Scotland team leak cause panik Ahead Of upcoming Euro 2012 qualifier

It was a testy Craig Levein whose Scotland squad flew into Prague for the first leg of their Euro 2012 qualifying double header against the Czech Republic and Spain after a tabloid newspaper published what was claimed to be a shock Scottish selection for Friday's opening instalment.The report majored on Levein's use of a 4-2-2-2 formation in training, with Kenny Miller relegated to the bench and a front pair of Steven Naismith and the hitherto uncapped QPR forward, Jamie Mackie.The full formation consisted of Allan McGregor in goal, a back four of Alan Hutton, David Weir, Stephen McManus and Steven Whittaker. Darren Fletcher and Gary Caldwell were assigned holding roles in midfield, with Graham Dorrans and James Morrison in the linking roles between middle and front. When asked to confirm or deny the report, Levein anchored his response on the insistence that he had made no final selection."Listen, I'm not going to talk about the team. I'll name the team on Thursday night as I always do," he said. "But I can assure you that the team hadn't been picked. What I am annoyed at is that I question sometimes whether people in your profession actually are interested in whether we win or not."Getting a story and not even having the courtesy to ask me if there's any truth in it. People who, in the past I've been as honest as I can with, that makes me really angry.

"The story can't be true if the team hasn't been picked. I know where the story came from, I know what routes it took and I know what happened when it got back to the newspaper, so from my point of view I expected a phone call to ask the question and I didn't get that."Miller was the conduit for the account that appeared in print, but Levein was at pains to stress that the incident had not forced him to deal with a disciplinary problem."Not in the slightest. I had a discussion with Kenny this morning about what happened and he was honest enough to tell me," said the manager."It's been as a result of an article he'd done previously and he was trying to get himself out of a position that he was in. As far as I'm concerned it was an innocent error, an unfortunate incident, but I don't think in any way that it was meant to undermine anything that we've been doing – and the player explained.""I don't want to answer questions about how we're going to play before the game. My job is to try and pick the team that I think has the best chance of success."

While the manager has to try alternative systems, it would be a major departure from expectation should he dispense with Miller, who is Rangers' top scorer, unless, of course, the player is carrying an injury which suggests he is best preserved to play the lone attacker again when Spain visit Hampden on Tuesday.

At any event, Levein has to evaluate several concerns before he comes close to finalising his selection and if some players were to exacerbate injury problems, Phil Bardsley could make an appearance, although more likely against Spain."His father was born in Scotland. If you speak to him and watch him in training he's delighted to be here and if I need him on Friday there's every chance that he'll be involved," said Levein of the Manchester-born Sunderland right-back."He's a good player and we've been aware for a while that he's eligible so it was just a matter of progressing the whole thing and getting him out. Hutton and Whittaker are full backs and with McEveley already away from the squad, that just left us with one certain player to be fit and that is McNaughton."So I think it's important to have another full back in and Phil can play in a number of different positions. He can play right back, he can play left back, midfield or centre back."We're back to a squad of 24 with Phil coming in but Whittaker, Hutton and McGregor haven't as yet satisfied me that they're 100 per cent fit. All three are improving."Whittaker did more than the other two today. The other two are here and hopefully all three will be OK."Should McGregor fail to make it, the likely choice of goalkeeper would be Craig Gordon, despite his lack of match fitness because of a long recovery from injury.

"Well, it wouldn't be ideal but he played for 90 minutes last week. Also he wants to play and that's the most important thing," said Levein. "McGregor is improving all the time. He's quite positive. He's had a half training session today and you have to remember that this is an injury he's played through three games with – it's a repetitive strain at the top of his thigh."He's played three games in a week and managed 90 minutes in all of them. From Saturday right through to Friday will be the longest period of rest he's had for a long period of time. He said the injury was 100 per cent better yesterday."Meanwhile, speculation about formations reverberated among the squad, as Weir acknowledged. The 40-year-old defender has seen it all, several times over."No one knows exactly what the formation is going to be. We worked on something yesterday, but it wasn't really with regard to picking a team or anything like that."I don't think anyone actually knows how we are going to play. I don't think you can be predictable or give too much away when you are going into games like this."Like I say the manager worked on something yesterday, whether it's set in stone or not I don't know. At the end of the day you can go around the house with systems, but it's not systems that win games – it's players."