'I was floating' - Craigan recalls night NI shocked Spain

Stephen Craigan ended up with Raul's jersey from what was the striker's last game for Spain

"David Healy turned to me and said, 'I just have this feeling, it's really weird'. Little did we know what was going to unfold."

Scheduled as a final tune-up for the home side before their Euro 2028 opener against Croatia next weekend, Northern Ireland are viewed as long shots to provide Spain with anything other than a morale-boosting victory in Palma on Saturday night.

Their odds of an upset in the Son Moix Stadium, however, are surely shorter than the night Xavi, Raul and Co. pitched up in Belfast for a Euro 2008 qualifier 18 years ago only to be undone by David Healy's hat-trick in a 3-2 defeat.

Prior to the stunning result at Windsor Park, and off the back of a damaging 3-0 home defeat against Iceland just four days prior, optimism among Northern Ireland fans could hardly have been in shorter supply.

"We were nervous going in," remembers former Northern Ireland defender Stephen Craigan.

"We thought if they got themselves in front, off the back of a big defeat for us, it would be a long night.

"Nobody expected anything of us. People just wanted us to be competitive. We just wanted to be competitive ourselves.

"You think of their front three, David Villa, Fernando Torres and Raul, if you'd have said to any of our back four that we'd be going up against those players and we were going to beat them, logically, you'd have thought 'no, that doesn't work'.

"That's what football gives you, that one-off opportunity as an underdog to over-perform. Then it's incredible what can happen."

The weekend their qualifying campaign began with that Iceland defeat, reports had emerged that Northern Ireland's players would be due a share of a seven-figure bonus pay-out should they make it to Euro 2008. Naturally in the aftermath of the chastening loss, after which they had been booed off the field, those headlines became the source of some ridicule.

"The supporters were critical. They weren't happy, quite rightly," says former Motherwell skipper Craigan.

"As a team, we weren't happy. There was a lot of soul searching done between that Saturday and the Wednesday.

"I remember going out to warm up and we were a bit fearful over how the crowd would react. There was quite a lot fans in early, it was quite lively, they were applauding us out, and it gave us that lift, the knowledge that they had our backs.

"We'd still have to go out and compete but having them with us, it gave us that comfort."

Craigan recalls that one player, at least, fancied their chances.

"I warmed up with him, and running across the pitch, David Healy turned to me and said, 'I just have this feeling, it's really weird'.

"Little did we know what was going to unfold.

"When he said to me he had a feeling, I just said to him, 'well, I hope it's a good one.'"

Northern Ireland were booed off the field just four days before beating Spain

Healy's trio of goals that night, in a game where Northern Ireland fell behind twice, was to be his first of two hat-tricks in that campaign, his 13 goals in a single qualifying group standing as a record until surpassed by Belgium's Romelu Lukaku last year.

"That whole campaign, David was untouchable," adds Craigan.

"Every chance he had, it ended up in the back of the net.

"So often we'd be in games when there wouldn't be a lot between the teams but David would pop up with a little bit of magic.

"That night we went behind, and we got level, we went behind again, we got level. You're thinking to yourself about what a great result a draw would be and then David does what David does.

"I can't imagine what he felt like. I was floating for days after that win, after what we'd done, but David must have been on another level."

After the game, Craigan was told by family members of the reaction in the Windsor Park stands.

"That story had come out, that the players had been told £1m between the squad or something like that if we qualified. It was the first I'd ever heard of it, anyway.

"But when David scored the third goal, the old South Stand where all the families would have been sat, everyone was going mad and then there was a shout from someone of 'they must be going for that million'.

"Apparently everyone that had been celebrating just burst out laughing."

'I've got his jersey, I wonder does he still have mine?'

Craigan would come home with a memorable keepsake from the evening, the jersey of Spanish legend Raul in what was to prove his last game for La Roja.

"It wasn't until years later that I thought he hadn't played since.

"Then you're thinking, 'I've got his jersey, I wonder does he still have mine?'

"I don't imagine he does, it's probably in a bin somewhere, but I've his up on the wall. Every time I see it, you get a flashback. I remember it all vividly."

After their shock defeat in Belfast, Spain would lose two of their next three before a 35-game unbeaten run and victories at Euro 2008, the World Cup of 2012 and Euro 2012.

Northern Ireland, meanwhile, would have to wait another ten years to play at a major finals after finishing third in the qualifying group behind both Spain and a Swedish side they beat at home and drew against in Stockholm.

"The fact that we were unbeaten against Denmark home and away, unbeaten against Sweden home and away, beat Spain, it seems inconceivable that we didn't qualify," says Craigan, who won the last of his 54 international caps in 2011.

"Losing to Iceland home and away, losing to Latvia away, that hammered it for us.

"But looking back on some of the results that we had, to beat that sensational Spanish team, it was an incredible journey."