5 qualifications you must have in your CV to be the next Scotland boss

The Scottish Football Association is looking for a new manager for the men’s national football team.

If you have at least a vague knowledge of football, this could be the job for you. The SFA is looking for someone who can at least match Alex McLeish’s glittering achievements in the role, which is a massive challenge and, as ever, we can expect the world’s biggest managers to be drawn by the opportunity.

However, should Jose Mourinho’s CV get lost in the post and Zinedine Zidane get mixed up with the closing date, it might just be worth throwing your name into the ring, especially if you’ve ever taken Macclesfield to the Champions League on Football Manager, or can spell Kazakhstan without several stabs at it.

To make life easier for all the prospective managerial candidates out there, we’ve copied and pasted the requirements for the job so you can see if you measure up.

Successful applicants for the role of Scotland men’s national team manager must:

1. Be able to get some lads out for a game

Strength in depth isn’t a problem that the manager will have to deal with.

In fact, when you consider injuries and players who don’t really fancy it on the whole, it can be hard to find 20 or so lads who are up for a game, especially in mid-week when there’s other stuff on.

The ideal candidate will have a good set of lads on speed dial who will be up for a trip to Nicosia at short notice or at least the ability to mass email a load of people who have at some time played football and might fancy a mini-break with a kick around thrown in.

2. Enjoy long, fruitless trips to Eastern Europe and Central Asia

The job will involve some travel. In particular, it will involve travel to places that you presumed were useless at football but are actually not that bad, especially when it’s freezing cold and you have no idea what time of day it even is.

The role will appeal to those who like to explore new places and to be jeered and heckled in those new places as they suffer a televised humiliation in front of millions.

Ideally, candidates will have a keen interest in poorly maintained football pitches and will be able to create excuses based around those surfaces at short notice.

3. Find a way to shoehorn numerous left-backs into a team

The SFA isn’t looking for a manager who creates game plans or builds a system around the players he has – Scotland’s national team has not achieved what it has over the years by creating game plans.

Our ideal candidate will be willing to field as many left-backs as possible, two is a minimum requirement, but we would ideally like to see three, four or even seven left-backs should the opportunity present itself.

It is very rare for the Scotland manager to have a gifted player of any kind at his disposal, so we expect a commitment to playing all talented players in every game, even if they have to go in goal.

4. Have a good night out with Alan McRae

Any candidate who wishes to be seriously considered for the job must be able to tell a series of bawdy anecdotes to Alan McRae, while plying him with quality whisky of course.

While the interview process will involve a cursory check to ensure the candidate knows what a 4-4-2 formation is, the majority of the time will be spent getting hammered and making unintelligible boasts that clearly never happened.

Any candidate who is unable or unwilling to invite McRae to a family wedding with a free bar or who cannot promise to drunkenly attempt a duo of Total Eclipse of the Heart at a Glasgow karaoke bar at 3 am within the next 12 months need not apply.

5. Desirable qualities

The SFA is particularly keen to hear from any candidate who is currently coaching Northern Ireland.

It is also seen as a major advantage if you have coached Scotland in the past, however badly.