Lewis Ferguson is clear Scotland will be fuelled by anger against Northern Ireland on Tuesday after being embarrassed by the Netherlands in Amsterdam.
The 4-0 defeat at the Johan Cruyff Arena came after Scotland dominated until conceding against the run of play five minutes from the break. The visitors lost their shape and rhythm allowing the Dutch to exploit their laxity and score three goals in the last 18 minutes via Georginio Wijnaldum, Wout Weghorst and Donyell Malen.
The collapse is a concern as the friendly was the first of four in the run up to Scotland’s Euro 2024 campaign. Next comes Tuesday’s visit of Northern Ireland to Hampden Park and with Scotland unhappy about how they fell apart, Ferguson was asked if there will be an element of anger in their approach.
“Of course, there should be after every defeat,” the Bologna midfielder said. “You want to go out there and put things right. So it’s good that we’ve got a game coming so fast. It’s at home with a big crowd, so I’m sure there’ll be a fire in our belly.”
Lawrence Shankland was preferred to Ché Adams to lead the attack by Steve Clarke but the Hearts striker failed to score, hitting the bar in the second half with only the goalkeeper, Mark Flekken, to beat.
Scotland’s lack of cutting edge is clear and though they have been heavily reliant on the goals of Scott McTominay and John McGinn, Ferguson believes the entire team should step up. “Everybody has to take responsibility. It’s a team thing, not just one or two individuals who are expected to get goals,” the 24 year‑old said.
“John and Scotty have been absolutely fantastic. They helped us a lot in terms of goals and assists. We’ve got a big squad, good quality, and everybody will need to chip in.”
Kieran Tierney impressed at left-back on his return from injury. “It was good to see some bodies back and some good performances in there,” Ferguson said. “It’s a learning curve for everybody – the players, staff – and we need to do better if we’re going to do something at the tournament in the summer, because the performance tonight was not good enough.
“For the first hour of the game we played some really good stuff, looked comfortable, created chances but never took them. They scored a cracking goal but we didn’t deserve to lose by that margin.
“The scoreline doesn’t reflect how the game actually went. It’s difficult to take – we shouldn’t be losing by four goals.”
Ferguson wants Scotland to show they can compete with the best sides in Europe. “It shows the margins because the level is so high at international level. We’re playing a really good side and played really good football but it changes the narrative of the game when we try to push it on. Maybe when we go two-nil down we need a bit more knowhow to close down the spaces as we were too open.”
Clarke made six substitutions in the second half, including Ferguson. “It’s difficult coming on when you’re losing but I want to play as many minutes as I can,” he said. “I hope to on Tuesday – we just need to wait and see. I’ll just get my head down and try to work as hard as possible and catch the manager’s eye.”
