Confident McLeish has score to settle with Dutch

SCOTLAND manager Alex McLeish last night declared himself quietly satisfied after the draw for the 2010 World Cup qualifying competition paired his team with the Netherlands, Norway, Macedonia and Iceland - and said he couldn't wait to get his highly-improved team back playing competitive football.

"I can't be too unhappy so bring it on," said McLeish, still reeling from Scotland's glorious failure to qualify for next year's Euro 2008 finals. "Obviously the Dutch are a good side but we don't fear anyone. As we proved against Italy and France, they will face a very difficult game when they come to Glasgow. Equally we can go to away grounds and do ourselves credit."

What seems like a generation ago, the Dutch famously humbled Scotland 6-0 in a playoff for the 2004 European Championship after losing the first leg at Hampden by a single James McFadden goal. But McLeish said there would be no repeat of that Amsterdam mauling, when Berti Vogts was in charge of the national team. "They have a tremendous history over the last 25 years but it would be great to put one over on them," said McLeish.

"We are a much better team now than when they beat us heavily in Amsterdam. Everything Holland did that night turned to gold but the players I have at my disposal are capable of competing against anybody and I'm sure they will relish going head-to-head with Holland. But let's not forget we have other challenges because we were in pot two for this draw and people see us as a scalp now."

The nine group winners go through, with the eight best runners-up going into a play-off to decide the last four finalists. Norway marginally failed to qualify for Euro 2008 after losing out to Greece and Turkey, while McLeish will not have the luxury of playing against an out-and-out minnow after being placed in the only group of five teams. Iceland, the bottom-placed team, have plenty of players with Premiership experience while Macedonia proved when drawing with England that they will be no pushovers.

"Norway should not be under- estimated, they are a very dangerous team," said McLeish, whose side will begin its campaign next August. "Like us, they will be disappointed not to have qualified for the Euros. We have massive competition in front of us."

McLeish has been widely linked with the vacant role at Birmingham but declined to speculate on whether he will still be Scotland manager by the time the 2010 qualifiers start. "I am avoiding all speculation at the moment," he said. "I don't know if I'm ready for a return to club football yet. I thought we might get Italy again. To be honest, I still haven't got over what happened against them even though I know I've got to get the nation going again. It's just that the way we lost was pretty brutal. Italy always seem to get the job done."

Before the qualifiers begin, the Scots, who last appeared in a major competition in 1998, could find themselves playing in the Celtic Cup - though not including England. "I'm not 100 per cent in favour of it but I can see the positives," McLeish said. "I'd love to play England but perhaps they feel they have bigger fish to fry."

While Greece's group was widely regarded as the easiest, England will be far from disappointed after avoiding any of the big guns. A palatable intake of collective breath was felt around the auditorium in Durban when England were paired against with their Euro 2008 nemesis Croatia, though it could have been far worse and trips to Ukraine - who Scotland, of course, know all about - Belarus, Kazakhstan and Andorra will hardly strike fear into the new England manager. One unavoidable result of England's group, however, is bound to be interminable references to 'Borat' country after they were paired with one of the furthest outposts in the European game in Kazakhstan.

Croatia coach Slaven Bilic was disappointed at being drawn with England again. "I respect them a lot and I really wanted to avoid them," he said. Bilic, however, may not be in charge by then. "My contract runs out after Euro 2008 and you can't plan long term in this job. I am focused on my job and the European Championships."

Wales face a difficult group, up against Germany and Russia as well as Finland, Azerbaijan and Liechtenstein. Northern Ireland face Slovakia, Slovenia and San Marino as well as Czech Republic and Poland. Republic of Ireland, who are managerless, must negotiate a path in a group containing defending champions Italy and Cyprus - to whom they suffered an humiliating 5-2 defeat during their unsuccessful qualifying campaign for Euro 2008.

Perhaps the most intriguing pairing was that of political and ideological rivals North and South Korea in the Asian section while Australia, playing in the Asian section for the first time, meet China, Iraq and Qatar in group one. In all, 31 nations will join hosts South Africa in the 2010 finals.

Away from the draw, FIFA president Sepp Blatter has vowed to do something about the growing trend of footballers turning out for other national teams. "If we don't take care about the invaders from Brazil, then we could have problems at the 2014 and 2018 World Cup finals," Blatter said.

Countries like Belgium, Spain, Mexico and Portugal have used Brazilians in past World Cup finals, including the likes of Deco, Marcos Senna and Luis Oliveira. In recent years Brazilian-born footballers have also played in the national teams of countries like Croatia, Macedonia, Equatorial Guinea and Togo, many of them being imported with the specific purpose of strengthening national teams. "If we don't stop the fast naturalisation of players in some countries, this will be a real danger," Blatter added. "There are 60 million footballers in Brazil but only 11 places in their national team."

Blatter also re-iterated he still wanted to limit the number of overseas players in club sides despite opposition from leading clubs and current European Union law.

Meanwhile, Nationwide has thrown its weight behind the possible revival of the Home International Championships by offering an annual prize fund of £500,000 - with the hope the competition will get underway next May.

Nationwide already sponsors all four nations and the building society's head of sponsorship Chris Hull added: "We would only support a competition providing all necessary approvals from the police and the authorities were in place. We would put forward a prize fund of £500,000. We would ask for all prize money to be donated to charity."

Flurry of Birmingham bets 'crazy'

ALEX McLeish admits he would consider an approach from Birmingham City, but the Scotland manager claims the rush of bets on him taking charge at St Andrews is "absolutely crazy".

The Barclays Premier League side are keen to make McLeish their next manager following Steve Bruce's exit to Wigan and their failure to lure Italy's World Cup-winning coach Marcello Lippi to the Midlands.

McLeish insists he has not been approached yet, however if Birmingham do make their move this week the former Rangers manager would seek permission from the Scottish Football Association to hold talks.

The 48-year-old accepts it would be a big decision to leave Scotland to return to club football. He said: "It would be and I've got a lot of thinking to do, if indeed Birmingham approach the SFA and say that they're interested."

McLeish is the hot favourite with bookmakers for the Birmingham post and is keen to manage in the English Premier League at some stage. "That is attractive to me, yes, in the long term," he added. "It's maybe something I can look forward to. I really enjoy the Scotland situation and who knows - I could be away in two or three weeks or I could be here for the next five years.

"And it wouldn't faze me to keep working with Scotland and hopefully take them to a World Cup finals.

"It's not so much undecided. If somebody was to come and make an offer or someone was attracted to take me to another club, then that's still to happen and the SFA would probably have to listen and I would have to listen.

"But I don't think at the moment that there's anything happening."

He added: "If people are putting a bet on then that's absolutely crazy, because there's absolutely no way I've done anything regarding going to Birmingham at the moment.

"I'll absolutely fulfil my Scotland duties until something else happens. At the moment there's a lot of speculation, but football is a strange game and it's unpredictable and you just don't know what can happen.

"But right now I'm the Scotland manager and the things you've been hearing and reading over the past few days is pure speculation."

ANGUS WRIGHT