Scotland's World Cup return ignites 28-year national fever

Kenny McLean's shot from the halfway line found the Danish net last November, and in that instant, Scotland's 28-year exile from the World Cup ended. Andy Munro, a father of three from Ayrshire, watched his children's faces as the stadium erupted around them. "Why are so many people crying?" they asked. He may have had tears of his own to wipe away. Eight months later, as Scotland prepares to face Haiti in the pre-dawn hours of Sunday morning, that same electricity has spread across the entire country like nothing seen in a generation.

The fever is visible everywhere, in ways both obvious and strange. Lucy McEwan, a 25-year-old teacher in Glasgow who plays amateur football herself, sees it daily in her classroom. Kids are trading FIFA Panini stickers with their teachers. The excitement is palpable, she says, because for the first time in many people's living memory, Scotland is actually there. She plans to stay awake for every match, which means her Thursday classes after Scotland plays Brazil will have a thoroughly exhausted instructor. Her students will likely be just as bleary-eyed, having set alarms for the 02:00 kickoff against Haiti.

In Dunlop, Ayrshire, Andy Munro's three boys—Harry, Keir, and Adam—talk about nothing else. The family plans to sleep at eight, wake at half past one, watch the match, and then the boys will play football Sunday morning anyway. "It's all they're talking about," Munro says. At Clerkhill School in Peterhead, pupils composed their own World Cup song with help from teacher Diane Pert, who set aside her own disappointment at working while her husband travels to America for the tournament. Dozens of musicians and bands across the country have released songs trying to capture the national mood.

The visual landscape has transformed. Chip shops and hairdressers in Glasgow's Anniesland display Saltires in their windows. Banks in Dumfries have inflatable footballs mounted beside cash machines. Bear Scotland, the company responsible for the country's roads, named one of their gritters "Snow Scotland Snow Party" and dressed someone in a kilt-wearing polar bear costume. East Renfrewshire Council rebranded itself East Robbo-shire Council in honor of captain Andy Robertson, who hails from the area. Outside Kings coffee shop in Dumfries, flags flutter above outdoor tables, and Mark Smith, the owner, watched passersby cheer and sing as the flags went up. "There's definitely a buzz in town," he says. "People are talking about our chances and remembering past World Cup attempts."

The commercial appetite is unprecedented. JD Sports reports selling roughly twice as many Scotland kits as they did for the 2024 European Championships. The strip is now the retailer's biggest seller across both the UK and the US. Pop-up merchandise shops have opened in Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Stirling. Retro kits are flying off shelves, along with t-shirts reading "We'll Be Coming 26"—a rallying cry for Tartan Army members heading to America. Venues accustomed to hosting concerts have pivoted to screening matches. The OVO Hydro, Scotland's largest arena, is preparing for thousands of supporters and will display the country's biggest screen. "We have waited almost 30 years for Scotland to return to the biggest stage in world football," says chief commercial officer Debbie McWilliams, "and we wanted to put the team on our stage for fans who haven't been able to make the trip across the Atlantic."

For pubs, the tournament represents a potential windfall. Nearly all local authorities have granted extended licensing hours. Liam Logue, who runs Greens Sports Bar in Dumfries with his wife Cas, sold 240 tickets for watch parties—40 more than he initially planned. Since selling out, he says, "every man and his dog" has messaged asking for entry. He could easily have sold another hundred.

For older supporters, this moment carries a particular weight. From 1974 to 1998, with the exception of 1994, Scotland reached every World Cup. For those who grew up in that era, participation felt inevitable, even if the tournaments themselves brought heartbreak. One fan recalls taking it for granted that Scotland would always be there, never imagining a 28-year gap. "There was a point when you started to wonder if you'd ever see us there again," he says. Now, tens of thousands of Scotland supporters are heading to the United States, with the Tartan Army already setting up camp in Boston. Some carry cautious optimism—worrying that Haiti might be an unexpected stumbling block, remembering how Costa Rica and Morocco have surprised bigger nations before. But most are hoping Steve Clarke's squad will finally break through the group stage.

In Glasgow's pop-up store, a worker recalls meeting parents of a very young child who was "used to Scotland winning all the time now"—a striking contrast to the lean decades that preceded this moment. Near the national stadium, where adults wept as the final whistle sounded last November, walking tour guide Lindsay Hamilton has noticed a shift in recent weeks. "There's been such a buzz around the World Cup, with folk giving their predictions and sharing their own personal stories from all the previous near misses." New murals of McTominay and McGinn have appeared across the country. For Lindsay, each one brings a smile. Like the rest of Scotland, she is hoping for many more to be painted this summer.