YES WE CAN
SCOTLAND 1 CANADA 1 Game’s a bogey for Strachan’s fringe stars as drab draw shows he’ll need big guns for Slovenia
GORDON STRACHAN has no major headaches with Scotland team selection for Slovenia after his fringe players flopped in their World Cup warm-up.
The game’s a bogey after the Dark Blues suffered another night to forget with a drab draw against Canada at Easter Road.
A paltry crowd of just 9150, the third lowest attendance for a home match in the modern era, saw Steven Naismith
equalise a Fraser Aird opener ahead of Sunday crunch qualifier at Hampden
A string of squad players passed up on a chance to impress against the side ranked 117th in the world as Strachan all but admitted those on the outskirts of his team failed to step up to the mark.
He said: “It was one of our better decisions to have a game. It has cleared up a lot of things and helped a lot of players and the coaching staff, in particular, to where we are going on Sunday.
“It doesn’t make my decisions for the game easier but it makes them clearer.
“This game has helped me a lot. We saw a lot of players who would have liked to have played a bit better but that was the way it was and we just have to deal with it.
“It’s very difficult to play international football when you’re not firing on all cylinders in your club game and to be put on the spot but we needed to find that out.
“It wasn’t a great night and won’t be memorable when it comes to the end of their careers but it is invaluable for me to use that information we have collected for the Slovenia match.
“A lot of players found it hard. Using a golfing analogy, it’s very hard to take two months off then go and play in the Masters. To try and find your form in an international match was going to be difficult.
“You could see we were rusty in the first 10-15 minutes and it spooked us a bit. We could have been braver with our passes through people and been braver to receive it.
“But when you haven’t played a lot of games it’s very hard to just switch on.
“It will need to be better on Sunday unless we are very lucky – and we’re not going to try to take luck into it. We need to be better.”
Scotland struggled defensively down the left and Lee Wallace and Oliver Burke were subbed at half-time while the strikers, including Chris Martin, toiled on a night in which the midfield created few chances of note, especially in the second half.
Fulham kid Tom Cairney made a decent debut in the centre of midfield but Strachan admitted he needed the experience of skipper Darren Fletcher to guide his side through a testing 90 minutes as Scotland under-performed again.
Strachan added: “Positives? Charlie Mulgrew was okay, Ikechi Anya was fine, Tom Cairney’s debut.
“Andy Robertson came on and did all right and Barry Bannan’s touch was not bad.
“But some of them found it a wee bit difficult. The professionalism of Darren Fletcher kept us going at times. We learned a lot.”
Bournemouth midfielder Ryan Fraser is all but out of the Slovenia game after injuring his knee in training on the eve of the Canada match.
Strachan said: “I doubt he’ll be fit for Sunday as it’s not our right to take any chances with players.
“We were looking forward to seeing him play but his knee swelled up and we’ve got to make sure he’s okay for his club.”