David Healy’s 80th minute goal won Northern Ireland its match against Denmark keeping their hopes alive against group leaders Spain and Sweden. He also scored his 13th goal which set an Euro record breaking Davor Suker’s 12 goals established in the 1996 Euro qualifying campaign.
NI’s win keep alive their slim chances of qualifying for the Euro. Sweden can get through with a draw against Latvia while NI faces the unenviable task of meeting Spain in its last encounter although their record against the league leaders has been very good with a 3-2 win against Spain and a 2-1 win against Sweden.
If there is one seminal moment that NI will look back with regret in their campaign if they fail in their Euro campaign it will have to be the Keith Gillespie own goal with a minute left in the return match against Iceland that they lost 1-2. A draw would have put them in a great position to challenge Sweden for the second spot. Iceland also proved to be their Achilles heel as Eidur Gudjohnsen put on the performance of his lifetime to beat NI 3-0 at Belfast in their opening encounter.