ONE of Steve Clarke’s most trusted players has been called out by a former player for ditching the country of his birth to represent Scotland.
The national team boss is looking ahead to next month when his side face Greece in a Nations League A play-off, with the Tartan Army hoping they can maintain their status in the top tier.
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But former Premier League goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer has taken aim at one of his star men ahead of the big March clash.
Aussie legend Schwarzer had a jab at striker Lyndon Dykes for deciding to play for Scotland over Australia, where he was born.
Dykes’ parents are Scottish but was raised in Queensland and then Canberra as a youth.
He moved to Scotland in to sign for Queen of the South as a 19-year-old, scoring 22 goals in 14 competitive matches over six months for their Under-20s before returning to Oz.
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After three similarly prolific – but short – spells with Queensland clubs Redlands United, Gold Coast City and Surfers Paradise Apollo, he returned to Palmerston Park 18 months later on a permanent deal.
He made his mark with the Doonhamers before being snapped up by Livingston, making his debut in the Premiership in 2019.
Since then Dykes hasn’t looked back, as his powerhouse style up top led to links with Rangers and Celtic but eventually he moved to QPR in the English Championship.
Whilst in London he established himself as a regular for Scotland under Steve Clarke and this past summer he decided to move to ambitious Birmingham City in League One.
So far Dykes has scored nine goals in 42 games for Scotland since winning his first cap in 2020.
Dykes, 29, is part of a growing contingent of players with links to Scotland at Brum, either through nationality (Grant Hanley, Marc Leonard and Scott Wright) or who have played for Scottish clubs in the past year (Ben Davies, Tomoki Iwata, Kieran Dowell) under the management of ex-Celts assistant coach Chris Davies.
Schwarzer was a recent guest on the Seaman Says Podcast with Arsenal legend David Seaman, and on the episode the discussed the situation at St Andrews with Blues on the up.
However, Schwarzer couldn’t resist a pop at Dykes during the show.
He said: “With Birmingham, look what a difference a season makes. Not even a season!
“If you look at what they were like in the Championship as opposed to now. The off-field management and all that sort of stuff seems to be getting itself right as well. I think that makes a big difference.
“Obviously, Lyndon Dykes is there as well. He’s an Australian, even though he plays for Scotland.
“He should have played for Australia, but he scored a goal [at the weekend for Birmingham], so that was really cool.
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“As Aussies, we kind of look at Lyndon Dykes as ‘he’s really Australian, but he just made the wrong decision’.”
*Seaman Says is brought to you by Betway.
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