A LESSER man may have felt a chill running up his spine in Zagreb, but if Gordon Strachan felt any discomfort about Scotland's daunting World Cup qualifier against Croatia he made a decent job of disguising it yesterday.

Before the afternoon was out, thunder and lightning rumbled and flashed over the city. There was a little rain cloud inside, too, when a Croatian journalist sat in on the Scotland manager's media conference and asked, in slow, very deliberate English: "Are you afraid of a heavy defeat?"

Well, no, he wasn't. Three weeks ago Roy Keane teased Strachan when they met by asking "did you actually have a look at the fixtures before you took the job?". Strachan claimed that he had not, which was unlikely to have been the case. Croatia are ranked fourth in the world by Fifa and Scotland play them tonight in the Maksimir Stadium. England at Wembley, Belgium at Hampden Park, Macedonia away and Croatia at Hampden complete the upcoming handful of fixtures, and this one looks the most formidable and unforgiving of all.

It is likely to be the hardest game of Strachan's first year as manager. In club management he might allow a couple of months for his message to sink in to his players' thoughts, through daily repetition in training, but international managers must use other methods. "You have to simplify it a wee bit," he said. He has put his squad through double training sessions on most days this week. The emphasis has been on getting closer to opponents, winning possession, passing the ball effectively and relieving pressure by getting further up the pitch. "It's one of the things we have to work on so we've got a chance of creating something and not being under the cosh for 90 minutes," said James Morrison, the captain.

Easier said than done, of course. Strachan said he did not want to "spook" his men by talking too much about the Croats this week. "We've worked on shape and talked about two or three things that they will try to do. We'll look at some of their individuals now we have an idea of what their team will be."

Croatia may play a 16-year-old, 5ft 7in debutant tonight. Alen Halilovic, the attacking midfielder from Dinamo Zagreb, is favoured to take over from the suspended Luka Modric. He is dangerous but unfamiliar. More dangerous, and far more familiar, are Eduardo, Nikica Jelavic and Champions League final goalscorer Mario Mandzukic from Bayern Munich. "Everybody is aware of Mandzukic, unless you come from Planet Zog," said Strachan. "You know what he does, how he plays. I know what he does but I can't stop him. It's all right knowing what he does. It's like Lionel Messi. People know what he does but nobody can stop him. We will try our best. Whatever team you're playing for, the longer you keep the ball, the less chance there is of the other team hurting you.

"There will be times when these Croatian guys produce individual brilliance. You have to stand up and say, 'right I really want to be the best player on this pitch, I really want to walk away with the Croat manager talking about me as a player'."

The expected inclusion of Leigh Griffiths and Russell Martin in the starting team will take the number of players selected by Strachan to 26 in only four games: two goalkeepers, eight defenders, 12 midfielders and four strikers. Through no fault of his, it has been far too many already. "The problem we have is that we keep chopping and changing our squad. Where we're strong in one area one time, we're a bit weaker next time. Most of us would feel that if we had a settled squad we would feel better about ourselves. We need to be on our toes at the moment. But we've had a look at a couple of shapes this week. We've had six or seven training sessions looking at two different shapes. I think one shape is better for the future and the other one might be one we pick for this game. If it doesn't go as well as we hope we can always fall back on the other one. Yes, there is a fear of getting beaten, that's the way it should be. But when you have the ball there should be no fear at all.

"When I was a player it was easy for me, I just looked round the corner and saw Graeme Souness and Kenny Dalglish in my team and thought 'this is not a problem'. I was watching them winning European Cups. They played in big European games. That is the secret of success: getting good players round you."

Restoring some order to Scotland after a record seven competitive games without a win – almost certainly a sequence which is about to be extended to eight – will involve small steps. Defeat seems inevitable tonight. Progress for Strachan must be measured in other ways, namely through evidence of the organisation, spirit and belief which might empower this limited Scotland team for slightly more realistic challenges later in the year.