EURO 2016: Wales celebrates like never before

Date

7/4/2016 2:10:17 AM

(MENAFN- Muscat Daily)

Friday night in Cardiff is often quite a lively affair and all the familiar sights were on show as ''hen'' parties made their way across the rainswept Welsh capital and sharply-dressed boys queued to get into nightclubs.

But never, for all the rejoicing in Welsh sporting triumphs down the years, has there quite been a Friday night in Cardiff like this one, after Wales beat Belgium in the Euro 2016 quarterfinal.

Appearing in its first major tournament in 58 years, Wales fought back to overcome Belgium, currently ranked the world''s second-best football nation, 3-1 in Lille, northern France, to book a semifinal with Portugal.

Huge roars rang out from Cardiff''s many hangouts as Wales came from 0-1 down to win, thanks to goals from Ashley Williams, Hal Robson-Kanu and Sam Vokes.

Chants of "Are you watching England?" could, understandably, also be heard from more than one hangout.

England may have scraped a 2-1 win over neighbour Wales in the pool stages, but the football fortunes of the two countries diverged drastically since then, with the much better-resourced English, featuring a host of

English Premier League stars, crashing out 1-2 against rank outsider Iceland in the round of 16.

As some 6,000 Wales supporters became increasingly delirious in Cardiff''s Bute Park fan zone on Friday, a few opted against joining the madding crowd and instead headed for the hangout at Angel Hotel.

Among them was TonyTaylor, a retired steelworker from Port Talbot. "It''s superb, I''m so proud," said Taylor who, like his son Richard, was wearing a Wales football shirt. "I know we made it to the quarterfinals of the 1958 World Cup, but this is different," he added.

Richard Cross, an IT worker from Neath, had been following Wales in France earlier in the tournament. He said, "Did you ever think you would see Wales play football like this?"

Even British Prime Minister David Cameron congratulated Wales by tweeting, "Amazing performance, amazing result. Bring on Portugal!"

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