Gordon Strachan will send his troops into battle against Everton in the FA Cup with the ringing cry ‘fortune favours the brave’ and he scoffs at suggestions that the game will be boringly goalless.

"People will look at our tie and immediately label it a no score draw but I don’t agree with that.

"Our form levels over the last four months have been as good as any four months you can choose over the last few years.

"Fortune favours the brave and I think both managers will go for broke. The teams will go all out to finish the tie at the first attempt. If it is a draw it will not be scoreless.

"We are certainly going to try to win at Goodison even though in doing that you can sometimes get a goal scored against you.

"If you get the breaks you can win. At our best we can give anyone in the league a game. If we slip below our best then anyone can beat us.

"There are a lot of things to interest people in this match. In a perfect world I would like to see a cracking game, with us going through to the next round.

"Cup football is different because you do not spend the week leading up to it looking at the league tables. If you win, you sit by the fire on Sunday waiting for the draw for the next round. If you lose, you get on with playing your next league match.

"It’s good to win obviously. Especially when you are in a little run of good form because it helps to build the momentum.

"All the teams which get through to the last eight will believe they can win it, especially if they get a home draw in the sixth round. This club won the Cup twelve years ago. It’s nice to have history, but it’s also nice to be part of that history."

Strachan knows his opposite number Walter Smith from their days as players in Scotland.

"He was a few years older than me so we did not move in the same circles. He is a very strong character – you have to be when you manage Rangers. You have to beat Celtic and you have to win the league to keep the supporters happy and everywhere you go there is a Rangers supporters or a Celtic supporter.

"I don’t know about any pressures at Everton. I don’t know the scene on Merseyside, but I do know that to last as long as he has in the game, and to do what he has done, he has to be a strong character."