FRANKFURT, Germany — Scotland's recurring failure at major tournaments has become so etched in the nation's psyche that songs have been written about it. They are arguably the unluckiest team in world football, lending themselves to ballads of broken dreams.
When the Scots qualified for the 1998 FIFA World Cup (their last appearance in the competition), Glasgow band Del Amitri wrote the team's official song and called it “Don't Come Home Too Soon”. It didn't work. Scotland were eliminated in the group stage and, in that time, qualified for a tournament 10 out of 10 times, but failed to reach the round of 16. Aren't you coming home too soon? They were one of the first to pack up and leave. Again.
If you are looking for glorious failures and stories of what could have been, Scotland is your team, whether it is a World Cup or a European Championship. The final chapter has always been the same: heartbreak.
“We've had some of the best players in Europe, especially during the 1960s, '70s and '80s, but we've never made it out of a group,” said ESPN FC pundit and former Scotland midfielder Craig Burley. “It's amazing. There have probably been 100 Scottish teams better than this one, but [current manager] Steve Clarke has done a magnificent job as a coach and who knows? “This team could be the one to finally get Scotland out of a group.”
No country in the world comes close to Scotland's record of qualifying for 11 major tournaments (eight World Cups and three European Championships) and falling at the first hurdle each time, but Clarke's team now have the chance to make history on Sunday in Scotland's twelfth tournament and fourth European Championship.
If Scotland beat Hungary in Stuttgart, after a 1-1 draw against Switzerland revived hope following a 5-1 opening defeat against Germany, it will almost certainly seal qualification for the last 16 of Group A and finally make what his predecessors never achieved. able to achieve.
“The team is aware that Scotland have never been out of a group before, so we are hungry to change that,” said defender Jack Hendry. “The team is determined to make history against Hungary. “There is a lot to look forward to now. Obviously, it's in our hands and it's something we can really enjoy.”
Scotland's long history of misfortune dates back to the 1954 World Cup, but it is about more than simply not being good enough. They have been good enough, at times featuring some of the world's best players of the time, such as Denis Law, Kenny Dalglish and Graeme Souness, but if there is a way to screw something up, Scotland have stumbled upon it.
In three World Cups (1974, 1978 and 1982), Scotland were eliminated on goal difference, and their elimination in 1974 came after going undefeated in the group stage in West Germany.
Four years later, Scotland flew to the World Cup in Argentina and coach Ally MacLeod told the nation they would return as world champions, but despite a 3-2 win against eventual finalists Netherlands in their last match, a defeat against Peru and a draw. against Iran meant that the Dutch outscored the Scots, even after finishing level on points.
“The whole country thought we were going to win the World Cup in 1978,” said ESPN FC pundit Steve Nicol, a former Scotland international. “It sounds ridiculous looking back, but 40,000 people saw off the team at Hampden Park and thousands lined the streets as the bus took the players to the airport. But the manager didn't really study the opposition. He just said that 'The team would be world champion, but we couldn't even beat Peru or Iran.
Despite the humiliation of predicting World Cup glory only to be eliminated at the first stage, Scottish manager MacLeod still insisted his team could have gone all the way after going down in a blaze of glory against the Dutch. .
“We had such anti-press that we all got together and said, 'Stuff everyone up and go out and play however we can,'” MacLeod said at the time. “If we had played like that in the first two games, there is no doubt that we could have won, but unfortunately we didn't. It's one of those things.”
However, Scotland's closest defeats came at the 1986 World Cup and Euro 1996. On both occasions it came down to a single goal.
In 1986, Nicol was in the Scotland team, managed by Sir Alex Ferguson, who needed to beat Uruguay in the final group match to reach the last 16. When Uruguay had a player sent off in the second minute, Scotland looked to be on course to qualify.
But this is Scotland. Everything went wrong.
“His son's expulsion worked against us,” Nicol said. “The referee went the other way after that and there was a foul every 90 seconds and he didn't do anything. Uruguay beat us up. It was like the worst of the 1980s: spitting, cheating, whatever, and everything. What could go wrong went wrong. I had the chance to score, probably our only chance. It was 4 meters away, the ball hit the sole of my foot and the goalkeeper stopped it and we ended up 0-0. went”.
Ten years later, Scotland went into the final group game of Euro '96 needing to beat Switzerland, and England had to defeat the Netherlands by a four-goal margin. An unlikely scenario, but with Scotland beating the Swiss, England took a 4-0 lead against the Dutch. Scotland were advancing until Patrick Kluivert scored a late consolation goal for Holland that sent the Scots off and caused English fans to sing songs mocking their British Isles neighbors for missing out again.
“That was the closest we got,” Burley said. “We were in, we came out, we went in again and then we came out. I was on the wing closest to the dugout and they told me to bomb forward, stay back, bomb forward. Then Kluivert scored for the Dutch against England and we were out .But what a night that was. Ally McCoist scored a goal to put us ahead and then missed about seven easy chances, actually.
For McCoist, the near-miss sums up the reality of being involved with the Scotland team.
“We finished with four points and today that would be automatic qualification,” McCoist told the Press & Journal. “I remember the crowd when England lost that goal, which effectively eliminated us, but England gave us a major turn at that time because they were beating Holland 4-0. Those five minutes summed up being a Scottish player and fan. I'm praying that it won't be the same in this Euro Cup, and I don't think that will be the case.
The chance to rewrite history now falls to Clarke and his players, and more than 50,000 Scotland supporters – the self-styled Tartan Army – are expected to travel to Stuttgart on Sunday. But although Scotland are just 90 minutes away from finally reaching the knockout stage of a major tournament, Nicol believes the weight of history will not weigh on the players' shoulders.
“All this psychological talk about carrying the weight of expectations is nonsense…really,” Nicol said. “When you get off the bus at the stadium, the only thing you think about as a player is the game you're about to play and what you have to do. The last thing on your mind is the outside noise about being the El first team to qualify from a group. Both Scotland and Hungary probably think the same thing before the match: that they have a real chance of winning and progressing to the next phase.
“But as a Scot, I'm setting myself up for glorious failure again.”
