James: We have nothing to fear against England

DAN JAMES insisted that Wales head into their last game against England with no fear and nothing to lose, despite a defeat by Iran which leaves their hopes of reaching the knockout stages hanging by a thread. Wales must beat Gareth Southgate’s side on Tuesday if they are to have any hopes of emulating the last Wales World Cup team, who reached the knockout stages in 1958. Manager Rob Page provided a hint that his squad know it’s over when he said he may field younger players in the game. Fulham forward James, who was dropped to the bench for the first time in 35 Wales games, said: ‘We’ve got to look at what we could have done better in this game and try to take the positives out of it. We’ve got to go into that game with no fear. We’ve got nothing to lose. ‘We’re here. We’ve got one game left. We can’t go into that thinking we’ve already lost. We can pick ourselves up.’ Manager Rob Page said he had no complaints about the result because ‘the majority of the team were not at it’ against Carlos Queiroz’s Iran side. It is hard to avoid the sense that we are witnessing the end of a golden era, with a 33-year-old Gareth Bale and 31-year-old Aaron Ramsey struggling to make much impression in their two games here. When Wales needed a win in their second game, against Turkey, at Euro 2020, Bale and Ramsey linked up memorably. They were marginal figures yesterday. Page would not be drawn on the fading stars, but said: ‘We want to prepare a game against England, a local derby, to finish off. I am disappointed because we fell well below the standards we set to qualify. If we had met those standards, we would have been OK and when you don’t do that in top competitions, you get punished.’ Page hinted that other players might be used, with Nottingham Forest forward Brennan Johnson one of those who will be asked to take on the mantle when this campaign is over. ‘It is a problem that we ask players who are not playing for their club to come and give performance after performance,’ said Page. ‘We will have to look at it and if necessary make changes to freshen things up.’ He did not deny that it was the most punishing blow he had experienced in management. ‘This is a hard one to take because of the stage we are on,’ said Page. ‘I have said to them before every game, “Go out and show the world”. But we got our rewards today. We deserved that defeat. We will go again. ‘We want to finish the competition on a high. It is out of our hands for going through. We want to finish on a good performance and a win. We are low at the minute but will get them back tomorrow and get them up.’