A FRIENDLY against Estonia at Pittodrie in February is about as low key as it ever gets for a Scotland home game, but Gordon Strachan will not be deceived.
The process of people making up their minds on a Scotland manager begins from the moment he announces his first team. What happens tonight will count for the man recently appointed to lead the country.
What he wants is to re-establish the football team among the nation's sporting success stories. "I think we'd all like to do a bit better," he said. "We'd all like to see Celtic doing well in Europe because it gives us all a lift. It helps when Stephen Gallacher wins at the [Dubai Desert Classic] golf the other day there. But the main thing in Scotland is football. That's the thing we talk about most.
"Andy Murray has been terrific, Stephen has won this, Paul Lawrie has done that, it's great. But everyone still really wants their national football team to do great. We understand that. If you get beat and it's not a good performance then that's not great. If you get beat and there is a real good performance then it will be fine. But we are animals for wanting to win."
Strachan wants to beat Estonia while thinking about two other teams. His first competitive games in charge are the World Cup double header at home to Wales and away to Serbia on March 22 and 26. "On the feedback that I've had, the teams coming up probably have two different systems to what you are going to see with Estonia. So there is only a certain amount we can do in this game here. The stuff we have done in training so far, until now, is basically how we will set up against the two teams we will come up against soon."
Strachan has enjoyed being back at the coalface of management for the first time since leaving Middlesbrough in October, 2011. He has always derived enormous satisfaction from time spent with his family and away from football, yet being out on a training ground remains a powerful narcotic.
"Even when I wasn't in football I cannot remember a day where I might have been bored. I have things that fill up my life. It will be the same when this is finished. I have this, this, and that to do. That can fill up my time. Some managers feel they spend too much time in the office: that will not happen. I will be in the office when I am needed, because I have got plenty of other things to do personally and professionally. I have loads to do, none of which gets in the way of what I am doing here, trust me. I love what I am doing, but I'm not addicted to it. I'm not obsessed by it.
"But I enjoy the coaching. My life was kind of floating along nicely for two years. I'd wake up in the morning saying 'right what are we doing today'. I'd go see the grandchildren, go to the cinema at night, go and do a game with ITV. Now I find myself last thing at night and first thing in the morning asking 'are we going zonal or man for man marking'? So it has changed completely."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article