Greece will not rush decision on whether Konstantinos Karetsas faces Scotland

Scotland have to wait to see if 17-year-old Greece star Konstantinos Karetsas gets another chance to torment them in Thursday night’s 2026 World Cup qualifier at Hampden Park.

The young Genk attacker made a big impression when he came off the bench to make his international debut in the 1-0 Nations League defeat by the Scots in Piraeus in March.

Karetsas started for the first time in the return game at Hampden Park three days later and scored his first Greece goal and set up another in the 3-0 win which took the visitors into League A while relegating Steve Clarke’s side to League B.

Karetsas has had an illness but trained with his team-mates at the national stadium on Wednesday night and boss Ivan Jovanavic will assess him ahead of the game against the Scots, who have four points from six in their opening two Group C qualifiers.

Speaking through an interpreter at Hampden before training, he said: “He’s been ill for a few days. Yesterday, he joined up with the team.

“Today, he will train and his situation will be evaluated at the training session and overnight, heading into tomorrow’s game and with the hope that he’s able to help fully going into the Denmark game as well.”

Asked if he would gamble on Karetsas’s fitness it was touch and go, Jovanavic said: “The question isn’t so much if it’s 50/50, we want to rely more on players that are 100 per cent ready for their matches.”

Jovanavic, whose side lost 3-0 at home to Denmark last month after hammering Belarus 5-1 in their Group C opener, insists he will not be giving any special attention to Scotland’s Ballon d’Or nominee Scott McTominay, the Napoli midfielder who scored the winner from the spot against Greece in March.

He said: “Yes, he is a very good player.

“However, Scotland have lots of very good players with a lot of experience at international and club level.

“Arguably, they probably have more experience at top international level than our players.

“They’ve been to tournaments recently. But overall, the Scottish team has a lot of players that need a lot of attention anyway.

“It is an important game, especially after the last match, but for any team that has set itself targets, every match that comes up is important.

“Especially when we’re playing a good team such as Scotland.

“We want to do better, especially compared to the previous match and we want to keep getting better to provide us with a better continuation.

“It’s a very short window of three months to play six games to qualify for the World Cup, so every game is important, and there’s no going back on whichever result there is.”