Mctominay set for first start as Mulgrew is handed armband
Costa Rica but we will try to pick a team to beat Costa Rica,” he said. “They scored a lot of late goals in their qualifying campaign and they have good players and strength. They are a tall team. We have to stifle that.”
Mcleish described preparing for his second debut match in charge of Scotland as “like starting again”. He considers himself to be a better manager than in his first spell, when he won seven out of ten games.
“I have been out of the game for a couple of years,” he said. “I did a couple of stints abroad, I don’t have too shabby a record in England.
“I feel I am better equipped, have a little bit more common sense and can apply that as much as possible. Sometimes you go on a whim, like we did in the last campaign [for Euro 2008], and sometimes you find it is the right answer. It is a mix of everything.” Mcleish has named 32-year-old Blackburn Rovers centre-half Charlie Mulgrew as captain tonight. “We will see what happens in the next game,” he said, with the injured Celtic defender Kieran Tierney many people’s tip to be skipper when competitive action begins later this year.
Manchester United midfielder Scott Mctominay is set to start after opting to play for Scotland over England. One of Jason Cummings or Oli Mcburnie will likely lead the line – most probably the latter, currently on loan at Barnsley from Swansea.
“We are going to have to see what the strikers can do, and if they can bring it within this structure or whether we have to find goals from somewhere else,” he said. “But we have to give respect to the strikers we have brought into the squad and look to see if they can be potential important goalscorers for Scotland.”