'real Sense Of Disappointment' - O'neill On Germany Loss

Northern Ireland leader Michael O'Neill said that location is simply a "real consciousness of disappointment" successful nan dressing room aft his side's 3-1 conclusion against Germany.

Serge Gnabry scored an early extremity successful Cologne to put Germany ahead, but O'Neill's broadside fought backmost admirably to level done Isaac Price's volley from a corner.

NI looked to beryllium connected people to frustrate nan hosts, but 2 goals successful nan abstraction of 3 minutes from Nadiem Amiri and Liverpool's Florian Wirtz helped Germany prime up a much-needed first triumph successful Group A.

"We are very proud of nan display, but location is simply a existent consciousness of disappointment successful nan dressing room, which is understandable," O'Neill told BBC Sport NI's Gavin Andrews.

"This is simply a really reliable game, 2nd crippled successful a short play of time. It showed we weren't capable to make changes. We conscionable don't person nan extent to header successful this situation."

O'Neill was near to lament immoderate soft defending arsenic a protect mix-up allowed Amiri to pounce for Germany's second, whilst he besides questioned nan awarding of nan free-kick which Wirtz superbly dispatched.

"For 60 aliases 65 minutes we were good successful nan game. The 2nd extremity is simply a spot of a freak goal, we could person defended it better. The 3rd extremity isn't a free-kick. It's a awesome decorativeness but it's a soft free-kick," he explained.

"I thought nan referee was a spot fussy successful nan 2nd half. He refereed it good successful nan first.

"We were good successful nan crippled and needed to get to that last 15 minutes and we mightiness person had a last chance, but nan crippled drifted distant from us."

Northern Ireland beryllium 2nd successful Group A pursuing a triumph and a conclusion from their opening 2 games.

O'Neill believes his broadside are wherever they expected to beryllium astatine this shape of qualifying, pinch 2 immense location games against Slovakia and Germany to travel successful October.

"It's reliable to play 2 games distant from home," he said. "We sewage what we hoped for, but we're a spot disappointed it's not a small spot more.

"We person to beryllium fresh to play back-to-back astatine location and we cognize 2 bully results will put america successful a bully position."