Now let’s finish what I started!

FORMER Scotland boss Alex McLeish last night backed his successor Steve Clarke to finish the job of taking the country to Euro 2020.

Thursday’s play-off final in Serbia brings a belated end to the inaugural Nations League campaign that began with a 1-0 win over Albania in September 2018.

With McLeish in charge, Scotland would ultimately top a three-team section that also included Israel but a poor start to the Euro qualifiers proper saw McLeish sacked and replaced by Clarke before he had the chance to see the job through.

With Covid forcing the postponement of both play-offs and the finals themselves, the tournament will not be concluded until next summer.

‘It does seem crazy that we’re still here, after all this time, waiting to complete the play-offs,’ reflects McLeish. ‘We’ve already started the next Nations League but I really hope Stevie and Scotland do it.

‘I spoke to Stevie just after he got the job. We’ve kept in touch with a few texts and so on but I’m not going to pester him with the thumbs up-good luck stuff all the time.

‘He knows I’m right behind him.’

Unable to replicate the formula that saw him take the country close in the Euro 2008 qualifiers during his first spell in charge, McLeish was effectively on borrowed time after the team slumped to a heavy defeat in Kazakhstan in March 2019.

Ultimately he hopes his legacy is more positive and reflects on the double-header where his team won 4-0 in the Albanian city of Shkoder before beating Israel at Hampden to clinch that play-off spot.

‘Listen, things didn’t work out for me as they did in my first spell,’ he says. ‘But at the end of the day we did have a 66-per-cent success rate in competitive games.

‘The only thing that really mattered to us at that time were those two games — away to Albania and home to Israel.

‘We took care of them, had good performances. We had a really good focal point with Steven Fletcher playing up front. We had everybody fit for those two games, all our strongest players.

‘Ryan Christie played a blinder and of course James Forrest scored his magnificent hat-trick at Hampden.

‘Hopefully Stevie has everybody available. Players are playing a lot of football at the moment, cramming it all in and there is a danger of injuries.

‘And you see what Celtic suffered with four or five players through Covid.

‘It would mean so much to everyone to get that qualification.’