Burley Out, Who's In

So the inevitable has happened and Gorgeous George Burley has been given the boot by Scotland. 3 wins in 14 games is a dismal record and his failure to get us to even the play offs in a relatively easy group was risible. Yes he had problems with the Rangers element (who doesn't), but he should still have managed to cobble together a team who could get the runners up spot in our group. His obsession with low standard Championship players and Celtic cloggers (McManus, Caldwell and the fantastic Mr Fox for goodness sake) ultimately did for him.

As an ex-Hearts Manager you would think he would have had his finger on the pulse of the Scottish game but his omission of the likes of Wallace, Mulgrew, Conway, Stevenson and O'Brien, good young players surely worth a chance, is baffling. There are murmurs that he was biased against his old charges, hence Wallace's omission, along with Berra not getting a game ahead of Celtic's gruesome twosome. The thought his wee run at Hearts was a flash in the pan crosses my mind, maybe Romanov really was picking the team! He did get Ipswich promoted and into the UEFA cup, but that went pear-shaped pretty quickly too.

The two blazers at the SFA Smith and Peat, should take a long hard look at themselves too. Smith was very critical of the regime as a pundit but as soon as he put the blazer on he went native. Peat is a poor man's Jim Farry or Ernie Walker. Not a compliment.

So who to replace him. It's a bit of a poisoned chalice really. You need someone who will bore us to death but will get results - probably playing 4-5-1 and matching up to the bigger teams and scratching a 1-0 win against the likes of the Faroes. Craig Brown, Walter Smith and to a lesser extent Alex McLeish managed this.

Smith has been mentioned again, but I think he's burned his bridges following his defection back to the Govan horrors. Craig Levein is as usual mentioned. This guy is a media darling (as is the team he manages, the second most successful team from Dundee) and I can't fathom the attraction. Long ball anti-football with 9 physical players, one tricky winger and a diving midget as his usual first 11, he's won nothing wherever he's managed.

So back to my original point about the qualities for Scotch manager. Bore fans to death with a 4-5-1 formation. Match up to teams regardless of who they are. Be able to raise the team for one off games. Be a media darling in spite of doing nothing of much note. Add in unemployed meantime, hence cheap.

Only one candidate - Sir James of Calderwood, the cuprinol coated buffoon recently released from his duties at Aberdeen. I've already got £10 on him at 14/1 - and the odds are tumbling fast. You heard it here first folks.

Music tonight, my 80s theme has been hijacked by this breaking football news, so two for the price of one tonight, choose from "Ally's Tartan Army" by Andy Cameron or "I have a dream" by BA Robertson.