Tedesco blames injuries after Belgium shocked by Israel

Domenico Tedesco said Belgium's long injury list was to blame after they were stunned by Israel in their final Nations League group stage match on Sunday.

Belgium were defeated 1–0 in a match played in neutral Budapest, having also lost to Italy by the same score three days earlier.

Tedesco's team had already failed to finish in the top two of Group A1 and reach next year's quarter-finals, and they now face a second-place finish in Group B in a promotion/relegation play-off off.

Belgium were hit by something of an injury crisis during this international break, which captain Kevin De Bruyne decided to skip as he recovers from a hamstring injury.

Romelu Lukaku was among five players to withdraw from the squad on Saturday, while both Leandro Trossard and Zeno Debast were substituted due to injuries on Sunday.

“Some players played 90 minutes three days ago and tonight they were somewhat forced to play another 90 minutes,” Tedesco said afterwards, as quoted by UEFA.com.

“Overall, lessons learned were also part of the plan; it was about getting to know a lot of players as we will be there in March.

“I believe in the previous qualifying phase we had 21 injured players, and today we lost Leandro Trossard and Zeno Debast due to injuries.

“We had a team that had never played together, never trained together. We started well, but in the end, under very difficult circumstances, this is not the result we hoped for and that is why we are very disappointed.”

Despite attempting 649 passes in Sunday's match, the most in a single match in this edition of the Nations League, Belgium managed just twelve shots to Israel's ten.

Their overall expected goals figure of 0.91 xG, meanwhile, was only marginally higher than the 0.77 created by Israel, who saw Yarden Shua come off the bench to score an 86th-minute winner.

Despite the loss, Tedesco has seen enough to believe his team will remain at the top of the league when the March play-offs arrive.

“We will stay in League A, I am sure, because we know how to play in such games,” he said. “This will be important; that is our goal, just like qualifying for the World Cup.”