Ethan Ampadu makes call after Leeds United pair's international outing and Man Utd man's praise for players
Captain Ethan Ampadu is one of a dozen Leeds United players away on international duty.
Leeds United captain Ethan Ampadu made a clear declaration of intent following Thursday night’s narrow defeat to Portugal for Wales amid a Manchester United man’s praise for his players.
Wales began their 2026-27 Nations League campaign with Thursday’s clash against Portugal in Lisbon in which Ampadu made his latest start for his country as Whites teammate Dan James was named on the bench.
Defending Nations League champions Portugal went ahead in the 22nd minute through Joao Felix and the hosts looked to have doubled their lead after the interval through Cristiano Ronaldo.
Ronaldo, though, saw his goal disallowed for offside after the intervention of VAR and Wales then ended the contest pushing for an equaliser, by which time James had been brought on from the bench.
Portugal had ultimately done enough to seal a 1-0 victory from the contest for which Wales received plenty of praise including from Manchester United’s Bruno Fernandes who said their high level of performance was no surprise.
“We can do a little bit more”
Ampadu, though, typifying the standards which his side wish to reach, said his men could still do a little bit more as he declared that the team’s work rate was now a given.
"A loss and disappointed with the goal,” said Ampadu to BBC Sport.
"We knew it was going to be a tough game against very good opposition with a lot of quality, which they showed at times.
"We knew that we were going to have to suffer at times but we wanted to come here and make a real statement and impact. We wanted to show what we can do on the ball, which at times we did. But I think there's some things we can improve on already so we can do a little bit more.”
Pressed on how pleased he was by his side sticking in the contest and almost getting a leveller, Ampadu reasoned: “That's one that you are always going to get, we are always going to work hard.
"I think we've shown that over a countless number of years now so that's a given. We don't really need to talk about that.
"But it's tough. There were a couple chances at the end where maybe we could have got a goal, and then that obviously makes it a better feeling but it's never nice to lose.
"They've shown why they compete for the best trophies, because with half a chance, they put it in the back of the net."
“We knew they were good”
Serving up praise for Ampadu’s men, Manchester United star Fernandes was asked if he was impressed with Wales and how they pushed his side.
"We were not ‘impressed’ as we knew they were good,” said Fernandes.
"We knew they have a lot of good players, I play against many of them so they play in the Premier League so they need to have quality, they need to have a certain high level and so we knew they could cause us problems.
“But we created a lot of chances and I think he could have scored more goals and unfortunately this was not the case but we scored one and we didn't concede so that's amazing."