Is football boring? Is football boring?
There has been a refrain over the course of this autumn – across both media and social media outlets and even at The Observer – that football has somehow become dulled over the repeated international breaks during which there is no top-level play.
Not any more. Ask any of the millions tuning in to watch Scotland’s all-or-nothing World Cup qualifier against Denmark last night. Or those who saw Troy Parrott’s miraculous hat-trick to send Republic of Ireland to a qualification play-off on Sunday night. Football – the best thing humankind has ever created – is not boring.
This was a night for all those who love the beautiful game – save for, understandably, the Danish – to cherish.
Rarely does a goal truly get you out of your seat like Scott McTominay’s third-minute opener – a goal so good it forces you to message friends you know aren’t watching with a nudge, along the lines of: “Mate, I know you’re on a first date, but excuse yourself for a moment, you have to watch this goal.”
For more on the joy games like this can bring, read Giles Smith‘s latest here.
VAR – even VAR, the great bête noire of modern football – had a good night. It was correctly used to judge Andy Robertson’s foul in the penalty area on Gustav Isaksen for Rasmus Hojlund to dispatch Denmark’s equaliser from the spot. It then couldn’t intervene when Rasmus Kristensen was shown a second yellow card for a soft foul on John McGinn.
“Nobody said it was easy, no-one ever said it would be this hard,” sang Coldplay on their last trip to Hampden Park in August 2022. It was as if those words had never escaped the stadium, as Lawrence Shankland’s 78th-minute tap-in was cancelled out within three minutes by Patrick Dorgu. If you’ve never understood the philosopher Blaise Pascal’s quote: “The eternal silence of these infinite spaces terrifies me” – that was Hampden Park at the 81 minute mark.
But then a reminder of football at its wildest. Kieran Tierney, who has played 94% of his entire career as a left-back or left-winger, and 5% at centre-back, is thrown on at right-back. And Tierney, who has scored 16 goals in 409 appearances, including just one for his country, pops up with a stunning curling effort in the 93rd minute to go 3-2 up. Oh, and of course, the goalkeeper is his Celtic team-mate Kasper Schmeichel, who he will see tomorrow when they return to club duties. You think your water cooler chat at work is stunted? Go to Celtic’s Lennoxtown Training Complex and try and get a glimpse of that chat.
With any luck, you’ll be convinced by now that rumours of football becoming boring have been greatly exaggerated. If not, good news – Kenny McLean rounded off the night in the 98th minute by scoring from the halfway line. Happy now?
These are moments to cherish, and these are moments to reflect on what we have. Robertson after the game held back tears as he told the BBC he had spent most of the day thinking about his former team-mate Diogo Jota.
“Today I’ve been in bits,” he said.
“We spoke so much together about the World Cup, when we missed out in Qatar because of his injury. I missed out because Scotland never went. We’d always discuss what it would be like going to this World Cup. I know he’ll be somewhere smiling over me tonight.”
Scotland will play in their first World Cup in 28 years next summer. While the tournament has already been dogged by ticket scandals, political interference and the general spectre of Donald Trump, here is a reminder that it’s the action on the pitch that matters – always has been, always will be.
Photographs by PA & Getty Images