Ian Baraclough praise for ‘selfless’ Northern Ireland squad

Thursday night’s penalty shoot-out victory over Bosnia and Herzegovina sets up a qualifying play-off final against Slovakia in Belfast next month, with Northern Ireland still dreaming of a second consecutive European finals.

Bosnia’s home record made Baraclough’s side second favourites in Sarajevo, but Northern Ireland triumphed in what was the nation’s first penalty shoot-out as Liam Boyce netted the winning spot-kick after Bailey Peacock-Farrell saved from Haris Hajradinovic and Edin Visca hit the crossbar.

And Baraclough, enjoying his first victory in charge, put the success down to the character of his players.

“The spirit of the lads is fantastic, they’re selfless,” he said. “They don’t think about themselves, they think just of the team, that’s the group of players we’ve got.

“I’ve got a group of players I feel very comfortable with, they’ve worked very hard since coming in on Sunday.

“They enjoy working together as a group, they enjoy coming and playing for their country, I’m very lucky that I’ve got that type of squad.”

The match had finished 1-1 after 120 minutes, with Niall McGinn cancelling out a first-half goal from Rade Krunic. McGinn revealed the victory had led to some wild celebrations with “pizza flying everywhere” in the Northern Ireland dressing room, but the players do not get long to enjoy their success with a Nations League match against Austria following quickly tomorrow in Belfast.

Baraclough may need to make changes after 120 tough minutes on the road, and with another game against Norway following in Oslo on Wednesday.

“We’ll have to look after players because a lot of energy has been put out there,” said Baraclough. “Players have come off cramping up; we thought Paddy (McNair) had picked up an ankle injury but he said he’d cramped up after 80 minutes.”

--

A message from the Editor:

Thank you for reading this story on our website. While I have your attention, I also have an important request to make of you.

In order for us to continue to provide high quality and trusted local news on this free-to-read site, I am asking you to also please purchase a copy of our newspaper whenever you are able to do so.

Our journalists are highly trained and our content is independently regulated by IPSO to some of the most rigorous standards in the world.

But being your eyes and ears comes at a price. So we need your support more than ever to buy our newspapers during this crisis.

With the coronavirus lockdown having a major impact on many of our local valued advertisers - and consequently the advertising that we receive - we are more reliant than ever on you helping us to provide you with news and information by buying a copy of our newspaper when you can safely.

You can also enjoy unlimited access to the best news from across Northern Ireland and the UK by subscribing to newsletter.co.uk

With a digital subscription, you can read more than five articles, see fewer ads, enjoy faster load times, and get access to exclusive newsletters and content. Visit https://www.newsletter.co.uk/subscriptions now to sign up.

Thank you