How 16 Scotland players rated across agonising late Nations League defeats to Poland and Portugal

Another international window has come and gone. For Scotland, this camp was all about building towards the future but Steve Clarke’s side emerged from their Nations League double-header against Poland and Portugal without a victory in their last EIGHT competitive fixtures.

That is the Scots longest such winless run in their history and means the Tartan Army have now been starved of a victory in a competitive game for over 12 months - a 3-0 away win over Cyprus in a Euro 2024 qualifier.

Two late defeats and more individual errors cost Scotland their first points of Group A1, with a certain Cristiano Ronaldo popping up with Portugal’s match-winner on 88 minutes in Lisbon after Scott McTominay’s first-half headed opener was cancelled out by Bruno Fernandes’ scuffed effort from distance.

The Poland match was there for the taking after Clarke’s men battled back from a two-goal deficit to level up the tie and were firmly in the ascendancy towards the end of the second half only for a moment of madness from Grant Hanley to gift the visitors an agonising 97th minute winner at Hampden.

Here, the Edinburgh Evening News has carried out a review of all 16 players utilised by Clarke across both matches and assessed their performances out of ten. Those selected who played no part in both games included; Zander Clark (Hearts), Jon McCracken (Dundee), Max Johnston (Sturm Graz), Josh Doig (Sassuolo), Ryan Porteous (Watford), Connor Barron (Rangers) and John Souttar (Rangers).