The Left Back Spot

Nace is happy to stay at Everton, but realises he must regain his full back place to continue playing for his country.

Nace says: "The season was frustrating. Great from Everton's point of view, we have qualified for Europe. But I've always been in the 16 without playing in enough games. That's been frustrating for me. It's big Joleon Lescott who is keeping me out of the team. I had a niggle in one game and to be fair to him he has been the Players' Player of the Year. He has been different class. Stubbsy went into the centre half. I went out of the team and I think they only lost one game out of 13, so there's not much you can do.

The gaffer is not going to change it when that happens. It's frustrating for me when you're champing at the bit to play and you're being kept out of the team because a centre half is playing so well at left-back. He has done so well he has gotten into the England B team and played left-back. He got Players' Player of the Year award and thoroughly deserved it.

We have spoken about things before (myself and the manager). The gaffer has been good to me. He treats me for what I am, an experienced player. So I don't have any problems with the gaffer. We have had a talk and we will keep that between ourselves and now keep in touch over the summer.

When I went to see him at the end of the season I said obviously I am a bit frustrated. He said 'but you are in my 16 every week' and I couldn't really argue with that. It's a Catch-22 situation really. If the team had maybe lost a couple of games I would maybe have gotten back in, but they never. They had a great run at the end of the season and credit to the boys who were in the team, they did brilliantly. I don't have any bad feeling or anything, I'm just a bit frustrated that I never played as much football as I would have liked."

I have had seven years there - seven years in October - and I feel totally settled, my family is settled, the children are settled at school, I get on great with the fans. I like it at Everton, I wouldn't have stayed for seven years if I didn't like it. But after you have had a year or two of injuries and you don't play as much as you should then you get to my age - 28 now - and you think well I need to start playing a bit. Hopefully it will be at Everton.

I am realistic. You can't be the first choice for your country if you are not playing regularly for your club. That is one of the things I will be speaking to the gaffer about because I want to keep playing for Scotland. I don't want to be 29 and after all the Scotland games I have played as first choice I am coming away and being a substitute. I want to still be the Scotland left-back and the only way I am going to be that is by playing regularly every week. Jay McEveley has come into the squad after a great season with Derby where he helped them into the Premier League. There are going to be others putting pressure on us too.

Nobody should be playing for their country when they have not played for their club for that long. If it had been a qualifier against Austria I don't know if I would have played, but the gaffer saw it as a chance to give me 90 minutes ahead of Wednesday and that has helped me out." (04/06/07)

Gary Naysmith 2006/2007             Everton 1st Team Squad 2006/07