The 10,000 capacity open air arena has been packed out with people watching previous Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland games live on the biggest screen in the country.
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“Gareth Bale is a stand-out player, you don’t play for Real Madrid if you’re an average player but I honestly believe we’ve got one of the best defences in the tournament”, Lafferty argued.
England skipper Wayne Rooney says he isn’t concerned that Wales, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland have joined the Three Lions in the knockout stages.
Mats Hummels insists Germany will not be affected by criticism of his team as they chase global football’s holy grail of a World Cup and Euro 2016 double.
Wales meet Northern Ireland, one of the tournament’s four best third-placed teams, in the last 16 in Paris on Saturday evening and find themselves in what is seen as the easiest half of the draw in France.
The margin of victory might have been a lot more handsome but for an inspired display from Irish goalkeeper Michael McGovern, as Germany’s attacking talents – on the back of a limp 0-0 draw against Poland last week – clicked into gear during a superb first-half showing.
“The Titanic Fan Zone has been a massive success and we want to look at all options”.
“Some of the senior players came to me in the dressing room as we had one can of beer each in there”, he said.
Wales stole a march over England by finishing top of Group B despite losing the clash between the two, and Bale was clearly delighted.
“We’re focused to get it done”.
“It will be a British-type game and it will be hard. We all know what we have to do and we’ll go out to win the game”. With Manuel behind we know we have someone who can save us if the ball goes beyond us.
“Obviously you come to the tournament for one reason: to win”, said the 26-year-old forward who is level with Spain’s Alvaro Morata in the top scorer race.
On Northern Ireland, Bale added: “They topped their group in qualifying, you don’t do that by mistake”. “They live that and they always play this, so they always have the chance to make the game hard for the other teams”.
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“We know about them, but they will know us also”.
