Pitch in Bulgaria not acceptable - O'Neill

Northern Ireland head Michael O'Neill felt nan playing aboveground astatine nan Stadion Hristo Botev was arsenic mediocre arsenic he had seen "in a agelong time" aft his broadside were beaten 1-0 by Bulgaria successful nan Nations League.

The only extremity of nan League C crippled came successful nan 40th infinitesimal erstwhile visiting goalkeeper Bailey Peacock-Farrell misplaced a walk that led to a tap-in for Bulgarian skipper Kiril Despodov.

In a crippled of fewer opportunities, nan transportation successful Plovdiv appeared to make moving nan shot difficult for some sides.

When asked if nan aboveground was acceptable for world football, O'Neill answered "no".

He added: "It's not an excuse because it's nan aforesaid for nan Bulgarian players, but that's arsenic mediocre a transportation arsenic we've had successful a agelong time.

"It didn't thief either squad and it astir apt led to a beingness crippled and it made life difficult for nan referee. Challenges looked mistimed, and location were astir apt excessively galore yellowish cards for challenges that were a consequence of nan transportation arsenic overmuch arsenic thing else."

Northern Ireland came into nan crippled having kept 4 cleanable sheets successful their past six games and had mislaid only to Spain connected their travels successful 2024.

But they were undone successful Plovdiv erstwhile Peacock-Farrell rolled a misplaced walk successful nan guidance of Daniel Ballard only to spot Aleksander Kolev nip successful and quadrate for Despodov to pat into nan quiet net.

"We created our ain problems a small spot successful nan first half, we gave distant immoderate stupid free-kicks by being a small spot excessively fierce and we had to take sides our container a small bit," said O'Neill.

"It's a mediocre extremity for america to concede.

"It's a difficult nighttime for goalkeepers pinch nan shot coming backmost to them. Bailey knows that nan determination he made was not nan correct 1 and that is astir apt nan deciding facet successful nan game."

The visitors improved aft nan break, though still struggled to create meaningful opportunities to level nan game.

Despite nan amended 2nd half, pinch Northern Ireland having beaten Luxembourg to unfastened their Nations League run connected Thursday night, O'Neill felt his squad felt nan effects of playing connected nan roadworthy successful nan 2nd limb of nan double-header.

"The guidance was good.

"In nan 2nd half they gave america everything. It's ne'er easy pinch nan 2nd crippled successful world football, distant from location and successful a short abstraction of time.

"It's ever difficult. We learnt a batch from coming but yet we're disappointed we came distant pinch nothing."