SCOTLAND are about to make a long-awaited return to a place they have never been before.

So much time has passed since they last played at Wembley Stadium that the English took the chance to demolish it and build a new one. Without getting into any newco/oldco territory, let's just say that the stadium's history transferred across.

The old ground was finished off in 2003 and the new one opened in 2007. An arch now dominates instead of the Twin Towers and 90,000 seats are on the site where once there was terracing capable of housing 100,000. Inside, no member of the Tartan Army will recognise anything from any distant previous visits. The goal frame will have goalline technology cameras on it this time, not guys punching the air about Ally MacLeod. But the majesty of the name remains: Wembley.

It is nearly 14 years since a Scotland team and fans occupied the place but inevitably some individuals made their own way there. Shaun Maloney and James McArthur won the FA Cup at the north London venue in May and both were there again at the weekend for the Community Shield. Charlie Adam sat in Scotland's St Albans hotel yesterday and reminisced warmly about the day he turned up at Wembley and scored one of the biggest goals of his career.

Tomorrow will witness a one-off return of the once regular invasion, with Scottish voices likely to raise the decibel level regardless of what unfolds below them on the pitch. This international friendly will be the opportunity for thousands of supporters to make a first visit to a place which is woven into the tapestry of Scottish football. Many of the team will be appearing there for the first time, too. With a capacity of 90,000 it will be the biggest venue most of the players and fans have ever experienced (only Barcelona's Camp Nou holds more among European grounds).

The years of occasional Scottish triumphs at Wembley - there have been nine in total since England began playing there in 1923 - have been lovingly recalled in recent days. 1928, 1963, 1967 and 1977 stand out. The players know they are about to take to the field somewhere special.

When Blackpool went there in the 2010 play-off final, Adam planted a free-kick in Cardiff City's net, setting his club on the way to a return to top flight football for the first time in 39 years. "When you have a moment like that, it never goes away," said the Scotland midfielder yesterday. "Wembley is one of the best stadiums in the world and there have been some great games there and hopefully Wednesday will be no different.

"It is one of the most iconic stadiums. The atmosphere is different now from what it was before, I don't think there is the same atmosphere as there was. The majority of stadiums nowadays are like that because of the way they are built. But when there are 20,000 Scotland fans in it there is going to be an atmosphere. These are the games you want to play in. England have world-class players in their team. We will go there and want to win the game.

"Scotland-England is the sort of game you want to play in during your career, it wouldn't have felt the same if it had never happened. We should play each other every year. Everyone enjoys it, we have 20,000 Scotland fans coming to Wembley and I don't think there will be any problems. 14 years is a long time and hopefully we don't have to wait quite as long for the next one."

Adam has played his football in England since 2009, with Blackpool, Liverpool and now Stoke City. That equipped him to make an interesting point yesterday about the circumstances around this game, namely that England go into it under more pressure than Scotland. The English football public does not take the Scottish game seriously and consequently the reaction would be merciless towards Roy Hodgson and his players were they to lose or even draw. Scotland have plenty of limitations, of course, but they will not be burdened by expectation.

"This is a chance for us to show there are good players in our team," said Adam. "We have good players who play in the Premier League every week so I don't think the English people disrespect us. [But] they have a massive expectation on them because of who they are and what they have got. Why should we feel inferior? The majority of our players play against them every week. We don't feel inferior about going to Wembley and playing the likes of Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard or Wayne Rooney."

Adam's admiration for Gerrard grew enormously in the year that he spent as his Liverpool team-mate. "He is the best I have played with, without a shadow of a doubt. He is probably one of the top players in the Premier League over the past 10 years. I was fortunate enough to share a dressing room with him and see him at close-quarters. He's the sort of guy you want to impress on your first day in training."

There is no veteran in the squad who has been around long enough to have played England before, and of course there have been a few incumbents since manager Craig Brown last led out a Scotland team at Wembley in 1999. But connections remain. The hotel in St Albans is the same one the SFA booked for that game 14 years ago, and a framed and autographed Scotland shirt hangs among much other memorabilia.