Is Walter Smith the right man to lead Scotland; Michael Grant

THE SFA are about to demonstrate a variation of Gary Lineker's memorable line about football being a game in which 22 men run after a ball and at the end Germany win. Barring an application from Ottmar Hitzfeld dropping through the letterbox, or another equally unlikely event, the 11 members of the SFA executive board will mull over a few possibilities before deciding that, yes, Walter Smith should be the next manager of Scotland.

Smith's name has been on everyone's lips in the 25 days since Berti Vogts' position became untenable with a draw in Moldova, uttered by those gladdened by his availability and others who groan at the thought of him getting the job ahead of a more charismatic, stimulating figure such as Gordon Strachan. Smith suffers when it comes to the Scotland job, from the fact he is such a familiar, undemonstrative, part-of-the-furniture kind of figure, and from the fact he is known to want the job in the first place. Smith, the SFA and Scotland seems a little cosy and convenient.

Somehow he might seem a more attractive candidate to everyone if he played hard to get, putting himself with Sir Alex Ferguson, George Graham and David Moyes among the celebrated names who wouldn't touch the manager's chair with a bargepole.

Ironically the qualities Smith will bring to the position are exactly the ones which created an opening for Vogts in the first place. The country craved something fresh and innovative in 2002 after eight years of Craig Brown's stable, steadying, pragmatic approach. But after two-and-a-half rudderless years under Vogts the SFA are having to call for another coastguard. To the conservative governing body, who acted uncharacteristically in experimenting with a foreign manager in the first place, stability and pragmatism suddenly seem attractive again.

The call will go out to Smith to restore "order" and yet the probable appointment of Rangers' most successful manager of the past 40 years has met with underwhelmed muttering in some quarters. There are supporters who feel that appointing Smith seems predictable, humdrum, dull. Another Brown.

There are legitimate questions to raise about Smith's suitability for the job and they are important ones. In going for him the SFA would appoint an international manager whose successes have been domestic, whether lording it over less wealthy Scottish clubs in the Premier Division or knowing how to construct a scrapping, committed Everton side which could survive a relegation dogfight. At Everton he whittled down the number of foreign players he inherited, sensing - correctly - that home-grown ones would be better equipped for the struggle.

No discussion of his managerial career would have credibility without acknowledging that some of his European results with Rangers were alarming. Europe was a cloud over his seven years in charge. There were heavy defeats to Juventus, Grasshoppers and Ajax and tortured nights against Sparta Prague, Levski Sofia, Strasbourg and even Anorthosis Famagusta. Sometimes - notwithstanding the run which took Rangers to the brink of the 1993 Champions League final - Smith's teams seemed wrongfooted and embarrassed by intelligent, unfancied foreign opposition and his tactics were often criticised. When he left Ibrox in 1998 he declined a couple of opportunities to work abroad but was interested by Sheffield Wednesday before the move to Everton. Scotland will force him back on to the continent.

Usually he is more comfortable working with seasoned professionals - trusted lieutenants - rather than with the emerging or inexperienced players he inevitably will have to gamble on in these impoverished times for Scotland. Barry Ferguson was underused and on the way out of Ibrox before Dick Advocaat took over from Smith and realised the young midfielder's potential. Now Smith will have to rely on Ferguson as his Scotland captain and their relationship will have to be solid.

Without the ability to throw money at the problem of the international side's modest resources, or fill the team with tried and trusted senior favourites, he will have to wean the likes of Derek Riordan, Zander Diamond and John Kennedy into full international football as successfully as Vogts did with Darren Fletcher and James McFadden.

In the final audit of Smith's managerial abilities, though, the successes and positive qualities outweigh the negatives. He has been more consistently successful in management than Vogts and would take the job with far more major experience than the two previous Scottish incumbents, Brown and Andy Roxburgh. In fact, it is reasonable to assume that this morning Smith knows more about the talent pool available to the Scotland manager than Vogts did after 32 months in the job.

At Rangers he was able to spend more than any other team in the country and there was an element of buying trophies about the club's domination of the 1990s. Smith's talent extended beyond the power to wield a chequebook, though. Signing Basile Boli, Stale Stensaas, Erik Bo Andersen and Peter Van Vossen have caused some to doubt Smith's transfer judgment. In fact they were virtually his only errors of judgment (injured players do not count) in more than 30 major transfers. He will not have to pick 62 players, as Vogts did, to work out his best 11.

Tempting Brian Laudrup, Paul Gascoigne, Trevor Steven and Jorge Albertz to Ibrox in the first place owed as much to his quiet authority as it did to David Murray's chequebook and the fact that all of them stayed at Rangers for as long as they did owed much to their sense of loyalty and friendship towards him. Players respond to Smith's patriarchal, reassuring manner. That, like the other strengths of his management - clarity, commonsense, stability - is easily disparaged and yet where did Vogts get without it? In 1997 Smith received two standing ovations at Rangers' annual general meeting after confirming his intention to step down and, although he has not returned for a game at Goodison Park since leaving in 2002, an Everton source insisted last week that he would be sure of affectionate applause were he to return there, fans having understood the financial constraints under which he had to work. On similar resources Smith kept Everton in the Premiership when Gordon Strachan could not do the same for Coventry, and he kept them in profit in the transfer market (see panel), but the football was an unending struggle and his eventual dismissal was inevitable.

The Scotland opening is a chance to realise unfulfilled potential. Despite the impression that he lived a lifetime in office at Ibrox he is nine years from pensionable age and has been a serving manager for only 11 years, just one more than Alex McLeish.

Smith is not the talismanic appointment some supporters hope for but he will restore weight to the Scotland scene. Those who pause to reflect will realise that "safe pair of hands" can be translated only one way: good manager. Even if it is fashionable to moan about him, no-one could seriously claim he has been anything other than that.

Frankly, if Scotland were as sniffy about who plays for the team as some have become about Smith managing it, the national side would fold altogether.

Smith would only have to demonstrate his credentials if he was up against a host of brilliant alternative candidates. But for the current Scotland there is no-one better.

SMITH'S sIGNINGS

RANGERS

IN Richard Gough (Free), Jonatan Johansson (Free), Antti Niemi ((pounds) 700k), Jonas Thern (Free), Marco Negri ((pounds) 3.75m), Sergio Porrini ((pounds) 3m), Stale Stensaas ((pounds) 1.5m), Mark Hateley ((pounds) 300k), Andy Dibble (free), Sebastian Rozental ((pounds) 3.5m), Joachim Bjorklund ((pounds) 2.7m), Jorg Albertz ((pounds) 4m), Erik-Bo Andersen ((pounds) 1.5m), Peter van Vossen (Free), Derek McInnes ((pounds) 300k), Gordan Petric ((pounds) 1.5m), Oleg Salenko ((pounds) 2.5m), Paul Gascoigne ((pounds) 4.3m), Stephen Wright ((pounds) 1.5m), Gary Bollan ((pounds) 250k), Alex Cleland ((pounds) 500k), Alan McLaren ((pounds) 2m), Billy Thomson (Free), Brian Laudrup ((pounds) 2.5m), Michael Rae (Free), Basile Boli ((pounds) 2.7m), Gordon Durie ((pounds) 1.2m), Craig Moore (Free), Fraser Wishart (Free), Duncan Ferguson ((pounds) 4m), Trevor Steven ((pounds) 2.4m), Dave McPherson ((pounds) 1.3m), Ally Maxwell (Free), Paul Rideout ((pounds) 500k), Dale Gordon ((pounds) 1.2m), Stuart McCall ((pounds) 1.2m), Alexei Mikhailichenko ((pounds) 2m), David Robertson ((pounds) 970k), Andy Goram ((pounds) 1m).

Total: (pounds) 54.77m

OUT Paul Gascoigne ((pounds) 3.45m), Gary Bollan ((pounds) 100k), Erik-Bo Andersen ((pounds) 800k), David Robertson ((pounds) 500k), Ally Maxwell ((pounds) 250k), Duncan Ferguson ((pounds) 4m), Steven Pressley ((pounds) 600k), Gary Stevens ((pounds) 350k), Chris Vinnicombe ((pounds) 200k), Sandy Robertson ((pounds) 250k), Dale Gordon ((pounds) 750k), Gary McSwegan ((pounds) 400k), Nigel Spackman ((pounds) 485k), Paul Rideout ((pounds) 500k), John Spencer ((pounds) 450k), Mo Johnston ((pounds) 1.5m), Trevor Steven ((pounds) 5.58m), Chris Woods ((pounds) 1.2m), Mark Walters ((pounds) 1.25m), Stuart Munro ((pounds) 350k), Tom Cowan ((pounds) 350k).

Total: (pounds) 23.32m Net loss: (pounds) 31.45m

EVERTON

IN David Ginola (Free), Lee Carsley ((pounds) 1.95m), Tobias Linderoth ((pounds) 2.5m), Jesper Blomqvist (Free), Tomasz Radzinski ((pounds) 4.5m), Alan Stubbs (Free), Gary Naysmith ((pounds) 1.75m); Idan Tal ((pounds) 700k), Duncan Ferguson ((pounds) 3.75m), Thomas Gravesen ((pounds) 2.5m), Niclas Alexandersson ((pounds) 2.2m), Paul Gascoigne (Free), Alex Nyarko ((pounds) 4.5m), Steve Watson ((pounds) 2.5m); Alessandro Pistone ((pounds) 3m), Andrew Pettinger ((pounds) 45k), Stephen Hughes ((pounds) 500k) Joe-Max Moore (Free), Abel Xavier ((pounds) 1.5m), Mark Pembridge ((pounds) 800k), Kevin Campbell ((pounds) 3m), Richard Gough (Free), Scott Gemmill ((pounds) 200k), Peter Degn ((pounds) 200k), David Weir ((pounds) 200k), Ibrahima Bakayoko ((pounds) 4.5m), Steve Simonsen ((pounds) 1.5m), David Unsworth ((pounds) 3m), Chris Woods (Free), John Collins ((pounds) 2.5m), Olivier Dacourt ((pounds) 4m), Marco Materazzi ((pounds) 2.5m).

Total: (pounds) 54.3m

OUT Abel Xavier ((pounds) 800k), Thomas Myhre ((pounds) 300k), Michael Ball ((pounds) 6.5m), Peter Degn ((pounds) 50k), Phil Jevons ((pounds) 150k), Francis Jeffers((pounds) 8m), Richard Dunne ((pounds) 3m), Nick Barmby ((pounds) 6m), Don Hutchison ((pounds) 2.5m), John Collins ((pounds) 2.2m), Mitch Ward ((pounds) 200k), Michael Branch ((pounds) 500k), Tony Grant ((pounds) 450k), Gareth Farrelly ((pounds) 400k), John Oster ((pounds) 1.1m), Craig Short ((pounds) 2.1m), Marco Materazzi ((pounds) 3m), Olivier Dacourt ((pounds) 6.5m), Adam Eaton ((pounds) 45k), Ibrahima Bakayoko ((pounds) 3.7m), John Spencer ((pounds) 600k), Tony Thomas ((pounds) 150k), Gavin McCann ((pounds) 500k), Duncan Ferguson ((pounds) 8m), Carl Tiler ((pounds) 700k), Graham Allen ((pounds) 300k).

Total: (pounds) 58.15m Net profit: (pounds) 3.85m

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