Michael O'Neill makes Conor Bradley admission while praising Northern Ireland star as 'top-class'

Liverpool star Bradley, who was named captain for Friday’s 2-0 win over Slovakia, had to sit out of a showdown with the Germans after picking up a second yellow card of Northern Ireland’s Group A campaign.

The 22-year-old is developing a fine connection with Ethan Galbraith on Northern Ireland’s right-hand side and the hosts missed Bradley’s quality – he would have came up against club team-mate Florian Wirtz.

Brodie Spencer was a more than capable deputy, playing across two different positions on Monday evening, and O’Neill felt many of his stars performed better in the second half than first.

Northern Ireland finished the stronger team, pushing for an equaliser until the final moments with Shea Charles and Callum Marshall both denied in the closing stages, and O’Neill feels home advantage was a major reason for that.

"We're at home, that's the biggest difference,” he said. “We're at home and we're chasing the game...we put a huge amount into the game on Friday night.

"The crowd carried us tonight when we needed them to carry us and I think probably in the end, if you look at most of our players, they had better second halves than first.

"Shea came into the game a lot more, Ethan came into the game a lot more, I thought Dan Ballard was fantastic for the 90 minutes – he looked like a top, top-class centre-back.

"Trai (Hume) was great, Brodie was good when he went into the back-three for us as well.

"There's no doubt we missed Conor on the night...we missed that threat on the right-hand side and the combination of him and Ethan.”

Northern Ireland came up against five players who ply their trade with German champions Bayern Munich, Wirtz, who joined Liverpool for £100million in the summer, and goalscorer Nick Woltemade – Newcastle United paid around £70million for his services.

While Germany recently endured a three-game losing run against Portugal, France and Slovakia, they’ve since responded by winning three on the trot to cement status as Group A favourites.

O’Neill felt there were many factors behind Monday’s defeat – but was quick to pay credit to the opposition.

"I think it's a bit of everything, but probably mostly the opposition if I'm honest,” added O’Neill. “This Germany team has maybe had a bit of criticism, but ultimately they've lost one game in the group.

"They are coming off the back of the Nations League where they lost games against France and Portugal...that's the top-end of international football in Europe.

"I know Germany probably expect to win every time, but sometimes you're not going to. I think that we played a top team tonight and that was probably the biggest factor.

"I thought physically we got to the level of the game again to be honest. I haven't seen the physical data yet, but I thought we got to the level.

"If you look early in the game, there is a difference in the physicality of the two teams, I think it's noticeable – some of our players aren't at that level of physicality yet.

"But some of them are only 21, 22 years of age. They're not at that point yet...I think that was a factor. When I watch the game back, the thing that I'll be frustrated with was possibly we maybe could have had more belief, particularly in the first half with the ball.”