STEVE CLARKE praised Scotland's "realistic" fans for backing them all the way through a tough period.
The national team has suffered a mixed bag of results in the latest batch of international fixtures in June.
Most disappointedly, Scotland lost out to Ukraine in the World Cup play-offs to blow the golden chance of a spot at Qatar 2022 later this year.
Clarke's men then put in a terrible performance against Ireland in Dublin, as they were defeated 3-0.
Two wins against Armenia - including tonight's 4-1 thumping - mean that Scotland are in a strong position in their Nations League group, though.
But that hasn't stopped a huge wave of criticism coming the team and Clarke's way, in an apparent mood change towards the national team once more following a spell of overwhelming positivity.
Clarke knows failure to qualify for the World Cup is not good enough, but he was grateful to a section of the supporters for sticking by his men.
He said: "The realistic fans are fantastic. The people who come over here, got nothing but praise for them. I'm glad they saw a good performance.
"But the realistic fans know what we're doing and what we're trying to do.
"The rest of it is out with our control."
He added: "It was a difficult schedule for the players but we haven't made excuses. There is no excuses for the two games we lost.
"Two wins against Armenia are not going to make this international camp a good camp because it wasn't.
"We failed in our primary objective which was to get to the World Cup. We failed in that.
"We had a really bad performance in Dublin which put us on the back foot again. So it's nice to bounce back tonight but there's work to do.
"It was a game we wanted to win, it was a game we probably had to win, although not necessarily if you look at it mathematically.
"It puts us in a position where we can go to September and have a realistic chance of topping the group and that's what we wanted."
