Anthony Ralston and Scotland determined to match performances to points

Anthony Ralston left the Scotland camp in positive and determined mood after addressing the negatives of their performance against Belarus.

Steve Clarke’s side held on for a nervy 2-1 Hampden win against the Group C outsiders but ended Sunday evening certain of a top-two finish after Greece lost 3-1 in Denmark.

Scotland will guarantee a final-game decider against the Danes if they can get at least a point in Greece on November 15.

And that will be the key takeaway for Ralston after beating the Greeks and Belarus despite concerns over performances.

“We had a chat and, as a collective, obviously we know we can do better, performance-wise,” the Celtic right-back said. “Even over the past two games, we can do a lot better.

“That’s the negative out the way, the positives are that it’s six points from the two games, we are a step closer to achieving our goal that we want to achieve. Going into next month we stand in a good position.

“We’re all experienced in the dressing room now, we’ve all been in these positions at different points in our careers, where you know yourself when you come off the pitch as a collective, the performance wasn’t there.

“But then the first thing you do after you’ve discussed that and cleared that, you then look at the positives.

“And the positives are we’ve put ourselves in a good position now to go in and rectify the things that we need to sort out but then also build on the positives that we’ve created in both games, because there were some good parts as well.

“But we know we want more from ourselves individually and as a collective and that’s what we’ll need to do.

“It’s easy, so soon after a game, you get caught up in what you could do better, you look at yourself, you look at the team, you look at everything. But we’re two games off our goal, so we’re not in a bad position. We’ll build on that and we’ll go from there.”

Clarke expressed his anger at half-time despite Scotland leading through a Che Adams goal and the post-match team talk would have been influenced by a late goal from the visitors.

“It’s emotion,” Ralston said. “We all care, it all means a lot to us. We want this World Cup and when we are talking about that type of thing, emotion is involved. We’re all in the same boat.

“It’s something that you take on the chin as a group, as a collective and you go out and correct it. We won the game but we want to build on that.”