PAUL Lambert believes that if Andy Robertson picks up a Champions League winners’ medal next Saturday that it won’t be until his career is over that he will appreciate the magnitude of what he has done.

Robertson will line up for Liverpool against Tottenham Hotspur at the Wanda Metropolitano on Saturday evening as he looks to lift the UEFA Champions League and emulate the feat Lambert enjoyed in 1997.

Lambert remains the last Scot to play in a Champions League final and win it – Darren Fletcher was an unused sub when Manchester United beat Chelsea to win it in 2008 – and the former Celtic captain made his own bit of history in the competition. Lambert became the first British player to win the Champions League since its inception with Borussia Dortmund’s 3-1 victory over Juventus in the 1997 UEFA Champions League Final.

“My situation was slightly different in that I was with a f o r e i g n team but you genuinely don’t realise just how huge it is until you have done it. It feels amazing but at the same time I think the more that time passes, the more you appreciate the magnitude of it.

“I am still welcomed back to Germany and people still want to talk to me about it. It is as the years go by that you can really appreciate what it meant to so many people and what an achievement it was. It’s indescribable. You really have to try to savour it but I am not sure you can take it all in. It really pushes you into an elite bracket of players which gives you so much confidence and belief in yourself.

“No-one can ever take it away once you have got your hands on it. And to be able to say that you have won the Champions League, something that so few players have done, gives you an assurance about yourself that you can’t buy. “From that moment on whenever you walk into a dressing room or anywhere else, you have that. You know what you are capable of and the level you are comfortable playing at.”

Like Lambert, Robertson has taken an unconventional path to where he is now. Robertson has grown weary of the retelling of his lowly Queen’s Park days where he combined training with part-time work in Marks and Spencer but the trajectory of his career is something that has been difficult to overlook. Still, Lambert has warned that even if he is successful in taking the most elite prize of all that he cannot afford to stand still.

“When I went to Germany I shared a dressing room with people who were household names,” said Lambert. “Guys who had won the World Cup. The likes of Matthias Sammer, Jurgen Koehler, Andreas Moeller, Paolo Sousa, Karl-Heinz Riedle and Stephane Chapuisat were all in that dressing room but what I have always found throughout my career is that the best players are also the most humble.

“When you have done it, you don’t need to do any big talking. Your medals do it for you.

“And that is the thing for Andy. I don’t know him at all but the most important thing for him is that he keeps his feet on the ground and keeps working. He is at Liverpool with an exciting manager and at an exciting time.

“He is just unlucky that Manchester City and Pep Guardiola have been so exceptional this season otherwise he would have had a Premier League winners medal with Liverpool. He has made amazing strides in his career over the last five years or so but the main thing is that you have to keep that appetite.

“You have to keep getting better. And that is where you see genuinely top-class players – in their attitude and application and in what they do in their daily lives. It doesn’t matter what you do, you can still keep pushing to be better.

"So, regardless of what happens for him on Saturday, it is vital that he keeps a level head. I know Jurgen [Klopp] well enough to know that he’ll have that attitude instilled in all his players.”

Liverpool have beaten Spurs domestically this term but predicting a winner on that evidence would seem like an act of folly given the manner of their respective journeys to the final. “I know Jurgen and he’s an excellent coach but the same goes for Mauricio Pochettino too,” said Lambert. “They are both outstanding managers and I love the way that both of their teams play. They are both good teams to watch and it’s a really difficult call to make as to who will come out on top. I love their enthusiasm and you see the way it rubs off on their players. I’m really looking forward to the game.”

As a new era begins with the national team, it would do Steve Clarke no harm to have a Champions League winner in his ranks.

“I never thought of myself like that,” said Lambert. “I think you need good players around you and the difference between then and now is that I had guys like Gary McAllister who was playing at the very top level beside me, Jim Leighton, Andy Goram – they all had experience at the very top level. The more players you have who are performing at that level, the better.

“But good luck to Andy next Saturday. I don’t know the lad personally but he has an amazing opportunity and I’m sure he appreciates that.”

Lambert and Clarke go back a long way, with the pair first crossing paths back in 1985. Clarke was one of the experienced players at Love Street as Lambert was taking his first steps in a professional career and the former Scotland captain believes he has the capabilities to go in and exert significant influence on the national team.

“I started off playing right-back and he was the outside right and he was brilliant for us kids that were just trying to come through,” said Lambert. “He has done brilliantly at Kilmarnock but I was never surprised at that. He is not a novice. He is a really experienced coach who has worked at the highest level and with elite players. This might be a bit different for him now because it is not the same as the day-to-day life of club football but it is a massive challenge and one that I think he will relish.

“He knows what he has got to work with and he knows what the big ambitions of the job are. But players will respond to him and as everyone has seen at Kilmarnock over the past couple of seasons, he knows how to get the best of them.”