Northern Ireland 'in a good place' ahead of Switzerland friendly - O'Neill

International friendly: Northern Ireland v Switzerland

Venue: Windsor Park, Belfast Date: Friday, 21 Kick-off: 19:45 GMT

Coverage: Watch on BBC Northern Ireland & iPlayer; listen on BBC Radio Ulster & Sounds; live text coverage & in-play clips on the BBC Sport website & app

Michael O'Neill says his youthful Northern Ireland side are "in a good place" before Friday's friendly with Switzerland.

The game against the Swiss, and Tuesday's game in Sweden, will be used as preparations for the start of World Cup qualifying in September.

It has been a positive 12 months for Northern Ireland, who defeated Scotland last March and won promotion to League B in the Nations League.

"I think we're in a good place, in terms of where we are development-wise, but you know, you can't build an international team in 12 months," said boss O'Neill.

"Realistically, it's going to take longer than that, but we're optimistic that this team is certainly going to take us in the right direction."

Despite their good form and the positive mood around Northern Ireland, O'Neill warned there still could be difficult nights ahead as he looks to build towards the start of the World Cup qualifiers.

"I believe this squad has made a lot of progress in the last 12 months," he added.

"There will be bumps in the road, it will not continue like this. There'll be difficult nights, there'll be tough games, we have to see what we're like if we go behind in games, how we react to that.

"So there are all sorts of situations we have to learn from and you can only do that by being on the pitch and taking on the games we've taken on."

With their World Cup qualifiers against Luxembourg, Slovakia and the winner of the Nations League play-off between Germany and Italy six months away, O'Neill has elected to play against two strong sides in Switzerland - beaten by England in the Euro 2024 quarter-finals on penalties - and Sweden.

Both matches will be available to watch on BBC iPlayer and O'Neill said they will be "two challenging games for us".

"Switzerland had a difficult Nations League, but they are playing at Group A level which is a tough ask," he added.

"I saw them live twice at Euro 2024 and I thought they were excellent. They are a well-structured and organised team, they were unlucky to go out in the way that they did.

"They are a little bit in transition as well. What you find with some of these countries is they have a lot of players they are reliant on for a long time and they are top, top players.

"But when you look at their squad they are still playing their football at a very high level."

O'Neill also admitted his side "need a good performance" at Windsor Park for their preparation.

"If you look back at the last 12 months we started that period with good games against Romania and Scotland," he recalled.

"We saw the highest level of the game in Spain and it is important to expose the players to this level because of what we will face come September when we play Italy or Germany in the World Cup in the second game."

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