The Scotland manager Craig Levein has said that he is confident that the nation can finally end the long wait to participate in the World Cup by qualifying for the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil.
After the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa was a major success, the party will be moving to Brazil in 2014. Scotland failed to qualify for the 2010 World Cup and numerous major tournaments prior to that. It has left the nation with major disappointment when it comes to the national team, but the manager has said that he hopes 2014 World Cup will be a different story for Scotland.
Scotland recently saw the Republic of Ireland achieve success in the form of qualifying for a major tournament.
The last major tournament that Scotland participated was way back in 1998 when they took part in the European championship in France. In the Euro 2012 qualification group stages, Scotland as finished the third team behind Spain and Czech Republic. Scotland yet again have a difficult qualification round for the World Cup because they will be in the group containing the likes of Croatia, Serbia, and Wales. Yet, Craig Levein has expressed his confidence that the national team will be able to qualify for the 2014 World Cup.
“I am very confident. This is the strongest squad I’ve had for a while so we are ready to go. The reason I took the job is to qualify for a major competition. I was fortunate to play in Italia ’90 so having experienced that, it is in my head that I want to qualify with Scotland as the manager. There is no bigger incentive for any Scotsman than that. The squad is improving individually. There are a lot of the players playing in the Premier League now,” said Craig Levein.