IF he didn't laugh he might have cried…
Conor Washington came so close to scoring a fabulous late winner against Italy on Monday night, but his shot off his weaker left foot was kicked off the line.
When told that his manager Ian Baraclough liked how he didn't snatch at it with his right foot, he replied: "I bet he wishes I had snatched at it now!"
Having done so well, to beat Italy keeper Gianluigi Donnarumma to a long ball and then skip past a lunging defender, the 29-year-old fluffed and scuffed a finish which would have made his name:
"It was one of those where, you get in that position and you think you've done everything right but, left foot, it was just a rubbish connection, I just didn't get enough on it.
"It has nearly snuck in, anything in the corner or a little bit higher obviously goes in. I'm disappointed with the way it's finished but it was nice to get in there and keep my composure - up until that point."
Earlier he'd fired in a right-foot shot from a tight angle which was deflected away for a corner and he admitted he'd thought about taking an early attempt on his right:
"As you go past him [Donnarumma] you think 'Should I pull the trigger?' - but if the way I did take the chance goes in then obviously nobody questions that. That's just the life of being a striker.
"My job is to get in those positions and score goals, Obviously I haven't done that but I've come on and managed to get into a couple of those positions myself so I will try and take the positives.
Despite not sealing a win, Washington reckons the performance and result against this summer's European champions is "right up there. The atmosphere was absolutely brilliant, probably as good as I've seen here. They were right behind us which makes it so much easier when the lungs are going, the legs are going. You hear that and you get an extra boost. It's disappointing not to have won the game and, from a personal point of view, not to have got the winner, but it was a good night."
After making his international debut shortly before Euro 2016, he believes NI can reach another major tournament: "We've been in and around [qualification] as long as I've been in the squad; in both of the previous campaigns we've been disappointed not to get there, which I think is a sign of how far we've come.
"Then you look at the groups we've had - crazy, really, and this one was no different. Switzerland did well at the Euros [beat France and then were put out in the quarter-finals on pens by Spain] and Italy are obviously the European champions, so we've not been dealt particularly nice hands. We were still in and around it in this group and a definitely feel we'll be around qualification going forward."
