Scotland eyeing a ‘big win’ in Malta as they learn from past
Scotland struggle against a Malta side rated 176th in the Fifa rankings until – in the closing seconds – an attempted Maltese clearance rebounds from a Scottish player and crosses the line to give Gordon Strachan’s side a freak win. If that were to be the outcome of the Scots’ opening World Cup qualifier in the Ta’Qali Stadium tonight, it would be greeted with predictable and widespread derision.
Yet the lesson of Scotland’s doomed Euro 2016 qualifying campaign is that such an occurrence could mean Strachan’s players end the ignominy of failing to reach the finals of a major tournament since 1998. In the most recent campaign the Scots beat the Republic of Ireland in Glasgow and drew in Dub-
lin. Both Scotland and the Republic beat Georgia 1-0 at home, but in Tbilisi the Scots lost 1-0 where Martin O’Neill’s side had snatched an improbable victory with an Aiden McGeady strike in the final minute. Had Scotland reversed their Tbilisi result then they, and not the Republic, would have reached the play-offs.
Scotland performed well against the group heavyweights, losing by only a single goal home and away to the world champions, Germany, and drawing with Poland in Warsaw and Glasgow. When Strachan said, while announcing his squad for the Malta game, that the Scots need “a big win” somewhere in a group that also includes England, Slovakia, Slovenia and Lithuania, the general assumption was that it would likely have to be against Sam Allardyce’s men at Wembley in November or at Hampden next June.
But it ain’t necessarily so, as Hull City left-back Andrew Robertson pointed out last night. “We won’t know when the big result comes,” he said. “You would have thought that the big result was maybe Ireland at home in the last campaign but we fell short in Georgia and if we had won there that would have been the big result.
“So you just never know. Obviously you do look at the England games because they’re the top team in the group but if you go away and are struggling against a team yet nick a win late on, then that will probably be the big win.
“If I look at our group, the majority of us are doing well at our clubs. Some are finding it tough on the bench but others are flying so it’s not just me that can take confidence from it. Shaun Maloney hasn’t even made the squad and Hull have got off to a good start. The boys have been playing with confidence and that can only help because we only have a short space of time to work.”
Robertson, as with everyone in this Scotland squad, does not have to delve into the extended past of qualification failure to fuel his desire for a place in the 2018 finals in Russia. The pain is still raw to the 22-year-old.
“I watched the Euros and saw the other home nations doing well and wished we were there and that was natural,” he said.
However, he has been encouraged by the meteoric rise of Oliver Burke, the Scottish wunderkind in more ways than one since his £13 million move from Nottingham Forest to RB Leipzig.
From the vantage point of a player whose 10 caps have seen him reach a milestone, but who was only recently in a similar position to Burke, Robertson proffered a newbie’s guide to assimilation at international level.
“Just take every bit of advice on board,” he said. “He’s settled in fine and that will only get better as he gets to know the boys more. He is like a whippet. But he’s not just about speed and power now. He’s added that killer touch and it shows in how many goals he has scored.”