NIGHT WE WON 0-0 AT WEMBLEY
Battling Scots showed we were back in the big-time with display to make the Tartan Army proud again
“YOU’RE just a sh*** Grant Hanley,” they sang at Tyrone Mings, who at least had the decency to see the funny side.
Declan Rice? Not so much.
The England midfielder didn’t take too kindly to being similarly compared to Billy Gilmour, having been schooled by a kid who had made just 22 appearances for Chelsea before being thrust on to the biggest stage of them all and performing like Nureyev in Nikes.
Scotland didn’t beat England on that rain-sodden night at Wembley in the middle of summer but Steve Clarke’s men won the respect of everyone at the Euros.
It was the night that our wee nation announced it truly belonged at tournaments like this, having been missing from the big ones since France 98.
The misery of a false start a few days earlier with a 2-0 defeat to the Czechs at Hampden – when Kieran Tierney was desperately missed through injury but Clarke still fielded the wrong team – was replaced with a sense of hope when the teamsheet showed that the Arsenal defender was back and Gilmour was making his first international start.
The decision to go with Che Adams and Lyndon Dykes up front also instilled in the Tartan Army – who were responsible for the songs that drew different responses from
Mings and Rice 90 minutes later – a belief that the Scots weren’t prepared to sit back and invite England onto them for 90 minutes. Clarke also resisted calls to ditch right-back Stephen O’Donnell, who’d had a torrid time against the Czechs, and was rewarded with his best display in a Scotland shirt. England’s national stadium held only 22,500 fans due to Covid-induced restrictions, 3000 of them from north of the border, but it was our lot who made most of the noise. Scotland survived an early onslaught, culminating in John Stones smacking the woodwork with a header from a corner after just 10 minutes. But the resilience of Clarke’s team ensured that was as close as Gareth Southgate’s side came to beating keeper David Marshall. Gilmour began to demand the ball,unafraid to take it in tight areas populated by Rice, Kalvin Phillips and his Chelsea team-mate Mason
Mount. Operating alongside Callum McGregor and with John McGinn ahead of them in support of the front two, Gilmour dictated the tempo.
As the half hour loomed, Tierney shook off his shackles to overlap Andy Robertson and sling a cross to the back post where O’Donnell forced a superb low save from Jordan Pickford, who then had his moment of luck as the ball rebounded an inch too high for Adams to head into the empty net.
After the break, Dykes forced a goal-line clearance from Reece James as our tartan heroes continued to look for the goal that wouldn’t come.
England, too, had some moments to get the pulse racing and the fingers crossed that their breakthrough wouldn’t materialise.
Robertson and Tierney made near goal-line clearances and in the dying seconds there was the kind of stramash in Marshall’s six-yard box that would have had commentator Arthur Montford in a frenzy.
The ball stayed out and a draw, the least Scotland deserved, was secured.
“I thought we were the better team,” Robertson said. “On another night we could have won it and I don’t think that anyone can really argue with that.”
Gilmour added: “I’m so proud to get a start and to come here and do really well is even better.
“It was a great performance by the team and everyone did what they needed to.
“We were already pumped up. It was a massive game for us and we knew what we had to do.”
Gilmour’s high was replaced by a massive low as three days later he tested positive for Covid-19 and had to stay behind at the Scotland base near Darlington.
And how the team missed him for the final group match, where a Luka Modric-inspired Croatia put us to the sword at Hampden to end our Euros.
But that 90 minutes at Wembley proved Scotland can live with the best.
Or at least live with those who think they’re the best.