Hard work and solid shape can lay foundation for steady progress, says Paul Hartley

Published on Saturday 6 March 2010 20:07

BE STRONGER. Be Scotland. Nothing is impossible. That's the new slogan now that Adidas has taken over the job of kitting out the national team and it's completely in keeping with the approach of the man charged with making the dreams a reality, according to one of his players.

Victory over the Czech Republic on Wednesday has provided manager Craig Levein with a decent foundation from which to build and no one was less surprised than Paul Hartley. The midfielder, who earned his 25th cap by coming on as a substitute at Hampden, has been there and done it all before with the man who catapulted him into the higher echelons of the game when he moulded a Hearts side which was organised, hard-working and difficult to beat.

Levein was the boss who signed him for the Tynecastle club in 2003 and helped him evolve into a player who could operate tirelessly from one penalty box to the other and pull off the kind of displays which combined goalscoring clout with a defensive awareness. That combination earned him national honours and he believes that Levein is instilling similar ideals into the Scotland squad. So it's little wonder the Bristol City midfielder holds him in such high regard.

"He's still the same manager, a very good one. Beating the Czechs is a promising start for us. It's exactly what I expected the manager to do," stated Hartley, who has come through the Scotland managerial mash-up of recent years and believes the country now has a football figurehead who can deliver. With limited time to work with the players, Levein still managed to press home his expectations and impose his own tactics on a team who had struggled throughout the previous campaign.

"The style changed quite a lot in the last campaign, but I think now we'll have a solid team, a solid shape about us no matter how we play and I think the players will want to play under this manager, he's that good," added Hartley. "I've always said that. He's tremendous to work under. You don't mess him about, that's for sure. It's a big job for him, but he's the type that can step into it no problem. I've got every faith he's the right man for the job. I said that once his name was mentioned, I felt he was number one choice. Having worked under him for a long spell, he wants everyone to give everything they've got and if he can see that then he'll be happy.

"Some of the lads asked me how he operated and I said 'you have to give everything you've got but he's very honest with you, he'll look after his players'. As you saw, how we set up and the way we played, the work-rate is a big thing for him. If you're working hard for him, he'll look after you."

Hartley would love to see the new approach reap the reward of qualification to the 2012 European Championships, but in the meantime he is content that it has already allowed him to return south to Bristol City with some pride.

"Scottish football has not been great over the last couple of years so they do tend to rub it into you a little bit. It's nice to go back to England with a win under my belt. Sometimes Scottish football does get ridiculed down south so it's nice to get back into work with a win. To get the first friendly win at Hampden in 14 years, that was a good start."

With hard work, greater organisation and stronger resistance, maybe the number of impossibilities is on the wane.