Ramirez is eyeing a double over McLeish

IF he wasn’t such a nice guy, you would suspect Oscar Ramirez was trolling Scotland on the eve of tonight’s friendly at Hampden. Revealing that he had spent part of the build-up actually watching footage from Italia ’90, specifically trying to pick out Alex McLeish? That’s cold. Throw in his observation that Costa Rica are expected to beat the Scots in Big Eck’s first game at the helm and you could build a case against the team’s current manager. In truth, one of the stars from that shock 1-0 win in Genoa was simply prepping himself for the inevitable questions on his rival at Hampden. ‘My first game as national team coach was against Brazil, managed by Dunga — who I played against at Italia ’90,’ he said. ‘I didn’t remember Alex playing that day, so I went back and watched the video. It’s nice for me to see former players from this game.’ Memories of that stunning triumph are made all the sweeter by the knowledge that, buoyed by winning their very first match at a World Cup, Costa Rica would go on to reach the knockout stages. Their performance in Italy was a turning point for the national team, even though it took until 2002 for them to return to the biggest stage. They also qualified in 2006 and, four years ago in Brazil, really shook up the world by winning their group ahead of Italy, Uruguay and England — losing on penalties in the quarter-finals to the Netherlands. And it all started when they beat the Scots. ‘It was a very important game in the history of Costa Rican football,’ said Ramirez. ‘A nation who had never been to a World Cup before, winning that game was a surprise. ‘Now there is big expectation. Of course there is some expectation that we win this game against Scotland. But we have to balance that with preparation for the World Cup.’