ALEX McLeish admitted he can sense a burning desire among his Scotland players to secure a Euro 2020 play-off place and silence their critics on the eve of their final Nations League match against Israel last night.
The national team, who thrashed Albania 4-0 in Shkoder in their penultimate fixture on Saturday, need to win their final Group C1 match at Hampden this evening to top their section.
The commitment of many of the players to their country’s cause had been questioned in the build-up to the game at the weekend after no fewer than nine players pulled out of the squad.
However, McLeish, who could field the same starting line-up as the weekend, has revealed the criticism his men have been subjected to has created a determination to succeed and he is confident they can achieve their objective.
“I can see it in their eyes,” he said. “I’ve been in football a long, long time and I know when you get a good feeling about things.
“I get a good feeling about this group of players. I see it in their body language. I see guys who are very motivated to win for Scotland and give their best performances. You get a good feeling as a manager when you see that kind of player in your dressing room.”
McLeish added: “Hell hath no fury like a Scotsman scorned. The DNA of the Scotsman comes into it. The players don’t like to be criticised, I don’t like it. Because we don’t like to fail.
“But out of a failure, which was Israel away, we had to show the resilience and look at how we approached Albania.
“It’s never easy away from home at any level. Look at Liverpool recently going to Red Star Belgrade, people expecting them to wipe the floor with them, but they had a difficult night and lost.
“You have to earn it and we certainly earned it on Saturday with a performance level which was really good.
“There is no doubt it (winning the group) would be an achievement. Look at England winning yesterday (Gareth Southgate’s men beat Croatia at Wembley to top their section) and the way they celebrated.
“So, of course, we have to embrace this. We will be going all out to win it tomorrow night. We’ve won a semi-final at the weekend and we are facing a big final tomorrow night.
“The guys have come off the back of a good performance with great confidence and I emphasise I can see it in their stature at the moment. The way they are walking about. When you talk to them individually they are all absolutely 100 per cent keen to do something for their country.”
Asked if he would keep faith the team that won on Saturday, McLeish said: “I’ll be tempted, yeah. We’ll keep it close to our chests at the minute. But I’ve done that before on many, many occasions as a manager. The good news is that everyone is fit to play.”
Israel are level on points with Scotland and only need to draw to go through because they would, having won 2-1 in Haifa last month, have a better head-to-head record than their rivals.
Asked if he thought Andi Herzog’s side would sit in and play for a point, he said: “That’s the question. They have been very positive and very strong going forward with the ball. They play very high wing backs and they were really committed in Israel. They played really high against us.
“We probably disappointed a wee bit in not seeing that space in behind them and not going there much more. Whether they will come here and sit in we have to wait and see.”
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