Wales vs Belgium: Marc Wilmots' men are a collection of individuals - Wales are a proper team, says Danny Higginbotham

We all know that if Gareth Bale picks up the ball in the room between the defence and midfield, and if he can turn and run with it, then it is a disaster waiting to happen for Belgium

Wales have a workmanlike attitude which is unparalleled in France this summer (Getty)

Wales are certainly underdogs for Friday’s quarter-final against Belgium, but I have seen enough of their opponents to know that they are a very flawed side, with an obvious weakness that Wales can exploit.

Belgium may have better players than Wales, but the Welsh are far better organised, with better structure and shape. Belgium leave too much space for their opponents, crucially a huge open gap between their defence and midfield. This was why they lost their first match 2-0 to Italy.

Although results have improved since then, and they did not concede a goal against Republic of Ireland, Sweden or Hungary, that does not mean that the problem has been solved. If you look deeper, they are still leaving too much space, still conceding chances, and eventually they will be punished for it. With Aaron Ramsey and Gareth Bale in the Welsh team, why should that not be in Lille tomorrow evening?

What we will see in that quarter-final is a match between two teams with very different approaches. Chris Coleman has spent four years trying to turn this Wales team into something like a club side, with a clear sense of identity and their own way of playing. Many of these Wales players have been together for years, which is why against Northern Ireland they had more than 500 caps in the starting eleven, even though most of their players are still in their 20s. They function well together as a unit, and are more than a sum of their parts.

Marc Wilmots’ Belgium are the polar opposite. They have plenty of good players who play for big teams but Wilmots has done very little to turn them into a real team. On the pitch they still look like a collection of individuals, rather than a team. Players do not know what their team-mates are doing, and that leaves too many spaces all over the pitch.

That is what we saw in Lyon in the group stage, when Belgium lost 2-0 to Italy in a game that starkly revealed their flaws. Wilmots set his team up in a 4-3-3 and the front three pushed all the way up to press the Italian back three. The Belgian midfield three followed and that left far too much space between them and the Belgian back four. Axel Witsel and Radja Naingollan,, who should have been the more defensively-minded players, played too high up the pitch, neither of them dropping back to protect their centre-backs.

Italy had far too much space to play in and Graziano Pelle was always an option as an out-ball from the back. When the Belgian defence tried to push up to close the space, Emmanuele Giaccherini ran in behind and put Italy 1-0 up.

I know that Belgium’s results have improved, with those three straight wins and clean sheets that followed. But this problem did not go away. In all three games the midfield pushed too high up, with no holding player staying closer to the centre-backs. In all three games their tactical raggedness meant that they conceded chances. Just look at the accompanying graphic to see how much space there was between the centre-backs and the midfielders against the Republic of Ireland. More ruthless opposition would have punished them. Hungary had plenty of opportunities to equalise in the last-16 game before Belgium blew them away at the end.

That is why I have confidence in Wales’ ability to exploit that space. We all know that if Gareth Bale picks up the ball in the room between the defence and midfield, and if he can turn and run with it, then it is a disaster waiting to happen for the opposition. Ramsey is also dangerous if he has time on the ball to shoot or to play a clever pass. Suddenly it is very easy to see how Wales can hurt Belgium if they get the ball forward quickly to those two.

The Belgian back four will be left with a difficult decision to make, whether they step up and close the space, leaving room in behind, or sit back, allowing Bale to get on the ball. The fact that Thomas Vermaelen is suspended, making this the first team these four defenders have played together, will not help.


 The Belgian players' average positions against Sweden were telling 
 (Opta)

Of course Wales will not have much of the ball tomorrow and their first priority must be to defend. Joe Allen and Joe Ledley, playing in front of the back three, will have to track the midfield runners to make sure that none of the three centre-backs get dragged out of position, which would create space for Romelu Lukaku to exploit.

The Welsh wing-backs Neil Taylor and Chris Gunter are likely to be pinned back, as they were against England. This time it should be less of a problem, though, because Wales will have an outlet. That space between the Belgian lines means that a long ball to Sam Vokes will always be an option, and he can hold the ball up and help his team to get out. Against England that was not an option because of the presence of Eric Dier in front of the English defence.

But Belgium do not have a player like Dier and that is part of their problem. They have too many individuals playing their own games with little regard for the shape of the team. They leave ludicrous space between defence and midfield. They have been warned but show little sign of changing. They are not going to turn into a compact team overnight. If Bale gets the ball in that gap tomorrow then it could be Wales in the semi-finals.