Clarke awaits his moment of truth
AS Steve Clarke gears up for a rare triple-header of international football, his big call is to decide whether three really is the magic number. The national coach cast off his natural preference for a flat defensive four i n Scotland’s previous two fixtures and the results were, at best, inconclusive.
The clear and obvious positive to the introduction of a back three was that it provided room for Andy Robertson, a title winner with Liverpool, and Arsenal’s Kieran Tierney, arguably the two best players available to the Scotland boss.
Each started in the 1-1 draw to Israel, with Tierney replaced by Leeds United’s Liam Cooper for the second Nations League fixture, a 2-1 win over a hastily cobbled together Czech Republic team in Olomouc.
The accommodation of the two top-end Premier League left-backs was welcome but it once again exposed the lack of balance to this current generation of Scotland defenders.
In the absence of an equitable option on the right side of the back three, it was Manchester United midfielder Scott McTominay who stepped back to play the other side of middle man Scott McKenna, another leftie.
Clarke has cutely described McTominay as an ‘oval peg’ for that round hole but his only other rightfooted alternatives are Motherwell’s
Declan Gallagher and Ryan Porteous of Hibernian, the latter freshly called up after a strong start to the domestic season yet still uncapped at 21.
By throwing an extra defender into a team that already struggles to accommodate a glut of central midfield talent, Clarke might have solved one problem by creating another.
He may have been inclined to indulge in some more trial and error had the imminent triptych of fixtures been arranged in another order but any experimentation will need to wait until the Nations League games against Slovakia and the Czech Republic.
First he needs to make a big call and get it right. Put simply, Thursday’s Euro 2020 play-off semi-final against
Israel is the country’s most significant fixture in years.
‘We don’t have international friendlies to work on things, so I felt the games in the last window were a chance to look at a different system,’ explained Clarke. ‘The players enjoyed it, they were quite comfortable with it, they understood their roles within it.
‘Some of them are playing in those positions for their clubs, so it wasn’t this dramatic change people seem to have cottoned on to. It wasn’t an experiment. It was a chance to have a look at a little bit more of a solid shape defensively and I think in the Israel game that showed.
‘Maybe we didn’t get enough support forward to Lyndon (Dykes) at the right times and that’s something we have to improve on. I’m sure if we decide to go that way again we will improve on it.’
As a Chelsea player, Clarke became accustomed to playing as part of a back three. He added: ‘It is a good system — we played it quite a lot at Chelsea when Glenn Hoddle came in, he was a big advocate of three at the back. It worked really well.
‘I found it a difficult shift
Everyone is well aware of the magnitude of this game... we won’t shirk it
playing right wing-back but I also played all three positions in the centre — right, central and left — and I absolutely loved it. Any one of those three positions was a dream to play.
‘You need people that are comfortable on the ball, you need wing-backs that have good lungs and can go up and down the pitch and I think we have that. If I had to go that way again, I’d have absolutely no issues with it.’
That comfort on the ball seem the main driver behind McTominay’s selection on the right, while Robertson and, to a lesser extent, Liam Palmer are quite happy advancing down the flanks as wing-backs.
Mikel Arteta’s fondness for utilising Tierney on the left of a back three helped sway Clarke’s decision to try the formation but having made the big switch for the Israel game last month it was a little puzzling to see the Arsenal man benched in Olomouc.
Arsenal’s reluctance to release Tierney to the SFA at certain stages last season inevitably raised suspicion but Clarke insists there was no club pressure. He explained: ‘That was my choice and I think it was a sensible decision since he hadn’t played two games in four days since coming back from his injury. It was my decision, nothing to do with Arsenal.’
FIFA’s latest word rankings place Scotland at 59 to Israel’s 93, meaning the home team should be clear favourites.
Scotland’s defensive issues notwithstanding, the guests also have a demonstrable advantage in terms of the breadth of striking options available to coach Willi Ruttensteiner.
Eran Zahavi has not only scored on his last two visits to Hampden but netted an inordinately high total of 11 goals during the Euro 2020 group qualifiers, while Moanes Dabour has experience of La Liga and now the Bundesliga where he operates for Hoffenheim.
Scotland’s named quartet of strikers — Dykes, Oli McBurnie, Oli Burke and Lawrence Shankland — do not possess the same pedigree.
Clarke’s greatest successes as a manager have been based on defensive organisation and yet Scotland have kept one clean sheet in 10 games. Snuffing out Israel’s attacking threat is a priority.
‘That is a frustration and it’s something we speak about quite a lot — getting the little details that enable you to get a clean sheet,’ he continued. ‘In the last Israel game we over-crowded a throw-in, which was how we got caught out.
‘The players did it for the right reason, they were trying to suffocate the game on that side of the pitch but one good little combination on the edge of the box between two of their best players, Dabour and Zahavi, cost us a goal. Those little things are key to keeping clean sheets.’
Clarke’s final fling as a player coincided with Scotland’s last summer at a major tournament. but he did not make Craig Brown’s squad for France 98.
Defeating Israel is not the straightforward proposition it appeared when the draw was made. And a final against either Serbia or a Norway side spearheaded by Erling Haaland is an ominous prospect.
‘Everyone is well aware of the magnitude of the game. We don’t shrink away from that,’ added Clarke. ‘We’ve spoken about it on a few occasions with the players, they have the chance to make history.
‘The players know they can be a little part of the history of Scottish football over the next two months.
‘It’s about making sure we get ourselves as a nation back to major finals. Hopefully it’ll be Euro 2020 and, following on from that, the World Cup in Qatar in 2022.’