Wales boss Gary Speed hailed the brilliance of Tottenham winger Gareth Bale after their 1-0 win over Bulgaria.

The 22-year-old grabbed the only goal of the game late in the first half as he cut in from the right to fire a deflected shot past Nikolay Mihaylov in the Bulgaria goal and end the Euro 2012 qualifying campaign on a high.

Speed readily acknowledged his contribution, particularly on a very heavy pitch.

He said on Tuesday night: "Gareth was phenomenal again.

"The pitch out there tonight did not suit his game, I have played on pitches like that and it's heavy and dead, the grass was long and we said to the players at training last night that if you run with the ball on that you are going to get caught, so to put in a performance like that is phenomenal.

"He is a match winner, but that said you have to give your match winners a platform to win games for you, and everyone else gave him a platform and he puts the hard work in too. That's how we will achieve things and he works harder than anyone and that's the situation we need if we are to keep improving."