Northern Ireland v Slovakia

If, as expected, Stuart Dallas wins his 50th international cap this evening against Slovakia he will become the 41st player to reach a half century of appearances for Northern Ireland. To date 44 of his 49 caps have been as a Leeds United player, four while plying his trade at Brentford and one, in May 2011, his debut, when he was still in the Irish League with Crusaders.

This evening’s Euro 2020 Path B Play-Off Final will be Northern Ireland’s 124th match in the European Championship competition, which includes qualifiers and games played at Euro 2016. In total we have won 46 of those matches and lost 51, however our home record in the competition is infinitely better than our away record. Of the 58 matches we have played at the National Football Stadium at Windsor Park a total of 28 have ended in victory and 18 in defeat, while we have scored 75 goals and conceded 63.

Tonight will be only the third time that Northern Ireland will have played a full international match on 12 November. The first occasion was back in 1986 when Billy Bingham’s side earned a point against Turkey following a goalless draw in a European Championship qualifier in Izmir. The last occasion was in 2017 when they again drew 0-0, this time in Basel versus Switzerland in the second leg of the World Cup 2018 play-off, which Northern Ireland unfortunately lost 1-0 on aggregate.

Northern Ireland players with the most appearances in European Championship qualifiers and finals 42 Aaron Hughes 37 Chris Baird 33 Kyle Lafferty 32 Keith Gillespie 31 Jonny Evans 30 matches are: Steven Davis

If Jordan Thompson manages to score against Slovakia tonight he will become only the second Stoke City player ever to find the net for Northern Ireland and the first in nearly 37 years. The previous one to do so was Sammy McIlroy who scored two goals for his country while attached to the Potters. The first came against Scotland in April 1982 and his second against the same opposition in Belfast in December 1983.

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