CURVEBALL
In the four matches they’ve sat through since their unconvincing Geopolitics World Cup win over Haiti, it must rankle among diehard conscripts of the Tartan Army that the only sporting moment they’ve been able to celebrate with genuine wild abandon remains a Wyatt Langford home run biffed out of the stadium for the Texas Rangers at Fenway Park. Away from the diamond, fairly meek surrenders by Scotland to Morocco and Brazil led to Steve Clarke’s resignation, which in turn prompted Sébastien Pocognoli to surf in on a wave of cautious fan suspicion. Following an extremely promising second-half display in his first game against Slovenia – one that obviously featured no goals, a couple of missed sitters and plenty of attacking verve from his side – the Belgian had plenty of reasons to be cheerful going into his first home game as Scotland head coach. After all, as a newbie to the gig he probably didn’t know any better.
He does now. While Hampden Park was far from full for Tuesday night’s match against Switzerland, those who did turn up also had every reason to feel less downbeat than usual ahead of a potentially glorious new dawn of not only qualifying for tournaments, but potentially getting past their group stages. This being Scotland, any optimism evaporated shortly after the 10-minute mark when – “AFTER REVIEW!” – Jack Hendry was sent off for preventing a clear and obvious goalscoring opportunity with a blatant tug on Dan Ndoye’s shoulder. Having first been awarded a penalty for a foul that was actually committed outside the box, the Swiss had to settle for a free-kick and promptly scored it anyway.
“We were ready to deliver the game we wanted from the first minute,” parped Pocognoli at the end of a match in which his 10 men shipped two more and came out on the wrong end of a 3-0 drubbing. “We had an unlucky red card, punished with the free-kick, that’s the worst scenario.” While Pocognoli clearly has a lot to learn about his new role if he thinks that is as bad as things will get on his watch, Scotland now have a trip to Skopje, where they will hope to keep a full complement of players on the pitch and at least trouble the scoreboard operator in a match against North Macedonia.
Fourteen years ago this month, the then Scotland manager Craig Levein was the subject of much abuse from fans when his similarly goal-shy side failed to beat all of Macedonia (yes, that’s a joke) in a World Cup qualifier. “This is going to be really tight indeed,” insisted Levein, of a group in which Scotland would eventually finish 15 points off the pace set by Belgium. While Pocognoli’s reign is in its infancy and he will be afforded far more patience than his unpopular, ultra-defensive predecessor, any kind of win on Saturday will be greeted with far more Scottish delight than anything the Red Sox and Rangers could ever magic up between them.
LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE
The Nations League is taking a night off but Niall McVeigh has piping hot Women’s Bigger Cup action, with Paris FC 1-2 Arsenal live at 5.45pm BST.
QUOTE OF THE DAY I
“I want every single @ManCity fan to know I am here; more than ever. I am, always have been, always will, be behind my club, my owner, my chairman, Ferran [Soriano], the players, staff, Enzo [Maresca] and you, our unique supporters. Let me be clear: we will get through this together. I love you all” – a few months after doing one, Pep Guardiola pops up to tell distraught fans he’s going to battle on through with them after reading the Premier League’s bombshell official guilty verdict and revelation of £900m worth of “sham” contracts. Yep, presumably he agrees with City chief suit Ferran Soriano who has since parped that he thinks the findings are “a conspiracy theory”.
QUOTE OF THE DAY II
“If I was a player, I’d be 100% sticking those medals in the bin. Of course you would, it’s cheating. They won it on the pitch because cheating was going on. [Manchester City] knew it would hurt a lot of people, but they’ve still done it” – Roy Keane, there, not mincing his words and taking a very different view to another former Manchester United captain, Wayne Rooney, who reckons players should not be stripped of their shiny titles.
FOOTBALL DAILY LETTERS
Everyone is outraged and the Premier League will give themselves a big slap on the back. The most that will happen is that the big five (and Spurs) will be reduced back to the big four (and Spurs). We’ll continue to praise plucky little Brighton and lament how monied Manchester United can’t get it together while preventing the likes of Aston Villa and Newcastle from having the money to sustain any multi-year challenge to the clubs owned by nation states and hedge-fund managers. What we need to learn and correct from this is why City felt the need to cheat. The Premier League is not a fair system or level playing field and never has been. City will be rightly punished, but Stoke still won’t win the FA Cup” – Nick Livesey.
I doubt very much that Silvio Berlusconi was grandfather to Andriy Shevchenko’s first son [Tuesday’s Memory Lane, full email edition] as Andriy’s wife, Kristen, is the daughter of Mike Pazik, a US baseball player. More in keeping, Berlusconi was likely godfather to the boy” – Steve Barker (and 1,057 others).
If you have any, please send letters to [email protected]. Today’s prizeless letter o’ the day goes to … Nick Livesey. Terms and conditions for our competitions, when we run them, are here.
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