Scotland 'four years behind'

The Scotland manager Berti Vogts has blamed four years of decline for the country's current world ranking of 60th, their lowest ever.

Scotland have lost every full international match under Vogts, losing to France, Nigeria, South Korea, South Africa and Denmark. The former Germany coach's sole win as Scotland manager came against a Hong Kong select side.

However, Vogts believes international transition should have started after the World Cup finals in 1998. Vogts said: "The Scottish Football Association should have reacted after France 98 because the truth is Scotland did not perform well.

"It's not one person's fault but perhaps the country is suffering because of an island mentality. No one looked closely enough at what was going on around the world.

"In the last six years there has been an explosion in world football with the perfect examples being the vastly improved standards of the likes of South Korea and Turkey.

"The result of Scotland's neglect – something I can't explain because I don't understand why nobody did anything – is that Scottish football is already four years behind," Vogts said.

"I'll do my utmost to make sure Scotland begins to recover and makes up for lost time."

Vogts has added strikers Steve Crawford and Paul Dickov to his squad for the opening European championship qualifying match against the Faroe Islands on 7 September.

Cardiff's goalkeeper Neil Alexander will replace Neil Sullivan, who has a broken finger. Rangers' Neil McCann has dropped out because of injury.