Gordon Strachan insists Scotland can still qualify for Euro 2016 and urged his players to use a spirited performance in the 3-2 loss against Germany as inspiration.
Strachan's men sit four points behind Republic of Ireland, who occupy the play-off place in Group D.
That means they will likely require victories away at Poland and at home to Gibraltar to have any hope of being in France next summer.
However, their boss is refusing to give up hope, with Strachan telling Sky Sports: "Unless the points are different from what I see, they [Ireland] are catchable.
"We have two games and if we win them, we'll see what happens. We're still in it and we still have a chance of being in France next summer.
"The players need to go and watch a video of their performance. They should be proud of themselves."
Scotland twice came from behind in the opening half as a Mats Hummels own goal and James McArthur's strike cancelled out Thomas Muller's double - only for Ilkay Gundogan to net decisively just after the break.
"We're gutted," added McArthur. "It shows the characters we have in the changing room to be down twice against the world champions and come back.
"It's obviously going to be tough against them. They are very good players and we saw how clinical they were.
"But I thought we did enough to get something from the game."
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