AULD RIVALRY MUST NOT BE ALLOWED TO CLOUD SCOTLAND’S EURO VISION–
FOCUS, people. Focus. Don’t be distracted by the euphoric roar of defiance heard from Hampden to the outer Hebrides on Saturday evening. Do not, whatever happens, fall into the sad and petty old habit of believing that only one i nternational f i xture really matters.
Sure, there’s no harm in a bit of nostalgia. It may even help engender a bit of ‘wha’s like us’ spirit to remind ourselves that, for all the patronising platitudes, England will be more confident than ever of reaching the 2018 World Cup after drawing us in their qualifying group; to most south of the border, we’re no more than a useful tool for selling tickets.
Fancy changing that perception? It can be achieved long before the oldest rivals in international football meet on Armistice Day — a nice reminder of the things that bind us together, whatever our sporting differences — in London next year.
Scotland are semi-firmly en route to the European Championship Finals in France next summer. That should be more than merely the short-term focus for coaching staff, players and fans alike.
Anyone who understands the nature of the task facing Gordon Strachan, a man charged with rebuilding the reputation of this much-abused footballing nation, must know that getting to Euro 2016 represents the be all and end all, the sod-all-others ambition upon which absolutely everything depends.
Bag ourselves a return to France, coincidentally our point of entry into this long exile from a major finals, and we will march on Ta’ Qali, Bratislava, Ljubljana, Vilnius — oh, and Wembley, of course — as a fully reintegrated member of the international footballing family.
OK, so maybe reaching the last 24 out of a UEFA membership of 54 hardly represents a return to the elite. Once again, we are thankful to the late David Taylor for promoting the idea of expanding these finals to include almost half of Europe.
But the considerable morale boost that would come from taking part in a summer tournament, and maybe even daring to dream of progressing beyond the group stage, simply cannot be underestimated.
Ask players and coaches involved in previous qualification ‘Doubles’ — the 1990 World Cup followed by the European Championships two years later, or Euro ’96 followed by us reaching France ’98 — and they talk of j ust how invaluable that tournament experience can be.
However strong the team spirit already is within ‘club Scotland’, players and coaches spending three weeks together preparing for and competing in a major finals, going through the hell of defeat and — hopefully — experiencing the thrill of triumph... that’s utterly priceless when it comes to creating a strong and combative unit.
If we are to become relevant again, we have to build on something. Our players have to get used to the idea that they belong at finals.
Experiencing that success once would be worth all of the positive thinking and punchy pep-talks in Strachan’s mental armoury.
Just to pluck a nation at random, look at how England have developed over recent years. To dismiss their qualification processions as a result of getting ‘easy groups’ is to ignore the fact that they deserve top seed status because they never seem to slip up on the road to a finals. Once they get there is another story — but, goodness, they are a qualifying machine.
The road to Russia appears to be just as much of a skoosh for Roy Hodgson, assuming he’s still at the helm, and his boys. As for how Scotland should view the challenge of Slovakia, Slovenia, Lithuania and Malta, well, let’s be honest, you couldn’t have hand-picked a more amenable path to the finals for a Pot Three nation.
That’s certainly true if you assume that we’re playing for second place and a play- off, perhaps the only realistic ambition for any team cursed with such a lowly starting position.
Ah, but Gordon and chums are working hard to change that. The right set of results from our final four Euro 2016 qualifiers — Georgia and Gibraltar away, Germany and Poland at Hampden — to edge one of the better nations out would certainly shake up the world.
And then? Maybe, before the scheduled resumption of footballing hostilities with our nearest and dearest ‘enemies’, we could meet England on neutral territory. In a game that really means something. Paris is always nice. Or Nice, Lyon, Bordeaux, Marseille...