Scotland boss Clarke refuses to confirm if star man Doak will start must-win clash with Poland
Steve Clarke has warned that he won’t gamble on playing Ben Doak against Poland if he feels that two games in four days would place too much strain on the teenage winger.
The 19-year-old terrorised Manchester City’s £77million left-back Josko Gvardiol during a man-of-the-match display in Scotland’s 1-0 win over Croatia at Hampden last Friday.
Victory in Warsaw tomorrow evening — combined with a Croatia loss to Portugal — could potentially seal second place in Group A1 of the Nations League and secure a pot-one seeding for next month’s draw for the World Cup qualifiers. Lose or draw and Scotland will be relegated.
Still pondering his starting XI, Clarke praised Doak’s impact against Croatia but spoke once again of the need to protect the young player from excessive demands.
‘As I sit here now — I haven’t named the team,’ said the Scotland boss. ‘All the boys who finished the game the other night, you have to take a look and make sure they wake up tomorrow morning fit, fresh and ready to go. That’s something else you have to think about.’
Already a fans' favourite, Doak’s omission from the start would leave a lot of disappointed supporters, many of whom accuse the manager of an overly cautious approach towards the player, who is on loan at Middlesbrough from Liverpool.
Ben Doak, who was man of the match against Croatia, is not guaranteed to start in Poland
Steve Clarke admits there will be many disappointed fans if Doak is omitted from the starting XI
Goalkeeper Craig Gordon is expected to play, despite a virus that has prevented him training
‘Yeah, there would be,’ Clarke admitted. ‘But that’s my job.
‘He can be (a game changer), as long as we look after him and make sure that he continues to develop. A lot of people see the good things that he does.
‘Me and my coaching staff are a little bit more analytical. We’ll see other things that he doesn’t do quite so well, because he’s only a young player and he’s looking to learn.
‘I think he’s in a good environment at Middlesbrough in terms of learning the game and working on the game. When I watch his progress there, from when he got into the team until now, he’s improved already, in my opinion.
‘But there’s a lot to work on over the years. But, at the moment, you guys can all be excited about what he does with the ball. There’s plenty of time for him to develop and it’s important not to put too much pressure on the boy.’
Goalkeeper Craig Gordon failed to train on the even of the game after contracting a virus. The Hearts veteran travelled to Poland and Clarke expects the 41-year-old to be ready for one last push to avoid relegation from League A.
The manager said: ‘We know all about Poland because we played them at Hampden (a 3-2 defeat for Scotland). They’ve got big threats. People will look at their game against Portugal and think: “5-1 — they got hammered”.
‘But they didn’t. They were very good. The game just got away from them. We expect a tough challenge.’
