Pat Nevin: Scotland's World Cup loss left me confused - we can be angry but it wasn't personal
I felt one penalty claim was justified and we probably deserved a point
Once again Scotland left us feeling confused. We won against Haiti without playing well but there was a shadow of disappointment hanging in the New England air. After losing to Morocco at the same venue, this time I felt proud of the players, for their effort, their commitment and their resilience.
As I write this, I can hear a lament being played by a lone piper through the warm evening air in Boston. The performance didn’t deserve that. It was far more spirited.
Lest we forget, Scotland were pummelled at the start, which is no surprise when you lose a goal after 70 seconds. Morocco are a technically better side than Scotland man for man, but it helps confidence even when you are in the world’s top ten teams if you get an early goal. For the next 25 minutes it was bordering on a mismatch as the Scots chased shadows and scarcely played half a dozen passes together at any point.
There was the much-discussed decision to play Kieran Tierney ahead of Andy Robertson on the left-hand side, but not in the usual three centre-backs-and-a-wing-back way. The goal was lost going through a gap in the left of the back four that perhaps wouldn’t have been there with three central defenders. It also doesn’t help when we randomly go for an offside move when that isn’t in the gameplan. It was the worst possible start.
Suddenly there was a lack of belief, a nervousness that didn’t allow any chance of a foothold in the game in that first quarter. I hate that the game is played in quarters, but at this World Cup that is the case whether we like it or not.
It could have got ugly, but maybe this team’s experience - the most experienced Scotland team ever fielded with over 600 caps between them - meant that most of the players have been there before and knew that things could change if they stuck to their tasks. It was tough surviving that period, but then the Scottish players are a tough group.
The system was tested to the extreme, mostly because of Achraf Hakimi, who was allegedly playing at right full-back. He was however popping up on the left wing, at centre-forward or finding space in the midfield. The Scottish team hated trying to pin him down and the Scottish fans were even less impressed by him, but he is a special footballer.
The problem of facing Hakimi
Hakimi tortured us because he pulled Tierney everywhere. This is exactly what I did whenever I was marked man to man. You take your marker where he doesn’t want to be and where he doesn’t really know what to do. Should he pass you on to another defender or keep following you, it is disrupting his own team’s shape. I would always take my marker and stand beside another defender so I was occupying two, leaving space somewhere else. Hakimi did this and it wasn’t until after the rehydration break that Clarke was able to clarify the markers’ jobs.
By the start of that second quarter, slowly but surely the Moroccans either tired, took the proverbial ‘foot off the gas’ or possibly Scotland simply improved. It probably took that long for the shock of losing the goal to fade, but by ten minutes from the end of the half, the game started to look much more even.
Had those ten minutes not happened, then Steve Clarke might have rung the changes at the break, but it is tough to make substitutions when you have just had the best period of the game. That holding pattern seemed sensible as the Scottish influence grew.
By this point a couple of the less celebrated Scottish players were catching the eye. Nathan Patterson didn’t do a lot wrong and he began to push forward impressively the longer the game progressed.
In the backline, Jack Hendry was again impressive. He was defensively solid and had one brilliant goal-saving tackle that in the end hit the cross bar. Maybe even more impressively, he looks imperious when he strides into the midfield with the ball, which can change the dynamic in there.
The real story started with the substitutions, Ben Gannon-Doak unsurprisingly upping the tempo when he appeared and suddenly the Moroccan defence dropped back ten yards deeper. Lyndon Dykes came on and before he touched a ball he was in the face of his markers to ruffle their feathers. It seemed to work. The fact that the referee was the most lenient I have witnessed in a decade meant that Dykes could put himself about a bit.
As the game wore on, Clarke - who is generally considered a conservative coach, too conservative for many - ended up with an incredibly attacking side. Ross Stewart and Lyndon Dykes were up front and Scott McTominay was right beside them with Gannon-Doak on the right and Andy Robertson flying up the left.
The best chance of a Scotland goal would have been from McTominay and three times he got himself into dangerous positions. He was first blocked by Dykes for a header, then Gannon-Doak before finally being squeezed out by a whole bunch of defenders on the last occasion in the Moroccan six-yard box.
The real questions surrounded the two penalties that Scotland didn’t get. Most Scotland fans and many of the players were convinced at least one should have been given, but then Mr Tantashev was not in the mood to give many free kicks on the night. He was a throwback to another era, a referee who didn’t give free-kicks when the merest brush or nudge from an opponent leads to players crumpling in a tangled heap. Though infuriating when your team doesn’t get a free-kick. it was refreshing and he did treat both sets of players with the same disdain when they were looking for easy fouls.
That said, I do think that by the rules John McGinn’s shout was a good one. If you go beyond the defender and he doesn’t contact the ball, but does contact you enough to affect your balance, then it should be given. It was however subjective as the referee was arguably within his rights to suggest it was ‘a coming together’ not a tackle. I disagree, as having been on the end of those sorts of challenges many times, it feels like an infringement at the time - even if it is just thigh on thigh. He went for the ball, didn’t get it and got you instead, it should have been a spot kick, just.
As we all know well by now, had it been given by the referee it wouldn’t have been overturned, but if not given then the VAR was unlikely to intervene. A tough call for Scotland, but to be honest, no more unfair than the penalty that Haiti should have got for handball against Grant Hanley. We can be angry but it wasn’t personal.
In the end I thought Scotland deserved to get that point we all desired so much because of the second-half performance. I finished my last column saying we will need to be very good, but we will probably have to be a bit lucky on top of that. Sadly we didn’t have that good fortune this time - and that was the difference.
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