Familiarity will take time, claims Clarke

Scotland manager Steve Clarke reckons it could take as many as 10 international camps before he achieves true familiarity with his side.

Clarke took over from Alex McLeish in the summer, with tonight’s European Championship qualifying match away to Russia kicking off his third double-header in charge, which concludes with Sunday’s home match against San Marino.

Having achieved success in his last club job with Kilmarnock, Clarke admits he is still getting to grips with the reduced contact with his players at international level, revealing he had less than an hour’s coaching time over two days prior to flying to Moscow.

Clarke insists it will take time for him to develop a solid understanding with his players, and he said: “This particular week has been an eye-opener and I’ve had to rely on the work I’ve done before in previous camps.

“When you take over a club side you have six or maybe eight weeks to get them ready.”

Clarke continued: “That’s quite a lot of coaching hours you don’t get here. I’m not pleading for time in terms of my job. But it might need 10 training camps – I don’t know how many it will take before the players can start to turn up and say, ‘we play a certain way for our club, but with Scotland this is how we do it.’

“This is only my third camp with the players. There has to be a sense of realism. If everybody is looking at me and saying, I did a great job at Kilmarnock getting them coached and well drilled then I’d say to them it didn’t happen just like that.

“It was over a period of time that the team at Kilmarnock forged its own identity.”

Scotland were defeated 2-1 by Russia, who are ranked 10 places above them in 42nd in the world at present, despite Clarke’s men taking the lead when the two sides met at Hampden Park last month.

He said: “It’s going to be a tough game but I saw enough in the first game at Hampden to let me know that we have a chance to win.”

Aberdeen defender Mikey Devlin is in line to make his debut at centre-back alongside Charlie Mulgrew, potentially getting the nod over fellow uncapped players Declan Gallagher and Stuart Findlay.

Kirkcaldy-born Oliver Burke, on loan at Alaves from West Brom, could be preferred ahead of Dundee United striker Lawrence Shankland in attack.