McLeish backs Strachan for Scotland job

Gordon Strachan was backed to become the new manager of Scotland by Alex McLeish on Tuesday as he ruled himself out of a return to national service following Craig Levein's sacking. Levein paid for a poor run of results, including just three wins in 12 competitive matches which left Scotland bottom of their World Cup qualifying group and their hopes of reaching Brazil 2014 all but in tatters, with his job when the Scotish Football Association fired him on Monday. McLeish, like Levein and Strachan a former Scotland international, had a brief spell as manager of the national side in 2007 before returning to club football as boss of Birmingham. McLeish and Strachan were team-mates in the successful Aberdeen team of the early 1980s managed by Alex Ferguson. But they later found themselves in opposition when Strachan was in charge of Celtic at the same time McLeish was boss of arch Glasgow rivals Rangers. "Gordon Strachan is a pretty good candidate to me," McLeish told Talksport Radio. "He's had success at club level with Celtic. "Whether he wants to come away from the television role he's got -- because he's very good on TV -- would be a big decision for him to make." McLeish also ruled himself out of another stint as Scotland manager by saying: "I left the national team to take up club football, I felt I was missing the day-to-day stuff. "I'm still of that mind. I wouldn't like to be unfair to the Scotland fans in terms of coming back to the job. A lot of people would maybe think I was a hypocrite." Interim national team coach Billy Stark will name the squad for this month's friendly against Luxembourg on Wednesday.