By Stewart Fisher
STEVE Clarke has revealed that he plans to ask league bosses for their help in Scotland’s bid to qualify for Euro 2020.
Facing two make-or-break play-off ties at the end of March against either Bulgaria, Israel or Romania then most likely Norway of Serbia to make it to our first major finals since 1998, the national team boss said last night that the SFA may start a dialogue with the SPFL in a bid to make sure the Ladbrokes Premiership card immediately prior to those matches is all concluded by the Sunday in order to maximise his time working with his players.
Such a request, of course, would just relate to the national team’s domestic-based players, and require the agreement of broadcasters Sky and BT Sport, with St Mirren playing host to Rangers on the weekend of March 19/20 and Celtic due to take on St Johnstone at Parkhead.
Another potential fly in the ointment could be either Celtic or Rangers qualifying for the last 16 of the Europa League, with matches in the continent’s second club competition also scheduled for Thursday March 19. It may only buy him 24 hours for some of his players, but Clarke reckons that pushing all domestic matches to the Saturday where possible could pay dividends.
“I don’t think it would be possible for them to postpone it,” said Clarke. “It might be nice if there were no Sunday fixtures.
“Maybe we could make that request. That would then become a dialogue between another organisation and the television people.
“But it would be nice to think no one would be involved in a Sunday game. Maybe we could control that better in Scotland than down south.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel