Gareth Bale has suggested Wales need to master football s dark arts after they let a Nations League draw slip in a last-gasp 2-1 defeat to the Netherlands.
The Oranje emerged as victors in Group A4 following a dramatic stoppage-time period in Cardiff, where the Red Dragons looked to have seized a late point, only to lose it again.
Rhys Norrington-Davies appeared to have cancelled out Teun Koopmeiners opener in the 92nd minute, only for Wout Weghorst to snatch a winner in the fourth added minute.
Both teams were much-changed and the result made for a sharp comedown after Wales World Cup qualification on Sunday.
But Bale speculated whether improved game management might have helped the underpowered hosts cling on, telling S4C: It was a difficult game.
We didn t have our full-strength squad. The boys who came in worked very hard to get the equaliser [and] then to concede so early after that was gutting.
It s something we have to learn, maybe the dark arts of taking them down. We need to learn from this.
100 There were exactly 100 seconds between Rhys Norrington-Davies scoring Wales’ equaliser (91:23) and Wout Weghorst netting the Netherlands’ winner (93:03). Fleeting.
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe)
They re a world-class team [but] we re in this A league now because we deserve to be testing ourselves against the best.
I think if you re the tier below, you get away with that at the end. You play the top teams, you don t do the things you need to do and you get punished.
It s hard to take but it s something we need to learn from. We re still a young team we have to learn from stuff like that and take it forward.
With the loss, Wales suffered their first home defeat in a competitive international since November 2018, having been unbeaten in 13 such matches coming into the game.
Goalscorer Norrington-Davies felt similar frustrations with the defeat, but admitted it was a good chance for fringe players to stake a claim for a spot at Qatar 2022.
I feel like we played well against a top side, he added. [I m] delighted to get the goal but with the result, it s a disappointing night for myself.
We all want a place at the World Cup, we re all battling it out. Obviously, quite a few youngsters played this evening, and we have to show what we ve got.
We take a lot of positives from the games, but at the end of the day we haven t got a point yet. I feel like we could have at least taken a point.
