JOHN McGINN was so appalled at Scotland being the only home nation not represented at the European Championships in France that he booked a holiday in order to avoid watching it on television. Now, three years down the line, he is so convinced the national team will make it that he has decided against booking up for next summer.
The Aston Villa confirmed his emergence as the national team’s main goal threat under Steve Clarke when he added two more goals to his tally against Kazakhstan last night. That made it seven goals for the campaign, equal to the number which Belgian hot-shot Romelu Lukaku has to his name in Group I.
While Scotland’s Euro 2020 fate will be settled in the play-offs in March, once again we are looking like bumper representation from teams from these island. England and Wales have qualified, while Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland join us in the play-offs. McGinn is determined that Scots should be the butt of the joke no longer.
“It was tough in 2016 and to be honest I didn’t watch much of the competition,” said McGinn. “I was on the periphery of the squad at the time and know how close we got to qualifying only to fall short.
READ MORE: Scotland 3 Kazakhstan 1: Five things we learned in Scotland's successful revenge mission
“So with everyone else there, it was so hard to watch - I went on holiday, I was out of the country and spent my time chilling out instead of watching it. But I haven’t booked a holiday for next summer because I believe we’ll get there.
“For a long time it has been Scotland sitting on the sidelines when other teams are playing in major championships,” he added. “There won’t be another country in the Home Nations who are craving getting to this Euros more than us. We just want to give the fans, the loyal supporters who turn out to watch us, something to shout about. Getting to a major tournament for them is the aim of everyone.”
While Scotland booked that play-off under Alex McLeish, that is three wins on the bounce for the first time in two years and McGinn is convinced that Scotland are a far more serious proposition under Steve Clarke.
“I have never had a run of scoring like this before,” admitted McGinn. “Naisy has helped me because he links the play and I can feed off the scraps. But it's odd. I went 15 caps without a goal. And it was annoying me. Then I got the goal against Russia and it just seems to have come from there. Hopefully I can carry it on into the play-offs, if it is helping the team and the campaign I am delighted.
“Tonight was a night where it could easily have been the same old Scotland, we concede and then heads drop. But we regrouped, got together again and definitely going into the playoffs we are in a much better place.”
With the likes of Andy Robertson, Kieran Tierney, Ryan Fraser and Scott McTominay still to return, Ryan Christie is bullish about our chances of qualification. ‘‘I’ve no preference as to who we get in Friday’s draw for the play-offs," he said. "But we are not going to get a better chance than this to reach the Euros.”
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