LOYAL ARMSTRONG WILL NEVER TURN HIS BACK ON THE NATIONAL TEAM
Armstrong views caps as ‘best thing in football’
STUART Armstrong appreciated the call. In receiving a full, unprompted explanation of why he had initially been left out of last month’s Scotland squad, Armstrong gained a positive insight into Steve Clarke’s man-management.
Not that there was ever any likelihood of the Southampton midfielder taking the huff. When Clarke got back in touch after Oli McBurnie’s injury withdrawal, Armstrong was only too happy to join up for the matches against Russia and San Marino. No thinking time was needed.
Armstrong’s all-in attitude — and a free-kick strike against San Marino — duly helped to ensure his inclusion for the forthcoming double-header against Cyprus and Kazakhstan.
It is another squad marked by England-based absentees. Arsenal requested Kieran Tierney be left out, while fitness issues have put paid to the involvement of Andy Robertson, Scott McTominay, Ryan Fraser and Liam Cooper.
If injuries are simply an unavoidable part of the game, Robert Snodgrass and Matt Ritchie calling time on their international careers is perhaps another matter.
Armstrong’s commitment is beyond question, however. Asked if it might have been easy to turn down the late approach from Clarke ahead of the trip to Moscow, he is firm in his response.
‘I don’t think I would ever turn down the opportunity to come away with Scotland,’ said Armstrong. ‘Playing for your country is probably the best thing in football for me.
‘It’s a different feeling from club football. Club football is terrific but playing for Scotland is always a special thing for me.
‘It was difficult not being named in the squad initially the last time but I had a good chat with the manager and completely understood the things we talked about.
‘The Scotland squad should always be picked on form and sometimes when you are not playing as regularly as you want to for your club, you can’t really argue.
‘But I was delighted to get the call to come back into the squad. I love being here.
‘It was really nice of the gaffer to explain to me beforehand why I wasn’t in that squad. I could have just found out when he named it. We had a good chat and I completely agreed with everything he said.
‘It’s a great positive to have that relationship with the manager. All the players will be the same. He’s just open with us. We are all human beings and can all be spoken to as adults. It’s a great thing to be able to speak one-on-one truthfully.’
The former Celtic man is confident his colleagues are being similarly honest about their fitness levels.
Asked why there had been so many call-offs in recent times, Armstrong added: ‘Because they are injured. They play a lot of high-intensity games. It’s all out and you pick up little niggles.
‘Sometimes you are not always 100 per cent and these things happen in football.’ Armstrong approaches tomorrow’s match in Nicosia having started Southampton’s last three matches. Prior to that, he was introduced off the bench by Ralph Hasenhuttl for the final 20 minutes of that record 9-0 drubbing by Leicester.
Promptings to talk about that experience are rebuffed: ‘I’d rather not. You could say all sorts of things about it but sometimes it’s important as a player, when you get beat, to learn from it.’
Of course, Brendan Rodgers, the man who raised Armstrong’s game to a new level at Celtic, is now in charge at high-flying Leicester. So did his old boss have any words of consolation afterwards?
‘No, not overly,’ said Armstrong. ‘Different things were happening during and after the game, so it was a busy time.’
He is more forthcoming about the general challenges of life in the bottom half of England’s Premier League.
‘It is a very challenging league but a great experience,’ said the 27-year-old, who had previously been benched by Hasenhuttl for much of the season.
‘When you go to a different environment, you learn different things about how that works and how you fit into it, what you can improve upon.
‘It’s been an interesting journey for me so far, not always smooth. It’s been up and down, as it always has been in my career. At Dundee United and Celtic, there were always ebbs and flows, which is how football works.
‘But the Premier League is an incredible league and I’m really enjoying it.
‘It’s a little bit of a different mentality. At Celtic, it was always more dominant. You have a lot more possession. Your aim there is to win the league and the cups.
‘In the Premier League, your ambition is to finish as high as possible. Last season at Southampton, we found ourselves not where we wanted to be but came through it and had a strong finish.
‘So it’s different challenges and different mentality. It’s about adapting to that.’
For Scotland, it is all about preparing for the Euro 2020 play-offs in March. Defeating Cyprus and Kazakhstan to enter those matches with some momentum is the immediate aim.
‘It’s about building on that San Marino performance and making sure these next two games are positive, that we get points from them and finish as high in the group as possible,’ said Armstrong.
‘Everyone thrives on good performances and winning games. That brings positivity among supporters. So it’s up to us to build on the San Marino game.
‘Winning helps give you that good feeling again of scoring goals, as we did against San Marino. Building on that confidence in our next two games is our aim.’