Seb Pocognoli announced his latest senior Scotland squad on Tuesday. His squad has 3 players missing from his previous squad, who have since been named in the Scotland U21s. Strategically, that makes excellent sense. Below is a short & simple explanation of why it makes sense to optimise playing players at age group level. That is rather than have age group players selected for the fringes of the senior squad.
Latest Scotland U21s squad
In contrast to Pocognoli’s September senior squad, Colby Donovan, Lennon Miller & James Wilson were left out of the senior squad announced on Tuesday. Unsurprisingly, all 3 were then named a day later in Tony Docherty’s U21 squad.
That winning habit
Willie Miller captained Aberdeen to one European Cup Winners’ Cup, 3 Premier League titles & 4 Scottish Cups among other trophies. He wrote in his autobiography of the importance of ‘that winning habit’. By selecting eligible players for the U21s rather than the senior squad, so the greater the likelihood of U21s’ success. By extension that further imbues a winning culture among Scottish players.
Scotland U21s tournament qualification record
The format of the UEFA U21s Championship has changed over the years since the first edition in 1978. In the first 10 editions of the tournament, Scotland qualified for the quarterfinals on 6 occasions. Further, on 3 of those 6 occasions, the Scots made it to the last 4. In doing so they enjoyed quarter final wins over Italy, Germany & Hungary. However, the picture since is a damning indictment of the Scotland setup. Namely, Scotland U21s have not qualified for the European Championship finals in their 16 attempts since.
Hence, Scottish players in that age group are missing out on excellent experience. Namely, of playing in the finals of that tournament.
Attracting multi-eligibility talents
Competition for the allegiance of multi-eligibility international footballers is ferocious. That includes multi-eligibility players with Scotland among their options. Some players have elected to play for Scotland while others have not. That includes players who elected to play for Scotland who had genuine prospects of representing a supposedly ‘larger’ football nation. The first of those was Bob Wilson, followed subsequently by David Harvey, Bruce Rioch, Don Hutchison, Kieran Tierney & most recently Scott McTominay. Richard Gough also had the choice of playing for Sweden although at the time the Swedes were not a stronger team than the Scots.
Footballers like those in any other walks of life are ambitious. Young players of multi-eligibility are more likely to find representing Scotland at age group level, attractive if age group Scotland teams are successful. And so the positive cycle propagates; attracting better players makes the team more successful, the more successful the team, the greater the attractiveness to other multi-eligibility players.
Exceptions
Players who genuinely improve the senior team
If an age group player genuinely improves the quality of the team by playing up a level, then of course that player will be called up at the higher level. Note though the specific use of the word, “team”. In the last international break neither Colby Donovan, Lennon Miller nor James Wilson played any minutes with the senior squad. It is a much better use of their time for the reasons listed above, getting them minutes playing age group football. In Miller’s case, he may also have the prospect of captaincy experience if he represents the U21s.
In contrast, Ben Gannon-Doak & Findlay Curtis both played for the senior team (Curtis flitted between the Scotland U21s & senior squads to play for both). Both are in the latest senior squad Pocognoli announced on Tuesday. Curtis’ value in the senior squad is much more debatable (Pocognoli has waxed lyrically of Curtis’ abilities), given the other senior wingers available to Pocognoli who could do a job for him. In contrast, Gannon-Doak has on occasion looked the part at full international level. His electric speed & trickery offers something otherwise largely absent from the senior squad.
There have been other young players who have genuinely upgraded the senior squad by playing up a level, e.g., Billy Gilmour. The opinion put forward in this article remains though, that there are benefits in bolstering age group teams with the best players young enough to play at that level.
Fast-tracking elite multi-eligibility prospects
There is also the case for fast-tracking elite level prospects to the senior squad, to tie their international allegiance solely to Scotland. That though isn’t entirely straightforward. Conditions to tie a multi-eligibility player to one nation are any of:
- Any senior international game when aged over 21
- Any game at a senior international world or continental championship finals such as the World Cup or European Championships
- 4 senior international games when aged under 21, with at least 1 of the 4 games being a competitive game. Hence why, e.g., Declan Rice played in 3 senior friendlies for the Republic of Ireland before switching to play for England
