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Alex McLeish believes big-money summer moves for players such as Scott Brown and Lee McCulloch can only be good news for the Scotland team.

McCulloch is expected to swap Wigan for Rangers in a £2million deal in the coming days, while Celtic pipped Rangers and clubs from the Barclays Premier League to land Brown from Hibernian for £4.4million.

According to McLeish, such hefty price tags are an incentive for players to meet high expectations, as well as boosting their own confidence.

And the Scotland boss insists he will benefit when those players report for international duty.

He said: "It's been really encouraging to see the breakthrough of these kids and there are now high expectations on them because of their transfer fees.

"Scott Brown has gone to one of the biggest clubs in the world, in Celtic, and Lee McCulloch is coming to one of the biggest clubs in the world, in Rangers.

"It's done the Scottish international team no harm at all to see these boys coming through, because they come through with confidence.

"They have a price tag and that must give them belief that they must be pretty good after all."

He added: "There are a lot of players coming through from the SPL clubs who maybe five, six, 10 years ago wouldn't have got first-team football.

"It's a breath of fresh air that the chairmen are relying on youth set-ups to rear the kids to come through."

Having Scottish players based in Scotland does not necessarily make his own job any easier, according to McLeish.

But he is well aware of the problems that can arise from what initially seem like lucrative moves abroad.

Garry O'Connor left behind Hibernian for a new life at Lokomotiv Moscow in March 2006 but he and his young family failed to settle in Russia, leading to problems off the pitch.

O'Connor damaged his own Scotland career when he failed to show up ahead of a Euro 2008 qualifier against Ukraine last October during Walter Smith's reign.

Fortunately for O'Connor, he was welcomed back into the international fold by McLeish, making a triumphant return against Austria and the Faroe Islands, before agreeing a £2.65million move to Birmingham.

Speaking of his Scotland stars, McLeish said: "I don't mind where they are although it's good that they're in the British Isles.

"The world is a shrinking place now, you can get anywhere within a matter of hours.

"I think the problem with O'Connor was that his family were very lonely out there and, when a player doesn't have peace of mind, it's hard for him to concentrate on his job and his work.

"Although, I've got to say, O'Connor handled it very well in the last few months as opposed to when he had the problems last season."

McLeish was speaking at the Bank of Scotland Soccer One football festival in Coatbridge, near Glasgow.

"It's basically a programme to encourage kids to play football and the more the merrier," he said.

"The encouragement they get, and the fact that they can play football every week, hopefully means we will see some Scotland stars of the future."