Gordon Strachan found it impossible to be upbeat in the bowels of Wembley last night after what he had thought would be an historic Scotland win disappeared before his eyes, writes Michael Grant.

Scotland went down 3-2 to England in an engrossing Auld Enemy game but, when Kenny Miller put them 2-1 ahead in the second half, the manager thought he was on course for a win which would have been celebrated for decades. Instead Scotland conceded twice from set-pieces - having lost the first goal of the evening when Grant Hanley was off the pitch injured - as England recovered for a deserved win.

Scotland were outplayed for most of the game but were positive and well-organised, at least in the first half, and took the lead through James Morrison. Theo Walcott, Danny Welbeck and Rickie Lambert, on his debut, scored for England and by the end they could have had more. "At the moment I don't feel encouraged, I probably will be in a couple of days," said Strachan. "I just feel huge disappointment for everybody. It could have been a result we were talking about in 40 years' time. It's a huge disappointment to have put so much into it.

"When it went to 2-1 I genuinely thought we were going to win the game. I thought Kenny was terrific in the whole game. I forgot this was a friendly. It's meant to be a friendly but it doesn't feel like one. It's a long time since I've felt as bad as this."

Walcott exposed Scotland when Hanley was being treated for a head knock, but then Scotland were twice outdone at set-pieces. Steven Gerrard's free-kick over Russell Martin's head was met by Welbeck's header, then Frank Lampard's corner was buried by Lambert, who had ghosted away from Scott Brown. England made six second-half substitutions and Scotland six, and the changes disrupted Strachan's organisation in the closing 20 minutes.

"I enjoyed the fact that, when we had 11 men on the park, they did not score from free play," he said. "We tried to attack more, when we had James Forrest on I thought he did a lot of good things; he did good work going back the way as well.

"There were things that I liked but I think our concentration went at times. Those are small, defining things. That's not work-rate or anything like that, but concentration cost us. You have to give England credit for putting the ball exactly in the right place. People think it's easy to take free-kicks and corners but it's not."

That disappointment was mirrored by both of Scotland's goalscorers. Miller, the Vancouver Whitecaps striker who was left out of Scotland's 1-0 World Cup qualifying win in Croatia in June, echoed Strachan's frustration at the lapses that cost the visitors. "We gave everything we had," he said. "With two goals, you might expect to have something from the game. It was disappointing, the two goals we lost in the second half, two set plays, it should be our bread and butter.

We are normally good at that but we let ourselves down and it cost us.

"It was fantastic to come back and be involved in the national team and to get a goal in a Scotland versus England game at Wembley was a bit of a dream. But it would have been far better if it would have been part of a positive result; the dream would have been it being the winning goal.

"It was a nice goal. It was a great ball in from Alan Hutton; I managed to turn and get the shot off and fortunately it went in. It was about seeing the game out and the two goals were disappointing but there are a lot of positives we can take."

His 10th-minute strike was,

said Morrison, his finest moment in football but insists he would have given it up for a victory. "It was definitely the highlight of my career. I'm lost for words. It will take a few weeks for it to sink in. I got it out of my feet and I thought 'I'm going to hit this' and, when it went in to the back of the net, it was a great feeling. Joe Hart is a great keeper but it was solid strike and it moved.

I am delighted but I would have liked a win more than a goal."

Roy Hodgson, the England manager, praised Scotland's tactics. "We made life difficult for ourselves by conceding twice, going behind twice, I would suggest against the run of play on both occasions," he said. "All credit to Scotland, they were well organised, sharp on the counter-attack and they certainly restricted space in and around their penalty area. We had to really probe and work hard and try things.

I didn't think there was anything really malicious in the game, both teams were very competitive but it was played in the right spirit."