Steve Clarke one game away from becoming a national treasure as Scotland eye spot in...

[ASFN Admin]

The pattern of Scottish waywardness, which has seen qualifying campaigns come to grief on no fewer than 10 occasions since 1998, just might be susceptible to remedy by an unlikely antidote in the form of routine. Steve Clarke’s success at Kilmarnock was not based on any kind of cavalier approach but, rather, a quiet but implacable insistence on mastery of basics and the nurture of communal trust. The most obvious consequence of Clarke’s work at Rugby Park was widespread approval amongst the Tartan Army when he replaced Alex McLeish in charge of Scotland, although that initial trust was put to a speedy test when the Scots conceded four goals apiece at home to Belgium and to Russia in Moscow. Successive wins against San Marino, Cyprus and Kazakhstan towards the end of last year suggested encouraged hope that he might have turned a corner but the resumption of international football post-lockdown saw the Scots wobble in September, with a 1-1 draw at home to Israel and a nervy 2-1 win against a Czech Republic side which was effectively a third string because the main squad had been sent home because of Covid-19 positive tests. Clarke had switched to a three-man central defence, with Scott McTominay in the back line, an arrangement which looked vulnerable under pressure, prompting criticism which riled the manager. “I played a team where 10 out of the starting 11 were playing in their normal positions,” he said. “The only one I had asked to tweak a little bit was Scott McTominay. The fact that we have changed the system and it has worked for us is good. We changed it at a difficult time. “A lot of people seemed to look at the September games and say, ‘that was rubbish.’ The players were comfortable with it and on the back of more than half the squad not even having a competitive match and the other half having packed in a small number of games, it was almost like a pre-season camp. “I hadn’t seen them since the previous November. It was a long time but you are still trying to nail down the little principles and remind them of what we did before that was good. “I’m not talking about the system. I’m talking about the principles within the squad. We were happy with what we did inside the camp and I knew we had built something just by getting that group back together. “We ended up with three wins in October but you can’t go from not being very good in September to fantastic in October. There is somewhere in between and we still have to progress and we still have to improve. “No matter what the result is tomorrow night we are looking to improve on what we do as a team.” Clarke and several of his players have reminded critics that Scotland are on a run of eight games without defeat and three successive clean sheets. Credit must be allotted where it is due and he and they have played the percentages thoroughly, so much so that in the three October games the Scots had a grand total of two attempts on target – against Slovakia and the Czech Republic – and scored from both. They had no attempts on the mark in the Euro 2020 play-off semi-final against Israel but prevailed in the penalty decider to qualify for Thursday night’s decider in Belgrade. It is difficult to believe that Scotland can prosper yet again on such meagre rations, especially against the likes of Segrej Milinkovic-Savic, Aleksandr Mitrovic and Dusan Tadic. Serbia will, of course, not be urged on by their famously rabid fans, but they are on home soil and they were stung when Hungary beat them in Belgrade in a Nations League qualifier last month, a setback that was followed by a 2-2 draw in Turkey three days later. That said, there are no complexities to distract Scotland. A win, over 90 minutes, two hours or penalties, would see Clarke and his proteges exalted by a support which has not savoured the finals of a European Championship or World Cup for a generation. The status of national treasure, though, is not a reward which animates the manager. ‘No, I’ve never been one to covet that,” he said. “Even as a player I liked to be a wee bit under the radar. I like to be appreciated by the people around about me. They are the people that I work with and if I get that respect and that appreciation then that is good enough for me.” It might discomfit Clarke somewhat but, if idolatry is to be his lot after the final whistle sounds on Friday night, a celebratory nation will insist that he will just have to grit his teeth and accept six months of glorification as one of the hazards of a job properly done. Them’s the breaks, Steve. Team details (probable) Serbia (3-4-2-1): Dmitrovic; Milenkovic, S Mitrovic, Kolarov; Lazovic, Maksimovic, Lukic, Ristic; Milinkovic-Savic, Djuricic; A Mitrovic. Scotland (3-4-2-1): Marshall; McTominay, McKenna, Tierney; Burke, McGregor, Armstrong, Robertson; McGinn, Christie; Dykes. Referee: Antonio Mateu Lahoz (Spain).

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