IT may have been raining water in Paisley but not goals as Scotland Under21s’ drought officially stretched out to a year.
As a result of this dreich night at the Paisley 2021 Stadium and the 0-0 draw with Estonia it hosted – a friendly that was halted for five minutes in the second half due to a rogue sprinkler bursting into action - it means our youngsters have now gone a complete calendar year since they last hit the back of the net.
The last time the U21s scored was exactly a year ago to the day when an Oliver McBurnie striker coupled with a brace from Jason Cummings earned Ricky Sbragia’s side a 3-1 win over Northern Ireland.
While Scot Gemmill’s troops could not match that result or flurry of goals, the new head coach will have been pleased with the showings of his young team in this friendly ahead of their first Euro 19 qualifier away to the Netherlands in September.
Committed to offering youth a chance to bring through a younger generation of player, the likes of Stephen Mallan, Lewis Morgan and debutant Dom Thomas all looked pretty in pink.
It took just two minutes for Scotland to create their first chance and it fell to Paul McMullan. The Celtic man currently on loan at Inverness got a break of the ball on the right side of the box, but his sliced shot whizzed into the side netting.
They came even closer on seven minutes. It was home favourite Morgan with a bursting run through the heart of defence and low stinging shot across goal. The St Mirren forward was thwarted by a fine low parry from Andreas Vaikla.
Scotland were rampant in the early stages and it was the gangly figure of McBurnie that brought a sense of the spectacular to the game only a couple of minutes later through an audacious first time volley at the back post that very nearly trickled through the legs of Vaikla from point blank range.
St Mirren’s other representative, Mallan, wold also be denied by the stubborn man between the Estonian sticks 25 minutes in to halt his stinging low shot from 10 yards. He would later whistle a stunning free-kick from 20 yards just by the far post and fire straight at Vaikla. Swansea striker McBurnie also went agonisingly close just moments before the break.
Second-half substitute Thomas one of a handful of bodies thrown on and the Motherwell winger, who is on loan at Queen of the South, almost made an instant and spectacular impact. On the hour he burst into the box weaving by four defenders to eventually have his low shot nudged wide by Vailka.
Scotland continued to push as the rain drizzled down and Kilmarnock’s Greg Taylor nearly opened the scoring moments later by whizzing a left-foot effort just over the bar.
Thomas would again be denied by the keeper on 73 minutes, this time from distance, Morgan would also sting the IFK Mariehamn FIN man’s hands at the edge of the box on 76 minutes.
There was little goal threat from the visitors as the picked up a handful of yellow cards while virtually changing their entire team in the second half on a night of near misses for the hosts.
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