Northern Ireland v Norway

GOOD EVENING

Normally I would open by saying good evening and welcome to the National Football Stadium at Windsor Park for this evening’s UEFA Nations League match against Norway, but as neither you (the reader) or I (the writer) will be there on the night it’s not quite the same is it?

A new season, a new edition of the UEFA Nations League, a new managerial era as Ian Baraclough takes the reins at home for the first time, and it will all be different. The coronavirus pandemic has changed all of our lives this year, and in order to manage community transmission of the disease we are all playing our part. Hopefully we can take some small steps back to reality/ normality soon, as we did for the Sadler’s Peaky Blinder Irish Cup Final on 31 July (congratulations to the Glens, by the way), and we will work with both our own Northern Ireland Executive colleagues and UEFA to see if we might be able to click a few turnstiles for next month’s game. I’m sure after Gavin Whyte’s late header in Bucharest on Friday night our squad flew back to Belfast in the early hours of Saturday in an upbeat mood. Despite being up against it for much of the game (is anyone still hearing that referee’s whistle from the first half? - I am!) we did what we always do… we fought to the end and we came back with our first ever point in the UEFA Nations League. Those were great substitutions from Ian to bring on Kyle and Gavin who combined for the goal and what a night for both Bailey Peacock-Farrell in goal and Daniel Ballard, who made his senior debut.

Norway tonight will be a different challenge - they will be disappointed to have lost at home to Austria on Friday and will be determined to do better. For us, however, the game has several values. It is an important match in the UEFA Nations League itself, it will give our players, who are mostly in pre-season, valuable competitive minutes and, of course, it gives us another opportunity to put plans into practice on the field before next month’s vital UEFA Euro 2020 (which is what the competition will still be called despite it being held in 2021 now) play-off semi-final against Bosnia and Herzegovina. Enjoy the match tonight wherever you get to see or hear it. Let’s hope for another good performance - and a good result to keep up the momentum!

Patrick Nelson Chief Executive Irish Football Association

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