LEAVING Hampden Park after Scotland's goalless draw with Northern Ireland the other night, it was not difficult to form the impression that, in terms of making the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, widespread expectation may have been replaced by hope.
It was as if the collective realisation had dawned that the often thrilling events of the Euro 2008 qualifying is as good as it gets, that they represent a peak of achievement that is unlikely to be repeated.
The nature of the Scots' generally bland and largely fragmented performance will have been mainly responsible for this abrupt change of mood, the majority of observers concluding that the flaws – most notably in the matter of exerting and then exploiting genuine pressure on an Irish team reduced to ten men for the last 34 minutes – are too worrying to leave room for optimism.
When, however, allowances are made for certain aspects of the circumstances in which this latest winless friendly were played – and, in the interests of fairness, they should be – the onset of this more pessimistic view may yet prove to be premature.
The most obvious hindrance to the plans of the manager, George Burley, was, of course, the absence of a substantial number of players included in the original squad who would surely have started the match. These included three of his four defenders, the full-backs Kevin McNaughton and Callum Davidson as well as Gary Caldwell, and the midfielder, Paul Hartley.
In addition, some emphasis should be placed on the timing of the match, so close to the start of the domestic season that it would be reasonable to expect several players still to be short of the sharpness that comes from competitive outings. Given the differences in each player's physiology, the extent of the "rust" would vary from one individual to the other.
With the opening World Cup qualifier in Macedonia still two weeks off, there is at least an allowable chance that more members of the squad will be closer to the ideal state of readiness. Availability, needless to say, is another matter, entirely at the mercy of fortune.
Perhaps most seriously of all, there appear to be growing misgivings over Burley himself, although comparisons with the discredited Berti Vogts yesterday – primarily on the basis that he has yet to oversee a victory after three tries – do seem unreasonable at this early stage of his tenure.
The bald statistics of the manager's record so far – previous opponents, after all, included Croatia and the Czech Republic, two of the most formidable in Europe – are less concerning than his own, seemingly sedative personality. Even in casual conversation, Burley continues to talk as if in a media conference, his words measured and delivered with relentless evenness, giving no hint of the kind of range of emotions normally associated with inspirational figures.
Whether or not he is a different animal in preparing a team for battle can only be guessed at, since you could spray the Scotland dressing-room with buckshot and not hit a single player willing to give a candid and insightful appraisal of the manager in public.
Against the Irish, there was also evidence of uncertainty in Burley's selection and deployment. The omission of Barry Robson from midfield was made to look like a serious misjudgment when the Celtic player replaced Kevin Thomson at the start of the second half and immediately brought a new dynamic to that department.
Scott Brown and James Morrison appeared distinctly uncomfortable with their roles wide on the right and left respectively, positions they do not play with their clubs. Brown, especially, became conspicuously more effective on those occasions when he moved inside and brought his forceful, energetic thrusting into the game.
If there is now understandable apprehension over the looming double-header in Macedonia and Iceland, there is also some cause for believing that mistakes will be rectified and improvement achieved. At this stage, outright condemnation and the abandonment of hope should be held in abeyance.
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