Scotland 0-2 Austria. Shambolic first half display (second moderately better) in a game that was supposed to be "preparation" match for Germany. Perhaps we're lulling them into a false sense of security? Two further notes: 1. A terrible error by the young goalkeeper Gallacher for the second goal - mis-controlled an easy back pass, Austrian #9 ran in and took the ball into an empty net. Douglas better be fit for the next match 2. "Crowd" of just over 12,000 in Hampden. Even with its reduced capacity, this looked awful. The vast majority of the grounds in the SPL (outside of the OF) could have held this, and it would have generated much better atmosphere in one of the many stadiums which hold circa 15,000. Massive egg on face for the SFA. As for my general view - there is no doubt this provides more ammunition for those who were criticising Berti before last night. (ie Charlie Nic) But even a relative optimist (on Vogts) like me is starting to have doubts. What it amounts to is basically that Berti needs at least a decent performance against the Germans. If we get pumped 3+, then I think he is in trouble.
Last night was as bad as it gets. I mean losing to a team who are actually ranked lower than us in the FIFA World Rankings! And not just losing, but being completely outplayed by them, especially in the first half. And Austria aren’t even a good team. They were captained by Thomas Flogel who was a decent player at Hearts but nothing special and never interested the Old Firm. The pressure is really building on Berti because he seems very tactically naïve, after all he was playing Christian Dailly, a right footed, center back as a left wing back! McFadden’s performance was the only positive we can take out of the game but he didn’t exactly set the heather on fire. Berti will not get sacked so long as we finish at least second in the group and face a play-off for Euro 2004. But we would be unseeded and face a seeded team such as Holland or England (not Turkey ) and it would be a tall order to qualify especially if we play like we did last night. Scotland will come good but until we do we just have to put up with this mince!
My main worry is that vogts has been in the job for more than a year and he still doesnt look like he has a set system for us to play, only a friendly so I'm not going to stick the boot in too hard but anything other than a playoff spot and we have to ask what progress we have made.