Wonderkid Karetsas embarrasses Scotland

Steve Clarke can do without any more occasions akin to this. Relegation to the second tier of the Nations League is no disaster for Scotland.

- Ewan Murray

Indeed, it may be their natural habitat. It is just that the calamitous circumstances in which Clarke's men crashed out of League A were alarming for anybody with an affiliation to Scotland.

Greece outfought, outthought and outplayed their hosts at Hampden Park. The tie was effectively over while the corporate classes were still shuffling back to their seats at the start of the second half. Greece did not add to that third goal; it never looked as if they would need to.

Resentment towards Clarke, unavoidable after Scotland flopped at Euro 2024, had dissipated after a recent upturn in fortunes. Greece sent Clarke and Scotland spiralling several steps backwards. Ivan Jovanovic and his Greek players will be licking their lips at facing Scotland again on World Cup qualifying business.

This was an evening when no part of the Scotland team performed even adequately. The hosts were overly generous in defence, wasteful in midfield and no threat in attack.

Clarke makes great play of the fact his squad contains great international experience. The flipside is that perhaps this is a team which has reached the end of their cycle. Clarke can reasonably argue there is no emerging batch of talent to draft in. The friendly matches against Iceland and Liechtenstein in