Lads, it’s Gibraltar! Wales on the rocks after post-season friendly flop

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The British overseas territory of Gibraltar has an official population of 32,688. If it were sawn off the Iberian peninsula and reattached to the north side of the Bristol Channel, it would be Wales’s 13th-largest settlement, tucked in between Caerphilly and Pontypridd. At its narrowest point, just north of the airport runway that backs on to its national and only football stadium, it is around 400m wide. With a fair wind, Wayne Hennessey might be able to boot a football right across it.

Wales fans, you probably know where we’re going with this, but hear us out. We understand; failing to meet incredibly low expectations is kind of our thing. A June friendly in the Algarve, three months after their last competitive game and with five players making their debuts, was never likely to be invigorating fare. After the final whistle blew and Gibraltar 0-0 Wales was solemnly daubed into the record books, Rob Page was keen to point to a large canvas he had dragged in front of the scoreboard. “I have to keep saying about the bigger picture,” the manager sighed, scraping handfuls of egg and humble pie from his face. Page has a point – the result of this fixture ought to be meaningless. It’s all about giving young players game time, and building some cohesion before the Nations League returns in the autumn.

On the other hand: lads, it’s Gibraltar. There is an inherent risk in setting up a post-season loosener against a team ranked 203rd in the world; unless you rack up a few goals, the net effect is unlikely to be positive. Take Scotland, whose readiness to step into the Allianz Arena cauldron next Friday must have got a real boost from their 2-0 win over the same opponents earlier this week. Then again, if you fail to win at all, there’s bigger trouble ahead. From being a penalty or two away from leading Wales back to the Euros, Page found himself roundly booed and heckled by the 900-odd Welsh fans who turned up on Thursday. Having sent out a team with a total of 44 caps between them, Page had to throw on the likes of Dan James and Brennan Johnson in a failed attempt to rescue his team’s credibility.

The result is doubly damaging because Wales managed to beat the same opposition 4-0 in Wrexham last October, so it appears Page’s project is going backwards. There really isn’t much lower to go – only seven teams on the planet are ranked beneath Gibraltar, and the risk-reward ratio of a friendly against, say, the Turks and Caicos Islands, looks deeply unfavourable. Instead, the back-under-pressure coach must try to get a result from Wales’s next match, in Slovakia on Sunday. That now feels like both an essential and monumental task. As one wag put it, a lot of fans will want the manager to be sacked for failing to beat one of world football’s weakest teams – but Julio Ribas should be given time to turn things around.

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QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Up your game” – a message on a mayonnaise advert featuring Jack Grealish has got more interest than Hellmann’s creatives probably bargained for after the winger was axed from England’s Euros squad. In further condiment bumf doing the rounds, the Manchester City winger adds: “When we come together as England we feel a real togetherness as a squad to represent our country.” Ouch. But looking on the bright side he also admits to feeling “this same connection with friends and family over the summer period when enjoying a good BBQ back at home”. Every cloud. He can now look forward to following his own advice. “Fire up [the] BBQ and give the Grealish Burger a try!”

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