Wales fought back to draw with Switzerland in their opening game of Euro 2020, as Kieffer Moore marked his return to the starting line-up with what could prove to be a vital equaliser.
In only his third start in nine matches under interim manager Robert Page, the Cardiff City striker was close to giving Wales an early lead when his header was superbly tipped over by Yann Sommer.
Switzerland took control of the match from that point and, after squandering several chances, they eventually scored as the impressive Breel Embolo headed in from Xherdan Shaqiri’s corner.
Wales were slow to improve from their sluggish start but, with 15 minutes left, Joe Morrell’s delicately clipped cross found Moore, whose flicked header into the bottom corner sent the small but loud pocket of Wales fans in Baku wild.
Those supporters then thought their hearts had been broken 10 minutes later as Swiss substitute Mario Gravanovic scored just moments after coming on – but his goal was disallowed for offside after a VAR check.
Switzerland kept pressing for a winning goal deep into added time but they were denied by a series of brilliant saves from Danny Ward.
After the match, Wales captain Gareth Bale said: “Both teams tried to play, it was a little bit tense, but it’s not a bad result and we take the positives.
“We wanted to win the game, we had chances but so did they.
“When you go 1-0 down and you can crumble but we showed a lot of grit and character like always and we showed our class to fight back and get the goal.
“We worked very hard, it’s hard in this heat, I’m proud of the boys.
“After the match we said we need to use this as a springboard.
“We now need to recover and move onto the next game.”
This is how Group A looks after the first matches of Euro 2020.
