I’M expecting Jordan Rhodes  to gain a lot of confidence  from tonight’s experience  with the Scotland Under 21  squad.

From personal experience with  England at that level, I can tell you  that it gives you a massive lift to work  alongside different players with a  national squad and pull on the shirt  of your country.

Billy Stark had no hesitation in  getting Jordan  involved with the  Under 21s, who have an important   European Championship qualifying  assignment against Bulgaria at St  Mirren Park tonight (7.30).

Playing for your country is the  pinnacle of anyone’s career and,  while Jordan has been with the squad  a couple of times already, I know he  will relish the competitive element of  a championship qualifier.

And Scotland would be wise to  pick him, because he has made an  excellent start to the season with us.

Obviously we want to get him  back safe and sound with a string of  important matches coming up in  League I – not to mention the JPT  against Bradford at home – but it  would be great to see him bagging  goals on the international stage as  well.

I don’t think there is anyone better  in our division as a goalscorer and,  for such a young lad to have made  such a big impact in his first couple  of seasons with us is a fantastic  achievement.

To have got four goals under his  belt already with us is brilliant and  we know he went off to join up with  Scotland in fine spirits, having  finished his chances so well against  Cardiff in the Carling Cup, having  helped us to successive League I wins  against Colchester and Wycombe  and having played his part in the JPT  win down at Northampton, when he  was again unlucky not to score.

With people like Jordan, Lee  Novak and Alan Lee in your side you  are never going to have problems  scoring goals, especially when we’ve  got people like Gary Roberts, Danny  Ward and Donal McDermott only  too happy to chip in as well.

We need to remain patient,  because teams are going to try and  make it hard for us every time we go  out there on the pitch, just like  Oldham showed with a battling draw  at their place on Saturday.

There will be pitfalls along the way  and we need the fans to realise that,  but first up, let’s hope Jordan does  well and wins in a Scotland shirt  tonight.