Make or break for Strachan

Scotland face two massive World Cup qualifiers in the space of four days starting this Thursday.

First up is a must-win match against Slovakia before all eyes can turn to Slovenia on Sunday.

With two games to go, we still stand a chance of qualifying which is the first time we can say that in 10 years.

We have to win both games though and there is no other way around it.

Slovakia dismantled us 3-0 earlier in this campaign whilst we toiled at home to Slovenia back in March.

After that game we knew we would have to go on a superb run to make Russia next summer and we are one point ahead of where we should be.

A draw with England at Hampden – which still feels like a defeat – and victories over Lithuania and Malta have Scotland sitting fourth but only one point behind Slovakia.

They appear to be the main rivals and whilst Slovenia sit on 14 points as well, they play England on Thursday and could be out of the race by the time we play them on Sunday.

So for the second time in a month, we have to cheer on England.

A small price to pay to make the World Cup after 20 years.

But whilst we have to use that old managerial cliché of taking it one game at a time I feel it is important to look into the future, beyond this campaign.

If we qualify it is, of course, an overwhelming success and one which the whole team should be applauded for – especially after a sluggish start.

But if we don’t make it to football’s showcase next summer, is it time to go in a new direction?

I think the next few days will define Gordon Strachan’s legacy as Scotland manager.

We missed a glorious opportunity to make the European Championships in France in 2016.

It was no glorious failure, simply failure.

This time around we can’t pretend that victory over Malta and Lithuania is anything less than we expected.

The next two tough tests will truly show the mark of the manager.

If we don’t qualify this time, a change could help us move forward.

Many Tartan Army followers thought the former Celtic manager was lucky to stay on after the France failure.

This time round – granted it was a tougher group – he may not survive it.

Is it time to go in a new direction?

The main reason behind this is that we have to ask ourselves have we seen any major improvement?

Granted we’re a better side than under Craig Levein but in reality we couldn’t really get any worse.

This team is not getting any younger and we have no‘next generation’ coming through.

Youth hasn’t really been key for the 60-year-old and now he will be severely tested with his midfield maestro Scott Brown out of action after returning from his ‘retirement’earlier in the campaign.

For the sake of Strachan, this double header is make or break for his Scotland future.