NOW LET’S FINISH THE JOB IN STYLE
Clarke to set Scots up for win over the Irish before Ukraine quest
HISTORY shows that Scotland have been here before. Two years ago, the nation was still punchdrunk after reaching a first major finals in 23 years when Steve Clarke’s side travelled to Israel and blew their hopes of finishing top of a Nations League group.
When a team has spent the night dancing a Conga round a hotel in Belgrade, a manager can cut them some slack. After this week’s 3-0 thrashing of Ukraine, however, Clarke wants his team to finish the job this time.
The Scotland boss has set his players the target of starting the return game against the Ukrainians on Tuesday with a realistic chance of topping Group B1. Victory or a draw against the Republic of Ireland at Hampden tonight would leave them needing a point in neutral Poland to secure the safety net of a European Championship play-off. It’s close, but they’re not there yet.
‘Everyone was rightly impressed with the team in midweek against
Ukraine,’ says the Scotland boss. ‘But I told the players that all we have done with that win is secure the fact we won’t be relegated from the B league. That’s all we have done.
‘We can still finish first, second or third in the group. The next game is the most important one.
‘We want to build towards it. We want to finish first. I have said that consistently.
‘We still have a lot of work in front of us, then we can start to think about play-offs, seedings, whatever. Let’s get this game out of the way and then we can see what we need approaching the last game.’
The pragmatic side to Clarke’s personality isn’t to everyone’s taste. Accused — unfairly — of being a cautious and conservative manager, he surprised many with the tactical tweak which saw Scotland revert to a back four and blow Ukraine away with a powerful second-half performance.
A 3-0 win effectively meant that two draws against Stephen Kenny’s
Ireland, then Ukraine, will be enough to win the group. While that might be the mathematical state of play, Clarke would prefer to do it in style.
‘We have to win. Emotionally it is better for everybody if we can win and go to Ukraine with a win,’ he adds. ‘Two draws will do us. But you have to set up to win the game.
‘We want to win, we want to win at Hampden. When we play there at home we want teams to know they are coming for a tough game.’
As a motivation to win the game, revenge is pretty far down the list. Yet the awfulness of an unexpected 3-0 defeat at the Aviva Stadium in June was such that the Scots owe supporters a performance.
A soul-destroying defeat to Ukraine in a World Cup semi-final play-off days earlier was clearly a factor. Buoyed slightly by a comfortable home win over Armenia just before they crossed the Irish Sea, however, Clarke still finds it hard to explain what happened that day.
‘We actually felt quite good going into the game in Dublin,’ he says. ‘Obviously it did not work out, maybe the defeat against Ukraine, maybe we misread the way we had played against Armenia at Hampden, when I thought we responded quite well and played quite well that night.
‘Maybe I thought we had recovered when clearly we hadn’t. We didn’t reach our levels.
‘Before we played Ukraine, I spoke about getting back to our levels and getting back to how we can play. I think we did that midweek. Now we have to do that again on Saturday against a good Irish team.’
How good this Ireland team are is a bone of contention. Before the Scotland game, you had to go back to June 19, 2019 — three years previous — to find the last time Kenny’s side had won a competitive home match — against Gibraltar. It was the first time they’d scored three goals or more at home since a 7-0 thrashing of the same opponents in October 2014.
After that game, Clarke was cornered by journalists in the Aviva Stadium media area where he looked ashen-faced by what he had seen.
‘We didn’t see it coming either,’ he admits now. ‘We thought we got over the huge disappointment of not going to the World Cup. But obviously we hadn’t.
‘It was still in our system. For whatever reason, we didn’t reach the levels we wanted to reach and for whatever reason we lost to an Irish team who produced a very good performance on that day.
‘I said before we played them they are a good team, and now we know for sure they are a good team. We give them full respect.’
Ireland made hay from set-pieces in Dublin. Shane Duffy, in particular, threw a few low blows over his awful season at Celtic back in the faces of Scots tormentors when he bullied a defence missing Kieran Tierney.
The Arsenal defender is one of three players who could be missing again tonight as Clarke juggles his resources before another big game against Ukraine in Krakow.
‘We’ve got decisions to make on a few — Kieran on minutes on the pitch. Jack Hendry on minutes on the pitch, Stuart Armstrong on minutes on the pitch. Pretty much those three.
‘We have to gauge it today as this is only the second day of recovery and although it’s also the day before the game, we’re still recovering.
‘In terms of physical preparation, Ireland will have had the better week as they’ve had a clear week to prepare while ourselves and Ukraine are playing catch-up.
‘We don’t complain about it because we understand the reason we had to play the extra game against Ukraine is more important and much more newsworthy than a football match.
‘But Ireland will have had a better preparation. We’ve had a great win in midweek and we feel good about ourselves, so maybe it balances itself out.’
In a best-case scenario Ukraine will drop points in an early kick-off in Armenia before Scotland and Ireland take to the pitch in Glasgow.
‘My coaches are holding on to the hope that Armenia can get something from the game,’ says Clarke.
‘But for me, I’m just focusing on the fact that Ukraine will win and we then have to deal with the two games our way.
‘The ultimate aim of this week is to go to the last game in Poland against Ukraine with a realistic chance of topping the section.’