THE clubs that earn Scotland's places in next season's Uefa Cup must do so in the knowledge that they may have to face a better than decent opponent, with vastly greater resources than themselves, and be expected to dispatch them. I don't know if that's an entirely fair proposition.
On Thursday night we were outclassed by Nancy and lost 2-0. In the early hours of Friday morning I began my usual process of self-analysis in which I examine my own and my team's performance.
I know my players inside out and I know what I see in any match they play. I slept soundly after the match, content in the knowledge that we had all given it our best shot and that we had been beaten by a better team. But I was interested in understanding why they were better, and what we could do to be as good as they clearly were.
I was given a list of 22 players Nancy have. Many of them have come through their system and have been at the club for many years. The French club spend a substantial portion of their 45m annual budget on their academy.
There they have 50 boys aged between 13 and 18 who are scouted from around the country and its dependencies. The boys are resident at the club and are educated and trained by the club. The regime they are subject to is disciplined and produces young players with a great work ethic. It prepares them brilliantly for the professional game.
We work extremely hard to be as bad as we sometimes appear. We cover every base in trying to find ways to improve our players. It is my responsibility to maximise the resources at my disposal and to make the players the best they can be.
It helps to have them playing to their strengths, in a system that accommodates their abilities, allowing them to express themselves within a disciplined formation.
We managed this last season when we produced a style of play that was often fast and exciting to watch. Our system was based on a 4-3-3 and was positive and attack-minded. It was exactly the same philosophy the French team displayed on Thursday evening. We took Nancy on at their own game and they were better at it.
Many observers were surprised that we started with a back three and that young Jamie Murphy started on the bench. The intelligence I gained from my contacts in France had warned me that Nancy would play a 3-4-1-2 system. I had to consider how this would impact on our intended system and I decided we would have to change our thinking.
We would have started with two central midfield players who would have been overrun, risking the eventuality that this would undermine the players' and the crowd's spirits and that Nancy would score early, effectively ending the contest.
Their system would also have left Murphy playing as a right wing-back directly opposed to a very strong opponent who would have exposed our young player's defensive inexperience. Playing the system we did was the right decision and, although it was clear from early on we were facing very strong opposition, we were well in the match.
To lose the goals as we did compromised any plan we had. Before the game we warned the players against conceding unnecessary free-kicks in dangerous areas but we still did so and that is what cost us.
Without sounding clichéd, we must learn from the experience. I know managers often say that in defeat, but we should not miss this opportunity to improve.
I am challenging Dave Clarkson and our other strikers to look at Marc-Antoine Fortune and Monsef Zerka and learn from them. Their movement, strength and touch were a great example of what our forwards should be aspiring to. Steven Hughes is a super player but Youssef Hadji was better. Steven can be as good as Hadji if he is prepared to work hard enough.
I am asking my players to look at what they saw on Thursday and work even harder to improve. That can only be done on the training ground and can only be achieved with sustained hard work and commitment. I am prepared to work as hard as I ever have to produce better teams and to help my players, but they have to want it. Those who do will emerge.
Nancy would give the Old Firm a run for their money and it will be interesting to see how they fare in the next stages of the competition. I am a better manager for having been involved in these two matches against them. It has whetted my appetite for this football and against Falkirk today we will continue our efforts to qualify again.
One paper described my team as "McGhee's flops" after Thursday. The person who wrote that did not understand what he saw on Thursday night. But it was a warning to the Scottish managers dreaming of getting into European football: there is a price to pay for success.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article