OLD HEAD CAL HAPPY TO SEE NEW KIDS STAR
SCOTLAND U20s..0 TURKEY U20s..2 PAPAC TIPS GERS TO GO ON EUROPA RUN
MARK WALKER IN SPAIN
CALVIN MILLER has played for Scotland at all youth levels for the past six years.
And he’s relishing the responsibility of being a senior member of Scot Gemmill’s new-look squad.
The manager picked a much-changed Scotland team for the friendly in Murcia and plenty of his new boys impressed.
Motherwell’s David Turnbull looked composed and comfortable on the ball, Reading’s Tom McIntyre defended superbly and there were encouraging showings from Connor McLennan of Aberdeen and Sheffield Wednesday’s Fraser Preston.
The Scots looked like they would escape with a hardfought draw until the Turks netted twice in the last four minutes through subs Ahmet Canbaz and Enes Kiprit.
Hibs defender Ryan Porteous was also sent off at the end after an altercation with a group of Turkish players, although Gemmill had no idea why.
Dundee loan star Miller enjoyed his left-back role and made plenty of sweeping runs forward in a decent display.
It’s hard to believe Miller is still only 20 having first made his Scotland Under-16s debut in 2012 and earning almost 30 youth caps.
He said: “Because I’m one of the oldest in the group I felt my opinion mattered a wee bit so I was trying to help the boys. We’re all there to help each other and I enjoyed it. It’s always good playing for the national team.
“I’ve been in the set-up since I was a wee boy so it’s the same faces within the group. There was a good team chemistry and that helped too.
“The boys at Aberdeen – Bruce Anderson and Connor McLennan, David Turnbull too. I thought everyone who played did really well.
“There were a couple of errors in the end but we should take the positives rather than the negatives.
“The game started to open up a bit at the end. Folk were getting tired and as we tried to get forward we got done on the counter-attack with a misplaced pass.
“We put so much into the game and never really got anything to show for it in the end. Putting all that work until the 86th minute then conceding twice is always going to be disappointing.
“But there are positives. We had a game plan and we stuck to it in that period. We’d worked so hard until those goals went in.”
Gill (Robby McCrorie 46), Ross McCrorie, Porteous, McIntyre (Johnston 70), Miller; Wilson, Ferguson, Preston (St Clair 58), Turnbull, McLennan (Shaw 70), House (Anderson 52).
SCOTLAND –