Despite the frustration of only drawing with Lithuania, Scotland still have a golden opportunity to make their October World Cup double header a successful one, according to stand-in skipper Russell Martin.
The Norwich City man, who wore the captain’s armband when Darren Fletcher was taken off injured half-way through Saturday night’s match, believes salvaging a point in the 89th minute at Hampden Park could prove to be more significant in the Group F long run than dropping two.
And that is chiefly down to the section’s second seeds, Slovakia, sitting on zero points after losing to Slovenia.
The Scots are now determined to hand tomorrow night’s opponents a knock-out blow in Trnava, even this early in the qualifying campaign, by pulling seven points ahead of them.
“It feels like it could be a big point,” said Martin. “It was an important goal.
“It was a frustrated dressing room but we’re still second in the group and we can go to Slovakia and turn this into a good point. This group has got plenty of legs in it. We move on, Tuesday is another big one.
“It’s up to us. We need a big win in the group at some stage.
“If we get a draw we’re still unbeaten but if we can win it would leave them without a point from their first three games.
“That’s the plan. We’ll go there and try to do that. They’re second seeds in the group and it would be a big result to get.
“We’ll try to win it but the most important thing is staying unbeaten.”
James McArthur’s leveller came very late in the match but Martin believes it was the least they deserved.
He said: “We dominated the game and created some good chances but that’s what can happen in football at this level.
“Their goal came out of nothing really. We had dominated the play. The lads showed character to dig in. When we got the goal we thought we might have nicked another one.”
The hat-trick hero of the opening night win in Malta, Robert Snodgrass, admitted hearing news of Slovakia’s slip-up made him feel worse rather than better in the Hampden dressing room.
But when he had time to reflect on Saturday evening’s events, as was the case with Martin, he was far from downbeat.
“It’s not gone to plan but when you’re chasing the game a point is a good point,” the Hull City playmaker said.
“It was important we didn’t lose.
“We went into the game believing we would win. We didn’t think they’d be the team scoring first to be honest.
“They scored first and it was an uphill task after that. They were rolling about, which stopped the flow of the game.
“We got the goal and then there was a goal-line clearance at the end. We had chances but didn’t take enough of them. We were ruthless against Malta but weren’t in this one.
“We need to focus on ourselves but we know they (Slovakia) will be determined to get a win on Tuesday.
“It’s going to be the sort of group where everybody thinks they can beat everybody.
“If you look at our point it’s maybe a good one, with Slovakia getting beaten. We believe we can win on Tuesday.
“To get the mental edge over them would be a big one. To go seven points ahead so early on would make it even sweeter if we do beat them.”
