
The Cymru WU17 squad head to Portugal later this month for three friendlies with the opportunity to build on the success of retaining their League A status and to give themselves the best chance of reaching the UEFA finals when the competitive action returns in March.
Peter Wilson’s side will take on Denmark (22 January – 11am), hosts Portugal (25 January – 3pm) and complete the series of fixtures against Iceland (28 January – 3pm). All matches will take place at the Estádio Municipal de Lagos. “The warm weather will be much appreciated,” explained Wilson to FAW.cymru ahead of the camp. “I think players always play better in the sunshine and in a nice location, so going to the Algarve is brilliant and hopefully it brings the best out of them.”
The squad were in Portugal last October for Round 1 of the 2024/25 UEFA qualifying campaign and finished third in Group A1 to keep their place amongst Europe’s elite. Although the mini-tournament began with a 3-0 defeat to Switzerland and 5-2 reverse against Portugal, the squad showed their character on the final day to come back from being a goal behind to beat Slovenia 2-1, with Skye Hair scoring a winning penalty deep into injury-time. However, it was the display against Portugal that really stood out as the side went into half-time two goals ahead.
“The Portugal game was by far our best performance,” said Wilson. “Not just how we executed the game plan, but in terms of the attitudes and application of the players, which was absolutely fantastic. We then achieved what we needed to with the result against Slovenia. We wanted to stay in League A as playing against the top nations is our number one priority, especially if we want to build on the legacy that’s going to happen next summer with the senior squad (EURO 2025).

“We had three games that we can be proud of and we can build from, especially that Portugal first half. We’re playing them again so we’ll have to do something different this time, even though we played our best 45 minutes of football against them. We made slightly more hard work of it against Slovenia in terms of the scoreline and the performance, but we felt in control, even when we conceded. We just needed that little bit of final third magic and from there it was about just keeping our heads and staying focused. Skye took the penalty fantastically, it was really difficult for the keeper.
“The scenes at the end just sum up where this group are heading and the togetherness and the belief that they’ve got. How they’re in it together right to the end. A draw against Slovenia would have been enough, but we don’t want just draws. We want to be competing, winning and dominating teams when we can. In the end we did that, we ground them down and we got the result we needed. We want to go and use these games now in January to really refine and and bolster the capabilities of our players and see what we can achieve from it.”
The three games will provide key preparation for Wilson and his squad before they head to France in March to take on Scotland, Slovakia and the hosts in Round 2. Cymru are in Group A2, with the seven group winners qualifying for the UEFA WU17 Championship Finals that will take place in the Faroe Islands in May. Although Cymru have never qualified for the finals at this age group, they can now take inspiration from the senior squad reaching EURO 2025 as they prepare for their first major tournament.
“You’ve always got to have that at the back of your mind,” Wilson added. “Can we do it? You never know. Why can’t we build on what we’ve been doing in the past two or three camps? There’s a lot of excitement for it, and we want to go into March having had the best experience possible this month. It’s an opportunity to play three really, really good nations. That’s the exciting bit. What can we bring to the table that’s going to hopefully get us some really good experiences and some really good performances and results.”

Wilson has made five changes to his squad from October and will be looking for the new faces to put themselves in contention for a place in the squad in March. Poppy Holt and Jess Rawlings return from injury, but there are some younger additions too. “We’ve got to always look to future in the same way as Rhian (Wilkinson) is doing in the senior team with the likes of Mayzee Davies and Mared Griffiths,” he added. “If you’re good enough, you’re old enough. Carrie Jones made her senior debut at 15 years-old, a month after she was on one of our U15’s camps.
“In this camp coming up we’ve got Cadi Griffiths, who’s a current U15 player, and Mared’s sister. She’s scored six goals in five games at U15 and U16 level in the first three months of international football. Charlotte Underwood also comes up having had some good camps with the U16’s. So for us we’ve got to make sure that we’re looking at players who are doing well. We’ve got to give those players the opportunity and we want to push the older players. They’ve earned the right to be at this level.”