The experience is still fantastic, although I’ve been doing it with the Scottish team for 14 years now. I’m sure that Kevin Keegan would like to be in my shoes right now. The amazing thing I’ve found about international management is that, in spite of all the hassle, there’s a great deal of satisfaction in having the privilege of dealing with the country’s best players, especially on the training ground. At present I’m preparing to leave with my usual depleted squad for a training session in advance of Scotland’s game in Zagreb. The experience is still fantastic, although I’ve been doing it with the Scottish team for 14 years now.
It would be dishonest of me to say that I haven’t given Kevin more than a passing thought these past few days. For a man who I consider a friend, and for one who so obviously wears his heart on his sleeve – like a Scotsman, in fact – it must have been extremely distressing for him to take such a momentous decision so promptly.My assumption is that he probably had things in mind in the event of a defeat against Germany.

What more could he have done to postpone the inevitable? How could the England manager minimise the risk of failure? It’s the same for all of us – ask Mick McCarthy, Mark Hughes and Sammy McIlroy regarding the awesome accountability and I’m sure you’ll get the same answer.It’s an experience which can be appreciated only after having been there. The media scrutiny is voracious, the world claustrophobic in the extreme. I’m sure that Kevin, for all his honours as a player and his experience in club management, would have been surprised at how daunting the task was. Keegan is a great motivator, an ebullient personality and a superb football manager. His record at Newcastle and Fulham was excellent, so why do so many people question his tactical awareness?I hesitate to say so, or to sound smart after the event, but England’s fixture schedule did not help.

In conversation at the World Cup draw in Tokyo, I said to Kevin and the England delegation that the best start against a major opponent is away from home. The logic is simple: anything gained is a bonus, and if you lose, the situation can be redeemed by winning the return game.One colleague who took the advice was McCarthy, and look at the brilliant start he has made away from home in the Netherlands and Portugal. It’s no coincidence that Scotland have played away against Norway, Finland, Austria, Lithuania and Latvia in our recent first qualifying matches and have not lost. Indeed, this time we started with no fewer than three games on foreign soil.From outside, the England job looks like mine – a wonderful, impossible task. Impossible because of the increasing conflict between club and country and the influx of foreign players. For our game last night in Zagreb I was short of seven selected players – Lambert, Ferguson, Dailly, Dodds, Matteo, McCann and McNamara – five of whom could be considered first-choice.