3593: Scotland: The revival is up an

by : Sam Cullen

Scotland scoring 6 in an international, surely not?

The last time they achieved such a figure was way back during the dark depths of the 1980s, when they beat the then Yugoslavia 6-1.

No doubt many down south will be sneering, claiming it was only the Faro Islands and can’t be used to gauge anything.

However, they’d be wrong, it does show significant progress for the Scottish national side under Walter Smith, who inherited a side which seemed marooned in the footballing backwaters.

Firstly, who can forget the draw with the Faro Islands in 2002 under Berti Vogts, when the little islanders had actually been 2-nil up against the Scots. Even in the return leg in 2003, Scotland only managed a 3-1 victory over one of the minnows of European football.

As the statistic earlier in the article shows, Scotland have not been a goal hungry side of late. Yet only 2 games previously to this one, they also recorded a comprehensive 5-1 victory over Bulgaria in the Kirin cup.

This shows that after many years, finally the Scots can be confident that they have a forward line capable and able to provide much needed goals in their international fixtures.

Also, looking at the goalscorers on Saturday can give Scotland fans more hope for the future.

With the exception of Kenny Miller, all the players who hit the back of the net on Saturday are in their early 20’s and surely promise more to come in the future for Scotland.

Kris Boyd, for example, has already scored 4 goals for Scotland in only 3 appearances, which bodes well for him translating his excellent domestic form into international fixtures.

Of course, Scotland still face a huge challenge to qualify for Euro 2008.

Being drawn against France or Italy would be tough, but being drawn against both of them as about as desirable as an engineering work disrupted journey on the Northern Line.

A glimmer of hope can been seen though, as the World Champions proved they are far from invincible by disappointingly drawing 1-1 at home to Lithuania, who happen to be the Scots next opponents.

As they travel to Kaunas, the squad must know that nothing less than a win will do for their chances of qualification for the tournament.

It’s not going to be an easy campaign, far from it, but under Walter Smith it does appear Scotland are definitely heading in the right direction after the mire that Berti “Mc”Vogts left them in 2 years ago.

Sam Cullen
3 September 2006