Although the Scots won the first fixture 4–0, a return match was planned in Wales the following year, and so it was that the first international football match on Welsh soil took place at the Racecourse Ground, Wrexham, on 5 March 1877. Wales played its first competitive match on 25 March 1876 against Scotland in Glasgow, making it the third-oldest international football team in the world. Wales, as a country of the United Kingdom, is not a member of the International Olympic Committee and therefore the national team does not compete in the Olympic Games. However, the majority of Welsh football clubs play in the Welsh football league system. These two Welsh clubs play in the English league system alongside fellow Welsh clubs Newport County, Wrexham and Merthyr Town. Historically, the Welsh team has featured a number of players from Wales' top club teams, Cardiff City and Swansea City. They also progressed through UEFA Euro 1976 qualifying to the quarter-finals, though this was played on a two-legged, home-and-away basis and is not considered part of the finals tournament.
A second successive UEFA European Championship followed when Wales reached the round of 16 of UEFA Euro 2020. They then went 58 years before reaching their second major tournament, when – following a rise of 109 places from an all-time low of 117th to a peak of 8th in the FIFA World Rankings between August 2011 and October 2015 – they qualified for UEFA Euro 2016, where they reached the semi-finals before again losing to the eventual champions, Portugal. In 1958, they reached the quarter-finals before losing to eventual champions Brazil. The team has qualified for the FIFA World Cup twice, in 19. It is controlled by the Football Association of Wales (FAW), the governing body for football in Wales and the third-oldest national football association in the world, founded in 1876. The Wales national football team ( Welsh: Tîm pêl-droed cenedlaethol Cymru) represents Wales in international football.
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