Michael O’Neill has insisted ahead of Monday’s crunch Nations League clash in Luxembourg that his exciting young Northern Ireland team are ready to win competitive games away from home to match their brilliant Windsor Park form.
The visitors just need a draw to top their group and earn promotion but O’Neill will send his team out only with victory in mind.
Over the past year Northern Ireland have won four matches out of four in Belfast when points were at stake but despite some impressive displays on the road in friendlies in 2024 they have yet to win a competitive fixture on their travels or score a goal.
In September in the Nations League they lost 1-0 in Bulgaria and a month later drew 0-0 against Belarus. That match was played in Hungary but still designated as an away game.
Indeed Northern Ireland have not collected maximum points on their travels in their previous six matches. The last success came in San Marino in O’Neill’s first game in charge second time around.
This squad is improving all the time under O’Neill’s leadership and at home they have been outstanding lately but he knows when the World Cup qualifiers come around in 2025 having the ability to triumph away from Windsor will be crucial.
In a detailed answer on the subject ahead of the game with Luxembourg, O’Neill said: “I think any qualification campaign is based on your home form but certainly the ability to pick points up away from home is key.
“I also feel the way a qualification campaign works where you play the first four games – two home and two away – you can put yourself in a really strong position if you win away games.
“We haven’t had a lot of opportunities to do it in the last 12 months. We had away friendlies in Romania and Scotland (in March) where we acquitted ourselves very well and drew and won at Hampden.
“If you look at the competitive away games this year in Hungary against Belarus we felt we should have won. Behind closed doors it maybe didn’t have the edge to it that we hoped though the performance was good and the game versus Bulgaria was a good learning curve for the group because it showed the margins of the game.
“It took us 20 minutes to settle into a physical match on a difficult pitch and then I felt we acquitted ourselves well but we gave the opposition a goal and that was the deciding factor in the game.
“Those are the learning experiences we have had in this campaign. Even going back to the Euro qualifier in Helsinki (in 2023) we were beaten 4-0 (by Finland) but we lost a goal either side of half-time and quickly the game goes away from you.
“There is more resilience in the squad now and more of a consistency in the squad that we didn’t have before in terms of player availability which is a big thing.
“I think this team is ready to come away from home and play against good nations and win games. We get the opportunity on Monday night in a brilliant stadium and fantastic pitch so it is a great game for us.”
From Friday night’s 2-0 victory over Belarus, O’Neill is without the suspended Ciaron Brown which may offer a chance for Ruairi McConville or Kofi Balmer in the three man backline. The boss pointed out that he didn’t want to disrupt the side too much in a match he feels will be a test even though Luxembourg are bottom of the group with just two points from five matches.
“It would be easy to come here and think it will be an easy game. I actually think it will be our most difficult away game,” he said.
“I think the results Luxembourg have had aren’t a reflection of where they are as a team. We expect a very tough game.”
O’Neill revealed that he had barely discussed the prospect of promotion to Nations League section B with his players.
In his press conference he also said that he had ‘buried’ the shock World Cup qualifying defeat to Luxembourg on his last visit here in 2013.
Another loss in Luxembourg would be a surprise though not to the level of 11 years ago which proved to be a turning point that saw Northern Ireland and O’Neill go on to reach Euro 2016.
Should Northern Ireland produce what they are capable of, a third win in a row in the Nations League is on the cards.
It was interesting to hear O’Neill speak about his pleasure at the different ways the team won against Bulgaria and Belarus in Belfast.
“You always want your team to play the way we did against Bulgaria but that game allowed us to play like that because it was more open,” he said.
“Against Belarus from very early they set their stall out to be difficult to beat. We just didn’t score in the first half. In that type of game it is really important to score and the earlier the better because the opposition start to believe more and more in what they do.
“I think we showed great patience and also our start to the second half was very good. It was almost like we said to the opposition ‘we have another gear to find here’ and that’s what we did.
“If you look at the statistics and momentum of the game our dominance of the first half was actually greater than in the second half but we were a bit more clinical.”
Northern Ireland have become fun to watch again after a period following O’Neill’s departure to Stoke when that wasn’t the case.
The fans are enjoying seeing the young guns do their thing, but does the manager?
“Definitely not during the game no,” he replied with a smile in his press conference.
“It’s enjoyable to watch afterwards but I’m a bit of a perfectionist so I’ll point out a lot of things. There are bits we have to work on like final third play and a lot of timing things could be a little bit better.
“What we have found is a solid base to play with. We have had a lot of the ball in these games and we have been a lot better with the ball than in qualification for Euro 2024 when we were open and loose and when we gave the ball away we were punished. I don’t think we do that now. We have more recovery and athleticism in our team and that is key for us.”