Tottenham defender Ben Davies praises Ukrainian strength before World Cup play-off with Wales
Ben Davies of Wales in action. Wales v Estonia in a 2022 FIFA World Cup Qualifier at the Cardiff City Stadium on the 8th September 2021. Credit: Lewis Mitchell
Wales defender Ben Davies has been full of praise for the Ukrainian players for their strength and resolve ahead of Wales’ final against them on Sunday.
Just like in Hampden Park on Wednesday night, the match will be full of emotion with the war continuing in Ukraine.
The Tottenham defender is under no illusion that their opponents will give it their all to get to a World Cup, but that they are ready for whatever the Ukrainians conjure up in Cardiff.
“We are well aware of the situation that Ukraine is in right now, and it must be incredibly tough to be in their shoes. But as far as we are concerned, we have just to focus on what is ahead of us”
“We know it will be an emotional event and a lot of people will be wanting some good news for Ukraine, but we have to try and stay out of that and focus on 90 minutes of football”
Davies praised the Ukrainian team for their attitude and resilience in the face of the utter horror that is unfolding in their country.
“We think we are very lucky in the sense that we don’t have to see how tough it is every single day or how difficult it must be for them to have their lives uprooted”
“You have to just credit their players for the way they have handled it so far. The way that Zinchenko has handled it all in the media is a real credit, and he has shown what a stand-out man he is.”
Wales will still have to do a job on Sunday though. Their opponents put in a really good display against the Scots, but Davies believes Cymru can go all the way.
“It is something that we’ve been desperate to do for 50-60 years”
“It is major for us. It’s a dream for our team, and we’ve put ourselves in a situation where we are one game away, and the focus for us will be purely on that.”
While Wales have developed so much over the past decade, the players have had to dealt with some near misses, notably against the Republic of Ireland in 2017, and Denmark in Euro 2020, but Davies won’t let the squad be clouded by those matches.
“We haven’t really thought about those near misses. We’ve only focused on what’s in our control with the squad that we’ve got now”
“The last one we had was getting to the Euros. It’s the same core group, and we’ve got one chance”
“We are one game away from a World Cup.”
Against Poland on Wednesday, Rob Page put out an experimental squad that coped well against a strong outfit, especially with the amount of new and young players on the team. Davies believes this shows the strength within this team.
“These boys are very fearless. It may be their first experience of crunch games of the Euros last year”
“I think they handled it really well. We didn’t handle it as much as we wanted to in the Denmark game but before that we stood up to the challenge.”
“We really punched above our weight.”
Wales play Ukraine at the Cardiff City Stadium on Sunday in the European playoff final for a place in the World Cup.
