Evening Standard
·22 March 2024
Evening Standard
·22 March 2024
Northern Ireland travel to Bucharest to face Romania tonight.
It is the first of two scheduled friendlies during this international break for Michael O’Neill’s side, who also meet Scotland at Hampden Park on Tuesday evening.
Northern Ireland will hope to build upon their impressive 2-0 win over Denmark in Belfast in November, a positive end to an otherwise hugely disappointing Euro 2024 qualifying campaign that brought only two other wins in total - both against minnows San Marino.
They now take on another Euros-bound team in Romania, who topped their qualifying group ahead of Switzerland and Israel without losing a game to reach only a third major tournament since 2008.
Edward Iordanescu’s team have been placed in Group E for this summer’s finals in Germany, where they will face Belgium, Slovakia and either Ukraine or Iceland.
They have not met Northern Ireland since 2020, when the two nations played out consecutive 1-1 draws in the Nations League.
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