McBurnie asks the Tartan Army to keep believing

Scotland forward Oli McBurnie has urged the Tartan Army to keep faith with the national team and manager Alex McLeish.

Pressure has mounted on McLeish in recent days after the Scots suffered defeats in the double-header, with last Thursday’s 2-1 Uefa Nations League defeat by Israel followed by a 3-1 friendly loss to Portugal at Hampden.

Sunday’s home friendly against the Euro 2016 champions attracted less than 20,000 supporters with around 3,000 sold tickets unused.

Swansea City attacker McBurnie is demanding patience from the Scottish fans, with their hopes of securing a play-off place for Euro 2020 through winning their Nations League section now resting solely on next month’s matches away to Albania and at home to Israel.

McBurnie said: “It’s obviously frustrating for the supporters when we are not picking up the results that we want.

“We want to win games as well. It’s not we want to go into games and lose them.

“I would just say to stick with us. Hopefully, they could see a little bit of improvement in the game against Portugal. Some of the stuff we were playing was almost worlds apart compared with the other night in Israel.

“Obviously the boys beat Albania last month and we the like the know in ourselves we didn’t really turn up to the game against Israel. It’s down to us to show that we can. There were building blocks there against Portugal that we can improve on and it’s down to us to try and do the business.

“It’s definitely a project and a progression and we need a bit of time. Hopefully next month we will build on this.”

Leeds-born McBurnie, who was raised by a Scottish family, has won six caps since being drafted Scotland winger James Forrest insists he and his team-mates must be ready to produce two big performances when they return for the next two internationals next month.

Celtic player Forrest is urging a strong response from the national side following a disappointing start to Alex McLeish’s second stint as manager.

The Hoops attacker said: “There is no hiding the fact that it has been hard.

“We need to make sure we are ready to take off in the next international games.

“We need to come back and get a good result in Albania away and that would be good to take us into the second game at home against Israel.

“It is still in our own hands – that is always a good thing.

“We know if we turn up and look after ourselves we can do it – we just need to bounce back in the next two games.

“They are not going to be easy games. They will both be hard, so we need to set up right and make sure everybody is ready to into the Scots’ squad for the first time by McLeish earlier this year.

Although he has yet to find the net, McBurnie is eager to repay McLeish’s faith in him, adding: “He is the first manager to call me up and has called me up for every single squad since then.

“For me, I can’t thank him enough. I will always be grateful to him for that and, of course, I want to prove him right as well.

“I just need to score goals. That always helps as a striker. We are playing well at Swansea at the minute and getting some good results. So I am sure scoring a few goals would help my case. The Portugal game was the first time me and Steven Naismith have ever played together. I think we had only trained together once before.

“Obviously it is going to be hard. We don’t know each other’s games and things like that, but the more we play together the more understanding we will have.”