However, in the end Wales will be too much for Northern Ireland and ultimately move on to the quarters.
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Wales finished top of Group B after beating Russian Federation 3-0 on Monday and Chris Coleman’s men are now preparing for a last 16 clash in Paris on Saturday.
But Coleman said the team would not be getting carried away by the manner in which they reached the last 16.
“We’ve shown what a good defensive team we are, but now we have shown what a good team we are in possession”. But we’ve got enough quality in the team.
“We don’t know who we have yet”.
“They were awesome again and I just hope we can keep giving them reasons to celebrate”.
When the tournament started there were 15 different permutations with regards to who could play who in the first knockout stage.
You are reading news and information on LongIsland.com, Long Island’s Most Popular Website, Since 1996. “It’s just a real picture of our football”, Fedun said to the Kommersant newspaper. “Once you think you’ve arrived. you’ve never arrived in football”. The story of the night, however, was a Welsh one.
Arsenal midfielder Aaron Ramsey is pleased with the way Wales has performed so far at the competition. Against Slovakia and England, Gareth Bale scored from free kick.
Portugal will qualify with a win and could only miss out on first place if Iceland win and eclipse them on overall goal difference, then goals scored, then disciplinary (Portugal have a superior coefficient).
Akinfeev was nearly caught unawares by a vicious Ramsey drive from 30 yards as the Russians backed off, and Bale forced the Russian goalkeeper to block twice before setting up Ramsey for a shot that Akinfeev blocked on the second attempt.
“It’s great. One of the best things about playing at a tournament like this is coming up against some of the best players in the world”, said Hughes, who has played for Newcastle, Aston Villa and Fulham.
For Coleman, who as a player suffered the disappointment of narrowly missing out on qualifying for a major finals, his side’s all-round performance made him “immensely proud”.
“Geographically, we’re small, but if you judge it on passion, we’re a continent”, Coleman said in a statement that his Northern Ireland counterpart could also make his own.
“We will enjoy the moment but come the next day we will prepare for what lies ahead”, said Bale.
“I’ve been a player myself. The way we’ve played in the recent games, it’ll be interesting and I believe we will come out on top”.
“We spoke after the England game that we needed to be better in keeping the ball, and we did that”.
“It will be a British-type game and it will be hard, but if we can match the performance against Russian Federation we have a very good chance”. You nearly think, how are they still doing this?
“It was an unbelievable team performance”.
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“Even our hotel feels like home”. “We’ll have a look at it, and look at areas where we can exploit them”.
