John McGinn never had the opportunity to meet Denis Law in person - but the Hibs hero is well aware of the Manchester United legend’s ‘extraordinary’ goals tally for Scotland.
And the Aston Villa midfield star has set his sights on emulating Law and Sir Kenny Dalglish by becoming his country’s record goal scorer.
McGinn surpassed Rangers great Ally McCoist in the all-time Scotland scoring charts during the previous international break in November, moving him up to fifth position in the standings with 20 goals to his name.
Prior to scoring twice in a row during the Nations League fixtures against Croatia and Poland, the 30-year-old had gone 12 months without hitting the back of the net for Steve Clarke’s side.
“Yeah it’s definitely a motivation to be amongst those names,” McGinn declared. “I like to wind Ally McCoist up a wee bit when I see him! Obviously if I had to choose the team winning over me scoring, I would still, but I sort of have it in the back of my mind.
“It's something that I think is achievable. I think ten more goals to match Kenny Dalglish and Denis Law is something I never thought I would say. So I've got it in the back of my mind, but first and foremost, I want to keep the team in Division A. If I manage to nick a couple and creep up towards it then even better.
“I didn't meet him (Law) at all. Obviously I was aware of how good he was. My dad told me, my grandpa, everyone sort of idolised him whether it was people down south, people up here. Everyone always spoke about how good a player he was and I think his record speaks for itself.
“I think he had 30 goals for Scotland and maybe even under 60 caps which is an extraordinary achievement. So everyone that speaks to him spoke so highly of him and I think the respect our football world showed him just shows how highly he was thought of and what a player he was.”
The Scots are preparing for a play-off double header against Greece this week as they bid to maintain their Group A status in the UEFA Nations League. And McGinn is confident Scotland now possess the firepower required to return from Thursday’s first leg in Piraeus with a victory.
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“You always need attacking options,” McGinn stated. “I think for a couple of years we were very, very limited. We had a combination of players injured, players out of form, but obviously Nizzy (Kevin Nisbet) is back scoring, George (Hirst) is in for the first time, Tommy’s (Conway) doing really, really well at Middlesbrough.
“So we have different options now. We're not really as one dimensional. He's got players like myself and Ryan Christie who can float in between wide players, centre, just off the front and McTominay, whose certainly like an attacker for us.
“We have got different ways we can approach both games and I think with the number of games we're playing individually at club level, we might need to freshen things up over the two games. I'm sure the manager's thought about that and thankfully now he's got more and more options.”