How short are the Scotland team?

Scotland crashed out of contention for World Cup qualification on Sunday after they drew 2-2 away to Slovenia.

Their manager Gordon Strachan came up with an unusual reason for his team's failure, stating: "Genetically, we are behind."

Here, we look at the height data of Scotland and Slovenia's starting line-ups using publicly available information on soccerway.com, and also sees how Scotland compare against the most recent starting line-ups of the other home nations plus the Spain side which won the 2010 World Cup.

:: Strachan was right about one thing - Slovenia were a taller team, with their average height coming out at 185 centimetres compared to Scotland's 181.

:: Scotland did possess the tallest player on the pitch, though - goalkeeper Craig Gordon at 193cm. They also had the two shortest players - Barry Bannan (169) and Leigh Griffiths (170). Slovenia's shortest player was Jan Repas (171) while their tallest was Bostjan Cesar (191).

:: Wales' starting line-up against Georgia also came out with an average of 181cm, but they had the tallest player out of all the teams surveyed - goalkeeper Wayne Hennessey at 198cm.

:: England's side against Lithuania averaged 185cm, slightly ahead of the Republic of Ireland against Moldova (184cm) and Northern Ireland against Norway (183cm).

:: The smallest players in the study were Joe Allen of Wales and Wes Hoolahan of the Republic - both 168cm.

:: Height is clearly only part of the equation, though - the Spain starting line-up which won the 2010 World Cup final against Holland averaged 180cm, with five of the XI under that mark.

• superscoreboard