Wales better as underdogs – Coleman

Wales captain Ashley Williams trained with the rest of the squad on Tuesday, raising hopes the defender will be fit for Friday’s European Championship quarterfinal against Belgium.

Belgium confirmed their place in Friday’s quarter-final on Sunday when they thrashed Hungary 4-0 with a standout performance from Eden Hazard.

The Wales boss said: “We think it was when he fell after he collided with Jonny (Williams)”.

“He landed on his hand with a straight arm which was a bit of an impact on his shoulder”.

“The way he gets us up for games is second to none but the preparation that goes in to matches behind the scenes with him and the staff has been really noticeable and impressive”. I would be surprised is he doesn’t make the game. We talked about it: ‘That’s our aim – that’s where we want to get.’ That night we saw their celebrations and are obviously on a high ourselves now. He thrives on it. ‘They could field two teams who are able to compete at these Euros.

“It’s great working for the manager”, said the West Bromwich Albion centre-back.

Taylor, meanwhile, made clear that Wales can not focus on their previous victories over Belgium if they are to beat Marc Wilmots’ side on Friday.

A win will leave the nation in need of smelling salts and a lot of ibuprofen come Saturday morning but, listening to Coleman talk such a good game it’s impossible to rule out the unthinkable.

“We’ve come up against Belgium fairly often in qualifying campaigns and played well against them and I think the onus will be on them”.

“We’ve done everything we believed in over the last two years – can we do it again?” It’s hard for us to plan a football match, it never goes how you think, but the vision for us at the moment is being at the end of that game with a goal more than them’.

“If you go too open against Belgium they will go through you like a knife through butter”. France is talented enough to win the tournament with that kind of patchy dominance, but we still haven’t seen them dominate against an above-average side. “But that comes with its own problems”.

Wales manager praised his side’s mentality after their 1-0 victory over Northern Ireland at Euro 2016. We are looking forward to being on the pitch with a player of his standard. “It’s about your own team because it’s dog eat dog”.