This is a cap awarded to Northern Ireland players for international matches played in the 1958/9 season.
This is in the same year that they first they qualified for the Fifa World Cup, becoming the least populous country in history to make the finals. This record stood until 2006 when Trinidad & Tobago reached the finals.
They were eventually knocked out in the quarter finals by France 4 – 0, and this remains their best World Cup performance to date.
That year they played ten matches as follows:
- Northern Ireland 1 – 1 Scotland
- England 2 – 3 Northern Ireland
- Northern Ireland 2 – 2 Italy
- Northern Ireland 2 – 1 Italy
- Wales 1 – 1 Northern Ireland
- Northern Ireland 1 – 0 Czechoslovakia
- Argentina – 3 – 1 Northern Ireland
- Northern Ireland 2 – 2 West Germany
- Northern Ireland 2 – 1 Czechoslovakia
- France 4 – 0 Northern Ireland
