WALES DEFEATED AGAIN DESPITE GREAT EFFORT AGAINST UKRAINE
The Dragons fell to a defeat despite a strong performance against Ukraine at the international break.
The Welsh team did a great job in most of the minutes in the game but paid dearly for a slip in concentration. The worry after the match for the Chris Coleman-led team is that the game pretty much went the way of the encounter against Bosnia and Northern Ireland. In those games as well, the smallest dip in focus during set pieces put them in misery.
In the summer, they would likely face higher quality teams and it wouldn’t be much of a surprise if they lost but for games such as the one against Ukraine, no one wants the game influenced by set-piece sloppiness.
Ukraine, the hosts took advantage at the first half through a poorly defended free kick. The Dragons still in the Euro qualification excitement hoped to better perfect the team but fell to defense sloppiness again. The match against Ukraine is the penultimate in the matches’ build-up before Euro France kicks off on June 11th.
The Yellow-Blue team led via Andriy Yarmolenko’s strike from a sent free kick. The lone goal was enough to see to Wales’s second defeat in three games. After the goal in the first half, the Welsh team couldn’t push much for an equalizer or win without the pace and attack from Real Madrid sensation, Gareth Bale and Arsenal’s Aaron Ramsey. They had come back from a goal down against Northern Ireland on Thursday. Ukraine dominated possession largely through the game and was more dangerous.
Joe Allen was the only threat for the Welsh team. He was just on his best in the game. The talent moved the ball sharply and stepped up in the absence of other key players. However, his set-piece delivery needs improvement. Ukrainian head coach, Mykhaylo Formenko was pleased with his team’s performance. Wales will hope to improve on their performance in their next match against Sweden just before the summer championship.