Highlights: Northern Ireland 1-0 Luxembourg

At a glance

  • Northern Ireland had already secured a place in Thursday's World Cup play-off draw because of winning their Nations League group last year

  • Jamie Donley opened scoring from penalty spot after 44 minutes

  • Donley had earlier 20th-minute goal disallowed for offside

  • Germany beat Slovakia in Group A's other game to secure automatic qualification for next summer's World Cup

Jonathan Bradley
BBC Sport NI senior journalist

Jamie Donley's first international goal was enough to give Northern Ireland a 1-0 win over Luxembourg in their final Group A qualifier for the 2026 World Cup.

The Tottenham Hotspur attacker, who represented England at under-age level, was making just his second international start in what was effectively a dead rubber and settled the game from the penalty spot in the final minute before half-time.

The hosts came into the game already assured of their place in a play-off semi-final for next summer's tournament thanks to their success in last year's Nations League, while also not able to finish any higher than third in their group.

As such, manager Michael O'Neill made six changes from Friday's 1-0 defeat by Slovakia in Kosice that ended any hopes of a top-two finish.

Donley was one of those brought in and the player on loan at Stoke for this season thought he had opened the scoring in the 18th minute with a neat finish into the corner, but Ethan Galbraith had been offside before squaring the ball.

Goalkeeper Conor Hazard had to be alert to prevent Christopher Martins giving Luxembourg a surprise lead before Mathias Olesen whistled an effort past the post as the visitors grew into the half.

The only goal of a dour contest came when Donley coolly converted the penalty awarded after the video assistant referee (VAR) adjudged Martins had kicked the leg of Ciaron Brown in an attempted clearance.

O'Neill rested Conor Bradley for the second half, replacing the Liverpool defender with Portsmouth's Terry Devlin at the break, while there was a further change five minutes later when Brad Lyons limped off to be replaced by Paul Smyth.

With so little at stake, and both managers using the opportunity to look at their options, the second half lacked many real opportunities with Isaac Price's pair of tame efforts in the final minutes the closest either side came to finding a second-half goal.

In Group A's other game, Germany beat Slovakia 6-0 to secure top spot and automatic qualification for next summer's tournament in North America.

Analysis: Donley takes chance to stake claim for play-off role

Jamie Donley scores a penaltyGetty Images

Jamie Donley has played six times in all competitions for Stoke this season

When Patrick Kelly came on for his international debut with eight minutes to go at Windsor Park, he became the 27th player used by Michael O'Neill during this campaign.

Across the six fixtures, 22 players made starts, an outcome that was certainly more accident than design.

Only Paddy McNair and Price started all six, while the absence of first-choice goalkeeper Pierce Charles for the entire campaign meant the side were never at full-strength across what was just an 11-week run.

While circumstances ensured O'Neill had plenty of opportunity to assess his squad options over the past three months, there had been no real sense that the manager had any cause to change his mind over his first-choice XI.

Perhaps until Monday night.

A game that featured more yellow cards than shots on target (eight v six) will not live long in many memories but will still hold a special place for Donley.

Luxembourg certainly did not agree with that awarding of the penalty that produced his first international goal but, on balance, if there was to be a match-winner the Tottenham player deserved it.

While playing deeper is his more natural position, he displayed good striking instincts to get to the front post for his earlier disallowed effort and showed a willingness to make runs.

After making his international debut against Switzerland in March after a well-publicised switch from England's under-age sides, Donley had started just once prior to Monday night but certainly showed enough across his 67 minutes to give his manager reason to think he could be an option at number nine in March's play-off.

How you rated the players

Player of the match

J. Donley
7.44
10 J. Donley
7.44
7 E. Galbraith
7.36
2 C. Bradley
6.94
12 C. Hazard
6.74
22 C. Brown
6.50
14 I. Price
6.41
17 P. McNair
6.40
6 T. Devlin
6.39
13 R. McConville
6.36
11 P. Smyth
6.27
20 J. McDonnell
6.24
3 J. Lewis
6.21
16 B. Lyons
6.09
8 C. Marshall
5.99
21 J. Magennis
5.86
19 P. Kelly
5.64
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After the opportunity to rate players has closed, the score displayed represents the average from all the submissions by BBC Sport users.

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