When Craig Levein was given the Scotland job in December 2009, he immediately signalled his intent to search for players who may be eligible for Scotland due to their parents or even grandparents having been born in Scotland. While it’s not unusual for English-born players to get capped by Scotland, Levein was making a big effort to find anyone and everyone who might be eligible, apparently drafting a letter to every agent in England to look into whether or not their clients would be interested in representing Scotland should they be uncapped and have Scottish relatives.
In that period of time, Levein has handed caps to Matt Gilks, Phil Bardsley, Russell Martin, Craig Mackail-Smith, Jamie Mackie and Jordan Rhodes, all of whom were born in England. He also called up highly-rated Blackpool youngster Matt Phillips into his squad to face Slovenia this week, although Phillips has now withdrawn due to injury.
The selection of Phillips got some media attention, with Ian Holloway claiming he was surprised that Phillips hadn’t already broken into the England squad. Levein was apparently informed of Phillips possible eligibility for Scotland after his family contacted the SFA, suggesting Phillips may well be upset that he hasn’t made the full England squad yet. It would be odd if that were the case, as it is only in the last few months that Phillips has started to shine for Blackpool, scoring regularly since returning from an equally successful loan spell with Sheffield United.
It would certainly look like something of a coup for Levein to get Phillips capped for Scotland, effectively pinching a highly-rated youngster before he can break into England’s top team. And it would follow on the back of Levein’s smart move to cap Jordan Rhodes, after his sensational scoring form this season saw him linked with big money moves to the Premier League in January. While some of the English-born players Levein has capped recently are far from exciting young prospects, inflating the pool of players available to Levein or future Scotland managers is no bad thing.
In a country with a population of around 5 million, and a domestic league lacking in quality, Scotland should not be ashamed of using FIFA’s rules to find players not born in Scotland to represent the Tartan Army. After all, if countries like Germany, Italy and Portugal can do it, why not Scotland? While the players Scotland cap may not be of the same quality as players like Lukas Podolski, Mauro Camoranesi or Deco, if they can come in to the squad and make a difference, then there should be no problem.
Some of Scotland’s best players were born outside Scotland, with the likes of Stuart McCall, Andy Goram and Richard Gough all born in other countries. Ironically Hamish Husband (Spokesman for the Tartan Army, and a man who often opens his mouth and lets his toes rattle, as we Scots might say) has publically warned Scottish players about representing Team GB at the Olympics, although he and the rest of the Tartan Army cheer English born players scoring for Scotland (such as Mackail-Smith did last year against Liechtenstein).
The worry for Scotland is that with Levein attempting to bring in new faces, born in Scotland or otherwise, to the squad, that it takes a while for the team to gel and for Levein to find his best starting XI. Scotland have a tough qualifying group for the 2014 World Cup, and a poor performance in that campaign could see Scotland fall further down the FIFA rankings, perhaps even to a lower seeding pool, making campaigns to reach future international tournaments even more difficult.
Levein made mistakes tactically during the uninspiring qualifying campaign for Euro 2012. While it may be unrealistic to expect Scotland to go to Brazil in 2014 when they are in a group with Croatia, Serbia, and Belgium, it’s important that the team at least pushes for 3rd place in the group. Without achieving that, Levein will be under pressure to keep his job, and the future will become even bleaker for international football in Scotland.
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