Wales came away with nothing to show for their efforts after paying the price for attempting defending their lead against England.

Gareth Bale’s splendid free kick handed his side the lead against the run of play and it appeared Chris Coleman was content to instruct his side to sit back and defend for the remaining 45 plus minutes.

According to SASoccermag’s Opta-powered match centre, Wales had just 30% of the possession and completed just 223 passes. England on the other hand chased the game from well before Bale’s opener and completed over 500 passes.

Of Wales’ passes, 32.7% were hit long as they attempted to hack the ball into England. A telling sign of the Welsh intent was that there accuracy suffered with a little of 61% of their passes finding their man. The Three Lions were far more clinical as over 80% of their passes found their man, setting up wave after wave of pressure which ultimately told when substitute Daniel Sturridge hit home the winner.

Gareth Bale completed just 46 touches on the afternoon as he was forced to do far more defensive work than he will be used to. For reference, Joe Hart, who had little to do all afternoon, had 30 touches of the ball.

The win leaves England on top of their group with Wales now needing a positive result against Russia to ensure progression to the knockout phase. A more attacking game plan may be the order of the day for Coleman and his troops.