The result that Scottish football supporters have fantasised about for more than a century became reality last week: Scotland 1, Brazil 0. The match took place in Spain and although it was billed as a “friendly” encounter, that fine Scottish commentator Derek Rae observed afterwards that the Brazilians did not take kindly to the defeat. “Bit of needle in it & a few of the Brazilian players not too happy at the end,” he tweeted.

For Scotland, the game was ideal preparation before they travel to France in June to take a tilt at the World Cup. For the teams that await them in the group stages – England, Argentina and Japan – it was proof that Scotland will be worthy and tough opponents. Each will have noted that the discipline, organisation and work rate that have recently come to characterise Scotland’s emergence as a genuine football power were evident in this display against a team ranked 10th in the world.

The nation really ought to savour these moments and hold them in its heart. It’s not often that Scotland gets to talk about its hopes in a forthcoming World Cup tournament and beating Brazil in the same paragraph. This is Scotland, though, and, as ever, the victory struggled to dislodge the eternal scuffling and hoofing of Rab and Tam from the sports pages of our national press. Walter Scott once described Scotland as “land of the mountain and the flood” in a line later borrowed by the great Scottish composer Hamish MacCunn as the title for his 1887 overture. He might just as well have described it as land of suspicion and doubt, these being the reactions we often exhibit on the rare occasions we meet success.

And so too with this talented team, which has eclipsed anything achieved by adult footballers wearing the dark blue of Scotland in 146 years of hopeless endeavour. This Scotland team, you see, are women and, as such, the reactions to anything they achieve are tinged with a measure of regret: “If only this was our men’s team.” Indeed, some used this first victory by a senior Scottish side against Brazil as an opportunity to inveigh against the recent modest increases in financial support and coverage of women’s football. Phrases such as “virtue-signalling” and “affirmative action”, these being among the favoured lexicon of the creatively challenged, have been deployed.

The narrative is a familiar and depressing one: people who affect enthusiasm for women’s football are kidding themselves and others in a predictable bid to get with the big, liberal picture. Small attendances and meagre viewing figures are cited as evidence.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Scotland manager Alex McLeish: ‘By the global standards of men’s football, Scotland is rank rotten and has been for many years.’ Photograph: Adam Davy/PA

Scottish football supporters are largely ignorant of another time in our history when women’s football regularly attracted large crowds of up to 50,000 in this country. This happened during the First World War when much of senior men’s football was suspended. This was also at a time when men were men and knew what they liked. Well, they evidently liked the skills on display by the country’s best women footballers. There was a market for the game because (and every authentic supporter knows this) we will always back any human, beast or insect wearing the colours of our team in any contest. Scotland’s football authorities moved quickly to squash this emerging market for football and threatened all male officials participating in the women’s game with expulsion. They quite literally practised a grim form of social engineering to kill the development of women’s football at birth. Today, there is a reason why, despite the significant growth in participation by girls in football, audience figures remain tiny compared with those for the men’s game. Billions of pounds are lavished on marketing, promoting and covering men’s football. In Scotland, sponsors queue to be associated with failure, embarrassment and incompetence.

By the global standards of men’s football, Scotland is rank rotten and has been for many years. In the rest of the world, grace, beauty and subtlety have replaced brute force. In Scotland, we are still drawing woolly mammoths in caves. Here, a new species of the game has evolved: “Scottish rules football”. Many of our games are played on surfaces that look like they have been recycled from abandoned warehouses. Everything short of decapitation and amputation is permitted by our referees.

Our national team is led by a bewildered-looking chap who, in coaching terms, looks like he has been in a coma for the past 30 years. Last month, we had our sorry arses skelped by Kazakhstan, a country that calls for a national holiday if they don’t concede within the first 10 minutes of a game. This is what a century of maladministration, discrimination, graft and the politics of the bowling club get you.

I have another dream. We simply stand down our national men’s team and transfer all resources into developing the women’s team: sponsorship, television rights, coaching resources, merchandise income, the full bifter. In women’s football, we are ranked a none-too-shabby 20th in the world and are on an upward trajectory. For the first time ever, we have an opportunity to produce something we have craved for one and a half centuries: a Scottish national football team that might become the best in the world.

• Kevin McKenna is an Observer columnist