Ignore the big 6ft 5ins Burnley hitman and concentrate all your efforts on goalscoring sensation David Healy.

That seemed to be the message from rival coaches to their defenders when they encountered Northern Ireland in this qualifying campaign.

That approach certainly came back to haunt Sweden as Lafferty made the high flying Swedes pay with an outstanding individual equalising goal.

On Wednesday evening against Spain, Lafferty, if selected after missing last night's crucial qualifying showdown against Denmark at Windsor Park through suspension, will aim to repeat his sensational Stockholm magic.

Healy, as the current top striker in Euro 2008 qualifiers, is now considered a marked man after his wonderful goalscoring exploits during this campaign, including a memorable hat-trick against Spain!

Expect the mighty Spanish defenders to tighten up on the Fulham striker after he suitably embarrassed them at Windsor Park 14 months ago.

That should allow Lafferty a little extra space and he's determined to take full advantage of their generosity.

Lafferty hasn't been at all impressed with either the Spanish or Swedish defences and admits to facing more taxing examinations from the smaller footballing nations in Group F.

"I thought the match at Windsor against Spain would have been harder than it was," says Lafferty, who made his first full start for Northern Ireland against Spain.

"I've actually found it tougher against the so called weaker teams in the group.

"Maybe the big teams don't know who I am. And the fact David is the dangerman of our team, they now always seem to put two players on him. That allows me that little bit of extra space to hopefully hurt them.

"Against Sweden I was playing off David so it left me open to explore the space and I felt I should have done a lot better with a few chances that came my way.

"But we know we can win in Spain - we proved that last year."

Lafferty, at the tender age of 20, is one of many young stars in the Northern Ireland squad.

A healthy blend of youth and experience has been mixed together to form a formidable Northern Ireland outfit.

A group of players who only up until a couple on months ago were in contention to top Group F at the end of this qualifying campaign.

Lafferty, like the rest of us, has been amazed by Northern Ireland's progress during the last two years and promises our fortunes will only continue to improve.

And he insists that anything other than a top three finish in Group F would be viewed as a major disappointment.

"I think if you asked us before the group started then we would have said we were happy with fourth position, but after being top of the group during the campaign I don't think that's good enough anymore for us," asserts Lafferty.

"I think we honestly can get to a tournament finals - if not this one then I believe we have the quality in the squad to reach the World Cup finals in South Africa.

"Everyone knows what we can do now - these qualifiers have shown that we can reach a major finals and it has given us a buzz. Now we need to go and achieve our goal."