Nick Woltemade’s first international goal condemned Northern Ireland to a 1-0 World Cup that qualifies for Germany at Windsor Park.
Newcastle’s 69 million Pounds turned into David Raum’s 31st-minute corner with the back of his shoulder umortodox perhaps but enough to run a hard-fought competition in which Michael O’Neill’s young side showed no fear against their famous opponents at night to his 100.
Julian Nagelsmann spent Sunday insisting that he had not meant any respect for Northern Ireland when he discussed their “long ball” tactics last month, but the hosts went toe with Germany and saw a Daniel Ballard strike off the offside.
Still, a seven-game undefeated race ended in Windsor Park as an 11. Straight loss for the Germans left them three points behind both Germany and Slovakia, which went into the last qualifications next month. Their safety net for a potential qualifying play-off via the Nations League may still be necessary.
But O’Neill is likely to take the heart from another tapping screen from one side whose average age at kick-off was under 25. Brodie Spencer replaced the suspended Conor Bradley in the only change from Friday’s 2-0 win over Slovakia.
Northern Ireland struggled to get out of their half in the early exchanges, but out of nowhere had the ball into the net in the 14th minute before an offside flag -flags limited the festivities.
Ballard was souring home a loose ball after both Paddy McNair and Jamie Reid couldn’t connect properly to Bailey Peacock-Farrell’s long free kick in the box, but McNair was offside when Ballard got the first flick-on.
Germany slowly regained the upper hand and then got the lead with their 50th goals ever against Northern Ireland. Woltemade jumped to meet Raum’s corner, and the ball hit him on the back of his shoulder to beat Peacock-Farrell, the goal that stood after a VAR-Check for Handball.
Reid should have done better late in half after Ethan Galbraith cut into the box from the left, but stretched, strained Stevenage man, while Ali McCann sent a late strike narrowly. In between, Galbraith was booked to Fouling Aleksandar Pavlovic, who steered him out of next month’s trip to Slovakia.
Karim Adeyemi should have doubled Germany’s lead less than two minutes into the second half, but is cleaned through on goal, bent his shot on the wrong side of Peacock-Farrell’s right post.
Northern Ireland, refreshed up, when Josh Magennis replaced Reid at the break, continued to fight, with Shea Charles, who tested Oliver Baumann from a tight angle before the Galbraith curved the side decor with a low strike.
At the other end, Peacock-Farrell did well to keep a deflected strike from Serge Gnabry.
Last month in Cologne, Northern Ireland fought well for 70 minutes, but then admitted two late goals as they could not handle the strength of Germany’s bench in a 3-1 defeat.
This time they held the fight until the end. Galbraith shot narrowly in the 85th minute, and replacement Callum Marshall stabbed the palms in Baumann three minutes later, but there was no way back.
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