Bulgaria U21 team suffered its first defeat during the European qualifiers after losing 1:3 to Wales in Cardiff.

It was a horrendous start of the game for the “young lions” who conceded an opening goal in the 8th minute. Wesley Burnes made a good run down the right wing and crossed the ball to Thomas O’Sullivan who headed it home. Just 4 minutes later another brilliant combination between Burnes and O’Sullivan allowed the latter to score the second goal in Aleksandar Lyubenov’s net. In the 25th minute Ryan Hudges made a decent cross, the Bulgarian defence did not manage to deal with the situation and Josh Jorvet made it 3:0. The first real chance for Bulgaria came in the 33rd minute, when Kiril Despodov’s shot went wide. Three minutes later Hudges could have made it 4:0, but the ball came off the right bar. The first shot on target for the Bulgarians did not come before the 39th minute, when Nikola Kolev’s effort was saved by the Welsh goalkeeper Christian Dibble.

After the break the Bulgarian team seemed a bit more focused and started to attack more often. Milcho Angelov and Bekir Rasim came on the pitch, replacing Cvetelin Chunchukov and Aleksandar Vasilev respectively. In the 51st minute Bulgaria got a goal back, after Rasim played the ball to Nikola Kolev, whose powerful shot outside the box surprised Dibble – 1:3. Shortly after that Despodov had a good opportunity, but failed to score. In the 70 minute Antonio Vutov replaced Kiril Despodov. The young lions missed several chances until the end of the game. Dibble made a couple of wonderful blocks, denying Rasim, Vutov and Malinov.

Bulgaria`s Line Up:

12. Alexander Lyubenov

  6. Hristo Popadiyn

18. Radoslav Terziev

  5. Plamen Gulubov

20. Lazar Marin

15. Kristian Malinov

  8. Nikola Kolev

19. Alexander Vasilev (46 min. - Bekir Rasim)

7. Cyril Despodov (70 min. - Antonio Vutov)

10. Georg Iliev

  9. Tsvetelin Chunchukov (46 min. - Milcho Angelov)

Department "Public Relations and Media"