I’LL EARN MY STRIPES NOW I’VE FOUND TIGER FEET
Robertson ready to become a main man for Scots after stepping up to plate at Hull
He used to be the baby-faced rookie with club and country, blameless as both failed in their quests.
Now Andy Robertson insists he’s all the man he’s ever going to be and is ready to take responsibil ity for Scotland and Hull City achieving their dreams.
And he realised as much standing in the tunnel last Saturday looking across at Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Paul Pogba, Wayne Rooney, Anthony Martial and the rest of a Manchester United 18 who’d had more than half a billion pounds spent on them.
The 22-year- old’s learning curve since his move south two years ago may have been steep but he believes it’s prepared him perfectly for the challenges ahead, whether surviving in England’s top flight or striving in Scotland’s World Cup group.
The 10- cap full-back said: “There were plenty of lessons learned from my first spell in the Premier League.
“It was good, in that I broke through then was in and out. But at the end of the day everyone at the club failed that season as we got relegated. It wasn’t good enough.
“And I had to learn how to deal with an injury – which I never had to before. I was out for six or seven weeks. Then I had to learn how to play against top-quality players.
“You can think you’ve got them in your pocket for 85 minutes then, in the last few minutes your man tears you apart and you get beaten. That doesn’t happen up in Scotland usually.
“If you’re playing well other people don’t affect you. But down there players can just turn it on in the last five minutes. And that’s what you need to keep in mind, to stay concentrated for the full 90 minutes. But I think I’m getting better.
“Standing in the tunnel last week with those guys, you just think: ‘ This is the team you want to play against’.
“These are the players you want put up against with the big transfer fees and all the quality.’
“Especially as a defender, you’ll get a buzz from keeping them quiet. The Tiger’s back four kept Ibrahimovic quiet and Rooney quiet – up until the last minute when he came alive and punished us.
“The difference with the big teams is they have strength in depth if things aren’t working. United brought on Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Marcus Rashford who changed the game. One wee lapse of concentration cost us in the 90th minute.”
Rober t son ins is t s hi s confidence has grown though – as has his belief in those around him this week.
The former Queen’s Park and Dundee United kid said: “I’m more prepared now. I played 56 Championship and cup games last term, I only played 24 in the Premier League the season before.
“I have more experience. We got promoted so it was a successful season and I played some
Standing in the tunnel with those Manchester United guys you think: ‘This is the team you want to play against, these are the guys you want put up against with the big transfer fees’
of my best football probably. We have been working on things defensively because even at Dundee United, when everything was going well, that was kind of my weakness. “I have strengthened there. It’s an age thing. You see centre- backs coming into their own when they are 30-31 because t hey have t he experience t o defend. I am gaining that experience now and getting better and better.”
While Hull may be embracing their against-all-odds status as underdogs this season, Robertson is well aware of the need for a change of mindset against Malta tonight.
He said: “Scotland are favourites and we should be.
“At Hull, we’ll only play a few games where people wouldn’t say we’re the underdogs. We played in the cup last week against Exeter and we had to change our mentality. I’m sure the boys here will now do the same. “We’ll be the big team and we need to take the game to them. On the flip side, in the last campaign, when we played against Germany they were the big team. It’s all about adapting to who you are playing against. “If I look down the squad just now the majority of us are doing well at club level. Some are f inding it tough on the bench but others are flying.”
Boss Gordon Strachan insists the difference maker for his squad in this campaign will need to be picking up a big result. The Republic of Ireland and Poland both took chunks out of Germany in the Euros group, compared to the now traditional plucky defeats Scotland endured.
But while the assumption is that means taking points from top seed England, Robertson insisted: “We won’t know when the big result comes.
“We thought the big result in the last campaign was beating Ireland at home but then we fell short at Georgia away. If we’d won there that would have been the big result.
“You do look at the England games because they are the big team in the group. But if you go away and you’re struggling then nick a win late on that could be the big one.
“Hopefully we get a goal and it will be enough.
“I did watch the home nations doing well at the Euros and of course you think: ‘I wish we were there’. “But you can’t be bitter about it. We just need to hope we’re on the plane with them the next time.”