Dumfries defender and former Queen of the South striker ready for Scotland's date with World Cup destiny

Dumfries defender Grant Hanley and former Queen of the South striker Lyndon Dykes are ready for their dates with destiny this week.

Steve Clarke’s Scotland squad take on Ukraine at Hampden tomorrow night in their World Cup play-off semi-final.

A win would see the Scots face Wales in Cardiff on Sunday evening for a spot in Qatar this November.

Hanley, 30, will be looking to put the sting of relegation with Norwich City behind him to help take Scotland to their first World Cup since France in 1998.

The former Dumfries Academy pupil and Palmerston youth player, said: “My mindset is just on the Ukraine game just now.

“As for Wales, if you know me you’ll know I’m not a big believer in that kind of stuff.

“I like to keep things simple. My focus is purely on Ukraine. “Playing at a World Cup is one of the boxes I’d like to tick in my career.

“Playing at the Euros last summer was a massive achievement for me, the rest of the lads and the nation as a whole.

“The next step for us all now is to try to qualify for this World Cup which would be huge for everybody.

“But you can’t look too far ahead of yourself. I know it’s a cliché but it’s true. If you start thinking about what is coming up you end up getting slapped in the face.”

The Hampden crunch will be emotionally-charged given the backdrop of the conflict in Ukraine with Russia. That creates a strange atmosphere around the fixture but Hanley believes the biggest respect they can pay the visitors is by giving 100 per cent.

He said: “The last game was postponed and we had a friendly where there was a lot of money raised for the people in Ukraine after what happened.

“That was the right thing for us to do at the time. But now the focus for us has to be on football.

“We’ll be