World Cup 2026

[Imaq]

Hungary were a tough team that tournament, were they not higher ranked than us back then as well?  We’ve shot up quite a few places recently but I’m sure back then they had a better spot.

I do feel there’s a bit of arrogance around teams like that because I don’t see us as someone who should just be expecting to turn over a team like Hungary, right now that’s always going to be a very hard game.  We should in the sense that our country revolves around football and so many kids are exposed (Begbie) to the nations number 1 sport so we should be a lot better but our team isn’t actually as good as some make out in comparison to other nations.  I get the idea folk think we’re on par with someone like Croatia or similar top 15 team, teams who aren’t quite the elite level but still very good but I feel we’re still way off that.

From what I seen of the US they have largely been considered a footballing backwater who don’t even like fitba and they would likely be comfortable against us.  We have been left behind and let doon by the SFA.

I'm not saying we should turn up and expect to turn over teams like Hungary and saying we didn't play well against Haiti isn't the same thing as expecting us to perform like Croatia

When we get to tournaments, there's a general attitude that getting there is the achievement and we're going to be up against it in every game, so should just be happy to be there. Hungary were a side on a similar level to us and we'd beaten better teams than them in qualifying. A loss to them could reasonably be seen as a disappointing result, just like they'd be disappointed to lose to us under those circumstances.

Similarly, last night was Scotland's first World Cup win in 36 years, it's fine to celebrate that in the moment, and there's no point in being so miserable about performances we forget to enjoy being there. That doesn't mean that, while dissecting it the next morning, ons wee Hertz cretin fora with about 25 active posters, we have to pretend it wasn't a poor performance in one of the vanishingly small number of games where we weren't the underdog. There's a huge gap between thinking we can turn up and roll teams over and thinking we should aim for better performances than one that had us hanging on to beat Haiti 1-0. Saying that isn't failing to enjoy the moment (although spending the World Cup in Leeds, posting, probably is tbf).