After recently returning from a long-term injury, Darren Fletcher has been featuring regularly for Manchester United and Scotland.
He was part of the Scottish team that was defeated 3-1 by archrivals England in a friendly match. This was seen as a major opportunity for Gordon Strachan to show that he has made a lot of progress since taking over. Even though it was only a friendly match, both teams were extremely keen on winning. It was England who continue to their impressive form after Wayne Rooney and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain scored the goals to seal a victory.
Andrew Robertson found the back of the net for Scotland, but his 83rd minute goal was merely a consolation. Fletcher said after the match that Scotland could have played much better and it would have helped them get a better result against their arch rivals. He pointed out that his team were not patient enough nor did they pass the ball with a lot of success. Fletcher was once a regular starter for Scotland, but his injury problems have now made him a substitute. He came on for Scott Brown as a second-half substitute against England.
Even though this was a disappointing result, Fletcher admitted that Scotland’s big games come in the Euro 2016 qualifiers. Scotland are fourth in the qualifying group.”I don’t think we did ourselves justice tonight. We could have been a lot more patient and passed the ball a lot better.I think the occasion, it’s a derby match, maybe got the better of us tonight off the back of a good results against Ireland.We lost goals at bad times – the start of the second half, just after getting back to 2-1, but maybe that shows character from England too,” said Fletcher. Scotland’s next match is a 2016 qualifying match against minnows Gibraltar.