Austria sickener makes O’Neill wish competition never existed

sucker-punch to Austria at Windsor Park.

Valentino Lazaro struck with virtually the last kick of the game as Austria won 2-1 to make it four defeats out of four for Northern Ireland in Group B3.

There have been encouraging signs for O’Neill’s side in all four games but no rewards – with attention now turning to next year’s Euro 2020 qualifiers.

“There’s a lot more positives than negatives but ultimately we lost the game so that’s a negative,” O’Neill (inset) said. “In terms of where we are as a team basically we’ve got to forget the Nations League was ever invented and we’re ready to go and play in March.”

After a first half of few chances, Xaver Schlager put Austria ahead four minutes into the second half, nipping in front of George Saville to rifle a low shot across goal.

Corry Evans’ first international goal in eight years just before the hour looked like giving Northern Ireland their first point in the competition, but Austria finished the stronger after Marko Arnautovic came on as a substitute minutes to play.

“He’s a top player, a top, top player,” O’Neill said of the West Ham man. “When you look at him you see he’s a top-four player in the Premier League, he could play in any of the top teams in Europe.

“No doubt when you’ve got a player of that calibre and with 20 you drop him into the team he’ll give you a special spark and he did.”

Austria’s winning goal came from a Northern Ireland mistake, with Stuart Dallas robbed of possession by David Alaba, who played in Arnautovic who in turn set up Lazaro.

“Stuart is maybe thinking he should have put the ball out of play,” O’Neill said. “But again we’re looking at that wee bit of quality.”