30 seconds away from building a bronze statue of Leigh Griffiths
I started writing this fully expecting to rank this well in the bottom half. This campaign was essentially over in many people's minds by the end of game 4, a 3-0 loss at Wembley where we were lucky to get nil. By then we'd already needed a last minute equalizer at home to Lithuania then been royally thumped by Slovakia.
We then went and won four of the next five. It wasn't always impressive - Slovenia were beaten by a late winner from sub Chris Martin who had been a target of Tartan Army ire for some time, and a last gasp own goal saw off Slovakia in the penultimate game. But there was an unexpectedly straightforward victory in Lithuania where Andrew Robertson scored a screamer, and then there was the England game at Hampden. If only Stuart Armstrong had passed the other way, or punted the ball out of the ground, or just done something, anything, else...
Ultimately we went to Slovenia knowing a win would get us in the playoffs, and we deservedly led at half-time but crumbled after the break. A 2-2 draw meant we missed out on second on goal difference, though we would have needed the win regardless to get a playoff place.
Make no mistake, Gordon Strachan was not some misunderstood messiah who was badly treated and harshly moved on after the campaign. But were we perhaps in better shape than we realized?
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