Key events
Ewan Murray’s preview
Steve Clarke will take a moment to celebrate a significant achievement when Belarus visit Hampden Park on Sunday. It will be game 72 in office for Clarke, surpassing Craig Brown as Scotland’s longest-serving manager in terms of matches.
Clarke’s big picture involves World Cup qualification, with Scotland in a strong position, but he can appreciate his longevity. “I’d be a bit daft if I wasn’t proud because I’m the first guy to reach that amount of games,” he said. “It’s nice, but that’s a little personal thing at the moment. It shouldn’t be about me. It’s about the team and it’s about trying to get to the World Cup so that’s what we’re going to focus on.
“The brief was to qualify for tournaments. We’ve managed to do that twice, but we want to do it again because we’re all greedy. The expectation was to do as well as I could. I’ve always looked at the players and you’re thinking: ‘What can we do to improve?’ Did I think it would last this long? Probably not, but here I am.”
Yes, yes, that Clockwise clip is a bit of a cliché. But really, there are no words that could better express Scotland’s relationship with the World Cup – at least none that I can print before 9pm. Previous generations dreamed of getting beyond the group stages; now the goal is to reach the group stages.
Scotland haven’t qualified for the World Cup since 1998, but Thursday’s comeback victory over Greece has given everyone an industrial-strength shot of the mixed blessing we call hope. Here’s how Group C looks at the halfway stage. (The top team go through automatically, the runners-up go into the playoffs.)
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Denmark P3 Pts 7 GD +9
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Scotland P3 Pts 7 GD +4
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Greece P3 Pts 3 GD -1
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Belarus P3 Pts 0 GD -12
If all goes to plan, Scotland will host Denmark in their last group game on 18 November knowing that a win – maybe even a draw, but let’s not get greedy eh – will secure automatic qualification for the World Cup.
Scotland go to Greece, who could be out of contention, three days before that Denmark game. Before we look to those games, it’s important – and I really can’t stress this enough – that they don’t make an emphatic balls-up of today’s game at Belarus at home.
Belarus are the weakest team in the group, and Scotland won last month’s return fixture 2-0. All things being equal, Scotland will win today.
All things being equal! We’re talking about Scotland and the World Cup here. Nothing is equal, least of all the eternal arm-wrestle between hope and despair.
Preamble
Kick off 5pm.
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