Scots confident as Serbia clash looms

St eve Clarke feels Scotland are as prepared as they can be for a European Championship showdown with Serbia.

The national team head to Belgrade next month on the back of an eight-game unbeaten run and three clean sheets on the bounce.

Victory against the Serbs will bring an end to two decades of hurt and ensure Scotland qualify for Euro 2020.

They continued their impressive recent form with a 1- 0 win over the Czech Republic on Wednesday night, keeping them four points clear at the top of their Nations League group.

Victory over either Israel or Slovakia next month will guarantee them first place and take a great step towards a play-off spot for the 2022 World Cup.

But now the focus can finally switch to preparing for Scotland’ s biggest match in more than 15 years.

Clarke said: “I think we’re as well prepared as we can be going into such a big match against Serbia.

“What we spoke about when we got together for this camp was that we had to beat Israel and go through.

“We managed to do that and on the back of that, rather than talking up the Serbia game too much, we made sure everybody was focused on getting maximum points out of the next two games.

“We did that and have the platform now where we can win the League B section and get promotion to Group A which would be fantastic in terms of the development of the team.

“It would be fantastic for our world ranking and it would also possibly give us a little safety net in the qualification for Qatar 2022. All those things were really important to us.”

Despite a camp that was ravaged by illness and injury, Scotland emerged resilient with three wins and no goals conceded.

Stuart Armstrong’ s positive Covid-19 diagnosis and Ryan Christie and Kieran Tierney being identified as close contacts saw them ruled out of these three games.

Scott McKenna, Liam Palmer and Oli Burke dropped out through injury without kicking a ball while Liam Cooper returned to Leeds after the Israel game having picked up an injury.

John Fleck limped off against Slovakia, Andy Robertson missed out against the Czechs through suspension and Lawrence Shankland was not in the squad on Wednesday night.

Clarke has seen a number of unlikely heroes come to the fore, with Aberdeen’s Andy Considine earning praise for his two displays this week and Motherwell duo Declan Gallagher and Stephen O’Donnell also impressing.

In Lyndon Dykes, who scored his second international goal against Slovakia, Scotland also appear to have found a talisman to lead the line up front in their quest for tournament football.

Clarke added: “The confidence in the squad is sky- high now. There are players who have missed out this month who will be desperate to be involved next month.

“T hen there are the players who have come in out the cold who will be desperate to be involved again.”

TALISMAN: An overjoyed Lyndon Dykes celebrates after scoring against Slovakia in Scotland’s Hampden victory.