Former Scotland boss Alex McLeish reckons Steve Clarke’s side can succeed where his missed out and qualify for a major tournament.
McLeish and Scotland were close to qualifying for Euro 2008 but for a late goal against Italy at Hampden Park.
Scotland are once again within one game of making a European Championships, with victory over Serbia enough to send them to the competition next year.
McLeish said: “The draw score-line we had with the Italians before they scored their second goal wouldn’t have been enough for us. But, it was very close.
“It will be a very tough game in Serbia. They are a very confident bunch, they’ve been bumping their gums about it since the draw was made.
“One of their top players, Sergej Milinkovic-Savic, I had at Genk and he’s a player Stevie’s got to make sure they put the shackles on. Also big Mitrovic in London with his Fulham prowess is someone I know a lot about too, including also his goal-scoring record at international level.
“But Stevie’s got the team in a great winning streak and we have defended really well. He’s made us hard to beat. We beat a good Czech team as opposed to their B team thateverybody spoke about the previous weeks before.
“We’ve proved ourselves against a top team like the CzechRepublic, so we can take plenty of confidence from that. There’s no reason why we can’t win the play-off final in Serbia.”