‘Leader’ Grant Hanley will bounce back from Scotland error, says Lewis Morgan

Lewis Morgan has backed Scotland defender Grant Hanley to respond strongly from the error that gifted Poland victory in the Nations League opener at Hampden.

Hanley needlessly lunged in on Nicola Zalewski near the byeline to concede a spot-kick deep into injury time, which the Pole dispatched to render Scotland’s comeback from two goals down futile.

“Grant has played at the top level all his career, I have no worries about him being able to bounce back and go again at the weekend,” forward Morgan said.

“He’s one of the leaders of our group and someone everyone looks up to, so there’s no doubts that he’ll bounce back.

“We are all devastated after the game, and no one more so than Grant, but football turns round quick and I’ve no doubts that Grant will be the first one to put it all right.”

Poland’s second goal was also a spot-kick, with Antony Ralston tripping Zalewski to allow Robert Lewandowski to net.

And Morgan, a second-half substitute, admitted the self-inflicted mistakes proved a reminder of the small margin for error at this level.

“I think we’ve shown enough to know that we can compete,” the New York Red Bulls player added.

“It’s down to ourselves that we lost that game, the Poles didn’t do anything to win, we maybe feel that we lost it.

“We had a right go, we created loads of chances and on another night it’s a different result, but it’s easy to say that.

“We are in top group of the competition and teams are going to capitalise on our mistakes, so we just need to put the good things into practice on Sunday [against Portugal] and try to eradicate some of those errors.”