Owain Fon Williams column: It's mad to make Wales favourites - but we've got the belief to win Euro 2016
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During this summer’s European Championships, Caley Thistle and Wales goalkeeper Owain Fon Williams will be penning an exclusive column for The Inverness Courier. He reflects on a historic night against Belgium and their date with destiny tomorrow.
IT all started with those blocks in the first 10 minutes.
The save from Wayne, then guys putting their bodies on the line – it just shows what a team we are.
We absolutely battered Belgium, but it was that opening incident that pushed us on to perform like we did. It gave us encouragement, hope and belief; we were right up for the fight.
After the game, normally there are a lot of celebrations. After Belgium we were dead on our feet.
Even the boys who weren’t playing were going through the emotions as if they were out on the pitch.
The boys played with their hearts on their sleeves and put everything into that performance. No-one could have asked any more of them – they kept going until the last minute.
Hal’s not had to talk about his goal because everyone is doing it for him. Wherever you look it’s being talked about because it’s a wonder goal. He Cruyff-turned and took three defenders out of the game, leaving him just the keeper to beat. It was a magical moment.
We’ve played Belgium four times now in a short space of time and they’ve only scored twice against us, whereas I think we’ve scored seven against them.
We knew they liked to play on the counter-attack, so the plan was to try to unsettle their first couple of passes so they couldn’t counter.
If we couldn’t get a foot in, all we did was get back into shape and make sure we didn’t get done by a one-two.
Eden Hazard loves them and uses his players like a wall, bouncing the ball off them, getting it back and whipping the ball in. We made sure that wasn’t going to happen.
At the end of the game we didn’t know whether we were going to do the slide in front of the fans, punch the air like Jurgen Klopp or do the Icelandic chant. In the end we did a mix of all three! The fans were unbelievable again, even though there were a lot of Belgian fans. We had a day off on Saturday and I saw my parents, which was nice as I’d not seen them for a while.
They went to The Last Post in Belgium, because it’s been 100 years since the Battle of the Somme, and obviously were at the game on Friday night. I’m glad they were there to witness a historic night.
It will go down in history because Wales have never got this far in a major tournament. For me to be involved in that is one thing, but for my parents to be there too is amazing.
It will be tough for Ben Davies and Aaron Ramsey to miss out against Portugal. They have both been unbelievable and I just hope we can beat Portugal and give them another game.
I can’t believe I’m actually saying there’s a chance of Wales being in a final. Portugal are a very good team with their superstar – but we’ve got one too. I’m sure there’ll be some words beforehand, but let’s hope Gareth Bale comes out on top. It’s a battle between two special players but there’s only one who’s a real team player.
It’s mad talking about us as favourites. It shows how far we’ve come as a nation. I said before the campaign that there’s no reason why we can’t go all the way.
There’s belief and togetherness in the squad and that’s the right recipe. But if you’ve got us as favourites, you must be dreaming!
