Dailly Determined To Go Out Fighting

CHRISTIAN Dailly suffered heartbreak at Hampden Park this weekend as Scotland's hopes of World Cup qualification were effectively ended with a 1-0 defeat to Belarus.

But the Hammers midfielder, a veteran of 58 caps for his country, insists that Scotland will give it their all in Wednesday's clash against Slovenia as they look to go out on a high from this World Cup Qualifying campaign.

"We will go to Slovenia and give it everything we've got," said the 31-year-old. "We're certainly not going to stop playing after the Belarus result.

"It's still a very big game for us. It's an international game, a World Cup Qualifier and there's still a great deal of pride to be taken from those players that are out there representing their country.

"There will be a lot of Scotland fans who will have paid money to go out to Slovenia and support us. They deserve to see us give everything and that's exactly what we'll do.

"It was always going to be a tall order for us after the way we started the qualifying group. It's still a pity the way it ended up against Belarus, but we're alot more optimistic about the future and we'll look towards the European Championships with far more confidence now.

"Belarus were a good side with a lot of very competent players. They were a better side than Norway and I think their position in the group is pretty false."

Christian was also quick to praise the influence new manager Walter Smith has had on the squad since taking over from the departed Berti Vogts.

"We wanted to keep the momentum going after the two games against Italy and Norway," he explained. "It was disappointing that we couldn't nick a draw because that would have kept things going to some extent.

"In hindsight though I don't think we could have been any more positive in the way we started the game. The system we played allows people to get forward, that's the idea behind it.

"We have one of the best defensive records in the group. In the second-half we changed things around a bit because obviously we had to really go for it at that point in the game.

"The players were totally up for it and gave it everything. Unfortunately on the day it just wasn't enough."