JAMES McFadden believes James Forrest will never change whether he scores four goals in one game or is dropped by his country.
The Celtic winger's exclusion from the last two Scotland games raised eyebrows given how consistently well he's played over the past two years.
His scoring feat at St Johnstone was not missed by McFadden, the national side's coach, who is a fan of this level-headed player who is never too up or down no matter what is going on with his life.
McFadden said: "James is a great guy. He never played the last two games but he was brilliant, his attitude is superb.
“We’ve got no complaints. He’s not going to go and get carried away with himself.
“He has been playing for Celtic for a long time and he understands the pressures and expectation there. It would be difficult to score four goals every game, but he wants to have a major impact on games anyway.
“I think he just knows he’s capable of it. It’s no surprise."
Forrest has a chance of facing Israel on Thursday even if he's asked to play a different role to the one he does for Celtic.
McFadden said: "He has played a number of positions for Celtic. He has played as a striker, as a wing-back, wide right and wide left.
“He’s a good football player. We have played him as a striker in a 3-5-2 and he is hungry.
“I think football players now are adaptable. The good thing is, certainly when I played, I would have preferred to play in my position but if I was getting a game I didn’t really care.
“He is disciplined, he is hard-working and can play in a number of positions. You saw on Sunday when he gets running at people he causes problems.
“That’s what you want to see. We know he’s a good player and it’s fantastic he can go and score four goals in a game from a wide position.
“It’s a great problem to have when you’ve got guys that are flying at club level and are desperate to come away and do well.
“We have got a fantastic chance of qualifying for a major tournament for the first time in 20 years – it will be 22 years by the time it comes around.
“Everybody wants to be a part of it. That’s what we need."
Some fans believe Alex McLeish has his favourites - Forrest not being one of them - an accusation McFadden insisted was nonsense.
He said: "Everybody here has got a chance of playing. There is nobody here to make up the numbers and that’s what’s great about the squad at the minute.
“We are looking at how we go into the game on Thursday, and it’s great. We want players that are playing at the top of their level and scoring goals.
“It was fantastic for James Forrest. He’s a great player and we want guys coming here saying ‘I want to be the man – I want to play.’
“I’m delighted for him, and it’s a great problem to have that we need to find ways to fit players into your team."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel