Steve Clarke has said what he thought of Anthony Ralston’s play as a Celtic fullback in Friday night’s 2-2 draw between Scotland and Finland.
Ralston got his chance to show the Scotland manager what he could do when he was put in the 28-person provisional squad for the Euro 2024 event in Germany.
On Tuesday, Ralston came on as a replacement but did not play in the 2-0 win over Gibraltar. On Friday night, he got his chance in the Hampden friendly.
Ralston played the whole game and clearly impressed the Scotland manager, as he is now one of four Celtic players who will be going to the big summer event.
Clarke says Ralston did a great job for Scotland.
As the Scotland team made their last preparations to leave for Germany, Clarke talked about how well the Celtic back played against Finland and said that the game showed how well he trained at Celtic.
To quote Clarke, “Tony was good against Finland.” I thought he played pretty safely at first, but he became more sure of himself after that.
“He started to get to the right spots and send a few good crosses into the box.”
“Because he plays for a club team that passes the ball around a lot, I think his training will be mostly base on that.”
The player is good with the ball and doesn’t give it up in dangerous spots.
A lot of people think Ralston will start in the first game of the event, which is against Germany in Munich on June 14.
After Aaron Hickey and Nathan Patterson got hurt, Clarke was worried about his defense for the Euros. But the Celtic back has now put Clarke’s mind at ease.
But Ralston has shown that he can be counted on with a strong game against Finland. He will be starting next Friday as Scotland tries to make it out of the group rounds of a football tournament for the first time in their history.
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