By Gareth James
Rob Page has pinpointed Dan James as a symbol of why Wales will go into Tuesday night’s Euro 2024 play-off final against Poland with huge confidence.
Wales have not beaten the Poles for over 50 years, but are just one more home victory from making their fourth major tournament finals out of the last five.
Substitute James celebrated his 50th cap with a fine second-half solo goal as Wales trounced Finland 4-1 in Cardiff on Thursday to set up their final clash.
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The Leeds United player has been in superb form for his club with 12 goals already this season, but still could not make the Wales starting line-up as manager Page went for David Brooks, Harry Wilson and Brennan Johnson as his front three.
That left James and Kieffer Moore as options to bring off the bench – a show of strength in depth that Wales have not always carried in the past.
“Dan James was fantastic, on his 50th cap, he got the goal he deserved,” said Page.
“It goes to show the confidence he’s got. We’ve got players coming off the bench full of confidence… you can really see it in the performance.”
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Asked if Wales are in a better position now in terms of player strength and more regular matches at club level than they were when they beat Ukraine in a play-ff to reach the World Cup two years ago, Page said: “I’d say so.”
“We are in a healthy position because we’ve got everybody playing.
“The gap in the World Cup play-offs [between the Austria semi-final in March and Ukraine final in June] suited us because we had senior players who weren’t playing club football, in Aaron [Ramsey], in Gareth [Bale].
“That gap helped us. If it had been four or five days later, we might have struggled a bit.
“Now, we’re in a different position because we’ve got a younger squad, a fitter squad, we’ve got players who are playing regularly.”
“We know what we’ve got in the changing room, they’re a great group of lads and we did have a selection headache.
“We got off to the best possible start. We had to address a couple of things at half-time and were better in the second half.
“It could have been five or six, but the message is that this is half-time. We’ve now got a massive effort to go on Tuesday and we can’t wait.
“Poland will be a tough game and we respect what they’re all about.
“However, we know if we bring our A-game like we did against Croatia [who Wales beat 2-1 last October] and tonight, the result will take care of itself.
“We’ve been there and done it, we know what we have to do, it doesn’t faze us. We’ve had a taste of major tournaments and we quite like it.”
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A leaping Brooks got the hosts off to a dream start in the third minute of the Path A semi-final at the Cardiff City Stadium when Wilson’s shot was saved and rebounded to him for the knock-in.
Neco Williams made it 2-0 in the 38th when he blasted the ball into the top corner off a backheeled free kick by Wilson on the edge of the box, but Finland pulled one back with Teemu Pukki’s 40th international goal on the stroke of halftime.
Johnson restored the two-goal cushion from close-range in the 47th, after Ethan Ampadu headed on from a free kick, and stand-in captain Ben Davies had a fourth ruled out by VAR in the 79th.
James, who had come in the 73rd minute for Johnson, then made it 4-1 in the 86th when he sprinted clear, dribbled around goalkeeper Lukas Hradecky and slotted the ball into an open goal.
Wales will play Poland, who beat a 10-man Estonia 5-1, at the same Cardiff stadium on Tuesday for a place in the June and July finals in Germany.
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