Now the moment is almost upon them, the unpalatable reality of what Scotland ’s players are about to confront begins to bite.
A match they have waited all their lives to win, set against a blood-stained backdrop of human suffering that renders the very idea of victory so hollow it might even seem like an act of callous inhumanity.
A pathway to the pinnacle of their childhood dreams, blocked by the ultimate no-win scenario of attempting to give the proud people of Ukraine a reason to feel ever so slightly worse about their current, unimaginable predicament.
