Northern Ireland manager Michael O’Neill felt the playing surface at the Stadion Hristo Botev was as poor as he had seen “in a long time” after his side were beaten 1-0 by Bulgaria in the Nations League.
The only goal of the League C game came in the 40th minute when visiting goalkeeper Bailey Peacock-Farrell misplaced a pass that led to a tap-in for Bulgarian captain Kiril Despodov.
In a game of few opportunities, the pitch in Plovdiv appeared to make moving the ball difficult for both sides.
When asked if the surface was acceptable for international football, O’Neill answered “no”.
He added: “It’s not an excuse because it’s the same for the Bulgarian players, but that’s as poor a pitch as we’ve had in a long time.
“It didn’t help either team and it probably led to a physical game and it made life difficult for the referee. Challenges looked mistimed, and there were probably too many yellow cards for challenges that were a consequence of the pitch as much as anything else.”
Northern Ireland came into the game having kept four clean sheets in their last six games and had lost only to Spain on their travels in 2024.
But they were undone in Plovdiv when Peacock-Farrell rolled a misplaced pass in the direction of Daniel Ballard only to see Aleksandar Kolev nip in and square for Despodov to tap into the empty net.
“We created our own problems a little bit in the first half, we gave away some stupid free-kicks by being a little bit too aggressive and we had to defend our box a little bit,” said O’Neill.
“It’s a poor goal for us to concede.
“It’s a difficult night for goalkeepers with the ball coming back to them. Bailey knows that the decision he made was not the right one and that is probably the deciding factor in the game.”
‘They gave us everything’
The visitors improved after the break, although still struggled to create meaningful opportunities to level the game.
Despite the better second half, with Northern Ireland having beaten Luxembourg to open their Nations League campaign on Thursday night, O’Neill felt his squad felt the effects of playing on the road in the second leg of the double-header.
“The reaction was good,” he said.
“In the second half, they gave us everything. It’s never easy with the second game in international football, away from home and in a short space of time.
“It’s always difficult. We learned a lot from tonight but ultimately we’re disappointed we came away with nothing.”