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Good points grizzly,hanley and ralston can't get near there club sides but yet clarke sees them as the answer for a two legged tie,there's no way either would be sharp enough for the demands.not even being biased towards max johnstone but he should have been involved,he had the balls to make the move abroad and further his career and has impressed in doing so but yet we stick with ralston who seems the type that will happily sit on his arse and not play as long as he's doing it at his beloved celtic.

When will people realise that Clarke and the rest of the Scotland management are useless fuds, constantly filling the squads with bang average at best non Scots just because their Granny or Granpa ate shortbread at the expense of homegrown talent like Miller etc. Its time for the whole management team to be binned and replaced.

I knew Davie quite well, was at FP working the day he signed, testing the fire alarm, the day after we beat Celtic in the semi I had the good fortune to be sent to do a 'wee job' at his house, the job took 15 minutes, Davie produced half a loaf of toast and jam and 2 cups of tea, we sat until 2 o'clock shooting the shit of all things fitba and Motherwell, he was proud as punch (Coop was suspended for the replay, which makes that semi victory even sweeter in my eyes, and his too probably), a real down to earth guy, when the players came back from training we had a wee ritual, I'd sit on the wall at wee Andy's howf and the players would traipse back to the dressing room along the front of the main stand, Nijholt would tap a cigarette and Coop would stop for a chat, Stevie Kirk had the Billy big baws attitude strangely. I'm pretty sure John Chapman funded the signing, or Tommy asked him for 50k for a player and when he found out who it was almost jumped over the knowetop wall to get his wallet

I refer to the likes of, Slicker, Conway, Hirst, Adams, Dykes and a large list of non Scots given caps over the years because they had a Scottish Granny or Grandpa etc at the expense of homegrown talent like Miller, Turnbull, Doak, to name a few in a long list. The whole Scotland set up is a shambles as some of the best and promising talent in the country is constantly being overlooked.

I would take a punt its at George Hirst, capped under 17, 19 and 20 for England. Grandad Scottish. Should be nowhere near squad in my opinion. I want guys passionaite for our country, not guys only picking us for convenience

I tend to agree with you but when you dig deeper you find that (based solely on place of birth) Max Johnston is no more entitled to play for Scotland than Scott McTominey, Lyndon Dykes and Bryan Gunn. All three born outside Scotland but with a parent or parents who were born in Scotland. Both Dykes parents were born in Scotland. So if being born outside Scotland is the criteria then our pool is even smaller and some surprising players would be ineligible. Also for me it seems unreasonable to ignore players who were born outside of Scotland because a parent was 'abroad' for work purposes. It is not as if the child chose to be born outside Scotland. Max Johnston as an example when his dad was playing for Middlesborough.. Extending qualification to take into account a grandparent is a step too far for me though. So that would exclude Hirst, Conway, Slicker and Adams. Maybe that's a balance that's fairer? Just to add to the nonsense, although the Home Nations agreed as a group to ignore them, per Uefa/Fifa players can qualify based on the length of time they have been in a country and any player born in the UK can play for any of the four nations. Schooling in a country for a set number of years is yet another route to qualification. James Tavernier is actually eligible to play for Scotland. Not saying he should but technically he qualifies. And, for the more senior amongst us, Jack Charlton also has a lot to answer for. I think the current Manager is a bigger problem than qualification criteria though. His loyalty to players who hardly feature for their Clubs is nonsensical. As is his refusal to select in form players. Only one Manager learned anything from the Thursday night win in Greece. And it wasn't Steve Clarke. Did he really believe that Ralston and Hanley with next to no game time for their Clubs could survive two full games in four days at International level.

As someone who follows Scotland home and away, thats just not true. Miller is in the squad at 18 years old. I still think its a bit early for him but absolutely delighted with his inclusion. Turnbull was in plenty of squads with the chance to impress. Maybe he didnt? He only got dropped when he got injured for Celtic and then couldnt force his way back into the Celtic first team (and then onto Cardiff where he is again injured). Doak was selected for the Euros squad at 18 years old when not even commanding a first team place at Liverpool. He didnt go because he got injured in training. He isnt in this squad cause he is injured again. Slicker, Conway, Hirst, Adams, Dykes, all selected in problem positions where there literally are NO naturally born Scots youngsters battering down the door. There really isnt anyone in Scotland good enough who isnt being selected because of a so called "non-scot".

In Portugal on holiday and watched it in Irish bar. Clarke overloyalty was always going to cost us. 1) Mckenna playing in la liga yet Hanley gets ahead of him. 2) Lewis ferguson outstanding in serie A yet dropped before McLean and replaced by the right wing headless chicken that is Ryan Christie. ( who has been outstanding for Bournemouth in centre defensive mid yet Clarke thinks differently) 3) young lennon should have got last 20 mins, would have given place a boost plus no pressure on him as game was finished anyway

I take exception to that. Which 'non-Scot' took Miller's place?

DC was a wonderful player (always remember Gullit's assessment of him) but credit to us too for giving him a new lease of life and allowing him to virtually play as he wished. One thing I particularly noticed about David when I saw him every week was that opponents couldn't even get near enough to kick him, he was so aware and so instinctive as a player. I was fortunate enough to work with his gentleman of a brother, who gave me Davie's MoTM engraved wine glass for his performance against Falkirk in the 1991 cup match when I retired. An easy thing to raise a glass to DC when the sad day in March comes around each year. Thirty-eight is dreadfully young to be passing away these days. Thanks for the memories, Mr Cooper.

Aye russell was a quality player as well,my first ever visit to celtic park was the game where he took the piss out a couple of there defenders then blasted the ball high into the net in the last minute,it was definitely a goal befitting his talent.

Oh, much worse than ours. Much worse. As an entity, not individually of course, they lack humour and moan from start to finish. Going back as far as 1981, I recall them whacking us 6-1 at Tannadice in the Cup and the boos ringing out from the terraces. Its not often that happens at Fir Park. I also recall Jon Daly scoring for them against us at Tannadice and rather than cheer the goal they booed the ref for missing a "foul". Again our lot don't tend to do that. Apologies, I digress.