Wales manager Chris Coleman yesterday attempted to relieve the pressure on his players ahead of their final group stage match against Russia this evening by casting an eye towards the future, after watching them wilt in the face of an English onslaught last Thursday.
Coleman’s men looked shell-shocked after Daniel Sturridge’s late winner, but with a victory over the labouring Russians guaranteeing progression to the knockout stages, a draw almost certainly being enough and even a defeat not a certainty to send them crashing out of the tournament, his intervention was a timely reminder that life in the Welsh camp is not all doom and gloom.
Indeed, Coleman asserted yesterday that even if Wales lose, they can’t really lose, as no one expected them to get this far anyway.
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It is one of football’s stock clichés that each game is taken as it comes, on its own merits. But Coleman looked beyond the tie with Russia as a reminder to his team that he doesn’t want this game to represent their final chance on the big stage – that they have the talent in their ranks to return to the party again and again.
The purpose of this was two-fold – to boost confidence in the ranks after the crushing defeat to their neighbours, and to downplay the billing of the match as a ‘winner-takes-all’ showdown.
“Whether we progress or not this is not the end of the journey for this team, this team will go on and on,” said Coleman.
“There is more to come from these players in the future and we will take so much from this tournament. This group can’t lose, they have everything to look forward to. We are playing against the best in Europe. We have to be at our best physically, mentally, tactically. We are being tested to the limits and learning so much.
“Normally in June we would be playing friendlies against teams who had qualified,” he added. “We were a bounce team, a team to practice against. Now we are at a tournament ourselves.”
Quite legitimately, Coleman may claim – and indeed seek to emphasise – that all the pressure ahead of tonight’s game is on their opponents.
Their leaden displays so far in the tournament have yielded a scarcely deserved draw against England and a fully-deserved defeat against Slovakia. An unthinkable reverse against Wales would send them crashing out of the tournament, a sight that may not entirely please the country’s hierarchy just two years out from hosting the World Cup.
Their coach, Leonid Slutsky, who had to rescue their qualifying campaign after the disastrous divorce from the exorbitantly paid Fabio Capello that almost bankrupted the Russian Football Union, has been hamstrung in his endeavours by injury to key midfield man Alan Dzagoev. It is not quite the equivalent of Wales without Gareth Bale, but it is not a million miles away.
Slutsky cast a jealous eye towards the relative luxuries at the disposal of Coleman, with nobody from the Russian squad approaching the quality that Bale or teammate Aaron Ramsey can offer the Welsh.
He is therefore more concerned with how his side can stop the superstars from Real Madrid and Arsenal respectively, as he attempts to guide Russia to a tournament victory for the first time in eight attempts.
“It is hard to man-mark superstars,” said Slutsky. “Bale likes to roam in different areas so we will try and neutralise his threat zonally.
“Wales have two top players. Their attacking play is built on the interaction between those players, but they have a decent side beside that. They tend to play on the break, but matches so far in this group are very tight. Fine margins will decide the result.”
Away from the field, the French authorities will be hoping there are no more of the shameful scenes that have blighted Group B clashes so far in the tournament.
To that end, they could probably have done without Russian striker Fyodor Smalov weighing in and apportioning the blame for his country’s supporter’s indiscretions at the feet of British fans.
“There's a number of videos that have been uploaded on the web and clearly the English really did provoke them, and indeed the Welsh fans,” said Smalov.
"Clearly these events mustn't go on in football stands.
"But if people really want to go out with the intention of scrapping, they should fight elsewhere.
"They shouldn't do so in the stadium, we want to have support in the stadium."
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