Blossoming Scotland will come again as superhuman Ukraine's 41 million reasons win out - Keith Jackson's big match verdict

There will be other enormous, career-defining opportunities for this blossoming Scotland side.

Just so long as the world as we know it has not been brutalised beyond all recognition over the next few years.

Heaven forbid the savagery Vladimir Putin has unleashed in Ukraine may yet reach a lot closer to home so our lives might be torn apart too, in a way which renders the outcome of any given football match all but irrelevant.

But it didn’t feel much like that last night. Not where these superhuman Ukrainians were concerned at any rate. Not even remotely.

While their brothers, fathers and mothers remain under merciless Russian bombardment, they arrived here as if this was their very own frontline. Their lonely chance to make a difference. And they refused to leave until the job was done and the watching world got a reminder of what glory to Ukraine looks like, in a sporting context at least.

In fact, when sub Artem Dovbyk raced clear to net their third goal in the dying seconds of injury time, the rest of his team-mates didn’t have enough energy left in their legs to join his celebrations in front of the joyous visiting fans.

They had given everything and the truth is their efforts were too monumental for Scotland to match, never mind overcome.

Goals before and after half-time had ripped this contest away from Steve Clarke ’s players, even though a late second-half salvage mission was scrambled together. Callum McGregor pulled one back just when it seemed Ukraine had no more left to give but Dovbyk proved otherwise with a clinical finish and gave his war-ravaged country a moment of pure joy.

The very least it deserves.

As ever there were puzzles for Clarke to solve even before he had the chance to gauge the ferocity