Stuart Dickson Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 Griffiths is another one they signed to weaken the opposition. Really? How often were Celtic planning on playing Wolves? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oaksoft Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 Collins has a point though. The standard of the top flight of the Scottish game is utterly shite and whilst it's correct to point out that Celtic tend to try to weaken their opposition by signing their best players, it's hard to get away from the fact that the majority of our so called top clubs spend most of August and January trying to beat non League English competition to sign players they seem to think will lead them to glory. Lets face it if are a Motherwell fan or an Inverness fan and you know that your club are looking to break the bank to sign the 1,000th best English born player shouldn't you be asking questions about the sanity of your club manager, and about the effectiveness of the youth development side of the club? With the amount of grant money and sponsorship money being thrown at the Elite Development programme in Scotland by both the SFA and by the Scottish Government shouldn't we be expecting to see better results? Shouldn't we be seeing at least one Scottish equivalent of Reece Oxford in the starting line up on opening day in at least one of our top 22 clubs? Shouldn't our clubs be looking at local talent or are we really saying that the best young Scottish talent our major clubs can product through the pro youth system is always going to be of a poorer standard than at least 1,000 English born players playing in the English leagues down south? Actually that's a reasonable call. We may well be struggling to pay decent establoshed players up here but there is absolutely no excuse for the lack of attitude, training and technical aptitude of youth players. I can't understand that at all. Our problems run deeper than a lack of Sky TV money. We suffer from shit agricultural coaching methods at all levels of the game. The proof is in the lack of players you've highlighted who are capable of playing anywhere outside Scotland. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DougJamie Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 Yet if someone doesn't want to include Celtic or Sevco for personal reasons, you think it is wrong? Nope, cause I believe in freedom of thought and any number less than 41 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DougJamie Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 Actually that's a reasonable call. We may well be struggling to pay decent establoshed players up here but there is absolutely no excuse for the lack of attitude, training and technical aptitude of youth players. I can't understand that at all. Our problems run deeper than a lack of Sky TV money. We suffer from shit agricultural coaching methods at all levels of the game. The proof is in the lack of players you've highlighted who are capable of playing anywhere outside Scotland. So much for the grassroots crap from McLeish, I agree with above sentiments. Standard is woeful, we know this, but I don't need Collins smug comments. Suggest a solution not rub in what we all know. FA have just announced £260M investment to grassroots, we get 1000th of that if we invest. This is a head to toe change, and whilst we are on subject how are Morton allowed to have that danger of a shit hole open. Sums up the whole ethos of the double standards by the SFA. We almost went bust spending 500k in 1999 to meet their so called standards. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pod Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 Isn't this what all teams do........................take players from teams which are poorer? Of course they do, that how we got Callum Gallagher. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stuart Dickson Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 (edited) So much for the grassroots crap from McLeish, I agree with above sentiments. Standard is woeful, we know this, but I don't need Collins smug comments. Suggest a solution not rub in what we all know. FA have just announced £260M investment to grassroots, we get 1000th of that if we invest. This is a head to toe change, and whilst we are on subject how are Morton allowed to have that danger of a shit hole open. Sums up the whole ethos of the double standards by the SFA. We almost went bust spending 500k in 1999 to meet their so called standards. It's not really about total amount of money though Doug, it's about how you spend it. Look at Belgian football for example. Their football association operates on a far smaller budget than the FA yet in the English Premiership Belgian footballers are some of the biggest names, and best players on offer. Vincent Kompany, Eden Hazard, Mousa Dembele, Christian Benteke, Marouane Fellaini, Simon Mingolet,Thibaut Courtois and Romelu Lakaku amongst many, many others. How is such a small nation able to get it so right whilst Scotland can't? Organisation. The SFA were getting it right but then they recruited that idiot Mark Wotte and they moved away from what was common sense into the most obvious way to piss away money for fun. The SFA had moved to raise standards as grass root clubs. You couldn't register a youth team any more without at least one qualified coach to 1.2 level and one at 1.1 level, with someone in the team having passed their sports injury course with in the last three years. They had proposals in place to move the standards up again and were going to make it one coach at 1.3 level and one at 1.1 level but that doesn't appear to have happened. Now getting volunteer youth coaches to attend coaching courses isn't necessarily going to make them good coaches - just as having a teaching qualification might not make someone a good teacher, but it makes sense for the SFA to at least have given them the information and resources they need to put good practice into place. The SFA also put into place a licenceship programme which meant that to access grants and funding clubs would have to prove they were achieving certain standards and maintaining certain practices in the running of the club on the whole. That too made sense, driving up standards at the bottom level of the game, with the added benefit that now there was a great deal of qualified volunteer resource in all areas of Scotland capable of promoting and improving the game. Then the SFA got it wrong. They put in place an elite development system that meant a great deal of the funding for grass roots football was being diverted into senior clubs and into educational establishments like schools. Now clubs and the sports academy schools have to fill quota's to get their funding and that means a LOT of kids being recruited into pro youth football who are never going to make it as senior footballers. In effect what we do is we move players that development coaches know will never make it and who should be paying to play football into a market where they get their football paid for - travel, kit, pitch hire, referee's dues etc - them by sponsors through the SFA, local authorities using our council tax and by the Scottish Government using funding that comes from the UK taxpayer, so a huge proportion of the available funding and resource is being squandered. It would make far more sense in Scotland to go back to something more akin to the old S' Form system where senior clubs are heavily limited in the number of schoolboys they can recruit and where they can only sign players from over 14's upwards. The SFA would be better reverting back to focusing on driving up standards at juvenile football clubs, and putting more resources into improving the availability of good quality playing facilities up and down the country. Edited August 12, 2015 by Stuart Dickson Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DougJamie Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 (edited) Well said Stuart, agreed. But cant see it happening, why can they not get this? Edited August 12, 2015 by DougJamie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HSS Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 What was the score tonight John? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kendo Posted August 12, 2015 Report Share Posted August 12, 2015 What was the score tonight John? Bring on the Malmo. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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