NEW YORK, June 22 (Xinhua) -- Scotland striker Lawrence Shankland said he was looking forward to Thursday's "massive" World Cup match against Brazil, which could determine whether the Scots reach the knockout stage of the tournament for the first time in their history.
After a narrow 1-0 win over Haiti in its opening World Cup match, Scotland competed well against Morocco in its second group game, but despite looking solid, never really looked like cancelling out Ismael Saibari's second-minute goal, which eventually decided the match 1-0.
The result leaves Scotland probably needing to take a draw from Brazil in Miami on Thursday to qualify from Group C as one of the best third-placed teams, depending on the result between Morocco and Haiti.
"We want to get a result. We know a draw will probably be enough to take us through, but we will go and try to win the game. If we can take a point, then we will take that," added Shankland, who was delighted to face Brazil.
"When you think of a World Cup, for me, Brazil are one of the first teams that come to your mind, and they're the first team I remember watching," he said, adding, "They have a quality squad and good team and we will need to be at our best to get something out of it."
The striker, who recently joined Glasgow Rangers, has been in good form, scoring the goal that qualified Scotland for the World Cup against Denmark in November and finding the net three times in pre-World Cup warm-up matches, although he insisted it was up to coach Steve Clarke to pick the team.
"All I'll do is train well and try to give myself the best opportunity," he said, but after Scotland failed to create much against Morocco, the forward admitted he was "craving more than one chance to be honest. Hopefully we'll have a few." ■
