Club must come first for Brown
GETTING into the Scotland team was the easy bit. For Scott Brown, it’s the exit strategy that’s the real problem. Sports writers are more comfortable quoting Craig Shakespeare than William.
But Brown’s dilemma is a reminder of the advice Polonius offered to his son in Hamlet.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be.
When Gordon Strachan’s job was on the line, the Scotland manager phoned a friend.
Others would have gone straight to the answering machine.
Celtic’s captain picked up and immediately offered to lend him his time.
This placed him in an invidious position.
One where he had to balance the demands of the club who pay him big money to reach the Champions League with the needs of an international manager clinging to office by his fingertips.
It was only three months, after all, since Brown had announced his retirement from Scotland duty, which Brendan Rodgers called a ‘wise move’.
‘These guys are not robots,’ said the Celtic boss at the time. ‘Scott A HIBS fans has dodged jail for taking a swing at the captain of Rangers. Dale Pryde, 20, ran on to the Hampden pitch after the Scottish Cup final, punched a rival fan, hit another with a chair and tried to whack Lee Wallace. Incredibly, this idiot’s only punishment is 250 hours of unpaid work and having to wear a tag for three months. Pryde can could himself lucky he didn’t do anything
really serious like sing a sectarian song. Or he’d already be cleaning the toilets in HMP Saughton. is a player who has been playing up to 60-odd games a season and in the latter stages of your life, that starts to have wear and tear on the body.’ When Brown answered Strachan’s SOS in November, then, eyebrows were raised.
The suspicion was Celtic could live with it for one reason; it was never expected be a permanent arrangement.
It’s natural to ask now if anybody actually asked what might happen if the Scotland boss actually kept his job.
Expected to go down all guns blazing before leaving Wembley in a body bag, Strachan escaped with some surface scratches and bruising.
An improved performance was followed by a win over Slovenia which keeps the slender hopes of a World Cup play-off alive.
Good news, then, for Gordon Strachan, perhaps. Privately, Brendan Rodgers must be less thrilled.
The Parkhead boss says he is ‘perfectly fine’ with Brown playing for Scotland against England in June. But the importance of the captain to Celtic’s Champions League aspirations can hardly be overstated.
A procession towards a sixth successive title offers a chance to ‘manage’ the situation. The two sides, says Rodgers, will ‘find a solution.’ Brown, then, will get time off. How long he can keep spinning plates in the air is the bigger question.
It’s three years since Steven Gerrard quit England duty to concentrate on Liverpool after his club manager — one Brendan Rodgers Esq — spoke of cutting back his appearances at club level to keep him in peak condition.
Gerrard was smart enough to take the hint.
Describing Gerrard’s international retirement as ‘great news’ for Liverpool’s Champions League prospects, Rodgers reacted as any club manager might.
When push comes to shove, caps don’t pay the wages.
It’s possible the Celtic boss really is perfectly relaxed about his skipper turning 32 and hauling his body around a football pitch 11 months a year for club and country.
If so, he’s the exception to the rule.
No one blames Gordon Strachan for coveting Brown’s services for Scotland. Tolerated rather than loved by the Tartan Army, many think the loss of the captain would be no big deal. Even with Brown in the team, Scotland have hardly been a roaring success.
However, no one else is waiting in the wings boasting 52 caps, six league titles, two Scottish Cups and four League Cups.
Strachan, who was Celtic boss for four years between 2005 and 2009, understands the politics of this. He knows how a club manager thinks.
Would he have fancied his £4.5million midfielder going off to play against England with Champions League qualifiers hovering on the horizon? Well, no, he wouldn’t.
Some suspect Brown might play against England then call time on his international career once and for all.
That would bring predictable accusations; of picking and choosing his games. Playing the glamour qualifiers and then choosing to walk away from the nitty gritty of an unappealing trip to Lithuania.
Scott Brown is a divisive figure on the pitch, but those who have actually worked with him say he is an under-appreciated and misunderstood Scotland player. That his return to international football was rooted less in ego and vanity than the desire to help out the boss who took him to Parkhead in the first place.
But there’s only one manager who can keep him there now. Only one manager he really has to please. And it’s not Gordon Strachan.