Three points, two goals and one clean sheet.
Northern Ireland’s Nations League campaign got off to the perfect start against Luxembourg at Windsor Park.
The Nations League is a competition that has not been kind to Northern Ireland in the past. In fact, Thursday’s win was only their second in 17 matches.
But Michael O’Neill’s young team are continuing to grow and develop, with the comfortable victory a fourth win in six matches.
After Callum Marshall and Dion Charles spurned chances from set-pieces, Luxembourg failed to deal with a long throw and that allowed Paddy McNair to poke home.
Better was to come five minutes later when Daniel Ballard diverted home George Saville’s low free-kick.
For the the second goal, it was a case of practice makes perfect.
“We had good control of the game and capitalised on set-pieces,” O’Neill said.
“We spent a good hour this morning in the analysis room and on the pitch with the players [working on set-pieces]. You don’t always get that time.
“It’s something we need to improve on and we did demonstrate that tonight.”
