FORMER St Mirren ace Kenny McLean netted his first goal for Scotland against San Marino - but admitted the Tartan Army were entitled to show their frustration during the laboured 2-0 win.

McLean, a surprise inclusion in Alex McLeish’s starting line-up, opened the scoring in the Euro 2020 qualifier against the football minnows with a delightful glancing header from a Ryan Fraser cross in just the fourth minute.

However, the 27-year-old and his team mates were abused by the Tartan Army after the final whistle – as they had been following their shocking 3-0 defeat to Kazakhstan following their opening Group I fixture in Nursultan on Thursday.

But, Mclean - who played over 150 times for the Saints between 2009 and 2015 - had no issues with the reaction of the 2,500-strong away support at the end of the 90 minutes as he acknowledged the performance and 2-0 result had been unacceptable.

“It was the start we hoped for, the start a lot of people expected and it was great for me to get my first goal,” he said. “It’s what we set out to do - take the game to them and try to break them down, which we did early on.

“But after that our final ball at times wasn’t good enough, we weren’t clinical enough and we didn’t move the ball quickly enough - it was a frustrating night for everyone.

“The fans as well. They weren’t happy and rightly so because we weren’t as good as we could have been. We weren’t as good as we know we are.

“We just didn’t do things quick enough at times and when that started being the case, when the fans started getting on us, we started getting sloppy and letting it affect us.

“Which we shouldn’t because the fans are entitled to their opinions. They come over here and support us in numbers wherever we go and if we’re not doing the job right we deserve what we get.

“The manager obviously thought he could trust me, because the squad has been looking good, but he started me on Sunday which was great. I just try to repay him with performances. It wasn’t the best, but we got the win, which was expected, but no more than that.

“There could have been more goals, we know that. I almost scored before I actually did as well. It was a good start, but after that we just didn’t click. They were stuffy, tough to break down.”

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