finance, which not a lot of Scottish sides (nor the governing bodies) actually have.

 

He is correct ,, they are not good enough ,, 2 games a year against us ,, and both games ,especially ,the last half of the season ,, it,s 11 behind the ball ,,, it,s all they can do lol we need to move on ..

 

Sell Hampden if need be. I'd rather see Scottish football improved than continue with a rather inferior national stadium. Celtic Park, Ibrox and Murrayfield are all superior stadiums anyway.

 

Hampden aint perfect but its better than poundland by miles mate, ask Vert he will tell you that as well

 

He's not returning my calls.
You'd think with me calling him dozens of times a day he'd get the message and answer, but no, apparently not. Also the last few days it's been saying "number not recognised" so maybe he's finally been trying to call me back now but had a problem with his phone.