ROLLERCOASTER: “Scotland will be ready for Germany this summer despite falling to defeat”

Steve Clarke watches on as Scotland lost 1-0 to Northern Ireland at Hampden.

Steve Clarke insists Scotland will be ready for Germany this summer despite falling to defeat in what was termed a must-win friendly clash with Northern Ireland.

A historic defeat – it was Northern Ireland’s first win over Scotland at Hampden for nearly 50 years – was not how Clarke envisaged continuing warm-up preparations for Euro 2024, especially coming on the back of a 4-0 loss against the Netherlands on Friday.

The manager said he “didn’t Perhaps of most concern was an injury sustained by Andy Robertson that saw the skipper forced off in the first half. After Nathan Patterson made a mistake, his colleague from Liverpool, Conor Bradley, scored what turned out to be the winner at almost the same moment. The 20-year-old scored his nation’s first goal with that one. Following a collision with Trai Hume just before the hour mark, Robertson sustained injuries that Clarke claimed his team will evaluate. A prognosis couldn’t be given at this time.

Steve Clarke watches on as Scotland lost 1-0 to Northern Ireland at Hampden.
In Scotland’s case, the patient appears to be unwell. For the first time since 1997–98, Scotland has failed to win seven straight games. “I don’t keep track,” Clarke declared. The most crucial thing will be that we aim to be prepared by June. We played a lot of the game and made an effort to get them to open up. Finding a gap between the lines was challenging. Compared to our recent games against the best teams, this one was completely different.

“They’ll just open the pitch, as we demonstrated on Friday night (against the Netherlands), when we created several very good opportunities.” In the last third of the pitch tonight, we were in need of a little cunning and craft, but we were unable to locate it. We effectively lost the game because of that. We possessed the majority of the ball and had 14 shots, but none of them were good enough to find the back of the net.

“We’re not very good at friendlies, it’s fair to say,” he continued. Since we don’t win many of them, let’s hope we’ll be prepared for the competitive events in June. We certainly will be.

He picked out the positives, including Lewis Ferguson. The Bologna midfielder replaced Robertson as Scotland changed formation. “He got in the box a few times and made good runs,” said the manager.

Clarke continued, “I thought Liam Cooper did a good job at center back tonight.” It’s good to see that Cooper has maintained his physical fitness given he hasn’t played much for his team this year. Nathan was happy to get back on the field and play another game for his young self. He doesn’t play a lot of football for his team, but he gets to play when he comes here. Good effort against a quality team on Friday night for seventy minutes. That was excellent. We need to improve on the areas where we weren’t as strong.

“I’ll leave, evaluate both games, and for us, getting ready for June is the most important thing. I arrived at this press conference a little bit late, and I would prefer be sitting here in my position than, unfortunately, Wales – who just got knocked out on penalty kicks. So it’s not all doom and gloom.”

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