Scots beat Venezuela despite Castellanos stunner

Scotland survived a wonder goal from Deyna Castellanos to beat Venezuela in their first full international since their World Cup play-off defeat by Republic of Ireland.

But Castellanos caught out Scotland goalkeeper Jenna Fife with a lob all the way from near the halfway line.

Venezuela had the Scots reeling, but they recovered to see out the win.

Only Chelsea playmaker Erin Cuthbert was called on again to start following Saturday's 2-0 win over Panama in what had been downgraded to an under-23 international.

• Reaction & as it happened

However, there were four changes from the loss to the Irish at Hampden, with Rangers' Fife in goal in place of Glasgow City's Lee Gibson, while Rangers' Rachel McLauchlan and Celtic's Kelly Clark were in defence and Birmingham City's Christie Murray in midfield as Leicester City's Sophie Howard and Rangers' Sam Kerr dropped to the bench and West Ham United's Lisa Evans missed out.

Both sides were looking to put behind them the disappointment of having missed out on next year's World Cup finals.

While the Scots started tentatively, Venezuela looked comfortable on the ball as they looked to recover from the disappointment of losing a South American fifth-place play-off to Chile that would have taken them to the inter-continental play-offs.

The Scots began to dominate and looked to have taken the lead when Fiona Brown rose to meet an Emslie cross and, as the ball trickled over the line as it emerged from a group of bodies, the referee ruled for a foul on Nayluisa Caceres when it looked like the goalkeeper had actually collided with her own defenders.

That was one of the few opportunities created despite a wealth of possession until Clark connected the Caroline Weir's corner whipped into the near post after 36 minutes.

Scotland extended the lead within another four minutes as Brown jinked inside her marker and found the unmarked Emslie to head powerfully home from 12 yards.

It looked like a routine win was on the cards - until Caceres showed the class of a player who made the opposite journey to Scotland's Weir this summer, from Real Madrid to Manchester City.

Minutes after Gabriela Garcia had joy cut short by an offside flag, her strike partner spotted Fife drifting to the edge of her penalty box and launched a shot over the goalkeeper's head from just inside Scotland's half.

Scotland were looked ragged and rattled but recovered to threaten again at the other end, but Kirsty Hanson's stabbed effort against the outside of a post was the closest they came to making the scoreline more comfortable.