McLeish takes the positives from defeat to Portuguese stars
element of taking risks, but I think we passed the ball well between the Portuguese at times.
“We had one or two sniffs around the goals without being tremendously dangerous. There was a lot for me to take out of the game. After that horrible result [against Israel] it was a wee bit of a lift.”
McLeish has been savaged by supporters and pundits since the Israel loss and he knows that defeat to Albania in Shkoder will lead to calls for him to be sacked.
But the former Motherwell, Hibernian, Rangers, Birmingham City and Aston Villa manager is determined to silence his critics and secure the Euro 2020 playoff place up for grabs in the Nations League.
“Every time you lose a game you know there is going to be criticism, you have to take it on the chin and bounce back,” he said. “It’s about resilience.
“I’ve had a few knocks in the past and also a lot of success. It’s never easy to lose and of course that was a tough weekend, but I have to stand up and be brave and take that and take it forward.
“There are others examples of managers being under the cosh in recent time, Michael O’Neill [of Northern Ireland] and Stanislav Cherchesov in the Russian camp and they persevered and came through it. I’ll always have that determination.”
McLeish added: “Obviously I’m aware of it [the criticism]. I guess it determines next month, we’ll see. We look to try and qualify, we’ll do everything we can to do that next month.
“We’re in that group with Israel and Albania for a reason. It’s because of the rankings. I look at them as cup finals. We want to win the two of them. We look for everyone to be on their A game when it comes to those two games.”
McLeish changed from a 3-5-2 formation to a 4-2-3-1 set-up and admitted he would think long and hard about how to approach the Albania and Israel games in the coming weeks.
“I know every system there is to know,” he said. “I’ve coached teams before with three at the back it’s been quite fashionable recently. We want to adapt to different formations. It’s about getting the right balance. For the Albania game [at Hampden last month] it [three at the back] really worked.
“I am not making any decision at this peculiar moment, with two games next month we will have long and hard chats about that.”