Wales vs Montenegro & England
During the final days of Mark Hughes reign at the helm of the Wales national team when the marvellous win in Helsinki and a fully deserved victory over Italy were a fading memory, Welsh fans would often travel to games more in hope than expectation. Then John Toshack came and killed the hope. An inevitable slide down the world rankings ensued with defeats home and away to Russia, Germany and Finland. Gary Speed left his Sheffield United managerial post to take over another sinking ship, the Welsh national side, but he seemingly couldn’t halt the slide as Wales slumped to 117th in the world and faced the ignominy of being seeded last in World Cup qualification for Brazil 2014. Wales faced humiliation after being leapfrogged by the Faroe Islands after some smart work by a software developer from Bucharest.
Whilst Gary Speed’s start as Wales boss had been less than inspiring he had made some positive changes to the Welsh setup. Roy Evans departed as assistant boss and was replaced by Dutch twitter enigma and physio extrodanaire Raymond Verheijen. The focus of international matches appeared to be on keeping the players fit and happy rather than upsetting and alienating them. And the fruits of this labour were seen on Friday night as Wales fielded what was probably their full strength XI (minus the suspended James Collins and injured Sam Ricketts). The last time Wales fielded a line-up with so few withdrawals was probably the memorable win over Italy at the Millennium Stadium, the Montenegro game ended the same way, a satisfying 2-1 home victory.
The win against Montenegro hasn’t given Welsh football a boost it desperately needed and will see the team climb into the top 100 of the World Rankings. Whilst not quite dining at “football’s top table” Wales will perhaps be eating at a Pizza Express rather than a Pizza Hut in weeks to come. Indeed it was Darcy Blake, a man who had difficulties with his fast-food lifestyle (too many burgers and too much time at the bar) only a season or two ago who was given the unenviable task of shackling Wayne Rooney on Tuesday night – a job he excelled at. Ultimately despite a solid performance in which Wales held possession of the ball for long periods and were never really put under a sustained spell of pressure, they lost the game by a solitary goal to nil.
Much of the press focus with regards to Wales’ game with England focussed on Gareth Bale. Whilst Bale is a remarkably important part of the Wales team and a very talented player he’s a peripheral figure on a football pitch, hanging out wide waiting for supply. It’s Aaron Ramsey in central midfield who will almost certainly be the figurehead for this new Welsh side. The problem with a player like Bale is that he cannot dictate play from out wide and he’s certainly not talented enough to run a game from the centre in the same way that Ramsey can. It should be remembered that Wales already have a lot of experience with a player like Bale in the form of Ryan Giggs, who despite his inability to play in friendlies still notched over 60 caps for Wales. He was undoubtedly a world-class (whatever that means) player but often found it difficult to truly influence games whatever position the manager at the time selected him in. Aaron Ramsey has the ability to be what Hagi was for Romania, a player who can pull the strings in midfield and lead his often less illustrious team-mates to qualification. That’s not to say there aren’t other talented players there, Bale could quite easily be labelled Wales’ Dumitrescu. Though admittedly this analogy does start to fall apart when Ashley Williams becomes Wales’ Popescu and Steve Morison Wakes’ Răducioiu.
Friday and Tuesday were the first time that the graduates of Wales wonderful U21 side of a season or so ago have played with the same verve, intensity and ability that they showed for Brian Flynn. Alongside these great young players you have the fact that the whole back four that played against Montenegro and England had at one point played for Welsh clubs. Perhaps now is the time that the Wales international team begins to truly benefit from Swansea City and Cardiff City’s unfamiliarly lofty position in the league pyramid. The pieces do seem to be finally falling into place.
However, now is no the time for Gary Speed and his staff to get too cocky, the Welsh national side has had more false dawns than a Celebrity Lookalike agency who specialise in characters from the Office. Speed and Verheijen look as if they’ve got the right ingredients of a side that can be competitive internationally. The 2014 World Cup may be too early for this group of players as Belgium, Croatia, Serbia, Scotland and Macedonia are tough opponents but Speed has to be confident that this set of players can have a real go at qualifying for Euro 2016 in France where the tournament is to be extended to 24 sides.