Steve Clarke hails strong refereeing performance as Scotland hold Denmark | OneFootball

Steve Clarke praised a strong refereeing performance from Daniel Siebert after Scotland began their 2026 World Cup qualifying campaign with an encouraging goalless draw against Denmark in Copenhagen.

Right-back Max Johnston took over from the already-booked Aaron Hickey in the 70th minute and was almost immediately shown a yellow card by Siebert for using his arm when last man in the Scotland defence.

Asked by the VAR to look at the incident again on the pitchside monitor, the German official took no further action, with a red arguably available for denying a clear goalscoring opportunity.

Clarke admitted he was “just a little bit worried” when the referee had a second look, but he said: “We’d had a look.

“Obviously it came off his arm really high up and then you could see quite clearly there was a little nudge in the back, which makes it, as the referee told me, not a big enough nudge to be a push, but certainly a big enough nudge for the ball to hit Max’s arm.

“So I thought the referee was very strong with that decision and it was strong refereeing.”

Clarke raised some eyebrows by leaving flair players like Ben Gannon Doak and Billy Gilmour on the bench but revealed he had been planning for a “physical” game, with centre-backs Grant Hanley and John Souttar rocks at the heart of the defence and Lyndon Dykes and Che Adams working the hosts hard until changes were made later in the game.

Denmark had long spells of domination, but the visitors had some terrific chances, with John McGinn, Ryan Christie and Dykes coming up short, although the visitors lived dangerously in the latter stages, with goalkeeper Angus Gunn standing firm.

Scotland, who have not qualified for the World Cup finals since France 1998, take on Belarus behind closed doors in Hungary on Monday and will be targeting all three points.

Clarke said: “That’s my job as head coach, to make these calls.

“You have to look at the game, you have to look at the opposition, you have to decide what you think might be the best way to help the players to get that result.

“So if I’m not brave, I might as well not be in the job.

“Obviously, physicality was a big thing for it because we know the physicality of the Danish side.

“We identified one or two things that might help us to take the team up the pitch.

“The last time we came here (a 2-0 defeat in 2021), I remembered being camped in from almost the first minute.

“So we recognised one or two things that would maybe help us to get up the pitch and sometimes it did, sometimes it didn’t.

“I think I’ve always tried to show flexibility.

“I maybe don’t get the press headlines about that, but we’ve always tried to change and sometimes you’ve got a change to suit the opposition, the way the opposition play and it worked tonight.

“It was a good disciplined performance. Denmark’s a really good side, especially at home.

“We knew we’d have to defend well and we certainly did that as a team.

“But also when we had the ball, we created some moments in the game.

“Maybe just a little bit more quality on the final bit, we could have got the goal that would have turned one point into three, so it’s a good start to the group, but lots of points still to pick up.”