Scotland took a major step towards the EURO 2008
Championships in Austria and Switzerland with a
crucial 3-1 win over Ukraine at Hampden this
afternoon.
The win leaves the Scots requiring four points from
their remaining two fixtures, away to Georgia on
Wednesday and at home to Italy on 17 November.
However Manager Alex McLeish has major selection
problems for Tbilisi with his midfield decimated
through injury and suspension. Scott Brown will almost
certainly be absent through injury, as will Paul
Hartley and joining them on the sidelines will be Lee
McCulloch whose booking today rules him out.
The Scots team included four Rangers players in their
starting line-up, namely Alan Hutton, David Weir, Lee
McCulloch and Barry Ferguson as captain.
The home side got off to the perfect start in just
three minutes when Kenny Miller met a Jamie McFadden
free-kick at the near post to head home.
The capacity Hampden crowd of 51,336 erupted, but the
Ukrainians were soon threatening an equaliser - four
minutes after conceding the opening goal Oleh Gusev
moved in from the right on an Andriy Shevchenko pass
only to see his shot from the edge of the box touched
over by Craig Gordon.
There was no stopping Scotland however - and
unbelievably it was 2-0 in nine minutes when a
cleverly-worked Barry Ferguson free-kick found
McCulloch free wide on the left, the Ranger curling
the ball into the top corner of the net.
Ukraine were not here simply to make up the numbers
however - and the deficit was reduced in 23 minutes
when Shevchenko netted Andriy Nesmachny's cross.
Suddenly there was a nervousness abroad on the Mount
Florida slopes - but the home side had a strong
penalty claim turned down by Dutch Referee Pieter Vink
eleven minutes later when Hutton was felled by Andriy
Vorobei.
Again, on the stroke of half-time, there was another
loud shout for a spot-kick when Jamie McFadden, racing
through, went down when challenged by Anatoliy
Tymoschuk. This was perhaps not as strong a claim as
the earlier incident, but McCulloch felt strongly
enough about it to talk himself into the referee's
notebook, thus ruling him out of the trip to Georgia.
For good measure, Ferguson too received a yellow card
for his troubles.
The visitors restarted on the offensive, determined to
salvage something from a game they had to win. Andriy
Voronin of Liverpool saw a twenty-yard snap-shot fly
just wide of the target in 49 minutes, then two
minutes later Oleksandr Hladkiy's shot from the edge
of the box was parried by Craig Gordon.
Christian Dailly replaced McCulloch just before the
hour - but midway through the second-half it was 3-1
when McFadden rifled home a Hutton cross.
Scotland were now in a commanding position - although
the Ukrainians refused to admit defeat. Substitute
Serhiy Nazarenko saw his header in 74 minutes from a
Hladkiy flick held by Gordon, and the Scots goalkeeper
again had to be alert in the dying minutes when he was
equal to a snap-shot from Voronin.
It was the home side who finished on top however with
substitute Garry O'Connor seeing his 22-yard effort
from a Miller lay-off flashing wide of the target.
Afterwards a delighted Alex McLeish looked back:
"The team keeps confounding people. Their commitment
was outstanding and the finishing phenomenal. We got
off to a flier. This is a massive step to
qualification."
So now it's on to Tbilisi…
SCOTLAND Gordon (Sunderland); Hutton (Rangers),
Naismith (Sheffield United); McManus (Celtic), Weir
(Rangers), Ferguson (Rangers); Pearson (Derby County),
McCulloch (Rangers) [Dailly (West Ham United) 79],
Miller (Derby County), Brown (Celtic) [Maloney (Aston
Villa) 75], McFadden (Everton) [O'Connor (Birmingham
City) 79]
UNUSED SUBS Marshall (Norwich City), Robson (Dundee
United), Boyd (Rangers), Alexander (Burnley),
UKRAINE Shovkovskiy (Dinamo Kiev); Yezersky (Shakhtar
Donetsk), Kucher (Shakhtar Donetsk), Chigrinskiy
(Shakhtar Donetsk), Nesmachny (Dinamo Kiev); Gusev
(Dinamo Kiev) [Rotan (Dinamo Kiev) 45], Tymoschuk
(Zenit St. Petersburg) [Shelaiev (Dnipro) 72], Voronin
(Liverpool), Vorobei (Dnipro) [Nazarenko (Dnipro) 61];
Hladkiy (Shakhtar Donetsk), Shevchenko (Chelsea),
UNUSED SUBS Piatov (Shakhtar Donetsk), Milevskiy
(Dinamo Kiev), Gai (Shakhtar Donetsk), Hrytsai
(Dnipro)
REFEREE Pieter Vink (Holland)