The Fiver | A can-kicking, makeshift, off-the-cuff approach to long-term success

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The Scottish FA is great. Really great. It’s simply the best, perhaps the main reason Shortbread McFiver has turned out to be the well-adjusted figure we know and love today. In 1950, the SFA declined to send the national side to the World Cup in Brazil despite having qualified, because they’d failed to beat England in the Home Internationals. In 1954 it agreed to send players to Switzerland, though only 13 of them to save cash, and none from O’Rangers because they were on a trip to the USA! USA!! USA!!! dancing for coin. Uruguay beat Scotland 7-0. In 1958, Matt Busby was recovering from Munich so they got the trainer from Clyde to fill in for the greatest manager of his era. The Scots lost two of their three games and were knocked out in short order, though at least nobody back home saw how it happened because the SFA was worried about attendances at junior level so banned all televised coverage. Good old SFA! And to think its pièce de résistance was still 20 years away.

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