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The National (Scotland)
The National (Scotland)
Sport
Joe Donnelly

Andy Robertson in passionate defence of 'different class' Ralston

Andy Robertson has said Scotland's performance during their 1-1 draw against Switzerland was far closer to the standard he expects from the national side in Euro 2024.

In what was a well-contested Group A encounter, Scott McTominay fired Steve Clarke's men in front on 13 minutes, before Xherdan Shaqiri pulled the Swiss level on 16 minutes.

The former Liverpool midfielder had pounced on a loose ball from Celtic full-back Anthony Ralston in the lead-up to the equaliser – but Scotland captain Robertson leapt to the defence of his colleague, hailing his performance thereafter while likewise praising his character.

"It was much more like us," said Robertson. "We were aggressive, on the front foot and we got off to a better start. We obviously then make a mistake – but there's no doubt about it, Tony Ralston was absolutely unbelievable after that mistake.

"Not many people can come back from that, it was a difficult one for him, but in the second half he was different class."



Robertson acknowledged that while Scotland had chances to score more on the night, so too did Switzerland, and the 30-year-old was impressed with the openness of the game and how both teams approached it.

From here, Scotland enter their third and final Group A encounter this Sunday against Hungary, where Steve Clarke and his players will target their first win of the competition.

For Robertson, recovery now becomes the squad's immediate priority, before their attention then turns to the weekend's important encounter.

Robertson added: "I think you can tell with the fans behind the goal, they were a lot happier with what they saw on the pitch, and we've left absolutely everything out there today. That's what it takes to play for your country.

"Now, we rest, we recover, and we go again on Sunday because that's a massive game for us now. We played a really good team today, and we face another really good team on Sunday.

"We can take a lot of positives from this game, but we can also tweak things and improve even more. That's the good thing, and hopefully you see that on Sunday.

"But, like I said, we need to get to our beds now, recover, take tomorrow to recover properly, and then on Friday we need to be ready to go on the training pitch and come Sunday we'll be good to go with the backing we've got."

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