Craig Bellamy guided Wales to Nations League promotion and then insisted it had been vital to prove that he was not a “lunatic”.
Bellamy extended his unbeaten run to six games – the best start by a Wales manager – as the Dragons recovered from conceding an early goal to beat Iceland 4-1 in Cardiff.
Turkey’s shock 3-1 defeat in Montenegro saw Wales leapfrog them at the top of Group B4 and boost their 2026 World Cup qualification hopes.
“I probably feel it was important to show people I am not a lunatic, I’m quite sane,” said Bellamy, whose temperament during a colourful playing career at the top level often got him into trouble.
Craig Bellamy’s side are unbeaten in six Nations League games (David Davies/PA)
“People thought I was going to be running on the pitch and pushing the ref and stuff, getting sent off.
“I probably felt more pushed into management to show I am not like that. People used to bring temperament up. ‘Oh yeah, but his temperament.’ I was like: ‘Really?’ Now you get to see this side of me.
“But you (media) were concerned, you were thinking: ‘I wonder what he’s going to be like?’ I understand that as well.
“You’ll see me even calmer and kinder, when it goes wrong … now is the worst period you can get me in, because my emotions are everywhere.
That tastes like promotion 🍾#UNL | #TogetherStronger pic.twitter.com/hNzvABMln6
— Wales 🏴 (@Cymru) November 19, 2024
“Trust me, you get nowhere being that way. I’m not naive enough to know those moments aren’t coming.
“I don’t know when but it’s going to happen. I feel like some are waiting for it to happen. I know that and I have to stay calm with that.”
Bellamy was actually booked in the second half for complaining to the fourth official with Wales leading 2-1 through Liam Cullen’s brace – his first international goals.
Andri Gudjohnsen had given Iceland a seventh-minute lead, but Wales coasted home after Brennan Johnson and Harry Wilson – with his fourth goal of the Nations League campaign – produced delicious strikes.
Wales are now effectively guaranteed a World Cup play-off, if needed, as the seventh best Nations League group winners.
Harry Wilson scored Wales’ fourth goal (David Davies/PA)
Bellamy said: “We want to go to a World Cup. We’ve got to get that ticked off. If we get there, we want to compete.
“These players deserve to be there competing because of their buy-in. They are in. When you have a group like that, their togetherness and who they are as people.
“I think I’m quite a humble person, some don’t know me. This group make you humble.
“We had a member of staff whose close relative passed away, players donated in memory of him.”
Bellamy said he was unaware of Wales leading the group until the Cardiff City Stadium crowd began singing ‘we are the top of the league’ and ‘Montenegro’.
“I heard the fans and thought this could actually be a good night,” said Bellamy.
“What I liked was when we went 1-0 down we were able to play and we moved the ball.
“The crowd got a little bit edgy, it’s not normal here to be playing that way. That was the most important thing, we were able to play chests out.
“Maybe we’re not a team that can keep the ball but we were. We believe we’re able to carve our way open in the game. When you look at the mentality of the players, they deserved to finish top.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here