YEREVAN (Reuters) – Wales’ hopes of qualifying automatically for Euro 24 suffered a potentially critical blow as they were held to a 1-1 draw in their penultimate Group D match on Saturday.
They suffered a terrible start when the home side’s Lucas Zelarayan cut in and fired a shot into the bottom corner after five minutes.
Wales struggled to gain control but had a huge stroke of luck in first-half stoppage time when a long throw-in by Connor Roberts went in off the head of Armenia’s Nair Tiknizyan.
A wide-open second half failed to separate the sides with Armenia’s Vahan Bichakhchyan denied by the crossbar and the hosts also wasting several other opportunities.
Wales needed to beat Armenia, and Turkey next week, to guarantee qualification, but their fate is now out of their hands. They have 11 points from seven games, five behind group leaders Turkey, but Croatia will go into second place if they beat Latvia later on Saturday.
(Reporting by Martyn Herman; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
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