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Alan Pattullo after Scotland win over Croatia
Transcript
00:00Hello, this is Alan Pattullo, I'm a Scotsman, football writer, just come up from the post-match
00:12press conference after Scotland's overdue victory, first victory of 2024, first competitive
00:19victory, which brings to, well completes a year of hand-in-games, with a win, a much
00:28needed win, of course Scotland must go to Poland on Monday night now and try and repeat
00:34the feat with a second consecutive victory, so to, well to certainly secure, definitely
00:41secure third place, perhaps we might even get second, depending on our events elsewhere
00:50and if there's a big enough goal swing, but let's concentrate on what happened here tonight
00:55first of all, Ben Doak was the star man, really came on to a game tonight, clearly
01:04very raw, but clearly very talented and gave Croatia a torrid time, certainly in the second
01:10half especially, and set up the winner for John McGuinness, who came on as a substitute
01:14midway through the second half and managed to get his 19th goal of his international
01:20career, which brings him on a par with Ali McCoyst of all people, Steve Clarke was a
01:27happy man downstairs, possibly slightly relieved, he described it as Scotland's worst performance
01:33of this Nations League section, but they were due a break and I think they probably were
01:39and they got that with a red card towards the end of the first half, which left Croatia
01:46obviously down to 10 men and really up against it, they did regroup and they actually did
01:54look dangerous at times in the second half, but Scotland managed to get that all-important
01:58goal, it was looking a bit dicey at one point, Hamden getting slightly agitated, but John
02:04McGuinness as he has so often in the past, came up with a good finish, steered it past
02:10the keeper, a difficult finish actually, when the ball dropped at him after the keeper had
02:16parried Doak's cross. So here we are, Scotthead, Warsaw, tried to pick up a second victory
02:27in four days, having only won once competitively since last September, since a win over Cyprus
02:36last September, which feels like another lifetime ago. Steve Clarke's certainly done well, I
02:43think he's changed the dial in terms of his own credibility, he looked like a dead man
02:50walking slightly after the Euros, but here we are, end of the year, or towards the end
02:56of the year, a good win over Croatia, and things will keep it brighter, certainly in
03:03the form of Ben Doak. Keep logged on to scottsman.com for more reports and opinion pieces over the
03:14next couple of days, my match report is on scottsman.com and I've just filed a quotes
03:19piece as well from Steve Clarke.