Caledonian Craig

Hmmm highly unlikely. If you think that they never qualified by rights (with a higher seeding) as not a reason to be hopefil then I think you are taking the pish. If you think them being bottom of their Nations keague group is not a reason to be hopeful then again I am highly dubious. And then fact their manager was under pressure to get resukts or be sacked and a lot more.

Possession count means nothing in football. It is results that matter. They never qualified through their group for the Euros? What happened there? Their manager's future hanging by a thread until late Thursday evening? Why? Hmm so they do not have strong back up in the keeper department. Was their No 1 keeper in goal when they got thrashed 5-0 by Ukraine?

And they leak goals. Poor temperament? A sending off is evidence of that. You could back Serbia to win all of them but you'd soon be skint with no winnings to pick up.

The games against Wales they equalised in the 85th minute in Cardiff and 76th minute in Belgrade. Football is a results game. Going on that formula they, just like us, failed to qualify through the group stages. In the current Nations League we top our group and they are bottom. Their coach was being asked if he would resign if they did not beat Norway so that says things have not been so rosy for them of late.

Well we can safely say then that Wales are better than us as Wales drew with them twice in that World Cup qualifying campaign. Also it is weird. Recently we scrambled to a win over minnows and our fans go apopleptic but Serbia have done the same in that time but its overlooked.

That was over two years ago now and irrelevant. I got picked up on using past Scotland results pre-dating Clarke's reign so same applied with Serbia's past games. Sure they will be favourites but I refuse to right off our chances against a team who, just like us did not qualify through the group stages.

Not if this report is anything to go by:- https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/serbia-star-makes-scotland-fan-22822122

I certainly would not put Serbia in the class of England or France though. Not even in the class of Russia or Belgium (the last two big teams we played).

No. Apologies I am getting mixed up with other Slovakia thread.

Possible.

We all know clubs hate players going on international duty. This is merely their way of trying to gain leverage to stop players going on international duty.

I do think New Zealand and Vietnam have advantages over Scotland and the rest of the UK. I'd guess both are not holidaymaker hotspots whereas Scotland and the UK is being in Europe and on Europeans doorsteps. Also perhaps New Zealand have been like Australia in that they closed their borders. I do think that would be a help. It really is quite stupid to allow people to move freely between countries in my opinion and certainly helps spread the virus. But you see that would throttle airlines and holiday companies and same goes for pubs on to close or not to close. We cannot have it both ways. We either be tough and shut down the borders and close pubs etc or the spread continues.

Just to add that Slovakia and Czech Republic do have COVID issues:- https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/54491472 Also worth noting that we have a knackered squad but so do Slovakia who also went through extra-time and penalties on Thursday night and then had a flight thereafter.

Tomorrow's game against Slovakia, we shouldn't lose focus on its importance as we have seen from out previous Nations League campaign. Yes we are through to a play-off final but tomorrow we have to go in search of three points and strengthen our position in this group. Now we know Paul McGinn, Andrew Considine and Ross McRorie have been called up to bolster the Covid-19/injury hit squad. A lot of the team put in a load of effort the other night so I'd expect big changes to the starting line-up. It would not surprise me to see us line-up something like this:- --------------------------------------------------------------------------------Marshall--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------Porteous---------------------------------Cooper-------------------------------------------------Taylor--------------------------------------------------------- ------------McGinn-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Robertson-------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------Jack--------------------------------------McLean----------------------------------------------------Fleck--------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------Fraser---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------Dykes-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yes but pretty sure they'd take Robertson and Tierney in a shot. Coming at this from a different angle but for years now we hear people on here going on about how Wales are no better than us well in the last World Cup qualifying campaign Wales got two draws against Serbia.

Sure a lot of their players are playing in Germany, England, Spain, Italy and France but not the highest calibre of clubs in those leagues aside from Kolarov at Inter.

Serbia's goal threat is Mitrovic who plays for Fulham. Can you imagine the moaning on here that he wasn't plating for a bigger/more fashionable EPL club?

Precisely. However, reading posters on here we are about to play the 1970 Brazil side.

Well I do believe they've already drawn 0-0 at home to Turkey.

Penalty shoot-outs do let us see more team unity though. It may look like something new/different but it is just because we have never had a penalty shoot-out before.

Also look at the current Nations League tables. We are top of our group and Serbia are bottom of theirs.

Well look at the opposition. The team our fans are painting as world beaters scrambled to a 3-2 win within the last two years) at home to Luxembourg similar to what we did and our fans were apopleptic about it remember? And if they are so far above us on the footballing scale why did they not qualify through the group stages?

Drew with the likes of England, Poland (twice) and won in Czexh Republic a few years ago. Also beat Slovakia so there have been times.

So next month we play Serbia in a winner takes all match in Serbia. Sure they will be warm to hot favourites but underdog role always seems to suit us better anyway so I am not unhappy with that. However, lets not go in with a defeatist attitude by bumming up our opponents too much. Clues are there that they are not unbeatable. Their manager (like ours) was under pressure and was being asked if he'd resign if they lost last night. Maybe that is to do with the fact that they have had patchy results over the last two years such as having drawn at home to Romania, laboured to a 2-1 win over Montenegro, beaten comfortably at home 4-2 by Portugal, laboured to a 3-2 win at home to Luxembourg, drew at home to Turkey 0-0 and drew 2-2 at home to Ukraine. Also there won't be an intimidating atmosphere to have to put up with. Sure they have players playing in top leagues as do we so lets not downplay ourselves. It is a one-off match and anything can happen.

They were more composed and comfortable in possession and had more of it as a result. We got into the more dangerous positions and came closer to scoring and held our nerve better in the shoot-out so we deserve it.