'Make amends' - the one Scotland defeat that still stings as Steve Clarke reveals plan for Aaron Hickey

The 3-1 loss at Hampden in fixture put back three months due to the invasion of Ukraine by Russia still stings. It cost Clarke’s side the chance to play Wales in a one-off play-off final in Cardiff for a place at Qatar.

On the eve of another campaign, Clarke has named a 25-man squad to face Denmark and Belarus. The next 12 weeks could see Scotland claim an automatic spot at next summer’s final if they finish top of a four-team group where Greece are the other awkward contestants.

Clarke has all but confirmed that this will be his last campaign in charge of Scotland, something which also drives his desire to become the first Scotland manager since Craig Brown to qualify for a men’s World Cup. Scotland rarely had a better chance than in June 2022, when an undercooked if emotionally charged Ukraine side came to Scotland and outplayed the hosts before succumbing against Wales a few days later.

“That's the one we feel we missed an opportunity for sure,” said Clarke. “Just the whole circumstances around the fact that the play-off game was delayed to June. We were probably missing one or two players that we would have had in the March that we didn't have in the June.

“The whole thing around the start of the war at that time between Russia and Ukraine. Maybe that got into our psyche, I don't know, but certainly on the night at Hampden, they played better than they'd ever played and we played as poorly as we'd played in the previous year and that resulted in us not going to the World Cup. We've got a lot of boys there who really want to make amends and hopefully we can do that."

‘He won’t play two 90 minutes’

Aaron Hickey is one of those that played that night. He is doubly determined to reach the finals next summer having been sidelined for last summer’s Euro 2024 tournament. He has only just returned to the Brentford squad having missed almost two years of football due to a serious hamstring injury.

He is line to make his first Scotland appearance since a 2-0 defeat to Spain in Seville in October 2023. Clarke admitted that playing the duration of both qualifiers next month so early in his comeback might be beyond the 23-year-old. The manager had a long chat with the player last week.

“Nothing seems to faze him,” he said. “You think two years out, or almost two years out, at that stage of your career can be a very difficult thing. Aaron didn’t seem fazed at all. He was really looking forward to being in the squad.

“Probably with the two games back-to-back it's going to be difficult for him to play two 90 minutes, for sure,” Clarke added. “But if we can get him on the pitch at some stage and he can show the qualities that he's shown, I think we'll be really delighted with him.”

Clarke has included Kieron Bowie in the squad after watching the Hibs striker, who made his international debut against Liechtenstein in June, score a wonder goal against Partizan Belgrade earlier his month.