'It's not about changing managers. You have to ask why we are where we are,' says Wotte

Sports Writer

Friday 19 October 2012

MARK WOTTE, the Scottish FA's performance director, last night warned that even coaches of the calibre of Jose Mourinho or Johan Cruyff would have been unable to prevent Scotland losing to Belgium on Tuesday.

Mark Wotte has sprung to Craig Levein's defence

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Stewart Fisher

Craig Levein's position as national team coach appears increasingly untenable in the wake of the 2-0 defeat in Brussels that left Scotland rooted to the bottom of World Cup qualifying Group A. Levein today flies out of Scotland for a planned break but talks are scheduled with Stewart Regan, the SFA chief executive, and president Campbell Ogilvie with some resolution expected within the next week to 10 days.

Wotte, who has no influence on the process, other than as a "sounding board", said he saw "no merit" in continually changing the manager and doubted whether some of the biggest names in the sport could have done any better."I don't know what's going to happen in the next couple of weeks but I hope we can continue what we've been doing," said Wotte. "My project is ring-fenced so I will keep on doing this, no matter what the position of Craig is, but I hope he's still involved because he's been an instigator of it."I love working with Craig, he has been a good supporter of the strategy and I don't think there's any merit in changing the manager. It's not about changing managers all the time, you have to look at the situation and ask why we are where we are and how do you change it. You can bring in Mourinho, but do you think we would have won against Belgium? I don't think so. You can bring in Cruyff, it wouldn't make a difference."It is easy to rationalise such comments: Levein had a seat on the panel that appointed the Dutchman 15 months ago, and the two worked closely together on the performance strategy. But Wotte also feels the manager has been dogged by bad luck and unrealistic expectation."The fans have a right to be impatient because they only want to see the team winning," said Wotte. "But expectation and desire are two different things. We expect a lot from the team and I don't think it's always fair to expect that we will walk through to Rio."I see a very committed Scotland team, there is a good relationship between the players and the manager. I saw disappointing results. So is it the manager or the quality of the players? Is it because it's the best we can do? Do we have the depth so that when one or two players are missing the quality goes down? I hear people say 'it's the Serbs, we'll beat them' but what do they know about the quality of the Serbian team? "Sometimes one result can change everything. If we'd beaten the Czech Republic at Hampden in the last campaign, we'd have been in the play- offs and we all know what happened. Not allowing the goal for 2-0 against Wales is a key moment and affects the game. I'm not blaming the referee for us not qualifying. But Craig hasn't been very lucky so far."

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'It's not about changing managers. You have to ask why we are where we are,' says Wotte

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