Head coach Matty Jones praised his more experienced Cymru U21 players after starting the year with a 1-0 victory over Andorra U21 in Spain.
Cian Ashford, Luke Harris, Evan Watts and Joel Cotterill were among those who played a key part in Cymru’s last UEFA U21 EURO qualifying campaign and all featured against Andorra.
Jones was able to hand debuts to 12 players – five of whom had not previously represented Cymru at age-grade level – and praised his seasoned campaigners for helping them settle into the squad.
“On day one I sat with a group of five, including Evan Watts and Joel Cotterill, who have had the luxury of captaining the team now,” said Jones. “They understand and think about leadership in different ways. Amongst that we’ve got Chris Popov, we’ve got Joel Colwill and Cian Ashford. They’re having incredible experiences.
“You know how passionate I am about setting the environment, getting that right and making sure that there was a huge piece around inclusion, expectations, who drive standards, what our standards look like and non-negotiables. All those things have been covered over a space of four days, and the players have adapted to it so versatilely that it’s been quite seamless.
“The collectiveness, the family feel and that ethos that we drive in terms of being together and supporting ourselves and each other through difficult time has been great.
“Coming into a new environment when you’re unsure what’s required of you is sometimes difficult. The players have adhered to everything and embraced everything we’ve thrown at them, which puts us in a really exciting position now to build on something. The foundation is in place and it really is exciting just to think what we could achieve going forward with this group.
Chris Popov scored his first Cymru U21 goal in Valencia as he fired home the rebound after initially seeing his penalty kept out by the Andorra goalkeeper.
It proved to be the only goal of the game as Jones’ side kicked off 2025 with a winning start after narrowly missing out on qualification for the finals at the end of last year.
“It’s obviously pleasing from a players’ perspective in terms of getting the result and allowing the players to go on with some momentum now in this new campaign,” said Jones.
“We spoke a lot over the last couple of days about the journey they’re about to go on and how important it is about picking up results and effective performances, not just from the team collectively, but for opportunities for players to individually showcase their abilities.
“It was definitely pleasing from our perspective. The staff group have put a lot of work in when it comes to opposition profile and obviously we had to make tweaks in the game. We all know how difficult the game was and would have been against Andorra because of their ruggedness, hard work, desire, craft, and they were very street wise as well. I was pleased with how the players managed their emotion and composed themselves to come out on top in the end.”
Cymru will round off the March camp with a fixture against Sweden at Oliva Nova Sports Center on Sunday 23 March (1:30pm KO).
The game will help Jones’ side in their preparations for the 2027 UEFA U21 EURO qualifying campaign, which begins against Denmark in September.
“It’s a tough opponent and we managed to have the luxury of watching them on Thursday against Belgium,” add Jones. “They’ve got a huge amount of threat on their front line and the rotations that they play. I don’t think we see many things that were too different from our opposition profile, so the study that we’ve taken on in the last six weeks hasn’t gone to waste.
“This will be a totally different challenge for us, and it’ll be one probably where we find ourselves more comfortable in terms of how we play, sitting in the mid block, looking at triggers to go and press and jump out and be aggressive in moments, and when we control our moments of brilliance as well.
“I’m not taking away anything from the quality that we have at our disposal. There are so many individuals, and I’m so excited so hopefully we get it right to give them the right opportunities to flourish in their performance and really embrace it for our country and come home again with success.
“Success already has been achieved overall, but when you play the game, it doesn’t matter who you’re playing and whether they’re friendlies, you just want to win. That’s what I’m feeling with this group.”
