WE’RE NOT ALL PLAN B:
More to Wales than Bale, says Williams
NEWS headlines across Europe t his past week have been dominated by the i ssue of financial aid for ailing Cyprus. In football-daft Glasgow yesterday, however, there was only one ‘Bale Out’ story on everyone’s lips.
When Tottenham’s Gareth Bale failed to appear at Glasgow Airport with the rest of his Wales team-mates, hopes soared locally that maybe, just maybe, the 23-year-old, who is increasingly being mentioned in the same breath as Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, would not be fit enough to be in a position to repeat his slaying of Scotland in Cardiff back in October.
And amid a veritable Bale frenzy, the Wales FA was forced to issue a tweet to confirm the Tottenham attacker — with 25 goals this season for club and country — had, in fact, travelled north, with confirmation later arriving that he is expected to win his battle with a virus to face the Scots tonight in Gordon Strachan’s first competitive game.
Unsurprisingly, Bale was the main event at the Wales media conference last night, despite not even being there. Yet Ashley Williams’ role as a sideshow to his more i n- demand t eam- mate hardly seemed to perturb the good-natured Welsh captain.
An affable sort, Williams cheerfully batted away question after question on his superstar colleague, even admitting he had never known it for one player to catch a separate flight to his team-mates to an away international venue, as Bale did in flying solo up to Glasgow last night.
As the Bale feeding frenzy drew to a close, however, the Swansea captain did not miss the chance to warn his waiting audience that there are more weapons in the Welsh armoury to call on than their lightning-quick attacker.
It is not that long ago, after all, that under the late Gary Speed, this generation was being backed to reach the World Cup for the first time since 1958, erasing the prolonged heartache since the grainy black-and-white era of John Charles et al.
Much like in Scotland, however, dreams and injustice are a way of life for Welsh football fans and their start to qualifying under Chris Coleman has been poor, including a 6-1 loss in Serbia in September which marked the nation’s heaviest defeat in 16 years.
With the likes of Arsenal’s Aaron Ramsey and the much-travelled Craig Bellamy in their midst, however, Williams insists the Scots should treat the Welsh as a one-man team at their peril.
‘If I was playing against Wales, I’d definitely pay Gareth Bale close attention but you can’t afford to forget the other boys we have,’ said Williams ahead of tonight’s match between the bottom two teams in Group A.
‘We have other weapons in our team, you know. It’s not just about
Gareth Bale, although he is definitely a world-class player.
‘ Craig Bellamy is a top- class player, too, and we have others. Hopefully we can show that we are a good side.
‘But Gareth still means everything to us. He is a massive player for Wales and we are a different side when he is playing. We desperately want him to play against Scotland and, thankfully, it looks as though he’s made a bit of a recovery in the past few days.’
To further get his point across, 28-year-old Williams reminded the auditorium at Hampden Park that, unlike Scotland, Wales are currently a sporting nation very much on the up.
Their rugby side has just been crowned Six Nations Champions after an astonishing, crushing win over England last weekend, having previously defeated Scotland at Murrayfield.
Williams’ Swansea lifted the Capital One League Cup, while Cardiff City are streaking ahead at the top of the Championship and look Premier League-bound next season.
It’s clear, according to Williams, that there is much more to sporting life in Wales than one multi-talented footballer called Gareth Bale.
‘Swansea and Cardiff are doing well and everybody is buzzing after the rugby last weekend,’ he said.
‘Rugby is such a massive sport in Wales and it was a great day. The Welsh public enjoyed it and it would be nice if we got a win to keep that momentum going.
‘Like Scotland, we didn’t have the greatest of starts to qualifying but we have picked up a lot since losing to Serbia when the manager was under a bit of pressure.
‘We wanted to do well for him after Serbia and I think we did that.’
Williams believes Wales deserved to win in Cardiff in October when two goals from Bale saw Coleman’s
“Gareth is world-class but we’ve got other weapons in our team”
side come f rom behind after conceding to James Morrison.
And he insists the presence in the Welsh camp of SPL spies like Celtic midfielder Joe Ledley and Coleman’s assistant, the former Parkhead striker John Hartson, will give his nation an edge at Hampden.
‘I’ve never played at Hampden Park before but I understand the atmosphere is going to be electric,’ he said.
‘We know there’s a lot on the line here and we can’t wait for it. John Hartson will have a lot of input, having played in Scotland, and Joe Ledley plays up here as well, so we have got two guys who should know the Scots quite well.
‘Both teams need the win and it should make for a good game, with both teams attacking and trying to score goals. But we will be looking for the same result we got in Cardiff.’