Iceland. A volcanically active island strewn with stunning glaciers and fjords and a population of just over 300,000. Geysers erupt in the highlands of the country, a cold uninhabitable combination of sand, mountains, ice and lava fields. It’s hardly conditions conducive to producing a nation of gifted footballers capable of making inroads on the world stage. Yet, here we are. Iceland, at the time of writing, have toppled England and march on to the quarter finals of the European Championships.

While it may be a once in a lifetime achievement from the Icelandic national team, the chance to even have the opportunity to over achieve at a major finals is down to the sheer hard work, determination and belief the Icelandic Football Association (KSÍ) have built into their footballing set up at home.

Watching Iceland at the European finals is almost painful as a Scot. Not due to their style of football, their personalities or their fans but because I look on and can’t help but feel it should be Scotland upsetting the odds. That in itself shows the failures of the Scottish national team.

Scotland have now failed to qualify for a national tournament since France 1998 and while there have been many hard luck stories along the way not all of it can be put down to complete haplessness. There are many glaring faults within the Scottish footballing set up that are regularly ignored and the cracks are constantly papered over. This mind set needs to change and we can start by looking north. There is a lot to be learned from our Nordic neighbours.

In short, the Icelandic footballing setup is simple, but what makes their development system so effective is that they are rigorous when carrying it out, whilst taking the correct steps to maximise player development. This involves a thorough scouting system, playing on grass pitches in summer to artificial ones in winter, large quantities of training sessions, having UEFA A or B level qualified coaches allowing players to flourish and arguably the most important, create an atmosphere that allows youngsters to fall in love with the beautiful game. In the words of Arnar Bill Gunnarsson, Director of Education for the KSÍ “What happens when you learn to love the game, you go out on the training pitch and do something extra.”

I’m not suggesting that Scotland should steal the blueprints from under the nose of the KSI, it would not work. Something akin to Iceland’s model needs to be implemented into Scottish football, something tailored to this country and crucially something that solves our player production problem.

In Iceland each kid, even as young as the age of 3, is assigned a coach who has a qualified A or B UEFA license once joining a team. This ensures that youngsters are being trained and developed in the appropriate manner. Youngsters are being taught to play as a unit from an early age, how to play in a team and not as individuals. This has reaped its rewards for Iceland and honestly, some of their performances at Euro 2016 has been some of the best team performances we have ever seen. You can see it in the way they play that nobody is out for greed or personal glory, all of them are working together as a group to achieve their goal. What Iceland fall short in quality they make up for in team spirit and togetherness.

Former Motherwell and Aberdeen youngster Jordan Halsman, who spent two years in Iceland with Fram and Breiðablik UBK explained to me about the Iceland’s ethos.

“The play is more free flowing, In Iceland they get drilled defensively, you can see it in the national team where they use the two banks of four with the two strikers. They sit really deep and work as a unit. Every kid, as a youth player has a region that they live in so they stay with the football team in that region until they are 16 so nobody is ever without a club at a good standard.”

This is exactly the approach Scotland need to adopt. We don’t have a world class player, we don’t even have a player that’s plying their trade in the top half of the English Premier League, but as Iceland have proved, that counts for nothing. Our new generation of footballers need to be coached as a group, they need to learn how to fight for each other, how to dig in their heels when the going gets tough and how to work as a unit. Play as a team and there’s every chance you will win as a team.

Whilst saying that playing as a single entity is of the upmost importance, giving the players the space to breathe is almost just as necessary. There is nothing worse, and we are relatively guilty of it in this country, of over-coaching players. Do that and you remove the flair, the individuality from their play but as much as these Icelandic kids are given the right to express themselves they are also taught the value of working as a team.

Halsman also eluded to this being the experience for him; “The difference is that, in Scotland with some of the managers I’ve played with and with boys clubs, they just want you to play a certain way and narrow down your options.”

So you had to pass to a certain player in the team or play a specific style and you start becoming robots. However, in Iceland they just sit with a notepad during the first 45 minutes of a game and then speak to you at half time which allows you to express yourself and that’s built all the way through the youth systems.”

Players need to be able to express themselves, instead they get nervous here. I remember when I was with Aberdeen and Motherwell you just had to play a certain way and if you tried to do something else you knew you were going to get a shouting. In a way you just become robots, which isn’t good. But when I moved over to Iceland I felt that freedom and I enjoyed my football a lot more. They allow players to flourish. They don’t want the ball played long, they want it played on the ground when they can.”

All of this stems from the interaction with these UEFA licensed coaches and it is important to note that there are no parent volunteers taking charge of teams in Iceland. While these dedicated parents and volunteer coaches are the heroes of many footballing communities around Scotland, they cannot deliver the same quality of coaching compared to someone who is qualified to do so. In the absence of professional coaching, players develop bad habits, training is not as beneficial, individuals are not dealt with in the correct manner and player development is stunted.

The benefits of UEFA licensed coaches cannot be overlooked and it is definitely a route that the SFA should look into. While it may be difficult to provide so many coaches, due to Scotland’s population being considerably greater than Iceland, it is still an option. Certainly if it is going to facilitate the production of a better standard of player, then a way to tailor that option to Scotland should be investigated.

Currently, the SFA are running a £10 million performance school initiative that is meant to, in their words “have a more focused and co-ordinated approach to youth development.” There are seven performance schools throughout Scotland, focused on delivering coaching to a select group of elite kids as part of the school curriculum. Give credit where credit is due, this is indeed a step in the right direction but it’s not enough. The schools are only giving coaching sessions to the regarded “elite” of youth football at all ages and the way these kids are chosen is questionable. Ultimately those few players, who are already identified as being standout individuals, are taken on board.

While these sessions are being delivered to a small group of players in schools it means that many kids, who have the potential of achieving something great, are being lost to the system in the youth club set up. More focus needs to be shifted to the regional youth set ups where there are a plethora of players competing regularly. Here you will find the hidden gems of Scottish football but unfortunately at the minute we are losing these stars of the future due to lack of encouragement, lack of coaching and lack of engagement. As they do in Iceland, youngsters need to fall in love with the game to blossom, at the minute that isn’t happening in Scotland and it needs to change.

Many steps have to be taken to get Scotland’s national set up back on track and one element that should be taken into consideration is the stage at which players begin to play competitive football. Too soon are kids thrust into playing 11-a-side football, playing for cups, leagues and points. There is no time for youngsters to become accustomed to the bigger sized pitch and how the game is played so differently compared to 7-a-side. Some may even say that the jump from 7s to 11s is too much and that there should be a stage in between where players play 9-a-side for a year to prepare for the step up to a bigger pitch, more team mates and a different style of game.

The focus though should be on prolonging young footballer’s introduction to competitive football. As soon as games start to mean something the focus is shifted to winning games at all costs. This is the last thing that should be happening in youth football, nobody should be thrown in at the deep end when they are not ready and sadly the case is that many are not ready when they start playing 11-aside. Pressure is suddenly heaped upon players to win, to get results and to perform. Coaches should be teaching their kids how to play in a formation, a style of football, and how to further develop themselves on and off the field. All of these things are best achieved in a pressure free atmosphere where creativity and confidence are cultivated. Prolonging competitive football is a factor that has to be implemented at grassroots football in Scotland as soon as possible. Then and only then can we strive towards being able to produce a conveyer belt of top class players and crucially, creating a national team that can at least have the chance to qualify for major tournaments.

To coincide with these logical measures you also need to be pragmatic. By doing that you give these opportunities every possible chance to succeed. The urgent issue that needs resolving in Scotland is the introduction of summer football. Why is it that summer football in Scotland is deemed as a fatuous idea from the football authorities? Why we persist with a season that is hampered by the weather, I have no idea. Quite frankly it’s farcical.

How can you expect to compete at an international level when games are called off every other week at all levels from the Scottish Premiership to a local game at U13’s level? The decision to persist with a season that stretches over the winter that particularly hits youth football is hindering development of young talent in Scotland and it is no longer acceptable. It discourages youngsters from wanting to get out there and get involved in football, it prevents them from “falling in love with the game”. In my experience of youth football, one memory stands out particular. The weather was shocking, torrential rain, going on hail and freezing cold. One of the boys who had stood on the touchline for the majority of game got the nod from the coach to go on. Ten minutes into the subs appearance his side went behind and the coaches’ first move was to substitute the boy who had just come on. The coach had no intention of watching how the youngster would develop in his substitute appearance, he cared only to win the game. If this kind of thing is happening all over the country, there is no wonder that kids want to stay inside, watch TV and play video games. We need to reconnect the young generation to our game, we need them to become infatuated with the beautiful game.

So many young players come up through the youth ranks in Scotland, have an impressive season and the big money makers come calling from down south. This is where Scottish clubs are powerless to do anything as to remain afloat they must reap financial gains at any turn and players are not going to wa nt to hang about when it seems as if the path to glory for them has arrived. You can name countless promising young Scottish talent who ventured to England in the hope that the grass was greener, but instead jettisoned to waste away on the bench or in the youth ranks. Stevie May, Chris Maguire, Fraser Fyvie, Shaun Hutchinson, Scott Allan, David Goodwilie, the list goes on. The lesson to be learned here is that we, as a nation need to find a way of keeping hold of these young talented players for slightly longer. One season in the top flight of Scotland, is no preparation for a move to the step up to the Championship or Premier League. Youngsters should be at least making 100 appearances for their club before the notion of making the move to a higher level should even be considered thus improving their ability, game knowledge and experience as a whole.

I am not going to sit here and pretend I have the answer to keeping our top players north of the border but a method such as giving clubs financial support to aid them in their attempts to keep their best players. This extra bit of cash could be used to giving players better contracts or be used to keep business running instead of having to sell on these gifted youngsters who will ultimately rot away on the bench of an English Championship side. It’s not a perfect solution, one with many flaws but it’s a start. As a nation we need to come together to understand just how we keep Scotland’s talent in Scotland.

I put the question to Jordan Halsman, asking what needs to be done in Scottish football. “I think that youngsters need to be given more of a chance. When I was at Motherwell, in our U19’s team I think 9 of the boys got first team contracts and then got a run in the first team, so I think we need more of that instead of bringing in foreign players. If you do choose these foreigners you will do well at club level but it harms the national team and we aren’t going to do as well there if our young players are not getting game time.

If you look at the Iceland team you look at the boy that came on at centre half against England, he’s never played an international game before but it’s all about giving him the chance. Also if you look at the top league in Iceland teams that are full of youngsters are playing Champions League and Europa League qualifiers which is priceless in terms of experience.”

The SFA need to gather round a table and decide where they go from here. They have underperformed in aiding the production of young Scottish talent and there is almost a sense of neglect from those taking up residence in Hampden. Youth football seems to be left to its own devices when it should be seen as the priority for producing Scotland’s footballers of tomorrow. It’s time the SFA realised that some bold decisions need to be made in order for our game to get back on its feet on the international stage. They no longer have excuses, when countries such as Iceland are achieving great things at major finals. It should be Iceland looking up to Scotland, not the other way around.