Wales laboured to a 1-0 win over the international minnows Liechtenstein to keep alive their hopes of finishing second in their World Cup qualification group.
Jordan James claimed his first Wales goal from close range after Liechtenstein’s assorted collection of full-time players, office workers and students had held out for over an hour. James wheeled away in delight with his obvious relief shared by 3,000 Wales fans filling three sides of the Rheinpark Stadion in Vaduz.
Moments later, however, James was booked and another late caution for Ethan Ampadu means both midfielders are ruled out of Tuesday’s crunch game with North Macedonia through suspension. That Cardiff City Stadium contest is a game Wales must win to overtake North Macedonia and secure a more favourable draw in the playoffs in March. If Wales fail on Tuesday then they will still reach the playoffs because of winning their Nations League group.
Craig Bellamy had an unfamiliar view from the stands, the Wales manager serving a touchline ban after receiving a second yellow card in the competition last month. Bellamy’s assistant Piet Cremers took his place in the technical area and four of Wales’s starters – James, Ampadu, Joe Rodon, Neco Williams – were a booking away from missing the final qualifier. Two of them came unstuck in incidents that could really hurt Wales.
Cremers said: “It’s never nice to lose players through suspension or an injury. But I’ve learned very quickly in this job that there’s nothing you can do about injuries and suspensions. You have to deal with it and we’ve got a really good squad. Players who have played before and know the detail.”
Liechtenstein, ranked 206 out of 210 teams in world football, had not scored in their six qualifying defeats and conceded 23 at an average of nearly four per game. Wales predictably dominated possession as Liechtenstein lay in a low defensive block and got bodies behind the ball.
The home goal remained unthreatened until Nathan Broadhead’s pressing forced an error and James saw his effort from the edge of the box pushed aside by Benjamin Büchel. The same combination worked the next opening, James finding Broadhead this time with a precise ball over the top. Broadhead’s excellent touch took him past Büchel but the Wrexham striker could not convert from a tight angle.
Wales thought they had broken the deadlock after 26 minutes when James headed a deep Sorba Thomas corner back into a congested six-yard box. Büchel was flustered under pressure from Dylan Lawlor and Rodon, and his weak punch fell to Broadhead who drove home emphatically. But Welsh celebrations were curtailed when the Albanian referee, Juxhin Xhaja, was sent to the pitchside monitor and decided that at least one of the Wales centre-halves was in an offside position from James’s header.
Wales raised the tempo after the break and Thomas delivered a cross to the far post from which Daniel James rattled the woodwork. Williams then headed wide from inside the six-yard box as it began to look like one of those nights for Wales.
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But, with the contest having ticked into its 61st minute, Williams played a clever pass for Daniel James to break behind the home defence. He cut out Buchel with a delightful ball across the face of goal, and his namesake Jordan had the straightforward task of ending Welsh anxiety.
Cremers said: “We knew we had to take care of today. We did that and now our focus goes to North Macedonia. It will be another difficult game in Cardiff but we play at home, we’ve got our fans in numbers and we’ll look to turn it into a positive result.
“This is a type of game where everyone expects you to win 5-0, 6-0, 7-0, but when you come to these places it can be a difficult game. We’ve seen that with teams that have played here before, like Belgium who struggled to score goals in the first half. It’s a team that’s very well organised, they keep the spaces small, and try to limit your chances.”
