Jeff Strasser
Luxembourg coach Jeff Strasser is well aware that his side could come up against a wounded animal in Northern Ireland on Monday night but is interested only in seeing his own players take a step forward.
Northern Ireland are still smarting from the controversial nature of their 1-0 defeat to Slovakia in Kosice on Friday that ended any hopes of a top-two finish in World Cup qualifying Group A, albeit knowing they can look forward to the play-offs regardless thanks to their Nations League success.
Michael O’Neill’s men, wanting to put down a marker for March, will aim to take their frustrations out on the Group A whipping boys, but Strasser said he was not thinking too much about his opponents’ situation.
“I am looking forward to what our team do,” he said. “I don’t know if (O’Neill) may give chances to players who didn’t play in the last game, but are going to try everything to win the game. For us (Friday) didn’t change anything.”
Strasser was only 17 days into the Luxembourg job when his side faced Northern Ireland in their opening game of this campaign back in September.
That ended in a 3-1 Northern Ireland win as Jamie Reid, Shea Charles and Justin Devenny scored for the visitors, while Aiman Dardari was on target for a Luxembourg side who had Seid Korac sent off in the second half.
Things have not got much better for Luxembourg since.
Although they ran Slovakia close in a 1-0 defeat in September and at least held Germany goalless for the first half of Friday’s 2-0 home defeat, Luxembourg have lost all five of their games so far, scoring once and conceding 12.
“We need to try to do better than in the last games,” Strasser added. “Especially in the last third, to score more goals. We need to be able to create chances and we did do that I think. It is important for us to get better in this way.”