The end of a 24 year wait? Scotland learn playoff pathway

Scotland have received a favourable draw for the 2022 World Cup playoffs.

Steve Clarke will inevitably remain balanced about the Tartan Army’s Qatar ambitions, but the head coach must have been rubbing his hands together with considerable swathes of the country on Friday evening.

The draw, held at the FIFA HQ in the Swiss city of Zurich, pitted the Scots in Path A, with a semifinal tie against Ukraine forthcoming in Spring.

Should Scotland progress against their eastern European opponent, they’ll face Wales or Austria in a straight shoot-out for a spot in the Middle East.

Will it be a home-nations final?

As referenced in our article last week, Scotland should feel relatively confident against the Ukrainians, who have recently lost national icon Andriy Shevchenko as head coach. Despite a respectable Euro’s run which saw Ukraine eventually knocked out by England at the quarterfinal stage, Ukraine still have substantial quality in their ranks.

Clarke’s team will look to negate the considerable talents of Premiership duo Andriy Yarmolenko of West Ham and Oleksandr Zinchenko of Manchester City, as well as classy dangerman Roman Yaremchuk of Portuguese powerhouse Benfica.

Wales will head into the Austria fixture with home advantage and the form card on their side; the Dragons are unbeaten since their European Championship Round of 16 hammering at the hands of Denmark in Amsterdam last June.

Austria, a rather unimpressive force in Scotland’s group, have lost 3 of their 6 matches since themselves being dumped out of the Euros at the second-round stage. One of those defeats coming on home soil against Steve Clarke’s men.

However, Wales’ performance level was generally patchy throughout their World Cup qualification campaign, registering goalless draws in Helsinki and in Cardiff to Estonia, but conversely putting 5 past Belarus and beating a competent Czech side in a crucial victory on Matchday 3.

The side have struggled to regain the scintillating form they demonstrated during the Euro 2016 finals in France, with linchpin Gareth Bale’s contribution waning in recent years. The Real Madrid forward netted 15 times in the period between 2014 and 2016; his comparative goal tally in the last three years has dried up to 5.

Tangible hope for Scotland

There’s a substantial amount of work to do before Scotland can start to think of their first return to the world’s premier footballing contest since 1998 and certainly no room for complacency, but the vast proportion of the Tartan Army will be quietly confident heading into March’s match-up with Ukraine, and the potential fixture beyond.

The draw in full (all ties to be played March 24, 2022):

Path A: Wales vs. Austria, Scotland vs. Ukraine

Path B: Russia vs. Poland, Sweden vs. Czech Republic

Path C: Portugal vs. Turkey, Italy vs North Macedonia

The venue draw for the three sets of play-off finals will take place after the outcome of the six semifinals played on March 24.

It’s already the closest Scotland have come to a World Cup this century, but they won’t be ringing Del Amitri to record the official anthem just yet …