Craig Gordon urges Scotland to push on after important Croatia win

Scotland goalkeeper Craig Gordon admits the team weren’t at their best in the 1-0 win over Croatia but hopes the result can be the start of a Nations League success story.

John McGinn’s late goal against ten-man Croatia gave Scotland their first win since being promoted to League A, and boosted hopes that the team can avoid automatic relegation back to the second tier.

A win against Poland on Monday night would see Scotland go into a play-off at worst, and if results were in their favour they could even reach the quarter-final of the competition.

Gordon didn’t want to look to far ahead but with the team having failed to win a competitive match in 2024 before Friday night, and the only victory at all coming in a friendly against Gibraltar, he knew exactly how important it was to have found a way to defeat Croatia.

“It was probably not one of the better performances, to be perfectly honest,” he said. “We didn’t hit the heights of the performances in some of the defeats. But we got a win and that was the most important thing.

“We’ve come so close and we had a little bit of luck tonight that we maybe haven’t had in a number of games. We’ve managed to see it through and get the win.

“With the way the group was situated, it was important we didn’t lose. So it was going to get to that point where you ask how much you’re going to throw at it. Do we do something and perhaps risk it at the other end? But we also needed a point to make sure we were in a good position going into the next game.

“So there were those sort of things in the back of everybody’s mind so it was nice to see that shot hit the back of the net and us get three points.

Scotland now travel to Warsaw for the final group game with the knowledge that a win would secure a play- spot at first. But if Croatia lose to Portugal and Scotland win, with a three-goal swing, then second place and progress in the tournament would seal a remarkable turnaround.

“We just need to keep winning matches,” Gordon said. “We got that first win and now we need to try and back that up now. We’ll see where that takes us.

“Everybody will be talking about all the permutations that are possible going into this last game but for us it’s about going there and trying to win.

“It was quite calm in the dressing room afterwards. We do feel as if we’ve been building towards this and performances have been of a good enough level to win matches.

“We’ve just not managed to do that so it’s nice to get one in the bag and now we can push on.”