Berra revels in Brazilian break from club struggle

Christophe Berra believes facing the superstars of Brazil can only help him improve as a player in the Premier League. Wolves are currently locked in a tense relegation battle as they desperately bid to hold on to their top-flight status and the break from club business is probably a welcome one this week.

For Berra, that means a training camp with the rest of the Scotland squad in La Manga before turning their attention to Sunday's friendly at the Emirates Stadium. But, far from treating this week's get-together and subsequent clash in London as a party, Berra is determined to use the experience as a valuable learning curve.

He said: "International football is played at a different pace, although you do get games like that in the Premier League. But we play against international-quality strikers every week so it can only be good for me as an individual to have this sort of experience.

"I'm only 26 and I'm improving all the time – I'm not at my prime yet and centre-halves can play at the top level until they're 34, 35 and 36. I want to carry on learning and improving my overall game and playing in these games like Brazil is only going to help me."

After a couple of days of team bonding in the Spanish resort, including several rounds of golf as Craig Levein and his coaching staff pitted their wits against the players, the hard work now begins in earnest as training gets under way, and Berra insists no one in the Scotland camp is under any illusions about the size of task they face. He added: "We're not kidding ourselves – it's going to be a difficult game because they're a better team than us with better individuals, but we want to continue our progress."