SCOTSMAN sportswriter Stuart Bathgate's use of "mediocrity" in his analysis of a recent Scottish Premier League match could have been used on a much wider scale over many Saturday afternoons.
In the steady deterioration of quality, excitement and skill among many within the professional game in Scotland, it has become all too apparent that a harvest is being reaped from the seeds of either negative or inadequate coaching of our youngsters
which may have been sown as far back as the 1970s.
It is, of course, the older enthusiasts of the game who see it most obviously and who thus suffer greater loss at the passing from the Scottish scene of the sumptuous skills of the likes of Johnstone, Henderson, Baxter, Murdoch, Cooper, Stanton, Edwards, Buchan, Jardine, O'Rourke, Harper, Gordon, Hunter, Wallace, Hood ... the names trip off the tongue. The young supporters who turn up faithfully nowadays to watch the best of the SPL in action cannot appreciate what they are missing and, for many, it is likely that the media hype and glorification of the modern game gives them an experience of excitement as satisfying as the aforementioned names gave us "older" enthusiasts 30 or 40 years ago. They do not know what they are missing.
The serious decline of player skill within the Scottish game, however, has surely never been more obvious. Granted, passing and ball control is infinitely better. Dead ball conversion around the opposing box is, generally, excellent. There, however, the credits stop. Generally, no chances must be taken by a player that possession might be lost; if that is a possibility, don't take the risk. Individually, the ability to feint, dribble, run off the ball, pass the ball into space, lose an opponent or turn up where and when opposition defences least expect it are, almost without exception, lost arts.
It is possible of course that, as in many walks of life, we will never see them restored to the football field; coaching of such may now be well beyond the pale of our managers, trainers and coaches as they themselves will be too old to possess these talents, carry them on to the training field and physically display them to the youngsters in the hope they might grasp them and put them into practice.
That assumes, of course, that we still have coaches who practiced such skills themselves in their day and are not restricted from passing them on by a potentially more serious aspect of the "developing" game. I refer to the quite appalling – and distressing – disappearance of both forwards and attack-minded members, first, from team selections and, second, from other areas of the field once a game is live. There is a possibility they do not exist in sufficient numbers now for that even to be an option for many of our managers.
When Hearts played Aberdeen at Tynecastle earlier this season, there were only two recognised forwards on the field – Christian Nade and Lee Miller – from the 22 who started the match. Fifty years ago there would have been ten; forty years ago there were, in most instances, a minimum of six and, in all probability, eight.
What on earth has been going on since these days – when we all loved scoring or creating goals – that has persuaded managers to transfer a desire to win matches to the almost perpetual desire to ensure they do not lose them? The answers, of course, would have to come from the men themselves, but it seems pretty clear that there has been little or no persuasion to develop attacking skills in young players but, instead, instil a mindset in the ten outfield players that they get defensive duties foremost in their minds – and think about offensive duties only if and when the opportunity might arise. The result of this catastrophic switch of emphasis has undoubtedly led to the presence of fewer personalities with ball skills and a willingness to take risks, huge decreases in attack-minded players and, most obviously to the Scottish public, a dearth of goalscorers at every level of the sport.
I heard a story a couple of months ago about a manager of a Scottish football club who hosted an open day on his club's training ground. He had contacted local schools and asked the staff to send along the best 10, 11 and 12-year-olds to the training ground for a day with the club, manager, coaches and some players. Seventy boys appeared. After a few words of welcome from the manager, the boys were split into four groups. There were four goalkeepers, 28 defenders, 32 midfield players and six forwards. He could not believe his eyes – but would the Scottish football public be surprised? I suspect not. We have to arrest this decline.
• Donald Ford played for Hearts and Falkirk from 1964 to 1976 and made three appearances for Scotland
