The Scotland team to face Norway:
Marshall
Hutton
Caldwell, G
Caldwell, S
Davidson
Alexander
Brown
Fletcher
Commons
McCormack
Miller
First impressions:
No place for McFadden: Impact sub? I would have thought tonight might have been a night to use him to create a spark.
Lone frontman: Miller supported by McCormack and Commons as well as Brown and Fletcher. Puts pressure on the midfielders to score because there is a good chance Miller won't (remember Amsterdam - one touch, two touch, three touch, tackle!).
Holding midfielder: No place for the veteran Hartley. Replaced by the young gun that is 49 year old Graham Alexander. I don't really understand why that decision's been made. We'll see if it works.
Comeback kid: Callum Davidson back for the first time in seven years and, at 33, another injection of true youthful vigour.
Keeper: No surprise that Marshall plays with Alexander spending the last couple of weeks trying to talk himself out of both the Rangers and Scotland teams. There's modesty and there's being a bloody idiot.
The verdict: Remains the same. We can do it in a dull and methodical way. It's pretty close to the team a lot of people would have picked with the players in the squad. We might hear more about some of the more leftfield decisions if it all goes wrong though.
not overly convinced about Miller up front on his own. Add Belarus away a few years back (game ended 0-0) and others to a list where our one chance in these away qualifiers falls to miller and he misses it. Burley is betting our chances of making the play-offs against miller scoring and that is one punt I would not have taken. To have a chance of being in the play-offs (we currently sit 8th in the list of second place teams with only croatia below, who will prob not finish 2nd as Ukraine have 2 games v Andorra within there 4 games to play, while croatia have played them twice already)
ReplyDeleteMcFadden up front for me and for those who say he is not a striker, remember France away.
Whatever burley says, we have to win tonight pure and simple. If we fail to win, we have to win the last two games and more likely need 7 points from the last three to make the play-offs
Would agree with that. But Burley obviously not convinced that McFadden is the right man to play up front on his own.
ReplyDeleteMiller always works hard but a striker has to be judged by goals return and Miller's is very poor.
We should - should - still have enough to do it tonight but Burley's already given the press a big stick to hit him with if we fail.
Sadly it's all over 3-0, no coming back from that with 10 men..
ReplyDeleteBurley must go, it's obvious he's provided no spark, no impetus, nothing but drab, dull, miserly coaching that has led to to drab, dull, miserly play...