Assistant manager Mark McGhee has laid it on the line for Scotland. Any more slips and the World Cup dream is over.
Gordon Strachan’s right-hand man knows the national team must end the qualifying campaign with four straight wins if they are to have any hope of reaching Russia next summer.
The Scots are fourth in Group F and McGhee believes only a perfect 12 points from 12 will give them a chance of sneaking past rivals Slovakia and Slovenia to clinch second behind unbeaten leaders England.
Speaking ahead of tomorrow night’s match against Lithuania in Vilnius, McGhee said: “We simply can’t afford any more mistakes. That is the position we’re in and there’s no hiding from that. I’m not going to sit here and say if they slip up and we do this or that we might have a chance.
“I think we have to assume we have to win all four games, so we’ll roll our sleeves up starting on Friday night.”
While Strachan’s men face an uphill struggle to climb back on to the major stage they have not graced since the World Cup in France in 1998, McGhee reckons the fixture list does provide them with scope to build momentum.
After Friday’s match against a team managed by former Hearts forward Edgaras Jankauskas, Scotland then welcome Malta to Hampden on Monday.
McGhee hopes they can take maximum points from those two matches to set up a section finale with Slovakia due in Glasgow on October 5 before a potentially decisive trip to Slovenia three days later.
The former Aberdeen manager said: “I remember my first season back at Motherwell and I had the players in training on a Sunday before certain matches. If you win games the players will believe that’s the right thing to do.
“We were fortunate that while the likes of Hibs were playing Celtic, Rangers and Hearts, we had all the teams we imagined we should be beating such as Gretna, Inverness or St Mirren.
“We had a run where we racked up something like 13 points from 15. We probably weren’t playing any better than Hibs but we did have to face the opposition they were.
“What it did do, though, was give us a huge leg up and huge belief. So it can be the same here and we have got to believe we can roll the confidence. To have what on paper looks like the less difficult games at the end of the campaign is the right order. There is no doubt if we win these two games this weekend we will take some beating in the last couple.”
Belief inside the Scotland camp has ratcheted up a couple of notches in the wake of their spirited showing against England in June.
Harry Kane denied them a famous win with his last-gasp equaliser but McGhee said Scotland can have no excuse for dropping their standards against the likes of Lithuania.
He said: “We will have to decide what is going to work out best against Lithuania and then apply it with the same energy and enthusiasm we showed against England.
“Nothing changes in that sense. We set a standard against England and there is no excuse for us not to bring that same determination to any other performance, regardless of the tactics or the set-up.
“The starting point has to be a determination to work harder than the opposition.
“We were disappointed when we drew against Lithuania at Hampden last October. We looked at three or four individuals who we hoped would win us the game. But those players in an attacking sense didn’t do terribly well.
“So that was the disappointing thing. It wasn’t so much about Lithuania that night, it was more about ourselves.
“I don’t think they’re better than they were a year ago, but I think we are. They are at home, they have lost consecutive games so they will be playing for pride, so I don’t think we can under-estimate them. But I don’t think anything has changed to say they have got an awful lot better than they were a year ago.”
