‘Can Scotland win the World Cup?’ was a headline I saw online this week.
Nobody can say that Shelley Kerr’s football team are going under the radar!
That’s the price you pay when you beat Brazil, I suppose.
You automatically assume that Brazil will be one of the top women’s football nations, just as they always are for the men.
Number 10 in the world rankings isn’t quite that – but it’s still a top side that we beat in a friendly earlier this week.
I’ve thought for a while that the coverage of the World Cup this summer will go through the roof, and the reaction to the Brazil results in the media has just confirmed that.
The fact that we don’t have an Olympics, Commonwealth Games or a major men’s tournament being played at the same time, the fact that the men haven’t qualified for anything for ages and the fact that this is a first for our women, will all add to the hype.
I’m sure in Shelley’s mind, she’ll know she has to play things down a bit.
Yes, you want to take advantage of being in the spotlight but unrealistic expectations are the last thing her players will need to be burdened with.
A World Cup will be on a whole different level to what most of them will be used to.
The only thing I could equate it to would be going to my first Olympics.
Support staff, including psychologists, will be crucial but there is only so much work they can do behind the scenes.
Nobody really knows how the girls are going to cope until the competition begins.
* It was a shame for Scottish curling that the men’s team couldn’t come back from their World Championships with a medal after the women didn’t make the knock-out stages in their event.
Team Mouat won bronze the year before and would have hoped to do the same or better this time around.
They ended up sixth.
I watched some of it on the TV and it was a high quality championships and Team Edin winning their fourth Worlds puts them up with the all-time best rinks.
Hopefully by next season we’ll be back to our best to do our bit to get Scotland some more medals.
* The golf clubs came out for the first time since my operation and thankfully the hip felt fine after an hour on the range.
It will be great to get out on the course again. I’ve really missed it and The Masters just makes you want to play again.
The big target this summer is to have my game in some sort of shape for the Scottish Open pro-am at the Renaissance Club. That’s the date circled in the diary.
* British Curling have made a change to their selection policy for the 2019-20 season.
As well as players being selected on to the programme the organisation will also have the power to form the teams.
It will be interesting to see how that pans out over the next couple of years.
