Wales 2-4 Armenia: Rob Page’s side slump to a shock home defeat in Euro qualifiers

You can celebrate your fabulous fans, stirring songs and spine-tingling atmosphere all you like, but none of those things matter very much if you are hopeless when the actual football starts.

In front of the Red Wall that is among the greatest support on the planet, 10-man Wales stank the place out against Armenia, who are ranked 97th in the world. They wasted a fine opportunity to take charge of their qualifying group, with Croatia on Nations League duty, and there were some boos at full-time. A defensive performance as poor as this will be duly punished by Turkey in Samsun on Monday.

From the early exchanges it had looked as though this would be a fairly routine evening. Kieffer Moore was dominant in the air and had already missed two opportunities by the time Daniel James put Wales in front. 

At that point, nobody had reckoned on Armenia fighting back, yet they led at half-time thanks to goals from Lucas Zelarayan and Grant-Leon Ranos. Ranos, 19, is on the books at Bayern Munich and added his second soon after an hour. Though Harry Wilson halved the deficit shortly afterwards, Zelarayan rapidly doubled his own tally to make it four – moments after Ranos hit the bar.

Wales’ misery was complete when Moore was shown a straight red card for appearing to kick out at goalkeeper Ognjen Chancharevich, whose ludicrous antics sealed Moore’s fate.

With four points from their opening two games, Wales arrived here in buoyant mood. Manager Rob Page praised their strength in depth said their woe at the World Cup – where Wales did not win a game – was firmly in the past.

Yet what Wales served up here was as grim as anything they produced in Qatar. They might not have England’s depth of talent, but every member of their starting XI has played in one of Europe’s top-five leagues. Their world ranking of 26th is about right and should have been more than enough to despatch a team 71 spots below them.

At first it seemed as though Armenia would be overwhelmed. Moore was winning everything in the air and twice went close, once from Connor Roberts’ long throw and then from Brennan Johnson’s cross.

With Armenia looking so shaky, it was only a matter of time before Wales took the lead. Ethan Ampadu sent Johnson clear on the right, and his low cross was turned in at the far post by James.

That should have signalled the start of a straightforward evening for the home side yet Armenia suddenly shook off their nerves and began playing some neat attacking football.

Captain Eduard Spertsyan headed just wide from Artak Dashyan’s right-wing cross and with Wales exposed on the flanks, Danny Ward nearly spilled Nair Tiknizyan’s low ball into the path of a visiting forward.

Moore put another header off target, this time from James’ delivery, before Armenia equalised with a superb strike in the 19th minute, as another cross from Tiknizyan was volleyed in brilliantly by Zelarayan.

And matters became even worse for Wales on the half-hour mark. Joe Rodon was dispossessed trying to bring the ball from defence and when Spertsyan sent it back into the danger zone, the unmarked Ranos guided a deft header beyond Danny Ward.

When Wales tried to respond, their finishing was wayward. Johnson’s first-time effort from 20 yards was parried awkwardly by Chancharevich, Moore shot straight at the goalkeeper from the edge of the box and Rodon headed wide. Then Johnson, usually a precise finisher, again fired too close to Chancharevich. At the other end, Tigran Barseghyan flashed an effort past the post.

Remarkably, it got even worse for Wales midway through the second half. Chris Mepham’s failure to spot Ranos’ dummy summed up his bumbling performance, allowing the forward to collect the pass from Zelarayan and shoot beyond Danny Ward from the edge of the box.

Wales took off captain Aaron Ramsey and the switch did the trick as Armenia failed to deal with another ball into their box and Wilson stabbed home Moore’s knockdown. Moments later, Wales had a huge escape when Ranos hit the bar.

It proved a brief moment of relief. Substitute Joe Morrell was robbed near his goal by Ugochukwu Iwu. Iwu slipped in Zelarayan, who did the rest from 15 yards.