Northern Ireland’s 30-year wait to play in a major worldwide tournament ended in disappointment after it was beaten by Poland on Sunday.
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Northern Ireland were “not good enough” and were “overawed” in their 1-0 loss to Poland in their first match of Euro 2016, according to Steven Davis and Kyle Lafferty.
“This has done a lot for the country and it is fantastic to see how many people are behind us from all sections of the community”.
Poland’s players celebrate their goal during the Euro 2016 Group C match between Poland and Northern Ireland on Sunday, June 12, 2016 at Allianz Riviera in Nice, France.
Arkadiusz Milik: Poland’s biggest goal threat of this game, he finally broke the deadlock after previously going close on numerous occasions.
“The next matches will show that we can be even better and go further”, he said.
“We are experienced, we know how to play this game”. Maybe there was an aspect that it did take us a while to settle into the game.
Although only a handful of Michael O’Neill’s squad play in England’s Premier League, the former financial analyst has moulded a tough unyielding outfit that is unsafe from set-pieces. We have got to win and play on the front foot. We know it’s a very hard job for a lone striker and Conor (Washington) and then Jamie (Dallas) coming on gave us another outlet.
When Poland were co-hosts of the Euros four years ago, Lewandowski was a good player, but not the star that he is today.
Gary McAllister of The Amalgamation of Official Northern Ireland Supporters Clubs, which represents nearly sixty supporters groups, had a similar take.
“We didn’t turn up, Michael [O’Neill] will have a word with us, he will speak the truth”. Jakub Blaszczykowski’s wonderful run up the right ended as he cut the ball back perfectly, with Milik taking one touch before rolling it into the bottom right corner. I was interviewed by Polish media back in Belfast and one guy was nearly insulting, saying ‘You’ve got players from Fleetwood [19th in League One this season]’.
O’Neill also touched upon the need to “adapt quickly” owing to the fact that Poland an other teams in France have power “in every area of the team”.
If we want to qualify out of this group, then we are going to have to win in Lyon on Thursday.
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“I don’t think we can change the fight, the determination and the heart”.
