ALLY McCoist is telling the one about the Scotsman, the Welshman and the Northern Irishman. It isn’t a joke, however, unless you include him drawing even the faintest of comparisons between Gareth Bale and Kyle Lafferty.

“Now, I need to qualify that,” he quickly adds with a smile, lest anyone think McCoist has completely lost his marbles and is placing the capricious striker he managed at Rangers on a par with a forward considered to be among the top five players in the world.

The subject under discussion is international strikers, something McCoist knows a fair bit about. Nineteen goals in 61 caps confirms as much. McCoist played in an era where Scotland were relatively well-off all over the pitch but most notably in attack where Andy Roxburgh and Craig Brown could also call on the likes of Mo Johnston, Gordon Durie, Kevin Gallacher and others. All would surely command a guaranteed starting slot were they still pulling on the boots today.

Alas, for Gordon Strachan, he does not have that luxury. Strachan has rotated his starting line-up in the past three games, starting a different striker in each one. Between them, Chris Martin, Steven Fletcher and then Leigh Griffiths failed to muster up a goal between them. Among Scotland’s myriad shortcomings, failing to alight on a reliable centre-forward surely features towards the top of the list.

McCoist views a grim scene with increasing concern but believes the Celtic striker has done enough to retain his place in attack when Scotland look to salvage a car crash of a campaign against Slovenia in March.

“I’d probably stick with Griffiths, to be honest with you,” he said. “I think you’ve got to be fair to him. I can understand what Gordon is trying to do with Martin as well. Martin has come in for a hell of a lot of stick. He’s not going to go in behind [defences] at all, he’s just a physical unit. You’re going to try and get it into him and get people in around him.

“I like the look of the boy [Oliver] Burke. He’s unbelievable raw, he’s very raw. Still massive amounts of coaching and learning to be done but we can all see something there you wouldn’t mind working with. We’ve definitely got options. I haven’t seen an awful lot of Burke but I’m not sure what he is yet. He’s physical enough. He could be one coming in from wide, he could be an option up front. There’s something to work on there and he seems really keen.

“We can play whoever we want up front but if we don’t play the game with the tempo we attempted to play in the England game then it doesn’t matter. If you don’t get at people, get balls in the box and move the ball quickly then it doesn’t matter who you play up front. It’s how you play more than who you play.”

Which brings McCoist on to the subject of Lafferty. For all the striker became something of a divisive figure during four seasons of mixed success at Rangers, he retains a talismanic presence for his country. Without Lafferty leading the line and chipping in with seven goals, there is every chance Northern Ireland would not have qualified for the European Championships.

“Everyone keeps making comparisons with Northern Ireland,” he said. “It sounds a bit ridiculous but Wales have got Gareth Bale and Northern Ireland have got someone like Lafferty. He leads the line for them and he’s strong, physical and causes problems. We don’t really have anyone like that. Bale is world class and can win a game by himself.

“Lafferty is nothing like Bale of course but he’s arguably as valuable to Northern Ireland as Bale is to Wales because his scoring record is ridiculous. He’s just a focal point for them. He can give them a break, you can fire it up to him, it will come off him, he can flick it on, it’ll bounce there, and he can run in behind. It gives them breathing space which the Scotland boys don’t really get. Even someone like Lafferty gets you a throw-in up the park and it gives you a chance to regroup.

“Lafferty has hardly played for a club in recent times. In this day and age with levels of fitness being so high, you might get an adverse effect in the third game down the line. But a professional player now who hasn’t been playing but has still been training at that level and has looked after himself, adrenalin can get you through 70 minutes.”

Strachan’s decision to stay on with Scotland means there is one less vacancy for McCoist to apply for. He is enjoying doing his regular media work but an enduring “love of the game” means he is keen to get into the dug-out again, believing after Rangers he could just about handle any challenge.

“I threw my name in for the QPR job last week which went to Ian Holloway,” he admitted. “A few other jobs have come up but just after I expressed an interest, people got in touch to tell me not to go near it with a barge pole. I'm not going to take anything for the sake of it. There's no point me moving my family down the road to be back up in three months.

“If something comes up, brilliant, I'd love to do it. It's what I want to do. But I'm in a fortunate position in that I can do some punditry and have other business interests which I'm keen to work on. I'm looking at England. But there are one or two things going on in America which I'd seriously consider as well. I have to think about my young family as well. But if something came up that suits them, I'd go for it.

“After Rangers, it can't be that bad again! My mate reckons I could manage the New York Yankees after that. At Rangers, there wasn't a scenario I didn't have to deal with. Sir David Murray said to me last week, 'We still don't know if you can manage – but we know you can crisis manage'. That's as near a compliment as I'll get from him.”

- Ally McCoist was at Torrance Park Golf Club to officially open their new state of the art £1.5 million clubhouse, part of a wider residential development on the site. Full details at www.torranceparkgolf.co.uk