Cyprus trip no holiday, say Scots

RICKY Sbragia has dismissed suggestions Scotland’s trip to Cyprus is an opportunity for the players to relax. 

Sbragia, who joined Scotland’s backroom team in Limassol after assistant Peter Houston pulled out to focus on his club role with Dundee United, revealed the players were being put through double sessions each day ahead of tomorrow’s friendly in Larnaca. 

Manager Craig Levein has been keen to give players time together away from the training field to build up a team spirit, a trip to La Manga in Spain last season without a game among his tactics. 

But he has stressed the need to be more prepared when Scotland go into their World Cup 2014 qualifying campaign after making a slow start to their European Championship bid.  That means playing more games and Sbragia is putting the players under pressure to get a victory against Cyprus. 

“We’ve got to win,” said Sbragia, who is Scotland’s Under-17 coach. “It’s not relaxed, the workload is very heavy. It needs a lot of organisation, making sure the players are happy, everything they want, they get, and providing the training they need for the game on Friday. We have to get them together and work them into a team to face Cyprus.”

“Getting together, bringing new people in and keep playing internationals is important. 

The former Sunderland manager is also looking to learn from his experience with the full national squad. 

He added: “The group seems very close, very together. I’ve been quite surprised how together they are “There are no cliques and they work well as a unit.” 

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.