World Cup warm-up games should come with a health warning. Ideally a manager tries out players and gets some minutes into the legs. If he is lucky, he might avoid a morale-sapping defeat and post-match boos. If his fortune fails to hold, a key player will succumb to injury.
When Billy Gilmour fell to the turf clutching his knee against Curacao, a Hampden crowd of 44,000 took a sharp intake of breath. On a list of undesirable outcomes for Scotland’s big World Cup send-off, the loss of the Napoli midfielder was a top-three item. The fact he was able to walk at all raised hopes that his removal was precautionary in nature. When he failed to return to the pitch for the full-time farewell to fans, the penny dropped.
