KIERAN Tierney last night accepted full responsibility for the Scotland defeat against Israel after scoring an own goal that gifted the home team their 2-1 victory in Haifa.

The Celtic left back diverted a Beram Kayal cross beyond Allan McGregor in the 74th minute in the Sammy Offer Stadium to ensure that Andreas Herzog's team triumphed.

Alex McLeish's men were booed by the large travelling support following the final whistle and Tierney apologised to them publicly when he spoke to the media afterwards.

“I’d like to say sorry to my team-mates, the fans, everybody really," he said. "It was my mistake that cost us at the end of the night. I need to be a man about it, take the abuse, take the hate, and get on with it and try to fix it.

“It wasn’t the only problem, but I’m at the heart of it, it’s my own goal. Everyone has given everything, including me, but it’s just unfortunate that I’ve made the mistake and we couldn’t get the goal back after it. It was always going to be hard.

“It’s going to come to me so I need to take it on the chin. You’ll get that as a footballer on the biggest stage, and at centre back you’re always in the firing line.

"There's always a chance that’s going to happen and unfortunately for me I got a stroke of bad luck. I was just trying to help the ball on, put it anywhere really, and sadly it’s gone in the goal.

“The fans are probably frustrated at me for the mistake so all I can do is apologise to them. They support us through thick and thin and I can’t thank them enough for that."

Tierney denied the three man defence that McLeish has used since being appointed Scotland manager for a second time was the issue and paid tribute to Israel for how they performed.

“I think we knew what we were doing but they’ve got good players who’ll trouble you in any formation, they’ll find spaces," he said. "We tried at half time to fix the problems they were causing us, but they’re a good team and we didn’t deal with them.

“We knew we were going to come here and get a hard game. We did well to get the lead but one of things we were trying to avoid was them clawing one back just after half time, and they did.

“And when you go down to 10 men (John Souttar was ordered off for a second bookable offence in the second-half) it's always going to be even harder. I thought we coped well with it to be fair and even after the goal, we had a couple of good chances and good possession."

The painful loss means the national team now face a more difficult task to finish on top of Group C League 1 in the Nations League and secure a Euro 2020 play-off spot.

“We’re back to square one now," said Tierney. "Everyone’s even so we need to be positive and move on. The dressing rom is disappointed, but the game’s over, we can only bounce back."