BIG INTERVIEW ExclusIVE
optimist.sport@sundaypost.com CRAIG BROWN freely admits he is the eternal
Yet as he looks ahead to the resumption of Scotland’s World Cup campaign in just three weeks’ time, he insists it is his head not his heart talking when he says he still fancies the country to qualify for Russia in 2018.
Gordon Strachan’s side have a friendly against Canada at Easter Road on March 22 before tackling Slovenia in a vital tie at Hampden Park four days later.
The last man to guide Scotland to a major Finals is upbeat, and sees no downside to fact Strachan has not had his players together for nearly four months.
“Since the disappointment against England at Wembley in November, we have had a chance to re-group and re-energise over what has effectively been, in international terms, a winter break,” said Brown.
“Now we have to be ready to go again for the second half of the campaign, which I am sure we will be.
“I know there is quite a bit of work to do (with four games gone, Scotland lie fifth out of six), but it is still all there for us. political point of view, with a lot of things to consider,” he said.
“You want to have a good working relationship with your club managers and, if anything is going to put a strain on that, it is getting their players injured in a friendly.
“So, if the Leeds manager only wanted Gary McAllister to play 45 minutes in a friendly at the very most, then that is all I tried give him.
“I had a very simple system. If they made that kind of request for a friendly, I would say: ‘Sure, I will try and do that’.
“If they came back with the same message ahead of a competitive match, they would be told to get lost in no uncertain terms!
“I can’t speak for Gordon Strachan. He is an extremely capable manager who will have his own thoughts.
“But if it was me, I would be looking to have one phase of the game in which my best 11 for Slovenia were all on the pitch together at the same time.
“Maybe the first half-hour, maybe the last. But a wee spell in which they could get a run-out together ahead of the big one.”
There are plenty of the Tartan Army clamouring for on-form Anglo stars – such as Fulham midfielder Tom Cairney and wing pair Matt Phillips of West Brom and Bournemouth’s Ryan Fraser – to be given a run out versus the Canadians.
Brown, for his part, cautions against throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
“I wouldn’t be expecting any big overhaul of the side,” he said.
“Everyone knows the pool of players available to us is very limited.
“In that regard Gordon Strachan and Mark McGhee deserve great credit for unearthing Ikechi Anya and Matt Ritchie, two players we didn’t know much about at all.
“It may well be there is another one out there, but I don’t see this