Steve Clarke says Scotland have a “fantastic problem” with selection after completing their World Cup preparations with a convincing win over Bolivia.
Clarke started Scotland’s final friendly as one of two strikers before the tournament against Haiti in Boston next week and it paid dividends in a 4-0 win with Che Adams’ brace either side of Lawrence Shankland’s early opener and Scott McTominay’s strike.
There was good performance all over the stadium. But Scotland’s players have tried to impress in their World Cup opener and Clarke admitted he welcomes the selection challenge ahead of next week.
“We face enormous challenges,” he said. “The first half was really good, we went back to the bench and the changes we made were good. If you make too many changes on either side you lose the rhythm of the game a little bit.
Lawrence Shankland celebrates with Che Adams and Scott McTominay from the Scotland national team.
“But for the players that went in, we wanted a clean sheet so conceding wasn’t the priority. “It’s been a while since we’ve had a clean sheet so I’m glad we got it.
“Goals will be important. Obviously we’ve been told we haven’t scored enough goals, but that’s four points in a row. It’s about creating chances. The creation of chances was good tonight. If we create good chances, we’ve got the players on the pitch who will score goals.”
Scotland’s performance was even more impressive considering the stifling heat in Harrison, New Jersey, where the match took place, but Clark said he was encouraged by the players’ response and said the group was ready for the tournament to begin.
Scotland players cooling off during water break against Bolivia.
“We are preparing as best we can at this stage,” he said. “Obviously you can’t always get everything you want in terms of preparation. We went to Florida for the heat and humidity and the humidity was high but it rained a lot. We probably didn’t get the heat we were hoping for, but we got that heat in the first half today and I thought we handled it well.
“I prepared as best as I could so far, and I will prepare well this week so I can start the tournament well.”
Clarke was not too keen on the excellent performance and result, reminding his players that he felt confident heading into Euro 2024 ahead of a disappointing tournament in Germany.
Steve Clarke speaks to Ben Gannon-Doak during Scotland’s win over Bolivia.
“We obviously won a few games to get into the tournament and it’s always important for the players to feel good about themselves,” he said.
“But to be honest, I didn’t read too much into it because they felt good about going to Germany!”
